execrable on both sides, and the fighting was strangely intermittent and ill-directed; but when the two forces did get together a savage merciless war to the knife ensued. The bridge was held by Prince Salm Salm and the regiment of cazadors (riflemen) of which he was then Colonel. Such a regiment! Austrians, French, Mexicans, Poles, and Hungarians, all mixed together, and devoured by jealousies and hatred of each other. Poor Salm had often to sleep among them on the bare ground solely to keep them from cutting each other's throats. The very buglers, lads of twelve or fourteen, used to steal away in the night and go shooting on their own account right in the Liberal lines. Yet. when any general fighting was to be done they were all there and stood by each other; and after one or two engagements it was really remarkable to see the affection they manifested toward their Colonel. I call to mind one dirty old Mexican who volunteered for all sorts of hazardous duties merely to secure a good word from Salm, and when he was finally decorated at Prince Salm Salm's request embarrassed that worthy officer not a little by kissing him in the presence of the whole regiment, and shedding a cataract of tears on his shoulder.

Opposite the bridge the Liberals had gradually been moving up a Parrott rifled gun, and at last had got within eight hundred yards of our works. Three shells dropped one after the other into one of our powder wagons, but happily did not explode. However, it was evident that mischief would be done directly if the gun were allowed to remain, so General Valdez, who commanded the line at this point, gave orders to Salm to make a charge. The Prince was delighted with the job, and so were the cazadors.

The captured gun was taken up to the Cruz where the Emperor received it in person, and with his own happy faculty of saying pleasing things at the right time, turned to the men who had brought it and spoke:

"Tell your compañeros from me that the cazadors are the Zouaves of Mexico."

There were no prisoners taken in this charge, and when the cause came to be inquired into one feature of Mexican warfare was prominently brought out. There were Frenchmen in the Liberal army, as well as Frenchmen among the Imperial troops. The Liberals, under Escobedo, having just previously shot in cold blood a hundred French prisoners at San Jacinto, the Frenchmen in the Imperial army vowed to give no quarter to such of their countrymen as they found fighting in the Liberal ranks. Terribly in earnest they proved themselves to be. French sergeant in the cazadors butchered four prisoners with his own hand, and talked pleas

One

"Now," said he, "I'll show them how we antly with the fifth until he had reloaded his used to do things in the American war."

piece, when he completed the job by shooting him also. The Liberals, unable to get away through the rapidity of the charge, took refuge in the houses on each side of the street, and were there slaughtered like sheep in a pen, the officers being powerless to prevent it. I saw the bodies of five Frenchmen piled one upon another in one doorway. Quiroga's regiment, on another occasion, made eighty Frenchmen prisoners and massacred more than half before they could be stopped. This was by way of retaliation, but as a rule the Mexican troops on both sides needed no such incentive to deeds of cruelty. Through the personal exertions of Maximilian, who issued the most stringent orders on the point, such scenes were never repeated in the Imperial ranks after the first few days of the siege; but in the opposite camp they continued to the end.

Carefully choosing his ground beforehand he filed his men quietly on each side of the lunette, keeping them under cover till the last moment. Then with one polyglot cheer-German, Spanish, French, and Hungarian-they dashed across the bridge and made straight for the obnoxious gun, never firing a shot till they got at pointblank range. The enemy, completely staggered by the suddenness of the move, had time to do nothing before the cazadors were upon them. The officer in charge of the piece was cut down by the Major of the cazadors, the artillerymen were brained and bayoneted under their guns. My dirty old friend, whose decoration has already been chronicled, came back with something like a twisted gas pipe in his hands, and complained bitterly that he had found one Liberal's head too hard for his rifle. "My Colonel! my Colonel!" he said, between his The sortie of Prince Salm was the only one tears, for like Job Trotter he had the water-made by the Imperialists during the day. Else works always close at hand, "give me a gun, a good gun! I have broken mine over a chinaco's head and his brains all run out."

Following up his success Salm pressed on till he had gained the very summit of the San

where they had enough to do to hold their own. They succeeded, however, in doing so; and at four o'clock, when the firing ceased, they had lost not a gun nor a foot of ground. On the lines of the Alameda and the Cerro de la Cam

adds that there has been on our part very heavy losses, but they are incomparably less than those suffered by the enemy. General Escobedo finally informs me that in the situation in which he finds himself it is necessary to continue the attack upon the city, and that he counts upon the probabilities of a complete triumph."

To this is appended a statement that "seven pieces of artillery" were captured from the Imperialists, and that "a regiment of Belgians" (who had all embarked for their native country six weeks previously) had deserted to the Liberals. The credit claimed for capturing the position of San Gregorio, which the Liberals themselves held, and nearly lost, is not the least amusing feature of the dispatch. It is a specimen of the misrepresentation which both sides (Imperialists equally with Liberals) practiced in respect to their reverses.

pana there was little heavy fighting. The Lib-ting possession of the mountain. General Escobedo eral movements in these directions, which would have been most unquestionably the best points for a concentrated attack, were apparently intended more for diversions than for any serious purpose. At the Cruz and on the Alameda there were some few prisoners taken, among them two Americans of Corona's Legion, who with characteristic daring had stalked right into the city while acting as skirmishers. As soon as their nationality was known Dr. Basch, the Emperor's private physician, rode down the lines, though he disliked being under fire more than a cat hates water, to communicate the fact to some one of the other Americans in the city. I rode back with him to the Cruz only to find that I had been anticipated; and that the Emperor, through Mr. Wells, the major domo of the American train before alluded to, had sent assurances to the prisoners that not only would their lives be safe but that they would be treated with every consideration due to prisoners of war. The promise was kept to the full extent. During the whole siege of Querétaro not one execution took place within the Imperial lines; and all the prisoners were fed and treated, save only in the deprivation of their liberty, exactly as were the soldiers and officers of the Imperial army. One of the last official acts of the ill-fated Maximilian was to dictate to the present writer a letter to the American Consul in Mexico city setting forth the violations of the usages of civilized warfare continually occurring in Escobedo's camp, and stating that, unless these outrages were discontinued, he would be compelled to institute reprisals.

The total loss of life to both armies in the engagement of the 14th of March (the history of which has never hitherto been told) was greater than in any other battle during the revolution. In the hospitals of Querétaro I counted four hundred and eighty wounded and dead. Our total loss was probably nearly a thousand, or one-sixth of the entire force. The Liberals, who fought always in the open air while their antagonists were mostly under cover, who were the attacking force, and who were repulsed at every point, must have lost at least five times

as many.

In this connection it may be interesting to reproduce the only official account of the engagement that has ever been published by the national authorities. It is a dispatch from the Governor of Guanajuato to President Juarez, dated March 15th (the day after the battle), and runs as follows:

When night was closing in, and the firing had dropped down to an occasional shell, whose passage through the air left a train of light behind like a comet, I rode over the lines with the Emperor and his staff. It was a strange, weird adventure, this ride in the gloaming-the rapid dash from point to point, the vivas of the soldiers coming suddenly upon us out of the darkness, and the answering boom of cannon from the enemy, who, judging from the cheering that something unusual was going on, now and then dropped a shot right in among us. Maximilian had a few bright, encouraging words for all his troops, and they manifested a feeling which in stolid Mexicans might almost pass for enthusiasm. Not so the Imperial generals and their Chief. Far on into the night a light burned in the narrow, bare-walled chamber of the successor of the Montezumas. Morning found the council of war scarcely broken up. Then we learned the reason. Our ammunition was all gone!

Even

In the hospitals the horrors of Scutari were reproduced on a small scale. There were neither surgical appliances nor surgeons for the work. Miserable wretches, with shattered limbs, which ought to have been taken off in the field, lay days before amputation could be performed. Then nine out of ten died. with the best of care, operations were nearly always fatal, owing to the vitiated air of the crowded city. There was one poor young fellow, barely seventeen years old, son of the celebrated Polish patriot, Count Pototski, and heir to one of the largest estates in Russian Poland, who lost an arm. He was a favorite with the whole army, and every thing was done to bring him through. The Emperor himself came to his bedside, and decorated him with the Cross of the Guadaloupe for his bravery. The poor lad shed tears of joy and pride, and next morn

"The citizen General Mariano Escobedo, chief of the army of operations against Querétaro, in a private letter written to me last night, gives the following news: The above-named General yesterday ordered a reconnoissance of the position occupied by the trai-ing was found dead, with his Guadaloupe still tor army in the city of Querétaro, and finally moved firmly clasped to his heart, where the Emperor against the city the three sections with which he had had left it. been menacing it. This resulted in a hot fight, which lasted eight hours, and led to an attack upon the posiBusily engaged in the hospitals from morntions occupied by the enemy on the mountain of San ing to night was a little American, who was a Gregorio, from which he was dislodged, our forces get-good specimen of Yankee versatility. He had

disturbers of the Mexican night under ordinary circumstances, were for once hushed. They were busy with the dead!

So ended the first and principal day's fighting in Querétaro. There were various ways by which it might have been brought to a different termination. If Escobedo, when he got

been an adjutant, a dry-goods merchant, an amateur actor, a wine-grower, and very nearly every thing else in the States; he turned up in Querétaro in charge of a large mule train; and now, on emergency, he developed quite a respectable talent for surgery. Whether he had ever received any medical education I can't say; but the chiquito medico Americano, or "lit-possession of the Church of the Panteon, had tle American doctor,” as the troops called him, became one of the most popular surgeons in the city, and Maximilian gave him the Order of Guadaloupe for his humanity.

sent up sufficient force to hold it, he might have captured the Cruz and the whole city by a coup de main. If Salm Salm's attack had been properly supported the right wing of the Liberal army might have been utterly routed, their whole position turned, and the siege raised. If the Imperialists could have sallied out to attack the Liberals on the 15th, the day after the fight, they might have driven Escobedo back to San Luis Potosi; but they had not the ammunition to do it. If the Liberals had renewed their attack the next day they might have enSi- tered the city almost without firing a shot; but their forces were too demoralized to move without reinforcements. These are all "might have beens;" but they are now buried in the irrevocable past, and the body of the dead Emperor lies in the city he defended.

One incident of the day brought out strongly the mingled religious superstition and savage barbarism of the Mexican character. A regiment had just come out of action; their bayonets were wet with blood, and they were boasting of the number of chinacos they had killed, when a woman passed with a waxen Virgin and Child, which she was conveying from some priest's house to a place of greater safety. lence at once fell on the ranks of the half-drunken, brutal soldiery, and every man stepped forward bareheaded to kiss the image. Ten minutes previously they had been butchering unarmed prisoners.

The word chinaco used above is a slang term for Liberals. Civil wars are fruitful of nicknames.. The "Yanks" and " "Round"Rebs,' heads" and "Cavaliers" of America and England find a counterpart in the "mochos" and chinacos of the rival parties in Mexico.

MRS.

MRS. STANHOPE'S LAST LODGER. RS. ARNOLD STANHOPE, or as some persons persisted in calling her- Mrs. Stanup-eked out her narrow income by taking lodgers. Six years before her husband had died and left her a fine old house at the West End, and just five thousand dollars besides. At the best percentage this was very little with which to take care of herself and her three children-children whose ages ranged from thirteen to seventeen, and whose education was then unfinished. At the first crisis Mrs. Stanhope took counsel with herself and her relatives.

"Sell the house and take a smaller one out of town, on a horse-car route, Kate," they one and all advised.

The disposition made of the dead was not the least characteristic part of the proceedings. Inside the city the killed were, of course, carted away and buried at once, or a plague would have been the result. But outside the lines they were left by both sides to be eaten by dogs and coyotes and turkey-buzzards, unless it occurred to the troops to have a joke with them. It was not an uncommon custom in Corona's camp to pitch the dead into the river, from which the city mainly derived its supply of water, the aqueduct being cut off, thus imparting to that turbid little stream such additional fla- What was their amazement when, after listvor as the gases from decomposing bodies mightening to them in apparent heedfulness and resupply. Passing over the ground covered by Salm Salm's charge, three weeks after the occurrence, I saw the dried skeletons of the men who were killed in the fight of the 14th lying where they fell. For many days the body of a Liberal colonel was visible within a hundred yards of our lines at the Casa Blanca, naked, except that the hands were covered by a pair of black kid gloves, which, under such circumstances, had a ghastly air of burlesque.

When the day's work was done there was something almost supernatural in the silence which descended on the city. Not a sound disturbed the stillness of the night; not a footfall echoed in the deserted streets. All the church clocks had stopped for want of attention. The watchmen, who were accustomed to make night hideous by bawling the time every quarter of an hour, had all been pressed into the army. Even the dogs, the noisiest

spect, she coolly informed them that she had concluded to keep the house and rent her rooms to lodgers. "Kate, you are crazy!" exclaimed her brother-in-law. "This house and lot, in this locality, would bring you fifteen thousand any day. And with that sum well invested, and with what you have, you can live very nicely out of town.”

"But I don't want to live out of town, Tom," she answered.

"We don't want to do a good many things that we are obliged to do in this world," Tom Alroyd retorted, a little impatiently.

"Well, I'm not obliged to do this," Mrs. Stanhope returned, rather proudly. "It's a matter of opinion, and I prefer to keep the house. As you say, it is in a very desirable locality. It will be no less desirable for lodg

ers."

"A matter of opinion, as you declare, Kate;

but I should hardly have thought that you would have preferred to fill your house with lodgers.' Then Mrs. Stanhope flashed out all there was in her mind.

"Tom, you may think me wild, or Quixotic, or what you like. But, until I am actually obliged to, I will never give up the old Stanhope estate. My Harry is the last male descendant of the name. I know it was his father's desire that he should succeed to it as he had done before him. And, besides that, I have a sentiment about it myself. I am proud of the old place, and I want to keep it in the family. Much too proud to let it go, Tom, though you may think I demean myself by taking lodgers."

womanly virtues. But her mother, who knew what silent courage and persistence she was possessed of, guessed that she had been working hard in many ways for "this thing," and at the last spoke of it in this riant manner to cover her real anxiety and perhaps distaste for it. And so she glanced up quickly at Ellen's information and asked her a plain question, while she watched her with searching eyes.

"Are you sure you have a talent for this, Ellen? do you like it? and shall you be happy in it? Because, if you do not, there is no necessity for it, remember that, for you are not as expensive nearly as you were as a school-girl, you know, and I managed then very nicely. Besides, you are valuable as a helping-hand in the care of the house."

Ellen colored a little at this, for she knew what her mother had thought. But she an

This settled the matter. Tom Alroyd had nothing more to say, of course, but he nevertheless felt a good deal both of disapproval and annoyance. To his wife Mr. Alroyd proph-swered honestly enough. "I really think I

have the talent, mother, and I dare say I shall like it; you'll let me try, won't you?"

"Oh yes, if you really are in earnest.' That was all the preliminary talk they had about it. And the next week the young teacher had entered upon her duties.

"What started you so suddenly on that track, Elly?" asked eighteen-year-old Harry, rather grandly.

"Oh, my talent, Harry. I couldn't hide it in a napkin, you know, any longer." And Elly laughed.

Long before the end of the six years when my story opens Tom Alroyd was forced to confess that Kate had done better than he thought "You see, Elly," Harry went on, still more she would. She had certainly made both ends grandly, "in another year I shall be able to take meet, and she had saved a little. If she was care of myself and do something for the rest of ever taken in, if she was ever vexed and dis-you, I dare say. So there is no need of your turbed by the way of life she had chosen, her relatives were none the wiser for it. She never

complained to them. At the end of the six years Harry was nineteen, in his senior term at college, and with a good chance before him in a great commercial house, whose firm had known his father, and therefore felt an interest in the son. Harry was nineteen. Then came Ellen, who was two years older; and then Frances, or, as she was always called, Frank, with another two years of seniority.

doing this thing."

"Thank you, Harry, you are very kind," answered Ellen, with a slight twinkle in her practical eye at Harry's swift surety of "doing something for the rest of you." "You are very kind, Harry, but there's my talent! I'm a little strongminded, you know, and I must work out what there is in me."

Not until a year had been passed by Ellen in developing her "talent," as she called it, did any one know just what it was that had started her on "that track.” It was Ellen's birthday. She was twenty-one, and her uncle Tom was gayly bantering her as was his custom.

"If Harry stood in your shoes now, Miss Ellen, it would be worth while. But I can't see why girls should ever be twenty-one. They should keep in their teens, you know, while they are girls. Why, there's your mother and your aunt here were married off long before your age. Let's see, Kate; you were only eighteen, and Mary was but seventeen. Why, what are you two about-you and Frank? -nice-looking young women like you, too."

When Ellen was twenty she considerably surprised her relatives by developing a talent for school-teaching. So, at least, she spoke of it, when she walked in one day with the information that she had been offered a situation in one of the grammar-schools at a salary of $600. "I always suspected I had a talent for this thing, mother, and you see other people have suspected it too." She never told how she had been waiting for "this thing" for a year, and how this patient waiting and a really splendid scholarship, and last but not least, the influence of an influential man, who had been Arnold Stanhope's intimate friend, had at the end of the year given her the situation she had sought. She was like her mother in this, that she never made a great thing of what she was doing; never talked about it, and laid before anxious friends her hopes and her fears and her patient Tom's.

Ellen answered this with great apparent carelessness; and you would never have thought, as she answered, that she was at all disturbed. Frank, who had been playing softly and fitfully at the piano, heard this last remark of Uncle Pretty, vehement Frank, who looked