don't wish to go forward, let my men pass." The junior officers of
the Ninth, with their negroes, instantly sprang into line with the
Rough Riders, and charged at the blue block-house on the right.

I speak of Roosevelt first because, with General Hawkins, who led
Kent's division, notably the Sixth and Sixteenth Regulars, he was,
without doubt, the most conspicuous figure in the charge. General
Hawkins, with hair as white as snow, and yet far in advance of men
thirty years his junior, was so noble a sight that you felt inclined
to pray for his safety; on the other hand, Roosevelt, mounted high on
horseback, and charging the rifle-pits at a gallop and quite alone,
made you feel that you would like to cheer. He wore on his sombrero
a blue polka-dot handkerchief, a la Havelock, which, as he advanced,
floated out straight behind his head, like a guidon. Afterward, the
men of his regiment who followed this flag, adopted a polka-dot
handkerchief as the badge of the Rough Riders. These two officers
were notably conspicuous in the charge, but no one can claim that any
two men, or any one man, was more brave or more daring, or showed
greater courage in that slow, stubborn advance, than did any of the
others. Some one asked one of the officers if he had any difficulty
in making his men follow him. "No," he answered, "I had some
difficulty in keeping up with them." As one of the brigade generals
said: "San Juan was won by the regimental officers and men. We had
as little to do as the referee at a prize-fight who calls 'time.' We
called 'time' and they did the fighting."

I have seen many illustrations and pictures of this charge on the San
Juan hills, but none of them seem to show it just as I remember it.
In the picture-papers the men are running uphill swiftly and
gallantly, in regular formation, rank after rank, with flags flying,