will not, in consequence, live in bronze during the lives of many
men, but will be remembered only as one of thirty Cubans, one of whom
was shot at Santa Clara on each succeeding day at sunrise.

The officer had given the order, the men had raised their pieces, and
the condemned man had heard the clicks of the triggers as they were
pulled back, and he had not moved. And then happened one of the most
cruelly refined, though unintentional, acts of torture that one can
very well imagine. As the officer slowly raised his sword,
preparatory to giving the signal, one of the mounted officers rode up
to him and pointed out silently that, as I had already observed with
some satisfaction, the firing squad were so placed that when they
fired they would shoot several of the soldiers stationed on the
extreme end of the square.

Their captain motioned his men to lower their pieces, and then walked
across the grass and laid his hand on the shoulder of the waiting
prisoner.

It is not pleasant to think what that shock must have been. The man
had steeled himself to receive a volley of bullets. He believed that
in the next instant he would be in another world; he had heard the
command given, had heard the click of the Mausers as the locks
caught--and then, at that supreme moment, a human hand had been laid
upon his shoulder and a voice spoke in his ear.

You would expect that any man, snatched back to life in such a
fashion would start and tremble at the reprieve, or would break down
altogether, but this boy turned his head steadily, and followed with
his eyes the direction of the officer's sword, then nodded gravely,