black-tunicked

I can see it still, the great jagged rock of the "Little House" rearing up above the stony, sun-baked African. plain, the scattered lines of our red-coated infantry, joking and cat-calling among themselves as they waited for the ammunition that never came; the red-capped Natal Kaffirs scurrying back to take their positions on the rocky slope; a black-tunicked rider of Frontier Horse leaping the gun limbers bellowing a fatuous order to laager the wagons, which went unheeded and was too late by hours; Pulleine fumbling with his field-glasses and shouting hoarsely: "Is that a rider from Lord Chelmsford?"

Watershed 2010

I can see it still, the great jagged rock of the "Little House" rearing up above the stony, sun-baked African. plain, the scattered lines of our red-coated infantry, joking and cat-calling among themselves as they waited for the ammunition that never came; the red-capped Natal Kaffirs scurrying back to take their positions on the rocky slope; a black-tunicked rider of Frontier Horse leaping the gun limbers bellowing a fatuous order to laager the wagons, which went unheeded and was too late by hours; Pulleine fumbling with his field-glasses and shouting hoarsely: "Is that a rider from Lord Chelmsford?"

Flashman And The Tiger Fraser, George MacDonald, 1925- 1999