wspapers would have deceived the elect; and I am
not sure that the keenest-sighted proof-reader of the "Imparcial" would
not have read and corrected a whole column before he discovered that
the paper was plaster and that the letters had been made with a pencil.
Major Greene of the United States Signal-Service, to whom I described
these counterfeit newspapers, went to the castle a few days later, and,
notwithstanding the fact that he had been forewarned, he tried to take
"La Saeta" off the nail. He trusted me enough to believe that one of the
papers was deceptive; but he felt sure that a real copy of "La Saeta"
had been hung over a counterfeit "Imparcial" in order to make the latter
look more natural. If the soldier who drew the caricatures, portraits,
and newspapers in that guard-room escaped shot, shell, and calenture,
and returned in safety to Spain, I hope that he may sometime find in a
Spanish journal a translation of this chapter, and thus be made aware of
the respectful admiration that I shall always entertain for him and his
artistic talents.

In all the rooms of the castle that had been occupied by soldiers I
found, scratched or penciled on the walls, checker-board calendars on
which the days had been successively crossed off; rude pictures and
caricatures of persons or things; individual names; and brief
reflections or remarks in doggerel rhyme or badly spelled prose, which
had been suggested to the writers, apparently, by their unsatisfactory
environment. One man, for example, has left on record this valuable
piece of advice:

"Unless you have a good, strong 'pull' [_mucha influencia_], don't
complain that your rations are bad. If you do, you may have to come and
live in Morro Castle, where they will be much worse."

Another, addressing a girl named "Petenera," who seems to have gotten
him into trouble, exclaims:

Petenera, my life! Petenera, my heart!
It is all your fault.
That I lie here in Morro
Suffering pain and writing my name
On the plastered wall.

JOSE.

Probably "Jose" went to see "Petenera" without first obtaining leave of
absence, and was shut up in one of the gloomy guard-rooms of Morro
Castle as a punishment.

Another wall-writer, in a philosophic, reflective, and rather melancholy
mood, says:

Tu me sobreviviras.
Que vale el ser del hombres
Cuando un escrito vale mas!

You [my writing] will survive me.
What avails