Day after day, the troops followed the steep ascents and descents, walking close to roaring torrents, crossing craggy peaks and narrow chasms, skirting edges of precipices, wading through snow, and hauling heavy guns and supplies up steep inclines. Great mountain-ridges, with cañons between, ran north and south, beside numerous lesser ridges; all these had to be crossed to reach Chile. The intense cold on the summits, killed many of the soldiers. While the rarefied air caused numbers to drop down and die from heart failure and exhaustion. Of the nine thousand two hundred and eighty-one mules and the sixteen hundred horses Friar Beltran had in charge, over half perished. The soldiers, surrounded by the mountain peaks that seemed to touch the sky with their snow-bound jagged tops, were depressed by the awful loneliness. Now and then, a condor wheeled above them. Strange noises, made by gusts of wind in the cañons, sounded like the wails of lost souls. Every step the soldiers took, convinced them that should they be attacked, it would be impossible to retreat. Such were some of the terrible hardships uncomplainingly suffered by the Army of the Andes. But the soldiers laughed at despair; a spirit of union and comradeship upheld them. Each corps tried to outdo the others in cheerful endurance. At last, after more than three weeks, the Army began to defile from the passes into Chile. Then San Martin and O’Higgins, in the great battle of Chacabuco and later at Maipu, won the victory and drove the Spanish Army from Chile. _General Miller and Bartolome Mitre_ (_Retold_) II Thus was accomplished one of the most heroic military feats in history. “The passage of the Andes by the Army of San Martin,” says Lord Bryce, “has been pronounced by military historians of authority to have been one of the most remarkable operations ever accomplished in mountain warfare. The forces which he led were no doubt small compared ... to those which Hannibal and Napoleon carried across the Alps. But ... the passes to be crossed were much higher.” Lord Bryce also says that San Martin comes nearer than any one else to being “the George Washington of Spanish America.” And San Martin has been called, “the Hannibal of the Andes.” NOT FOR HIMSELF Honours were showered on San Martin after the battle of Chacabuco. News of his successful crossing of the Andes and of his victory, reached Buenos Aires. All day long shouts sounded through the streets. Cannon roared from the fort and from the squadron in the roadstead. San Martin’s portrait was hung where all could see it, draped in flags captured from the enemy. The Argentine Government decreed a sword and badge for San Martin, and struck medals for his soldiers. They voted a pension of six hundred dollars a year for his little daughter, Maria Mercedes. They also sent him a commission as Brigadier-General, the highest rank in the Argentine service.