ROOSEVELT'S "WEARY WALKERS." 351 inland. But Wheeler was anxious to get his troopsof the cavalry division into action as soon as might be, and he considered he was not traversing the orders of his chief in employing them on this first serious reconnaissanceof the Spanish position. Such work is the ordinary duty of the cavalry division in a campaign. In this case, indeed,only one troop in the whole army had its horses with it. The rest hadbeen left at Tampa, and the local wits of the headquarters had already dubbed the Rough Riders "Roosevelt'sWeary Walkers," after their tramp from Daiquiri. The cavalry would have to do their work on foot,but at the outset this wasnot a great disadvantage, for in the dense bush between Siboney and Sevilla mounted men would not have been of very much use. General Wheeler accordingly directed his second in command, General S. B. M. Young, to move out to Las Guasimas early next morning, Friday, June 24th, with a force of about 1,000 cavalry, all dismounted, and acting as infantry. The force was made up of four troops (about 200 men) of the ist U.S. Cavalry, four troops of the toth U.S. Cavalry (a negro regiment), and 500 men of the ist U.S. Volunteer Cavalry (Roosevelt's Rough Riders). Four Hotchkiss quick-firing mountain guns were with the regulars,whomarched by the valley road, under the personal commandof General Young. The RoughRiders were to take themoredirectroad over the hill, thus protecting the left of the other column. Both were to join hands at Las Guasimas.

some importance as the opening action ot the Santiago land campaign. The first accounts published of it were verymisleading, but in an unusual way. The contemporary newspaper reports of the bombardments had exaggerated the success of the American arms ; the first reports of Las Guasimas didthe Americans,and especially Roosevelt's men, serious injustice.

According to these narratives the Americans were advancing through thick bush without any ordinary military precautions— laughing, talking and whistling, with neither vanguard nor flankers to protect them— when they stumbled unexpectedly on the Spaniards, and were badly cut up as the result of their own carelessness and lack of discipline. But from what has been already said of Wheeler's orders andplans, it must be clear that if either Wood or Young marched into an ambuscade on the 24th, they must have done it with their eyes open. When they marched off before dawn they knew, roughly, where they- might expect to meet the Spaniards;bothcolumns had their advance covered by Cuban and Americanscouts, and it was well known that once they had covered the first two miles out from Siboney, they might expect at any moment to meet an enemy.

What really occurred we know down to the smallest detail, for there weresome of the ablest correspondentsof the New YorkPress withboth the columns. Amongst others, Mr. Richard Harding Davis of the Herald, and Mr. Edward Marshall of the Journal, were with Colonel Wood, and Mr. Caspar Whitney was with General Young. They not only sent long despatches to their papers at the time, but several of them have since published lengthy narratives of the fight. On these data, compared with each other and with the Spanish official account of the day's work, the following story of the actionof Las Guasimas is based. It will be seen that the day wasan honourable one for all who took partin the littlebattle.

Wheeler had on the Thursday personally reconnoitred the road followed by Young, and ascertainedthat for two miles it wasclear of the enemy. But the Cubans reported that further on,near Las Guasimas, they had been fired on by a strong force of Spaniards. General Young's mission was to ascertain precise!) the Spaniards had at this point.

The fight at Las Guasimas would count as a big skirmish in a European war. But it has