All defence was from under cover.

Add to this, that the young and energetic Louis Botha was in command of the Boers.

It was a desperate task, and yet honour forbade that the garrison should be left to its fate.

The venture must be made.
The most obvious criticism upon the operation is that if the attack must be made it should not be made under the enemy's conditions.

We seem almost to have gone out of our way to make every obstacle--the glacislike approach, the river, the trenches--as difficult as possible.
Future operations were to prove that it was not so difficult to deceive Boer vigilance and by rapid movements to cross the Tugela.