one hundred on his back, weighing in all fifty pounds.

With these he has his Mauser, his blanket and an extra pair of shoes,
and as many tin plates and bottles and bananas and potatoes and loaves
of white bread as he can stow away in his blouse and knapsack. And this
under a sun which makes even a walking stick seem a burden. In spite of
his officers, and not on account of them, he maintains good discipline,
and no matter how tired he may be or how much he may wish to rest on
his plank bed, he will always struggle to his feet when the officers
pass, and stand at salute. He gets very little in return for his
efforts.

One Sunday night, when the band was playing in the plaza, at a
heaven-forsaken fever camp called Ciego de Avila, a group of soldiers
were sitting near me on the grass enjoying the music. They loitered
there a few minutes after the bugle had sounded the retreat to the
barracks, and the officer of the day found them. When they stood up he
ordered them to report themselves at the cartel under arrest, and then,
losing all control of himself, lashed one little fellow over the head
with his colonel's staff, while the boy stood with his eyes shut and
with his lips pressed together, but holding his hand at salute until
the officer's stick beat it down.

These soldiers are from the villages and towns of Spain; some of them
are not more than seventeen years old, and they are not volunteers.
They do not care whether Spain owns an island eighty miles from the
United States, or loses it, but they go out to it and have their pay
stolen, and are put to building earth forts and stone walls, and die of
fever. It seems a poor return for their unconscious patriotism when a
colonel thrashes one of them as though he were a dog, especially as he