So the American army suffered and prayed to be led forward, while the Spaniards between them and Santiago strengthened their own position with every hour, and confidently awaited their coming. The invaders now occupied the Sevilla plateau, and were within five miles of the city they sought to capture. In their front lay a broad wooded valley, to them an unknown region, and on its farther side rose a range of hills, that Ridge Norris told them were the San Juan Heights, strongly protected by block-houses, rifle-pits, and bewildering entanglements of barbed wire, a feature of modern warfare now appearing for the first time in history. With their glasses, from the commanding eminence of El Poso Hill, crowned with the ruined buildings of an abandoned plantation, the American officers could distinctly see the Spaniards at work on their intrenchments a mile and a half away, and note the ever-lengthening lines of freshly excavated earth.
But for six days the army waited, and its artillery, which was expected to seriously impair, if not utterly destroy the effectiveness of those ever-growing earthworks, still reposed peacefully on board the ships that had brought it to Cuba. Only two light batteries had been landed, and on the sixth day after Las Guasimas these reached the front. At the same time came word that General Pando with 5000 Spanish reinforcements was nearing the besieged city from the north. In that direction, and only three miles from Santiago, lay the fortified village of Caney, held by a strong force of Spanish troops. If it were captured, Pando's advance might be cut off. So General Shafter, coming ashore for the first time a week after the landing of his troops, planned a forward movement with this object in view. Lawton's division was to capture Caney, and then swing round so as to sever all outside communication with Santiago. While he was doing this, demonstrations that should deter the Spaniards from sending an additional force in that direction were to be made against San Juan and Aguadores. These movements were to occupy one day, and on the next the reunited army was to attack the entire line of the San Juan ridge. In the mean time no one knew anything of the valley lying between this strongly protected ridge and those who proposed to capture it.