358 THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR.

big biscuit sells for 20 cents when it is to be had." The day wasquiet, only occasional shots beingfired at Aguadores. It was supposed that theAmericans were waiting for reinforcements beforeadvancing. The next day was absolutely without any event, but on the afternoon of Thursday, the last day of June, a balloon was seenrising over the hills in the directionof the American camp. It attracted a great deal of attention in Santiago,but there was no fighting. Itwas a week since the action at Las Guasimas, but the situation was exactly what it had been on the evening after the Spaniards abandoned Sevilla.

better to keep out from the shore. When th were wanted to discharge their cargoes into tb> boats they had to be hunted up by the ahead) overworkedtorpedocraft. Then whenthe stores werelandedit was a problem howthey were to get over the few miles to the front. Even if a number ofwaggons had been available,there was noroadupon which to put them. The various camps lay along one muddy track, which in places wasa kindofditch sunk below thegeneral levelof the ground, and full of water after every shower of rain. Up this wretchedhillpath the supplies were carried by the mule train. The " packers" incharge of the work toiled withan energy that was beyond all praise. But there wereneithermennor animalsin sufficient quantities for the task set them, and though they did their best on most days, they could only bring up enough for the immediate needs of the moment. All that could be brought to the advancedcamps,even for the sick, was a supply of salted pork and hardbiscuits— bad food even for healthy menina tropical climate. After the first two days the men hadnot eventobacco, and coffee was often counted a luxury. Theideaof bringingup the heavyguns and their ammunition had to be abandoned for the present. All that could be accomplished was to drag up, sometimesby the sheer strength of the men, a few light field pieces andmachine guns.

What weretheAmericansdoing all this time ? When the news arrived of the first fightingand the retreat of the Spaniards the newspapers in the United States had announced that the way wasopen to Santiago, and the place would be stormedin another twenty-four hours. This was a natural enough idea for writers at a distance who did not realise the conditions existing on the spot, who only knew that the Americans were camped in sight of the city, and who had not yet realisedthat Spaniards could fight.

But General Shaffer could not advance till he had landed not only his men, but at least part of his artillery and a considerable amount of supplies. Men cannot march and fight without foodand ammunition. And this workof landing stores from the transports was a more lengthybusiness than merely getting the men ashore. There was a hopeless deficiency of the proper arrangements. The American army never had had any peacemanSuvres. Indeed for years no general had ever seen eventwoof hisregiments together. There was no staff, in the proper sense of the word, and all the administrative servicesof the armyhadbeen improvised,and as often as not put into amateur and inexperienced hands. No attempt was made to repair and strengthen the shaky pier at Daiquiri; and at Siboney,a still more important point,no effort wasmade for days to construct apier, and when it was begun it was done so badly that it was swept away by the sea before it was completed. The result wasthat onSiboneybeach everything had to be landedpiecemeal in small boats that were dragged through the surf. For a people with a reputation for practical,businesslike ways this was surprising enough. If the Spaniards had shown such want of system it would have been thought quitenatural. No order was kept among the transports. They put out to sea whenever it struck their captains that it was Other work that was equally important, and that shouldhave been done during thesedaysof waiting, was strangely neglected. The officers did not possess a single reliable map of the country in which they were about to lead their men to battle. With an efficient staff these maps wouldhave been prepared in twenty-four hours. The outposts held a line of wooded heights looking down into the valley in which Santiago lies. Only one of the generals seems to have done anythingto reconnoitretheground beyond the woods, over which the advance would have to be made. He seems to have done it of his owninitiative,without any reference to headquarters,and to have had nomeans of conveying to his colleagues of the other divisions the information he collected. With a properly organised staff it would have been reported to theIntelligence Officer at Shaffer's headquarters and thenissued as a memorandum with a sketch plan to all concerned. General Chaffee had fought his way from the ranks to a commission in the Civil War, and since then had taken part inmany an Indian campaign in theWest. He wasin every wayone of the best soldiers in the