city was crowded with people and I had some difficulty in find-
ing a place to sleep at any hotel. At the end of three days, 
Captain Shellbruck, Chief of Staff, furnished me with an auto 
in which to travel to Madrid and after that to visit the Lincoln 
and Mackenzie-Papineau Battalions. Bob Kerr, Canadian Pol-
itical Commissar, accompanied me on this trip and directed the 
course we should follow.

As we left Albacete at 6 o'clock in the morning we passed 
groups of soldiers marching to their breakfasts, singing as they 
swung along the streets:---

"Comrades the bugles are sounding
    Forward we march to the fray
Gladly we enter the battle
    Fight for the new social day."

We drove speedily along the highway in the quiet of the 
morning. It was harvest and threshing time for the peasants. 
Along the roads caravans of mule teams were slowly walking 
hauling <sic> the loads of wheat and other grains to the threshing 
floors. The ancient method of separating out the grain is 
still used in Spain. There is a large flat floor on which the 
grain is spread out in the straw. This is tramped over by 
mules dragging some rough log or scow. This tramping is 
kept going for hours at a stretch.

After this the threshed straw and chaff are thrown into 
the wind with a wooden fork and the wind "bloweth away the 
chaff" while the wheat falls on the floor. I could see the piles 
of grain on the side of the threshing floors, hundreds of which 
were situated along the road to Madrid, and scores of peasant 
people toiling on them under the blistering heat of an August 
sun. One would never imagine the country was at war to see 
the peaceful work and patience of the peasants all over the 
country.

But this feeling fades as we are halted at the approach to 
villages and towns by military guards to show our Salvo Con-

---37---