ILLINOIS STATE DAIf YMEN'S ASSOCIATION. . 67 



You will be interested to know how these boys were acommodated. 

 Each had a little canvas hammock, officers and men. They strung them 

 from stanchions about six feet apart. First tier about this high, and then 

 like this, and it looked like a forest of hammocks, and in the midst of it 

 all were our horses fastened in their stalls without any rest; could not lie 

 down. Soon we sailed away and it was a very pleasant trip down. One 

 night especially I am thinking of, I was resting on the after deck, and it 

 was before taps, and all of a sudden on the hurricane deck some one began 

 to play on the flagolette from one o f the operas, and you can imagine how 

 it sounded to hear the airs from "Martha" ringing out over the water. One 

 of the boys was playing; had his instrument and played for an hour for 

 us. 



It was a very beautiful July morning, about 7 o'clock, that we sailed 

 into the open harbor of Siboney. There we found about thirty transports 

 and more or less of the naval forces. There were one or two battleships 

 there and a number of cruisers. Siboney is simply a little indentation in 

 the coast. High hills rose direct from the water on either side. Except 

 that on the left as we went in there was a little narrow shelf on which 

 ran v aj narrow guage railway down from Siboney to Santiago. On this 

 narrow shelf as we came in and dr opped anchor I saw where the field hos- 

 pital was, and very distinctly saw the surgeons at work amputating arms 

 and legs from the wounded. That was not a very exhilirating introduc- 

 tion into Cuba by any means. About 8 o'clock, as I stood there, a little 

 cutter came steaming up, and through the megaphone I heard I was 

 wanted on the flagship. So I buckled on my sword and climbed onto the 

 cutter and went to the flagship and found Gen. Randolph. I #aid "Goo* 

 morning General." He told me he had just been on shore and received 

 orders from Gen. Shafter to disembark. I asked what preparations had 

 been made for disembarking. I did not see any docks there and there 

 seemed to be only one lighter, and that was very busy landing rations, 

 and) the men were not web-footed. 



"That's your funeral," he says. "You will have to fight that out for 

 yourself." 



