midnight
`` That 's it , sir ; but I must go . The lads are half-mad with joy , and if I 'm not handy we shall have them setting up a shout . '' But of course there was no shout , the men who , to their great disgust , were to stay and hold the camp bidding good-luck to their more fortunate comrades without a sound ; while more than once , with the remembrance of the dastardly murder that had just taken place , men whispered to their comrades something about not to forget what the cowardly Boers had done . Exact to the time , just an hour before midnight , and in profound darkness -- for the moon had set but a short time before -- the men , with shouldered rifles , set off with springy step , Dickenson and Lennox , to whom the country was well known from shooting and fishing excursions they had made , leading the party , not a word being uttered in the ranks , and the tramp , tramp of feet sounding light and elastic as the lads followed through the open , undulating plain , well clear of the bush , there being hardly a stone to pass till they were within a mile of the little kopje where the Boers ' laager lay . There the broken country would begin , the land rising and being much encumbered with stones . But the place had been well surveyed by the major through his field-glass at daybreak two days before , and he had compared notes with Lennox , telling him what he had seen , and the young officer had drawn his attention to the presence of a patch of woodland that might be useful for a rallying-point should there be need . Captain Roby , too , had been well posted up ; and after all that was necessary had been said , Lennox had joined his friend .