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196 travel-worn to the bone, of all colors and sizes, with their Remington or Mauser "Long Toms" across their shoulders—any way at all—they filed along like bits of moving earth on the landscape. In the forest trails, that our horses' hoofs had cut into mud gullies, they slipped along, leaping from one side to the other in search of firmer footing, or struggling knee-deep through pools and rivulets. They carried cooking-utensils queer and various—even old watering-pots taken from deserted gardens. They were hard up for everything—shoes, hats, equipments of every sort

It was at noon one day that a lanky old fellow with the face of a vulture was arrested and brought before Gomez. He had a servant and three stout mules grunting under a weight of merchandise, rich as the pack of a peddler in the Arabian Nights.

He had a formal permit from the Civil Government to sell these goods—bought in the towns, and carried out by bribery of Spanish officials—to peasants of the neighborhood. This was in direct violation of Gomez's proclamation forbidding trade of any kind between the town and the peasants. The old speculator's goods were scattered on the ground in heaps. He had several hundred cigars, a thousand packages of cigarettes, bundles of shoes for women and children, rolls of calico and linen stuffs, a number of trinkets and knick-knacks, four demi-johns of rum and brandy, some dozen pounds of hard bread, and two bags of coffee. This, when he found himself in trouble, he swore was all for his personal use.

Gomez tore up the government permit, and parcelled the bread and coffee and tobacco among the soldiers, excepting the staff and escolta. The shoes, calico, and knick-knacks were given to some peasant women of the neighborhood to keep—or divide among their friends—and, the rum and brandy were poured out on the ground, where it settled into the dry soil, leaving a rich aroma. Then the old fellow was sent on his way with a warning, and we took the march; our happy, ragged soldiery puffing clouds of pale smoke into the air from their newly acquired cigarettes and cigars

At Pozo Azul, a prefect, a tall, sharp-looking fellow, was tried on five indictments, for misappropriating government property, and levying small sums of money, illegally, on farmers of the neighborhood. He was sentenced to death; and as evening fell, the troops were drawn up, dismounted, on three sides of a quadrangle. Then an aide of Gomez trotted to the center of the square and read the indictments and the finding of the court-martial. Amidst silence, the prefect, his arms tied behind him, was marched across the quadrangle to the open side, followed by four ragged sharpshooters of the infantry and a corporal. His eyes were bandaged, and he was placed standing with his back to us all, six paces in front of the firing squad. There was a pause. No one moved but the corporal, who turned toward the aide as the four marksmen leveled their rifles. Then the last rays of the sun flashed on the lifted machete of the aide, and the corporal gave the order "Fuego," in a whisper heard only by the four and those nearest them.

The prefect's knees swayed under him, and he fell writhing to one side, on his back and left shoulder, with his face buried in the grass. The four bullets had passed through his head. Then the trumpeters blew "Attention!" and "Forward, March!" and the troops swung off within a pace of where the corpse lay; many straining over their shoulders to catch a glimpse of the features, others passing nonchalantly, as if it were an everyday occurrence.

Two days later a burly negro corporal, of vast breadth of shoulder and a gorilla-like cast of features, was found guilty of gross insubordination. He had twice threatened an officer with his carbine. He was shot at evening also.

He died as coolly as any man I have ever seen. With an air of disgust he waved off those who wished to bandage his eyes, and, leaning easily on a snake fence, in a sleeve-