552 
HORSE BUYING AND BREEDING IN SOUTH AFRICA. 
luggage, covered 500 miles in a week, and the animals were perfectly 
fresh at the end of it. 
In South Africa every infantry battalion has quite a large number 
of animals in its charge . 
110 cobs for its Mounted Infantry. 
164 mules for its line of wagons, the idea being for each line to be 
self-supporting as far as transport is concerned. 
A subaltern officer is told off to look after these transport mules, 
the Mounted Infantry Company having of course its own officers. 
The above seems a very large number of animals to entrust to the 
care of a dismounted unit, which up to its arrival in the colony has 
probably only had 4 animals to look after, and of course has no trained 
farrier of its own to assist the officers. 
An infantry battalion in South Africa has an establishment of : — 
buck wagons 
drawn by 
10 mules 
IOO 
Scotch carts 
>) 
6 „ 
36 
water cart 
)) 
6 „ 
4 
Ambulance 
)> 
6 „ 
6 
Spare 
18 
Total 
164 
For each cart 2 civilian drivers are allowed. These are generally 
Cape boys, and wear a colonial hat with the regimental badge attached 
to it, and are under a white conductor. 
The transport officer has. to assist him, one sergeant and a private 
for each buck wagon. 
A cavalry farrier sergeant is attached to the regiment and has to 
assist him, one shoeing smith (infantry) and, perhaps, two infantry 
soldiers who have been through a course of cold shoeing. 
Certainly mules, and I think mounted infantry cobs also, should in 
this country be branded with, the broad arrow on the neck or quarter, 
so that they can be easily recognized if they get lost on the veldt or 
elsewhere. Marks on the feet are very difficult to see, especially when 
it is wet, and a mule won’t as a rule let you pick up his feet to search 
for marks. When standing in camp, if a mule goes astray, the boy, 
to save bother takes the nearest one he can get from a neighbouring 
mine, which is the cause of constant confusion, which would be ob¬ 
viated by branding a regimental or local number on the skin as well. 
This was done, with excellent result, after our arrival. 
My next order was to proceed to Basutoland. Much to my regret 
I was, at the last moment stopped from going into this interesting 
country, (it was thought that the stock of decent sized ponies was ex¬ 
hausted), and I only got as far as Zastron, a town in the Orange Free 
State, about a day’s march from Masern the Basuto capital and resi¬ 
dence of the Commissioner. Zastron lies well in the conquered ter¬ 
ritory, a strip of country sliced off from Basutoland, and given by us 
to the Free State in 1869, when we took the Basutos under our pro¬ 
tection. About three miles away from here is a hill, where in 1865, a 
