But as we went the line of yellow behind our two nearest mountains, Lombard's Kop and Bulwan (Mbulwani, Isamabulwan--you may spell it almost as you like), was suddenly shot with red, and the grey night clouds showed crimson on all their hanging edges.

The crimson caught the vultures soaring wide through the air, and then the sun himself came up with that blaze of heat which was to torture us all day long.
The central rendezvous beside the Newcastle road was well protected by a high rocky hill, which one can only call a kopje now.

There were the 5th Dragoon Guards, the Manchesters, the Devons, the Gordons, with their ambulance and baggage, some of the Natal Volunteers, and when the train from Maritzburg arrived about six the Rifle Brigade marched straight out of it to join us.

I climbed the kopje in front of them, and from there could get a fine view of the whole position except the extreme flanks.
At 5.10 the first gun sounded from a battery on the right of our centre--a battery that was to do magnificent work through the day.

The enemy's reply was an enormous puff of smoke from a flat-topped hill straight in front of me.