THE WAR.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXXXII, Issue 98, 15 May 1900, Page 4

THE WAR.

THE HEKO OK MAKEKING. . AN JNTEKIOSYING SKETCH OF COLONEL ]J,VI iKX-POWELL. The Mafeking. eoricSjioHdent of the Lmnb>i\ Times draws a curious anil interesting sketch of Colonel BadenPowell, the defender of Mafeking. He says: - Colonel Uadon-Powell is young, as "men go ixi the army, with a keen appreciation of the possibilities of his onieur. Ills countenance is keen, his stature short, his features sharp and smooth. Ho is eminently a man of determination, with great physical endurance and capacity, and extraordinary reticence. His reserve is unbending, and one would say, quoting a phrase of Mr. Pinero's, that fever would be the only heat which would permeate his body. He does not go freely, silica,, he is tied to his office through the multitudinous cares of his command, and ho is chiefly happy when he can snatch the time to escape upon one of those nocturnal s'lent expeditions, which alone calm and assuage the perpetual excitement of his present existence. Outwardly, he maintains an impenetrable screen of self-control, observing with a cynical smile the foibles and caprices of those around him. He seems ever bracing himself to lie on guard against a moment in which he should be swept by fome unnatural and spontaneous enthusiasm, in which, by a word, by an expression of face, l)fr a movement, or in the turn of a phrase, he should betray the ligouis of the self-control under which he lives. I'jveiy passing townsman regards him with curiosty not unmixed with awe. Every servant in the hotel watches him, and he, as a consequence, seldom speaks without a preternatural deliberation and an air of incisive iin.dity. lie seems to close every agniiient with a snap, as though the steel mauae'es of his ambition had check-mated the emotions of the man in the instincts of the ollicer. He weighs each remark before he utters it, and suggesis ly his manlier, as by his w.jidv that, ho ' has considered the diiiereut el • eels it might conceivably have on any mind as the expression of his own mind. As an ollicer, ho has given to Mafeking a complete and magnificent security, to the construction of which he lr.ii brought a very practical knowledge of the conditions fji JJoer warfare, of the iloers themselves, and of the .strategic value of the adjacoHt areas! His espionage excursions to the Ijoor lines have gained him an intimate and accurate idea of the value of the opposing forces and a mass of data by which he can immediately counteract the enemy's attack. He loves the night, and after his return from the hollows in the veldt, where he lias kept so many anxious vigils, he lies awake hour after hour upon his camp mattress in the verandah, tracing out, in his mind, the various means and agencies by which he can forestall their move, wLich, unknown to them, he had personally watched. Hs is a silent man. In the noisy day he yearns for the-noiseless night, in which he .can slip into the vistas of the veldt, an unobtrusive spectator of tho mystic communion of tree with tree, of twilight with darkness, of land with water, of early morn with fading night, with the music of the journeying winds to speak to him and to lull his thoughts. As he makes his way across our lines the watchful sentry strains his eyes a little more to keep the figure of the colonel before him, until the undulations of the veldt conceal his pro- - gress. He goes in the privacy of the liighfc, when it is no longer a season of moonlight, when, although the stars are full, the night is dim. The breezes of the veldt aie warm and gentle, impregnated with the fresh fragrances of tie Molopo, although, as he walks with rapid, almost running, footsteps, leaving the black blurr of tin: town for the arid and stony areas to the west, a new wind meets hims, a wind that is clear.ind keen and dry. the wind of tile wa-tes that wanders for ever over the monotonous sands of the desert. He goes on, never faltering, bending for a moment behind a clump of rocks, s.-iveniiig himself next behind some bushes, crawling upon his hands and kie_vs. His head is low, his eyes ga/.o straight, upon the camp of the enemy ; iu a, iilt'e, lie moves again, iiis iu-fp.-clioii'i.. over, and he either changes • to a fivoli point or slai lies some dozing agentry as he slips back into town.