or boisterous-only a click like the ticking of a watch upon a still summer's night; but it meant that our heavy guns were ready to be touched off. Another column of smoke and another arrow of flame shot out from the side of the chase. The report was not very loud and not very formidable: it seemed to be merely four-pounders barking, and many a face had fallen before the word was passed down from the bridge that the chase was an Italian man-ofwar, the "Don Giovanni Bausan," and that in 66 THE AMPHITRITE" LEADING THE SQUADRON SENT TO BLOCKADE MATANZAS. stead of a fight we were only getting a salute In real honest war all Dons are to be trated for the Admiral. A DISAPPOINTED GUN CAPTAIN. Mechanically, as in a dream, the captain of the gun locked in position his fearful pet; reluctantly the ammunition was dropped back down the slide, and the shell extractor put tenderly away. The captain of the gun looked dreamily at his toes, as though surprised at the pattern of tattooing in India ink which they displayed and that they were ten in number. Then his eyes fell upon his gun, and rested upon it a long time. He seemed to expect to hear it get up and say something. Men were released from their quarters by the bugle, and the off watch went below. The gun captain's face was a study in seams and furrows of disappointment. His lips hung down all awry, as though he had been sucking sour lemons for a month. When he got down on the gun deck, he threw himself upon his kit and listened, while a "sea lawyer," a very wise-looking man, the wisest of the crew, pulled away at his pipe, and laid down the law to an admiring throng, who, as they listened, groaned out emphatic grunts of approval. Now," said the "sea lawyer" triumphantly, "yous jabbering idiots will understand why Tom Macfarlane has always been agin armored intervention. Now, if it wuz war, real old-fashioned, clean-cut, downright honest war, do you think that we would let that Don slip into Havana harbor jest because he is a bit off color and says he is an Eyetalian? Not for your life! 66 alike: that is, filled full of holes on sight; but with this armored intervention business it's saying' By yo' lave' to one, and After you' to another, and never a sight do you get of the particular yellow belly of the bunch yer after. God help the Republican party, says I, and its platform of armored intervention." The sound of a distant cannonade was borne by the breeze towards us. The guns of the Morro were saluting the arrival of the Italian Don. The gunner's mate pricked up his ears as he slept upon his canvas bag, and whispered, half waking, half dreaming, "Give me a shell, boys, an armor-piercing one, and scratch Remember the Maine' upon it. And we won't ever lock them guns no more until the old flag is hauled up over the Morro, and I guess we have got them where we want them." And in his dream he had. That afternoon we stood in close to the Morro, immediately followed by the " Iowa" and the "Indiana," and flanked by our attendant torpedo boats. Perhaps it was the wish of the Admiral to draw the fire, and so more perfectly locate the new batteries on the Mulatto ridge, to the eastward of the castle, than had hitherto been possible. But the Spaniards, who had been so prodigal of their fire the evening before, were silent now, though we were more than a mile within range of the eastward batteries and not by any means an unlikely mark for the guns of the Morro. About two bells the bugle sounded to quarters, and, when the inspection was over, the 500 men, whose faces had been hardened and whose nerves had been steeled PRIZES IN THE OFFING AT KEY WEST. such a very short time before to meet the shock of battle, trooped down the spar deck towards the stern. They were all dressed in white duck, and in the midst of them and rising above them by a full head was the tall and stalwart figure of the chaplain. He wore a mortar-board, and a black Oxford gown gathered about his waist with a velvet sash. The sinking sun had burnished the yellow casemates of the Morro with its dying rays, and we could see with the naked eye the guns as they protruded from the ports, and the curious crowds of Spanish soldiery as they gathered on the walls. EVENING SERVICE. "God save the state," the chaplain prayed, with uplifted arms. "O eternal Lord God, who alone spreadest out the heavens, and rulest the raging of the sea; who hast compassed the waters with bounds, until day and night come to an end; Be pleased to receive into thy almighty and most gracious protection, the persons of us thy servants, and the Ship in which we serve. So for days and nights the guard was kept along the Cuban coast, the spoiler was despoiled, and those who had drunk deep of the blood of their own children were in turn bled white. Behind the coral reefs and the royal palms of the once peerless island, now reduced by Spanish savagery to utter desolation, the cry went up from lips which had long since been strangers to any but the accents of despair, a cry of gladness and of hope, an expression of faith in an allmerciful God and his chosen instrument, a Christian people, who sought to love their neighbors as their own kith and kin. Often, as I listened, I seemed to hear, borne by the breeze over the intervening lands and the waste of waters, that cry of touching faith which I had heard so often, months before, in the starvation camps of the reconcentrados, "Mañana dios dara" ("To-morrow the Lord our God will provide"); and now, after many days and many months, this to-morrow had dawned. The Admiral made a little trip to the westward, along the coral coast, and entered the beautiful bay of Matanzas, to see how the blockade was progressing in this quarter. The insurgent fires were burning night and day upon the Pan, the great sugar-loaf hill that can be seen for so many leagues along the north coast. The visit was one merely of inspection; but when the Spaniards were discovered to be working in great number and throwing up sand batteries upon the exposed spits of land to the seaward of San Severino, followed closely by the "Terror and "Cincinnati," the flagship opened fire upon the works, and before fifty shots had been fired, principally from the smaller guns, the but half-mounted battery was silenced. The Spanish artillery was so badly served that not a single shot struck our vessels. Then the routine of the blockade was resumed. Day and night, each at its appointed station, the great iron ships and the light cruisers circled about the coast, and not even a single fishing smack that had not been examined succeeded in entering any of the ports upon the long line of coast that is comprised in the limits laid down in the President's proclamation. Sarcophagus of Alexander at Constantinople. From "Constantinople," by Professor E. A. Grosvenor. WITH THE TURKISHI AND GREEK ARMIES IN TIME OF WAR. T has been my purpose for several years to visit Europe at the first opportunity when there should be a European war, or hostile armies actually in the field. I not only wished to see the troops in action, but I desired to investigate the condition of foreign armies and the requirements for accommodating troops in garrison, as well as the best arms, uniforms, and field equipment for troops in an actual condition of war. It is customary for governments to send officers abroad for this purpose, and it has been the practice of our Government since its establishment. The first prominent officer to go on this duty was General Winfield Scott, at the time of the war between Napoleon and the allied armies; but he reached Europe too late to be a witness of the final scene of the great drama at Waterloo. Delafield's and McClellan's observations during the Crimea have been of deep interest to military students; also General Sheridan's experience with the Prussian army during the Franco-Prussian war. General Sherman, while in command of the Army of the United States, visited Europe in 1872, and remained an entire year. His observations were of great interest and importance to the United States. We have now military officers at nearly every court in Europe, as well as in the Orient; and military and naval attachés from foreign countries are on duty at our own capital. Since the close of the Russo-Turkish war in 1878, no opportunity for such observations as I desired to make presented itself until the hostilities between the Græco-Turkish forces in 1897. It may be well at this point to recall that the difficulty between Turkey and Greece began early in 1897 in Crete, where the Christians of the island were dissatisfied with the Mohammedan rule. When the riots in the island had become so serious that war between Greece and Turkey threatened, the Powers sent warships to the harbor of Canea. On February 21st these ships fired some fifty shots into the camp of the Cretan insurgents, located outside of the town a warning that Europe would not permit hostile actions. The skirmishing in Crete continued through the rest of February and into March. Early in March, however, Crete ceased to be the point of observation. The Turkish and Grecian armies confronted each other on the frontier of Thessaly. They exercised tolerable selfcontrol until early in April. Then the daring advance of the Greek irregulars into the disputed territory caused Edhem Pasha, the commander of the Turks, to suggest to his government that it was time to declare war, which Turkey did on April 17th. Diplomatic relations were at once severed, and fighting began. It was evident that there was to be war in earnest. I at once made my preparation to go to work has gone on steadily ever since, until now the Turkish military forces are completely modernized. A monument erected on the site where he formerly lived on the Bosphorus, reminds alike Turk and stranger of the high esteem with which Von Moltke's services in this work of reorganization are regarded. the field. At the time I left Washington, May 4th, the Greeks on the western frontier were holding their own, but in the east the Turks had driven them back and occupied Larissa. The latest information from the Levant seemed to indicate not only that Greece and Turkey would be engaged, but that some of the Balkan states and possibly one or more of the great powers of Europe The army is completely Moslem, no Chrismight be involved. The unexpected fre- tians or non-Moslems being admitted. Alquently happens, and as no one can foretell though exempted from duty, the latter are when a war will occur, so no one can say not exempted from military taxes. All what the phases will be or how it will termi- young Moslems who have reached twentynate. At the moment, no one anticipated one years of age are expected to enter the that, instead of any one of the great powers army for twenty years of service, unless becoming involved, they would all stand they can show some good reason why they aloof and witness the tragedy until it reached a critical point, and then combine to check its progress and dictate the terms of peace. Such was the situation when I left Washington. On reaching Paris, I found that several engagements had taken place while I was on the sea, but that the result was still indefinite. I also learned that my best way to reach the Turkish army was to take the Oriental Express to Constantinople. This I did, arriving there on May 19th. THE MILITARY ORGANIZATION IN TURKEY. I could not have gone to a better place to observe the Turkish army than Constantinople itself. Not only is the city the headquarters of the complex military establishment which governs the army, but it is also headquarters for the first of the seven military territories into which the empire is divided. When I arrived in Constantinople, there were fully 30,000 men stationed in and about the city, giving me ample opportunity to observe the methods and condition of the Turkish troops. There was a mistaken impression, when the late war broke out, that the Turkish army was antiquated in its methods. Military men knew better. The Turkish army is at present completely organized in accordance with modern methods. This organization is not new; it was undertaken as long ago as seventy years by Mahmud II. When, about 1827, he decided to begin the reconstruction of his army, he was obliged to turn his cannon on the Janizaries, and not to stop until the last one of that body was dead, so hostile were they to any change in the methods of the Turkish army. After the Janizaries were out of the way, Mahmud II. began to remodel his force. Ten years after this he had Von Moltke and other Prussian officers aiding him. This should not be called upon, such as physical unfitness or family obligations. The registration list shows that about 120,000 men are liable to service each year; but, as a matter of fact, only about 65,000 are incorporated into the army. According to the latest figures, the army numbers in time of peace 244,000 men, 24,000 of these being officers. It's war footing mounts to fully 800,000. It will be remembered that, when the war with Greece broke out in the spring of 1897, the Sultan mobilized 600,000 men without any great effort. New laws and reforms are in operation in the army, which it is expected will add enormously to this strength. The Sultan believes that at no distant day he will be able to call out, in case of necessity, an army of a million and a half men. Of course, fully a third of this body will be utterly untrained. These troops are drawn from all parts of the empire. What is known as the territorial system is in vogue in Turkey; that is, the empire is divided into seven military districts. Each of these districts furnishes a corps, recruited in the main from within its own limits. If one runs over the list of cities which are the headquarters of these corps, he gets some idea of the distant points from which the Sultan draws his troops:Constantinople, Adrianople, Salonika, Erzinjan (northeastern Asia Minor), Damascus, Bagdad, and Sana (southwestern Arabia). Not all the portions of the empire yield soldiers in equal numbers. Thus the division having its headquarters at Sana furnishes few soldiers, its recruits coming from Syria and Asia Minor. Those portions of the country occupied by nomad tribes, such as Tripoli and Turkestan, have never until within a few years furnished troops. A few years ago, however, an effort was made to utilize the nomads in an irregular cavalry resembling the Cossacks of the Russian army. Regiments have been formed with good success. The organization is known as the Hamidie Cavalry, in honor of the Sultan, Abdul-Hamid. It is impossible, of course, to apply to these irregulars the superior training given to men in the regular army; nor are they called upon for any large amount of service. They furnish their own equipments and mounts. As a rule they carry ancient rifles or pistols, and every man is armed with a lance. So far the only active service which the Hamidie Cavalry has seen has been in hunting down the Armeni It is easy to see from what they have done there that, in case of foreign war, they would be a most dangerous element in the Turkish army. What I saw of the Turkish soldiers in Constantinople convinced me that they are among the most effective in the world. There are many reasons for this fact. In the first place, the Turks are a strong race, accustomed to hard labor, and consequently are easily molded into enduring soldiers. They are all Moslems, and their religion has three elements which contribute largely to their soldierly qualities. First, it teaches them to believe in an absolute despotism; second, it enforces simplicity of life and strict temperance; and third, it promises them unending pleasures in heaven as a reward for their endurance on earth. The long term of service required of the Turks adds, of course, to their effectiveness. It should not be forgotten, too, that this service has much of it been active. In the last hundred years, Turkey has had a greater war record than any other nation in Europe. From the beginning of the century up to January 1, 1897, she spent thirty-seven years in actual warfare. The cost of handling this tre |