Soon we were there. Border guards stopped our coach and five ; minutes afterwards, We were in Spain. Eagerly We looked through. the Windows. The small village became alive as We passed through it.

Th/e Trip and the Reception

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-—r*r ~ ‘ V - ‘I’ We were making the last few mil 111- in a motor coach. The mountain roa we were taking as vvindingfiifs

A way through scenery of grandeur and beauty. We all had an apprecia- « tion of beauty, yet few of us were paying much attention to that through which we were passing. Our thoughts raced Ahead to the borders of Spain, which we knew must be near. - W1 3 3%? '

g Laughing women with children in their arms, men with a Welcoming_

smile, came out of their homes, or stopped in their walk to hold up a clenched fist and call “Salud”. Children ran from their play to mount the stones at the side of the road and hold up their small fists in Welcome too. /L:

We spent the_ night at an immense mediaevail fortress, which commanded the country for miles around. It was here that thousands. of the Asturian miners spent long months of imprisonment and tor- ture after their defeat in 1934, until they were release-d by the coming of the Popular Front Government. The following morning, we Were up early and many of us Went up on to the ramparts of the fortress to look over the country around us. Far away, through the crisp l morning air, We could see the white capped mountains standing clear against the intense blue of the sky. A scene of great majesty. To most of us, who had never before left England, it was a scene before which We could only stand silent and awed.

After breakfast, we marched down to the station. With us were five or six hundred men who had been gathering in the town in the previous days. Men of every nationality under the sun. All actua-

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