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VOLUME LXXXVI-NO. 143. BRITISH TROOPS DRIVE THE BOERS FROM TALANA HILL Dundee, Natal, the Scene of the First Big Battle in the Present War, and the Losses on Both Sides Are Very Heavy— General Symons Badly Wounded. GLENCOE CAMP, Oct. 20, 2:50 p. m.— After eight hours of con tinuous heavy fighting, Talana Hill was carried by the Dublin Fusileers and the King's Rifles under cover of a well-directed artillery fire by the Thirteenth and Sixty-ninth batteries. The Boers who threatened the British rear have retired. The fight was almost an exact counterpart of that of Majuba Hill, except that the positions of the Boer and British forces were reversed. General William Symons was severely but not danger ously wounded. General Yule assumed command. General Symons was shot through the thigh, but no bones were broken. He is cheerful. GLEN CAMP, Oct. 20 (After- i noon). — Tho battle to-day has | be^-n a brilliant success. The j Boers got a reverse which may j possibly, for a time at any rate. j check all aggressive action. The British artillery practice In the early part of the day decided the battle. The seizure j of Dundee Hill by the Boers was a sur prise, for although the pickets had been exchanging phots all night, it was not un til 8. shell boomed over the town Into the j camp that their presence was discovered. Then the shells came fast. The hill was j positively alive with the swarming Boers; ; still the British artillery got to work with j magnificent energy and precision. The batteries from the camp took up \ positions to the south of the town and ! after a quarter of an hour's magnificent] LIPTON'S ATTEMPT TO LIFT THE CUP HAS FAILED The San Francisco Call. firing silenced the guns on the hill. The correspondent could pee shells drop ping among the Boer pints with remark able accuracy and doing tremendous ex ecutlon, for the enemy were present In very large numbers and In places con- j : bly exposed. By this time the enemy held the whole of the hill behind Smith's farm and the Dundee k<>pj<?. right away to the south, ' in which the British infantry and cavalry moved at once. The fighting raged particularly hot at the valley outside the town. Directly the; <i firing General Symons ' ordered the infantry to move on t!.' Bitlon. The infantry charge was magnu cent. The way the King s Royal Rifl» s and the Dublin Fusileers stormed the po sition was one of the most splendid sights j SAN FRANCISCO, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1899. ever seen. The firing of the Boers was not so deadly as might have been ex pected from troops occupying Fuch an ex it position, but the Infantry lost heavily going up the hill, and only the consummately brilliant way in which Symons bad trained them to lighting of the kind saved them from be ing swept away. Indeed, the hill was al most inaccessible to the storming party and nny hesitation would have lost the day. The onemy's guns, so far as the correspondent could see, were all aban . f>r the Boers had no time to re move them A stream of fugitives poured down the hillside into the valley, where the battle wont on with no abatement. General Sj'mons was wounded early in Continued on Second Page. Talana Hill— The Kings Royal Rifles and the Dublin Fusileers Attacking the Position of the Boer Artillery. In "Shamrock Weather" the Amer ica's Trophy Defender Again Sails Away From the Irish Challenger. NEW YORK, Oct. 20.— Put away the ( cup and turn the key: cast it away even, for there will be time enough to mold another before the lock need be turned again. Twine garlands around the trophy, but scatter about it ashes, for once more it is an urn for ashes for hope, not the chalice of victory which Sir Thomas Llpton had hoped to lift. Beaten at every point of sailing and in every* sort of weather, there can be no further doubt that the Shamrock is not in the Columbia's class. One lone doubt that remains is whether there is any such thing as "Shamrock weather." That which was apportioned to her to-day was popularly regarded as the kind in which the broad-beamed Irish cutter would show to greater advantage than ■ her narrqw waisted competitor. But from the start to finish, throughout the wild dance to the outer mark, and throughout the dip ping and rearing spray-beaten thresh to windward there never was a time that su periority of the Herreshoff racer was not apparent. "We might as well wait until Herres hoff retires from yacht-building," said a discouraged British yachtsman as he closed up his binoculars and placed them In their case. "There seems to be no use in our building challengers so long as he continues to build defenders." Clean-cut as was this victory of to-day j It was even more glorious as a spectacle. Imagine two superb racing yachts sway ing and staggering before a wind which had the weight of half a gale in It, their swollen sails threatening each moment to bid farewell to creaking boom and buck ling spar. Picture, If you can, the stream of foam which came . boiling about the flying yachts as, driving before the wind and sea, they. rose buoyantly to the swells to sink stern first Into the sloping val leys that came racing after them. Then home again with flat; sails, as taut as drumheads and lee scuppers knee deep In foam, one i straining spar and shroud and sail and stay in a terrific effort to keep the vantage gained, the other as desperately striving to overcome the lead. It was well worth the ten misspent days the excursionists had squandered on these .other lifeless efforts "at racing, and which proved to be little more than days of fog and calm and drift. Straight out of the north a lively wind was blowing when the two yachts arrived off the lightship. The wind had a twenty mlle-an-hour gait and the Shamrock, as she dipped her green hull Into the sea, had a now-or-never look about' her. It was wind that Sir Thomas had been looking for, and in it all realized lay the Sham rock's last, long, lingering hope of taking away the cup. In all other sorts of weather she had been weighed and found wanting. It remained to see what she could do In wind of the kind that was blowing to-day. •"■ The start was at the lightship and the course was a fifteen-mile run to leeward and a beat back to the finish line. Both boats were standing to the northward under mainsail and Jib when the prepara tory gun was fired. The wind was then too bri3k for tho yachts to show club top sails, but their working topsails were up in stops and ready for setting. The Sham rock's was ; sheeted . home three minutes after the preparatory gun was heard, the Columbia setting her staysails four min utes later. , At five minutes, to 11 came the •warning gun, and ■ the racers . headed for the line, both Jockeying for position j and neither gaining any decided advantage. The star t^ ,_■ — - . 1 ing gun was fired, and the Shamrock Stood across the line showing mainsail, working topsail, jib and staysail. The challenger crossed at 11:00:34. followed one minute and one second later by the defender. The Shamrock lowered her spin naker to starboard as she crossed the line, but Captain Hogarth did not get it set until full half a minute after the Colum bia's went swelling to the wind. On the other hand the Columbia had not set her working topsail, while that of the Sham rock was gradually drawing that vessel away from the Columbia. Meanwhile the Shamrock's spinnaker was giving trouble, the sail hanging in ' stops a dozen feet or more from the top- j mast head. This ndvnntage was evened | by the queer capers which the Columbia's j spinnaker cut. The pole sremed "to be too ; light for the great weight of the wind i which the sajl was carrying, and it fre quently tipped at an angle so sharp that ■ it seemed as though the spar would be up ended. Once it went so high Into the air that it looked as though the pole had i been broken or that the crew were making efforts to take In sail. Despite all the handicaps of tipping booms and the ab sence of gaff topsail, the American boat , continued to overhaul the Shamrock, j Then the Columbia broke out her topsail, and soon afterward the Shamrock's men >: were afforded the same old familiar view of the Columbia's stern which they had so often looked upon before. The wind held strong and true, and the | run down the wind was as pretty a j yachting scene as was ever witnessed, j The excursion fleet toiling along on either i beam had all it could do to keep pace i with the winged racers. The gallant j American was still in the van as the two I COMPARED WITH PAST YEARS, COLUMBIA MADE GOOD TIME THE following table Mrlves the wlitntnsr yachts In the internation al contest" for the America* cup. and the time occupied by each In ernluit over the coarse. It will be observed that the time • mnde by the Columbia In the l:i»t two races of the Merles) of 1800 compares very favorably with that of pa.it years*, having been excelled on but three occasional * lSsl_Amer.ca.. ..;..................... H.M.S. I + is.-.! America 8:34:OO *. + IS7O— Muprle 3:58:21 *- -X ISTl— Columbia 0:10:41 * * Columbia . . 3:07:41 ♦ * Livonia .......7...;................ 4:02:25 * * Sappho ................ 5:30:02 * Sappho 4:10:17 . 187O— Madeline :.. 5:23:54 j, J Madeline 7:1S:4« ■+ 1881 — Mischief... 4:17:00 if Mischief 4:54:53 jj. £ ISBs— Puritan ..........:. 6:00:05 34. Puritan ......'.........1.' 5t03:14 *■ + 1880 — Mayflower 5:26:41 * ■¥ Mayflower 0:40:10 *• * Volunteer '.. ...........•..../ - 4:53:18 ? * Volunteer . ... 5:42:56 £ Vigilant '. .......... ... 4:05:47 + -ft VlKllunt 3:25:01 ♦ I-K Vlgfllant 3:24:29 * * 1805— Defender 4:50:55 * *' Valkyrie 111......... 3:55:00 ■* J Defender ... 4:43:43 + + 1890^-Columbia 4i53:53 * * Columbia 3:37:00 * f Columbia 3i3»i00 * * * *••••*••*••••••***•* ****** •••••••••*^*jg PRICE FIVE CENTS. neared the turning point. The jib which the Shamrock had been carrying had been replaced by the largest in her sail locker, and for a time it seemed as though the Irish cutter wnuld hold her own. but not for long. In spite of the change of can vas, in spite of everything that Captain Hogarth could do, the Columbia steadily drew away from the Irish cutter. Near ing the outer mark both made prepara tions for turning it. the Columbia taking In her spinnaker as she brought the buoy broad off hnr starboard bow. the Sham rock doffing hers half a minute later. Luffing around the point, the Columbia stond away on the starboard tack, fol lowed seventeen seconds later by the closely pursuing Shamrock. The r^ad home \\,is the road of the rough, and Irrimediati ly after heading into the wind both yachts began a lively dance over the tumbling sens. The defender was under mainsail, jib and staysail. The Shamrock, under the same sail, carried a working topsail in addition. She took that in at 12:34. the strain being too great for her rigging. Over the decks of both r utters the spray flew in sheets, and the lower edges of their mainsails were kept (inrk with flying- clouds of spray. No need to tell here of how or when the two boats tacked or how often they -went about in thru long thresh back to the fin ish line. Sufficient to say Thar whenever one altered her course the other followed. Tacks v,ere frequent and at irregular in tervals, but each time the Shamrock spilled the wind out of her sails, spun around upon her heels and filled on the other tack her crew saw the Columbia still farther in the lead. The Columbia gradually widened the gap. steadily outfooting and outpointing the Shamrock, and despite that vessel's brave showing it became apparent that she was not to win. This became so evi dent as the two neared the finish line that the conclusion of the contest was robbed of all the sensational features which mark a closely contested event.