“No,” the correspondent replied, wondering what was in the wind.

“I thought possibly you might want something to eat,” General Maceo said, with a smile.  “I have a boiled egg here and I want to divide it with you.”  As he uttered these words he drew out his machete and cut the egg straight through the center.  Passing half of it to the correspondent, he said:  “Share it; it will do you good.”  The newspaper man thanked the general and they ate the egg in silence.  He said afterward that the incident reminded him of General Marion’s breakfast with a British officer.  He had read the incident in Peter Parley’s history of the revolution, when a schoolboy.  Marion raked a baked sweet potato out of the ashes of a camp fire and divided it with his British guest.  The officer regretted the absence of salt, and the correspondent said he experienced the same regret when he ate his portion of General Maceo’s egg.

After munching the egg both men sat for some time observing the stirring scene in the valley below them.  The moon had gone down, but in the glow of the electric lights they could see that the activity among the Spaniards was as great as ever.  Suddenly Maceo turned to the correspondent and said abruptly:  “Were you asleep when Jesus called you?”

“Oh, no,” the correspondent replied, “I was not asleep; I was only just tired—­that was all.”

The general looked at him searchingly and then said:  “Don’t worry; it is all right.  We are going through that town in a few minutes.  There may be a fierce fight, and you will need a clear head.  The egg will give you strength.”

Within twenty minutes the little columns of three hundred men were on the move.  They led their horses down the hill about an hour before daybreak, with the general in the lead.  Silently and stealthily they entered the outskirts of the town.  The columns passed two blockhouses without being observed and at the break of day were beyond the town on the main road to Bauabacoa.  Meantime the Spaniards had discovered them.  The town was aroused and a hundred and fifty Spanish cavalry headed the pursuit.  The road wound through fields of cane.  A strong column of Spanish infantry followed the cavalry.  Maceo held his men in reserve and continued his march, the Spanish troopers trailing after them like so many wildcats.

Suddenly, to their astonishment, Quintin Bandera’s infantry arose on either side of the road and almost annihilated the pursuing column.  Those who escaped alarmed the columns of infantry, who returned to San Luis to fortify themselves.  Maceo and Bandera camped on the estate of Mejorana, about six miles away.  It was here that Marti, Gomez, the two Maceos, Crombet, Guerra, and Rabi met not long before this to inaugurate the new revolution.  Bandera and Maceo found plenty of provisions at the estate, but no bread.  A small Cuban boy was sent to the Spanish commander at San Luis with a note requesting him to be so kind