The age-herald., 1898-07-17
FUNNY PHASES
 OF THE WAR
BY LULU HUDSON.

at the front have been having some thrill l ing experience, in the recounting of which they have not failed to add that saving touch of Yankee humor which makes the newspapers of this country the original
 readable sheets they are. Among distin- guished young writers who are making the wires hum with their accounts of the progress of affairs in Cuba, are Stephen Crane. the handsome young author of the Red Badge of Courage the most nota- ble war story of years. written before
 MT Crane had ever seen an actual en-
 gagement: Edward Marshall, a prominent young eastern journalist; Sylvester Scevel,
 the famous war correspondent; and Rich
 ard Harding Davis, the author of "Gal-
 lagher and other successful stories. trav-
 eler, journalist and society man of two
 continents.
 Among these correspondents and hosts of
 others who are straining every effort to be first with the news for their respective
 papers. there is. of course, the Hveliest
 sort of rivalry and there is scarcely any
 sacrifice that each Mil not make to get
 ahead of the others. Stephen Crane, who , was in the thick of the fight with the Rough Riders, illustrates this vividly in the following account of the woundirg
 of Edward Marshall He says-a soldier passing near me said
 There's a correspondent up there all shot to h."
 He guided me to where Edward Mar shall lay shot through the body. The fol-
 lowing conversation ensued:
 Hello, CTane!'
 Hello, MarshalE In hard luck, old
 man?'
 "Yes. I'm done for"
 Nonsense, you're all right, old boy! What I do for your"
 Well, you might file my dispatches. don't mean file 'em ahead of your own, old man. but just file em if you find it handy
 Even at the brink of the grave he would not ask such a sacrifice. as that his dis patches should be filed first! It is hard to say whether the. pathos or humor of the situation stands out more vividly. MT. Crane says: ''I immediately decided that he was doomed. No man could be so sub lime in detail concerning the trade of Journalism and not die. There was the solemnty of a funeral song in those ab- surd and fine sentences about dispatches" Richard Harding Davis in one of his war articles for Scrhners monthly tells a fun ny story of Sylvester Scovel's experience with the first Spanish prisoner taken dur ing the war He was lieutenant a pris-
 
 turned over to Seovel, who, after adroitly gaining from him all the information pos sible, showed him hospitably over the ship. Now, if there is one American more 1 than another whom the Spaniards heartily detest it is Sylvester Scovel and from their standpoint, with good reason no doubt. | On this occasion MT. Scovel wore yacht l ing cap and dark blue serge suit and the lieutenant evidently mistook him for one | of the ships junior officers. At any rate | when the time came to say good bye, the | Spaniard after the manner of his race, l was profuse in his expressions of apprecia- | tion of the courtesies shown him, even | going so far to say with many 1ourish- l es, that it was as impossible to surpass 1 the courtesy of an American officer as to l surpass his warship.
 You have been most kind to me-" he added. land I should like to know your | name. shall always remember it. | Scove laughed and nodded, My name is | Sylvester Scovel," he said, lowing. 'T 1 am the correspondent of the New York | World" The Spanish have no sense of | humor, and this one could not rise to the occasion. He only gasped and stared and | backed hastily away.
 MT. Davis adds: fife can scarcely be | blamed. It must be bewilderng to find that you have been overwhelmed with courtesies by the man whose death, had he been your prisoner, and you had killed l him would have brought you an award l of s10,000 and a vote of thanks from your l government.
 The Spanish lack of the sense of humor | has been humorousy Illustrated at every l stage of the war. It is usually the case l that those who are most laughabe see least to laugh at. The pompous posing of the SpanardS, their flamboyant boaSting l their bombastic grandiloquence, their in- 1 cessant prating of pride and honor, have l furnished laughter for the world, but it l has all been most serious for the Span l iards themselves"
 | It is said that for civilized nation the l Spaniards are the most ignorant people in 1 the world Out of a population of about l 20 900 only S,5000, 900 have any education l at all. These are imposed upon and mis- l lead by the Spanish newspapers in a way 1 that is simply inconceivable in this en- l frightened age. Spain is supposed to be giv- l ing the most unmerciful licking ac- l cording to these papers and Dewey is 1 still believed by a majority of the masses 1 to be a prisoner in chains at Manila l Prominent Madrid papers tell the people l that this is wild and sparsely populated country: that the only white people live l along the coast, while the rest of the coun- l try is given over to roaming cowboys, l called Indians; that we have no army and l only a police force to keep off the Indians, 1 and that there is but one railroad to trans l port this force to the coast, and this passes 1 over bridge at Niagara, which is said to | be in a very dangerous condition; that our l soldiers are ill-fed and do not want to l fight and that America has never been | known to produce an athlete. It is then 1 explained that the reason for this is that l we live almost entirely on vegetables, 1 shipping all our beef out of the country, | so great is our desire to make money. l These statements have actually been set | forth in all seriousness by prominent Ma | drid papers, The Spaniards are in a fair | way to become disillusionized. l Those who witnessed the departure of the l Birmingham volunteers on the first of May l realized that many of the soldiers in the l emotion of the hour received certain dem- | onstrations of affection that would never l have fallen to their lot under any other l circumstances. Many a fearful, kiss from many a forty-scored cousin fell to the | lot of the soldier boys who bore up man l fully under the unusual treatment It l takes a great deal to disconcert an Ameri- l can soldier. At Fort Monroe recently, | when the transports were about to sail, | each of the soldiers seemed to have some