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72 the regular brigade had not been paid for three months.

Mayaguez is a darling little city on the western coast of Puerto Rico, — a place of lattices, balconies, and walled-in gardens ablaze with blossoms. Behind it lies a semicircle of green hills, and before it is the laughing sea. Columbus touched here in one of his earlier voyages, and historical associations have been accumulating ever since.

It is the third largest town on the island, having a population of 25,000, the majority of whom are white. The harbor is next best to that at San Juan, — 102 miles distant, — and is an open roadstead formed by two projecting capes. It is a seaport of considerable commerce, and exports sugar, coffee, oranges, pineapples, and cocoanuts in large quantities, — principally, with the exception of coffee, to the United States. Of industry not much can be said, save that there are three manufactories of chocolate, solely for local consumption. The climate is excellent, the temperature never exceeding 90° F.