74 A GARDEN DIARY 
of someone, by the way, who actually had tele- 
graphed out her recommendations to Sir Redvers 
Buller. As the story reached me the telegram 
took this form : “Please try to relieve Ladysmith.” 
I hope for the credit of human nature that the 
tale is true, but if so there is a simple innocence 
about this form of admonition of which I fear 
that I should have been personally quite incapable. 
My own ideas, my own forms of suggestion, are 
entirely different. They are large, nay grandiose, 
and moreover they are extremely intricate. As 
I walk about over these lanes and downs I see 
strategical possibilities in all directions, which 
cause me to thrill over the magnitude of my own 
conceptions. 
Towards evening, especially, the sense of what 
might be,—of what, for aught anyone can say to 
the contrary, still may be,—rises almost palpably; 
a beckoning ghostly phantom of the Great Coming 
Invasion. Dorking —that scene of crushing 
British disaster—-is not far off; were I to 
clamber up the opposite ridge I should be look- 
ing down on it. Moreover, between one land- 
scape and another the difference becomes much 
less when all detail is reduced to one vast blur. 
I have a friendly knoll upon which I some- 
times take my stand towards sunset hour, and 
from which I have of late conjured up Biggars- 
bergs, inaccessible and kopje-covered as heart 
could desire. It is true that the enemy holding 
