Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 February 1913 — WAR REMINISCENCES [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WAR REMINISCENCES

ONE SWEET BREATH OF HOME Pretty Incident in Porto Rico /MI MSProtocol Was Signed—Girl Plays “Btar Spangled Banner.” The American commissionera of evaluation had been in Porto Rico’s capital perhaps two weeks. It was lonely at the hotel. There were, besides the. commissioners- -and, • theirstaffs, a dozen or fifteen other Americans about the place, mostly correspondents and merchants, who were following closely in the wake of the army and navy for business reasons; They all hobnobbed together In a brotherly sort of way, but the language all about them was Spanish—which none understood except Admiral Schley. The proprietor of the hotel was a Spaniard, the cooking was essentially Spanish, the one bathroom was alio essentially Spanish, being very dirty, and altogether, despite the courtesy of the Spaniards and the natives, It was not very pleasant. Everyone was longong for home. . - One evening after a particularly bad dinner the Americans had gath-. ered in the interior court of the hotel to talk over matters. Admiral Schley was naturally the center of the group. Next him sat General Gordon, while the general’s son, a lieutenant in the army, and Lieutenants Sears and Wells and Ensign McCauley, of the Admiral’s stitff, were close by. While they were talking there > entered a dark-haired, dark-skinned girl who looked to be no more than 13 years of age. She must have been older, for later it developed that she was a wife. With her was her hnsband, who on this occasion was mistaken for her father. The girl strolled nonchalantly to the piano and her husband took a chair by her side. Running her fingers lightly over the keys she played some Spanish air. For a moment then she stopped and a ripple of polite applause ran around the room.

The girl turned half way on her stool, smiled pleasantly, and again touched the keys with her fingers. And what a thrill went through every American in the room as the nbtes of “The Star ed forth! Here was a breath of home, coming unexpectedly, to some of the men who had helped to make this home a place of which to be proud. With a common impulse they rose to their feet and stood In silence until the hymn was ended. The little girl faced around agalh, smiling at the applause which greeted her delicate compliment. "We thank you." said the admiral In his sweetest way, and everyone bowed. The Spaniards had beard the song and they peered from their rooms and peeked into the conn irom the hotel office, not sourly, but in wonder at this defiance to their flag. But -no one said a word in opposition, no doubt accepting the situation as part of the transformation then in process. Not for many a day had that song been played In San Juan, because even to hum it on the street would 1 have served as a signal for the mob to rise. But this Porto Rican girl had broken the ice and thereafter there was always the solace of American music for the exiles.