fusillade; and during this brief interval two men and two horses were
wounded in the platoon of artillery which stood idly just behind the
foot-soldiers,--too close, in fact, to be of any service, and in the way
of everybody. Then the two Gatling guns under Lieutenant Maginnis went off
into the field at our right, where they began to speak for themselves; and
Gatling guns in action have a mighty cheerful effect upon your nerves,
if they happen to be on your side of the fracas. Next, an order from the
general sent the artillery galloping to the rear for about an eighth of a
mile, where, after a short detour to the left and a mad race across swampy,
ditch-dug fields, it took up a temporary position on a convenient knoll.
The main body of our command had meanwhile arrived, and got into the row
without ceremony, the firing now being heavy on both sides. My memory
serves me with no clear impression of the sequence of events after this
period.

[Illustration: Mouth of the Mayaguez River.]

During the first hour of our fighting all the powder used by us was as
smokeless as that of the foe, and again and again the remark was passed
that this did not seem like the real business of war. In other respects
as well there were few of the accompaniments that we conjure up in our
stay-at-home imagination of battle scenes. There was a little galloping of
hooves, not long sustained; an occasional sharp cry of command or sharper
oath; an intermittent rumble and jar from the infrequently moved artillery,
not yet in action; and perhaps a groan or two from the wounded. But, even
when the field-rifles began to boom and shroud the landscape in drifting
smoke, the make-believe aspect of the affair did not in any degree
diminish. There were no clouds of dust, no heaps of slain, no cheers, no
desperate charges, and not even a glimpse of the stars and stripes. Away
to our right we could see crowds of spectators on the elevated platform