known Northern universities by a Ja some years ago. Being asked how with the institution, the Japanese r admirable. The teaching is so ba compelled to do all our own thin President's object was to say just Congress and the people to thinking not enough to show them either wha think or what he thinks himself, he to a nicety.

On the primary aspects of the ques the President is clear enough. He d to tell us, in strong and unequivocal we all knew already. He repeats t of the barbarities of the present stru again, and, it must be admitted, w energy which the present critical situ what both he and his predecessor said, that these horrors must come the subject of the destruction of the speaks out in plain language. His "the destruction of the Maine, by wh cause, is a patent and impressive p of things in Cuba that is intolera right.

There is one other portion of the message which is sufficiently clear and strong. That is the part relating to the recognition of the belligerency of the insurgents or the independence of the so-called Cuban Republic. The President reiterates the reasons that have been heretofore urged, upon general principles, against either of these steps. These reasons are, to our mind, conclusive; and, what is much more to the purpose, they are likely to have a very powerful influence upon Congress on account of a circumstance which has come, one is tempted to say providentially, to the President's aid. What no amount of the severest logic could have accomplished, the voluble Mr. Rubens has brought about by a little offhand talk. It can hardly be doubted that the disposition now manifested by the war wing of the Republican party in the House to agree with the President in his opposition to the recognition of the present insurrectionary government is traceable to the wholesome shock given to Americans generally by the Rubens manifesto. If we are to intervene in Cuba, we should intervene with our hands free, and not with our action subordinated to that of a set of guerilla leaders about whom we know little or nothing, whose title to the control of Cuba we have no ground for asserting, and for whose humane or competent use of that control we are utterly unable to vouch. These elementary facts of the situation were brought to the front with great vividness by Mr. Rubens' manifesto, and have come powerfully to the aid of the President's strong argument, written before the Cuban "counsel " had been heard from.

So much for what we have called the primary aspects of the question. But when it comes to the intricacies of it, the perplexities which confront us at the moment, the character of the diplomatic transactions which have led up to the present situation of affairs, the demands that have been made upon Spain, the points that have been granted and those that have been refused, the value or significance of such concessions as have been made, the light thrown upon these things by the President is very scanty. And the same is true as to the steps it is his desire to take if entrusted with the discretionary power for which he asks. His intention has to be gathered by inference from a phrase picked out here or there. In an able article in one of our New York contemporaries, for instance, we observe that much is made of the circumstance that the President, in speaking of the kind of government of which it is our duty to secure the establishment in Cuba, defines it not only as a stable government capable of maintaining order, but also as one capable" of observing its international obligations"; the argument being to the effect that, since none but an independent government can have international obligations, this expression pledges Mr. McKinley to secure the independence of Cuba if he is entrusted with the power he asks for. But upon such a slender thread as this, Congress will certainly not hang any issue so weighty; and what little strength there might be in the view is taken from it when we recall that the phrase is sufficiently accounted for as a mere allusion to the failure of the Spanish Government to prevent the destruction of the Maine, which had

of the message the President refers to revious answer in these words:

is last overture in the direction of immediate its disappointing reception by Spain, the Execu-rought to the end of his effort.

ostscript he says, referring to the suspenostilities:

measure attains a successful result, then our as a Christian, peace-loving people will be realt fails, it will be only another justification for plated action.

anguage means anything, it means that dent considers it our duty to give the susof hostilities a trial, and see whether it will ithout forcible intervention on our part, 1 and final termination of hostilities and ablishment of a stable government" which burden of the main body of the message. so, we are no longer to regard the reception overtures by Spain as "disappointing"; dingly it is difficult to see on what ground alled upon at the present moment to anSpain and the world that the United States has authorized the President to use the s of the country at his discretion, to enforce nds. According to the body of the mes