They had rejoiced quite openly after Christmas, and called attention every week in prose and poetry to the moribund condition of the British Empire, even boasting as if they themselves had borne a part in its humiliation.

They were still in a position to assert that the Boers were victorious, and that the volunteers were likely to do no more than exhaust the prison accommodation at Pretoria.

They could and did compose biting jests, but their very bitterness witnessed to a deep disappointment.

It was not possible to deny that the despised English garrison in Ireland was displaying a wholly unlooked-for spirit.

No one could have expected that West Britons and 'Seonini' would have wanted to fight.