1. This is a stirring selection to read aloud. What makes it so? Read the lines that you like best.
2. What has the first stanza on page 324 to do with the poem?
3. Explain: Suliote; Moslem; Platæa; lines 25-27, page 324.
Santiago, Cuba, was the center of some of the heaviest fighting of the Spanish-American War. The Spanish fleet had taken refuge from the American fleet in Santiago Harbor. The Spanish army had been concentrated there to protect their fleet. The American army, under the general command of Major General Shafter, invested the city. The following extract describes picturesquely the fighting three days before the Spanish fleet put to sea.
On June 30th the general order came to move forward and every man felt that the final test of skill at arms would soon come. The cavalry division of six regiments, camped in its tracks at midnight on El Pozo Hill, awoke next morning to find itself in support of Grimes' Battery, 5 which was to open fire here on the left.
The morning of July 1st was ideally beautiful, the sky was cloudless and the air soft and balmy, peace seemed to reign supreme, great palms towered here and there above the low jungle. It was a picture of a peaceful valley. 10 There was a feeling that we had secretly invaded the Holy Land. The hush seemed to pervade all nature as though she held her bated breath in anticipation of the carnage.
Captain Capron's field guns opened fire upon the southern field at El Caney and the hill resounded with echoes. 15 Then followed the rattle of the musketry of the attacking invaders. The firing in our front burst forth and the battle was on.
The artillery duel began and in company with foreign military attachés and correspondents we all sat watching the effect of the shots as men witness any friendly athletic contest, eagerly trying to locate the enemy's smokeless batteries. A force of insurgents near the old Sugar Mill applauded at the explosion of each firing charge, apparently 5 caring for little except the noise.
Now and then a slug of iron fell among the surrounding bushes or buried itself deep in the ground near us. Finally a projectile from an unseen Spanish gun disabled a Hotchkiss piece, wounded two cavalrymen, and smashed into the 10 old Sugar Mill in our rear, whereupon the terrorized insurgents fled and were not seen again near the firing line until the battle was over.