THE ARM-CHAIR AT THE INN
of San Josepho, we would have a plantation apiece and negroes enough to run it. It sounded pleasant, didn’t it?
“I’m not going into all the details—it’s the story of the jail you want, not the revolution. Well, we had two weeks of tramping up to our waists in the swamps; three days of fighting, in which one of the field-guns blew off its nose, killing the mate; and the next thing I knew, my two companions and I were looking down the muzzles of a dozen rifles held within three feet of our heads. That ended it and we were marched into town and locked up in the common jail—and rightly named, I tell you, for a filthier or more deadly hole I never got into. It was a square, two-story building—all four sides to the town—with a patio, or court, in the centre. Outside was a line of sentries and inside were more sentries and a couple of big dogs.
“They put us on the ground floor with a murderous-looking chap for guard. As the place was packed with prisoners, we three were shoved into one cell. Every morning at daylight one or two—once six—poor devils were led out; the big gate was opened, and then there would come a rattling of rifle-shots, and when the six
226
