ll celebrate
and shall continue to celebrate till the end of time, to commemorate
the birth of our Christ,--a sharp-eyed, dare-devil Filipino crept
slowly out of the city of Ilagan along a foot-path toward the
Americans' camp about a mile north of that city.

When so near to the Americans that their out-posts were plainly visible
during the flashes of lightning, the Filipino spy crept into a bamboo
thicket not over fifty feet from an American sentry. After lying there
for a half hour, waiting for the storm to come, the native grew a
trifle bolder and arose to his knees. That moment the sharp eyes of
the sentry caught him.

"Corporal of the Guard!" called the sentry in a loud voice.

The corporal, being suspicious that something unusual was taking place,
in responding to the call took with him two armed privates.

Approaching the sentry, with light steps and in a crouching attitude,
the corporal said in a heavy whisper, "What's the matter, Jack?"

The sentry was standing with gun in hand, loaded, cocked, and with
bayonet fixed. Keeping his eye centered on the exact spot where he had
last seen the slowly gravitating figure before him, the guard said
in an undertone that denoted grave alarm, "Do you see that thicket
just to the left of that big mango tree?"

"Yes;" said the corporal in a whisper, "What's the trouble?"

"There's a man in there," said the sentry. "I saw him quite plainly at
first--and I think he's got a gun in his hand. You better watch out,
boys. He's still there."

The corporal and the two privates fixed the bayonets on their
Krag-Jorgensons, filled the magazines, slipped a shell into the
barrel of each rifle, cocked them, crouched close to the ground,
some ten feet apart, and began to move forward, a step at a time,
between the flashes of lightening. Each time it would flash, they
would peer into the thicket. Each step brought them nearer.

"There he lies!," said one of the privates in a quick out-spoken voice.

"Amigo," (a friend) said the stretched-out form, as three guns were
raised in unison with the anxious muzzles pointing directly at him.

"Este no quere combate" (you don't desire to fight), said the corporal,
in crude Spanish.

"Mucho amigo" (very friendly), came the reply.

"Vamose aque!" (come here), commanded the corporal.

With his eyes fixed in theirs, the Filipino raised himself slowly up
and came toward the three Americans who stood but twelve feet away.

"Take him by the