about ten o'clock
Just as they had done so they heard four Boers who had been sitting talking together get up . He and his party dropped among the bushes and lay there quiet while the Boers came up to the lamp . '' ` We are to keep it going to-night , ' one of them said , ` for they may take it into their heads to make an attack , thinking that after having had a truce all day we shall not be expecting trouble , and they may catch us unprepared . I expect our German officer in a few minutes ; he said he would be here about ten o'clock , for the rooineks are not likely to move until they think we are asleep . ' `` They moved away again , and Philips and his men stole quietly off , but before they rejoined our fellows they heard a sudden shot , and in a minute a tremendous rifle fire broke out . Evidently the German had arrived and found the search-light would not act , and they concluded at once that we were marching against them , and for twenty minutes every man in the trenches blazed away at random as fast as he could load . I should say that they must have wasted a hundred thousand cartridges .