The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-09-18
COMFORT BAGS A DISCOMFORT.
Natives who Followed the Marching
Men Tasted Samples and Suffered.
From the Nav York Pres.


From the New York Press
Yauco, Aug. 2S.-This campaign has been
| a glittering success, in that it has demon
strated beautifully what the housewife"
or comfort bag ought to be. The proud
production of the dear American girl, sew
ed in solitude and watered with furtive
| tears, has b!ossomed into hideous night
mare-a thing one cannot get along with
and fears 10 do without.
The remains of that brilliant American
| institution, the comfort bag, are strewn
from Gates to Mayaguez, from Ponce To
Arecibo At every deep ford it yawns at
you from the pebbly bottom. At every
mountain pathway il mocks from the Jag
ged rocks.
Containing nothing that the soldier in
the field needed, but everything one might
need, the parting was a lingering one
sort o piecemeal.
Like the stock of old letters and papers
in business desk, one did not know what
to throw away or what to keep Laden
with little less than they could carry, but
burdened with far more than they ought
10 Nave been, the boys chung 10 their com
fort bags for the memories they brought
not the issues they served.
The parting in instaliments began with
the first days march to the interior. After
twelve miles under a boiling sun Tho hoys
began to take an inventory of themselves
Inc krag-Jorgensen was heavy but the
enemy was in front The haversack was
filed with two days ratlons, but three
were needed. It meant a court martial to
part with anything found wanting in dress
parade or the firing line.
All! the comfort bag It weighed tbraa
DOundS-DIt those WI
staggered on.
Fifteen miles, and the Colonel led with
no signs OF moments rest or a nights
camp. The sun was low, but had grown
ferVent in farewell. It-whatever that
mysterious II is-had forgotten to rain.
ana plantain leaves dropped and witherad
with the cocoanut and banana, and the
rocky bed of the mountain pass reflected
every ray of the brazen tropic sun into
the faces of the soldiers Stripped of
everything else that the martial law per
mits, clearly it was an issue of "ne or
the comfort bag" Then began the am
putation of necessity, the separation Of
the soldier from three pounds of over
weight.
The medical department was the first to
suffer where the makers of that memory
of housewife thought il would be the
last. With corps of doctors and uedi-
cine chests and ambulances following, the
PADhuCt VI d corner urug store was not
needed. The medical department was
cutely wrapped up in a separate leather
cover, and therefore easier to discard in
bulk. 1t contained something for the
stomachache something for the headache.
but nothing for the legache 1t held cute
strips of plaster for wounds, and bandages
to tie them up, but nothing, no salve. Cor
sore heels. There was quinine, where
10000 pills followed in a wagon, and ipecac
and something else to assist vomiting.
where brown forefinger was a quicker
means. But there was also the memory
of the dear girl who did all this.
But the blamed thing weighed a pound
where ounces were tons. The boys parted
with the medical department of their com.
fort bags with regret, but the dear girls
IN America who prepared them for their
deadly work did not toll in vain. The
natives who picked up the departments
along the road thought their contents were
for immediate consumption.
The howls of the Porto Rican victims Of
the American housewife, in her medical
capacity, will linger long in the ears OF
the soldiers as a pleasing memory. The
hide of one, who took all the medicine to