are clear and striking in tone, and
may at once be classified as model bulletins of history. He is a most
energetic, careful, studious and laborious soldier, bearing himself
with the dignity of a man modest as brave, and full of kindliness, but
determined in discipline, knowing it to be for the common good. He is
resolute in demanding that the requisitions shall be according to the
forms, and those associated with him must respect the regulations. The
objection to him of those who seek one is that he attends too much to
details, but that is well when the commander is absolute in duty and
has an appetite for hard work before which the small matters disappear
as by magic and the greater ones are conquered by force of habit.

The scenery of the battle fields around Manila should be carefully
regarded and remembered. The bay is a vast sheet nearly thirty miles
in length, with a width exceeding twenty miles. The shores of the
bay are low--not more than six feet at most, above high tide. They
are also sandy and soft, resembling in some respects the banks of
Louisiana rivers, but no levees are attempted. The famous Pasig
river is only twenty miles long, and drains a large lake, in which
there is an immense multiplication of vegetable growth that floats
perpetually to the Bay, and is called "lilies," though having the
look of small cabbages. The stream is almost as broad as the Ohio,
and, in its snaky turns, crooked as the Mississippi. The banks seem
to be prevented from washing away by the dense matting of grasses,
and the overhanging thickets, imposing in luxuriance. The houses are
close to the water, for the tidal river does not rise and fall enough
to disturb the inhabitants. There are mountains a few miles away
east and south--big lumps of blue. The stream that furnishes pure
water to Manila is from the mountains, and tapped near the mouth,
where it empties into the Pasig, seven miles from the city. Manila
is widespread, and of structures whose height has been moderated by
experience of earthquakes. There is a great deal of marshy land, and
rice fields, and the jungles, so thick and thorny, and the grasses so
tall, fibrous, and rasping, that the marching of columns of soldiers
is excessively fatiguing. It was a terrible task that was cut out
for our men, by the delay in the Senate, mischievously elongated,
the insurgents having fortified themselves in a way that they knew
would have been utterly impervious by Spaniards. Th