Page:From Yauco to Las Marias.djvu/175



Arrival of the mail-steamer — The soldier-boy and his letters — The greater part of the brigade is quartered in Mayaguez — Agriculture in Puerto Rico — Material result of our campaign — A fare-well order — General Schwan departs for the United States.

N the 19th of August a steamer came into the harbor, bringing us a mail, the first we had received since the beginning of July. If the people who wrote those letters could have seen the happiness they wrought upon their distant boys, I am sure they would have been surprised and touched. Again and again we read the simple news of home, — the cat was dead, or little sister had the mumps, or father had built a new fence around the back pasture, — and wars and kings and presidents faded into