The sun., 1908-04-03
sANrIAGO TEN YEARs AETER.


the stony path as Il II were yesterday.
Now you are on sure ground; 1t looks
familiar enough here you will stand on
the very spot where Grimes. the game
little man with tWlnkling glasses, gave the
order TO fire a little after O'Clock on the
morning when the sky was burning up like
q scroll and you felt cold oreeps down your
: spine Just little later when the Spanish
shells began to scream over the bill. But
| FL Pozo 10 fenced too; you must trespass 10
get up on the Crest and gaze on at San Juan
Back Of you the farm house that looked
half like q church or a shrine IL missed !
only q few broken foundation stones are
left, Near II there is something neW-a
wooden farm house with q tiled roof, the
color scheme Of the walls a taWdry blue.
Two large hounds with tails like cables
bark raucously at you from the doorway
but do not sally out TO see you on the prem
ises. Up the hill you CO.
Except that a patch OF pine apples 10
spreading over the lower slope. III Pozo,
the hill, gives you the welcome you had
hoped for The squat, ungainly tree, with
one great branch inviting you to sit aloit,
the tree by which the first battery pit was
dug, is just where you expected TO find Il,
ready to have its picture taken again.
But there is no Capt. Paget with his spy
glass and his raptures to give II human
interest now. You move ruminatively
westward and come upon the pits Of Best's
and Parkhurst's batteries. No, Fl Pozo
has not changed much. But there is some
thing unfamiliar in the sky; il does not
quite adjust itself to your reoolleotions.
Why, Of course, the buzzards are gone;
you see only one sailing languidly in the
blue. The army had rations and dead
for the buzzards, there are scant piokings
now on the valley floor.
You think that you will surely recognize
Skaters headquarters when you get
there, for Fl Pozo made you feel at home.
and impressions that we're torpid come
aooking back. OF course you know the
place. for it was just the other side Of a
ford where you filled your canteen every
time you passed, blinking the disagreeable,
fact that a stream in which the Cubans
washed their clothes once a month could
not be wholesome TO drink, brawl over the
pebbles as IL might. Here is the place.
and all around it Well. you have TO stop
and own yourself a stranger to the new
order and It's atmosphere Of privacy and
exclusion Yes, there the road divides,
the upper trail a leaiy lane, as you remem-
berit You stick to the main travelled road
and reach the bank up which you used to
urge your horse 10 interview Miley and
catch glimpse Of Shafter sitting adiposely.
bareheaded negligee and utterly spent
and sick OF il all in his hammock. You
recognize nothing
Perhaps II you had time TO light and set
a WHILE or better still to stretch tent fly
and "oamp down. some things would come
back and you might be able to identify
those mango trees under which you lay
dead beat and had counterfeit rest the
night before the advance. Grass grows
smoothly where the ground was rutted by
wagon wheels and cut up by horses plunges
and the hoofs Of professional pack mules
in those mad and strenuous days, Elabo-
rately fenced and trinity cleared Is the fore
ground now; cattle MUNICH In the shade Of
trees; and you see not one but several
houses back there in the edge OF the woods
quite a farm colony this, with it's beasts
and chickens and guardian dogs and men
bending at their work as II war had never
been. Why pause here? On TO Sevilla
and Guasimas, You turn in the saddle "a
you reach the brow Of the Hill whence you
got your first glimpse OF red rooted Sam
tiago, chiefly the Reina Mercedes barracks
and the protecting hospital with It's shame
less Red Cross flags, in the marking time
period OF June. From this distance IL
looks like the untaken and romantic city
Of your dreaming. But Yake up What
is that sign on the new house by the way
side? Surely an invitation 10 dismOunt
and moisten your clay. A cafe bodega,
a saoon-w whatever you choose TO call it,
right here on the road up which the sweat
ing and appalingly thirsty American SOL
diers hiked in the tropical heat Just over
there the trail turns on to Siboney, and in
the angle stands the makeshift monument
to the men who died in the skirmish of
Gausimas.
The sign on the roadhouse any Amer
ican soldier could read and appreciate.
'Tvoli beer. English spoken here" Cold,
satisfying amber beer-fioods Of il. Al
though not product of the States, being
made in Bavana, it is palatable and reaches
the right spot. This beer emporium is \
surely the greatest change on the road to
Siboney Closed is the hill trail 10 travel
lers, and back there CLEANS among the trees
commodious hacienda, white and cool |
Ii seemed TO be an imperative thing 10 |
trespass and thread the old trail again, but |
Capt. Dougherty was in command and We |
had to make Firmeza by sundown.
Sboney at lastl After passing under the !
outrageous pomp Of some Of the biggest
ceiba trees in Cuba and riding through |
groves of coooanut palms such as one sees
only in the lowlands near the coast. In |
physical features it is the same Siboney;
the tufted hills look down on il as before and
the surf of the Caribbean whitens the rocks
and sprawls on the sands of the cove; but
where Col John +. Weston-bluf, hus-
tlinE genial Jack Weston, now oeremoni-
GUS and sedate Ton duty as the military
overload Of the Philippines-where Col.
Weston dispensed commissary stores in q
shed and slept on sack is a putting and
wheeling sawmill, and on the slope across
the creek many huts and homes Of the
peasantTy have sprung up. with one general
store and dram shop in the midst Of them
Else Siboney is the same. 1t has no well
defined street and no central place that
could be called plaza even by the local
real estate agent IL lots are sold and titles