night by the unseen enemy and Surgeon Gibbs was killed and two privates wounded. The next day the camp was shifted to a better position, and some sixty Cubans came in and joined the Americans. The firing of the Spanish continued throughout the night, and Sergeant Good was killed, but on the 13th, with the aid of the Cubans, who knew the country, they were easily repelled. On the 14th the Americans took the offensive. Two companies of marines, supported by the Cubans, left the camp at nine o'clock to destroy the well at Cuzco, which was the only water-supply for the Spaniards within twelve miles. They failed to cut off the enemy, as they had hoped, but they drove the Spaniards steadily before them, reaching the intervening hill first, and carrying the crest under a sharp fire. As the marines descended into the valley the Spaniards broke cover and retreated rapidly, and at three o'clock the fight was over, the well filled up, and the heliograph signal station captured and destroyed. One lieutenant and seventeen men were taken prisoners, and they reported a Spanish loss of two officers and fifty-eight men killed, and a large number of wounded. On the American side one marine was wounded, and about a dozen were overcome by heat. This was the end of the Spanish attacks. They had had enough, and withdrew, leaving the American post undisturbed to the end of the campaign. The marines had done their work most admirably. For three days and nights they had met and repelled the attacks of a concealed enemy, never flinching under the strain whch had been upon them without a moment's relief. Then they had taken the offensive, and had marched and fought for six hours under the

tropical sun and through a dense forest and undergrowth with the steadiness and marksmanship of experienced bushfighters. It was a very brave, honest, and effective piece of work, showing admirable discipline and a surprising readiness to meet new and strange conditions.

On June 15 the work of the marines was followed up by the Marblehead, Texas, and Suwanee going into Caimanera, silencing the batteries, and driving the Spaniards completely away. The ships penetrated so far into the channel of the inner harbor that they ran on to torpedoes, the Marblehead picking up one on her propeller, fortunately so thick with barnacles that it did not explode by contact, as it was intended to do. Thus the affair at Guantanamo Bay was finished, and a secure refuge, base, coaling and repair station were secured for the fleet, which assured its ability to continue the blockade-a very important operation, performed with the thoroughness, foresight, and minute care which characterized all Admiral Sampson's work. But the best arranged and most systematic blockade, the most vigorous and sustained bombardments, the workmanlike establishment of a fine naval base-none of these things could bring the American ships alongside the Spanish cruisers. It was not the comparatively feeble batteries of the Morro, the Socapa, or Estrella Point which stood in the way. That which held back the American fleet was the mine-field at the entrance of the harbor, sown thick with torpedoes and submarine mines, exploding either by contact or by electric wires leading to batteries on shore. The navy which offered hundreds of volunteers to accompany

Hobson had plenty of officers and men who would have cheerfully dared all the dangers of that narrow channel, defying alike shore batteries and sunken mines. But such an attempt would have been not only perilous, and worthless, but a blunder of the first magnitude. Small ships, which perhaps might have slipped in, would have been utterly useless against the heavy Spanish cruisers, and a battle-ship sunk by torpedoes in the narrow channel would have been a useless and crippling sacrifice, and would have blocked the entrance so that the Spaniards could never have been forced out and the American fleet could never have gone in. Once the mine field was cleared, the ships could enter, but the mines could not be reached or removed until the batteries at the entrance were taken and the garrisons driven away. For this land-work the fleet had no adequate force. To reach and destroy the sea power of Spain in the West Indies, upon which the whole campaign against both Cuba and Puerto Rico turned, an army was needed to support the fleet, to take the entrance forts and thus permit the ships to enter, or else to capture the town itself and force the Spaniards out into the open. Thus it was that while Admiral Sampson was perfecting his blockade at every point, he was urgently asking that land forces be sent to his support, and all the officers and men of the fleet were waiting impatiently for the coming of the army which should deliver the Spanish cruisers into their hands.