The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1898-10-13
THERE were two men in the room,
BY CLEVELAND MoEEE

THERE were two men in the room,
stretched on cots. One was tall
and wore gray pajamas, the other was
of medium height and slender and
wore pajamas checked. with white and
blue. The tall man had been shot
through the head with a Mauser bull
let; he had pains and fever, but would
recover. The other had been shot
through the knee and his leg was stiff
in a plaster cast; it would stay so.
They were both lieutenants, regulars,
and had been in the game before San
tiago on the LIST of July.
This was at Bellevue hospital, in the
soldiers pavilion. Out in the sunshine
some convalescerts with crutches
were chatting and smoking. Some
were joking. Down the long ward in
side were dozens of soldiers unable
to leave their cots. And some of them
were joking, too. There were nurses
and doctors moving about, and a few
sympathetic ladies.
l want to tell now the story of the
young lieutenant, the one with his leg
in the plaster cast, as he told it to me.
l asked him questions and he answered
them in short, business-like sentences
much better than adjectives. Now
and then he put in picturesque touch
which might not have suited in Sun
dayschool address, but did not seem
out of place in battlefield narrative.
He began with the breaking of camp
that famous day of July 1, at about
four o'clock in the morning, two miles
back of Ell Pozo. His regiment, the
Sixth infantry, had been up the whole
night before, making roads They
went forward over the rough trail
in columns of four, marching slowly.
The shells from both sides sang over
them, ard now and then man went
down from bursting shrapnel. This
young lieutenant, with so men of com
pany C, was going into action for the
first time.
/ asked him if be was afraid
Il don't know as / was afraid" he
said, but didn't enjoy it. 1t wasn't
exactly like being up here in New
York. l didn't want to be hit. But
AAiNAA 'oN' IN SoN W ~ ohCetp anu
do his work; that's what he's been
taught, and he does it. 1t wasn't spe-
cially pleasant, though, passing a lot
of bleeding, yelling Cubans being car
ried to the rear. They looked like dew
ills with their brown faces twisted up
They'd been loafng about watching
the artillery fire and staring at the
ha l1nnn aud Of
Say, we hated that balloon, for it
didn't do thing but draw the Span
ish fire on to us.
when we were about a quarter of
mile from San Juan the order came to
turn off the road to the left and be-
gin the charge on the LIGHTHOUSE.
That took us through thickets and
over fields. We left all our stuff here
blankets and impedimenta-under
charge of a sentry, and went ahead
with rifles and cartridge belts and can
teens. The Lord knows what became
of that sentry, but we never saw our
stuff again. l am betting those Cubans
got some of it.
Anyhow, we knew the time had
come to show what sort of men we
were, and most of us thought a few
things as we went across stream
there, then on through more thickets
and out again into the road to Santi-
ago. There were 600 yards of level
fields ahead of us, and then the main
block-house on top of a slope $50 feet
high. The bullets were coming faster
now and we were in the omen IFS
funny how you dodge when you get
the whiz of a bullet by your head. The
lodging doesn't do any good, but you
dodge all the same-at least the new
fellows do; they can't help it.
''There was a wire fence just above