"What, are they all going to perish, then?"
"Don't imagine it, for God and the Holy Virgin will bring them safely through; hold that for an article of faith."
"Let us ask them to do it, then," groaned the unhappy mother. "Mother of the forsaken! where are my sons? What has become of them? Are they alive? If they are, what will they not be suffering, and what will they not suffer in the future, if thou dost not protect them? How their hearts will be filled with anguish and their minds with despair! Holy Mother! if I only had news of them, even. Let us pray to the Virgin to intercede for them."
The family began to recite the rosary with that fervor which changes anguish to hope, and sorrow to resignation; and scarcely had they ended when a little boy called out from the door:
"Uncle John Joseph, my father says there is a letter in the post-office for you, and that it is from the Christian's camp over yonder."
John Joseph, with the activity of twenty years, hurried out of the house, while Maria and her daughter, falling on their knees before an image of the Virgin, raised their clasped hands in prayer.
John Joseph soon returned, bringing with him one of his cronies who knew how to read and who proceeded to read aloud the letter which the former had carried in his trembling hand.
"MY DEAR PARENTS: I hope that when you receive this you will be enjoying as good health as I desire for myself. Michael and I are well, and at your service. The cholera is raging again, but we laugh at it. Every day of action is a day of pleasure and enjoyment for us; for it is happiness enough for us to win glory for our country and to see the enthusiasm of everybody; for this increases every day, as well among us of the ranks as among the officers and generals, and which shows most it would be hard to say. The mess has been a little scanty in these last days, because the sea was fiercer than the Moors themselves, and the boats were unable to reach us with the supplies; but what matter? The worst of it was that we had no tobacco. And so it happened that the commander-in-chief, who came among us encouraging us, like a greatly respected but very careful father, came up to me and said: 'Well, my boy, are you very hungry?' And I answered him: 'The hunger is nothing, General; if I only had—if I only had a cigarette.'—And what do you think he did? He went to his tent and brought from it an enormous box of cigars that the Queen had presented to him for the campaign; and saying that Her Majesty would be glad that they should serve to lighten the labors of her faithful soldiers, he distributed them among us. We have received provisions, thanks to the navy, that on this occasion did not seem the sister but the mother of the army; and as for that brave General Bustillo, a hundred lives, if we had them, wouldn't be enough to pay him for all he has done for us. Hurrah for the navy, father, notwithstanding that your worship doesn't like the sea.
"You must know, father, that a prince of the royal house of France has arrived here. Although tall and of handsome presence, he is but a boy— only seventeen. If your worship had seen him, you would have said that he was only a stripling, and not fit for such hard service, but you would have changed your mind if you had seen how he attacked the Moors. On my faith I had always believed that, from Santiago down, only the Spaniards attacked the Moors in that way. We believe here that what he wanted to do was to perform another exploit like the one related by Michael's mother of Hernando del Pulgar in her native Granada, and to fasten the Ave-Maria on the tent of Don Manuel Habas, and that he would have done it, too, if he hadn't been held back. And mind you, father, it is a very noble thing, and one worthy of admiration, to come, without anything obliging him to it, to this war, which is no child's play, just for the sake of proving himself brave. True it is that to have that name is worth more than all the gold in the world, and lifts one a foot above the ground.
"We have made more than half a dozen charges with the bayonet, father, like the one in which your worship took part. These charges are not, as one might say, greatly to the taste of the Moors, who, when they hear the call to the charge, to which we have given the name of General Prim's Polka, tremble and turn pale and fall back. [Note: It may properly be related here that this same division, with its leader, General Prim, reconnoitring at a few leagues distance from Tetuan, came upon a poor old Moorish woman, sick and abandoned by her people; and that putting her on a stretcher, they carried her on their shoulders to Tetuan with all the gentleness of sisters of charity. (Note of the Author.)]