But it was
not to be.
The march was continued until darkness fell over the landscape, and
the battery arrived at a beautiful camping-place about one mile east
of Siboney, where a break in the water-pipe near the railroad track
gave an ample supply of excellent water, and a ruined plantation, now
overgrown with luxuriant sugar-cane, provided ample forage for the
mules. The two troops of cavalry, which had been offered and refused
as an escort, had reached this camping-place some time before, so that
the wearied members of the detachment found pleasant camp-fires
already throwing their weird lights and shadows over the drooping
branches of the royal palm.
Here, in the midst of the jungle, they pitched their first camp in
Cuba. The condition of the mules was duly looked to, their shoulders
washed down with strong salty water, their feet carefully examined,
and the animals then tethered to graze their fill on the succulent
sugar-cane, after having had a bountiful supply of oats. Meantime the
camp cooks had a kettle full of coffee simmering, and canned roast
beef warming over the fire, and after a hearty meal the tired men
stretched themselves upon the ground, with no canopy except the stars
and only one sentinel over the camp, and slept more soundly than they
had on board the tossing Cherokee.
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