Page images
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

less I go straight up." I asked, "How do you do it?" He replied, "Why, twice twelve is twenty-four, 2 x 13=26, 2×14= 28," and he went on until he reached twice nineteen is thirty-eight, evidently having found out that the two table up to twelve was made by adding two each time; so he experimented up to forty and asked me as above. This is the way he has experimented and found out much that he knows about numbers.

[blocks in formation]

his understanding of his own nature is pretty accurate.

Bad temper? Half dead. Carelessness? Nearly dead. Selfishness? Half dead. Laziness? Dead. Disobedience? Dead.

Lies? Dead. Untidiness? Half dead. Exaggeration? Pretty nearly dead. Fear? Half dead. Love of praise ? 1-16 to kill. Boastfulness? Dead. Concealment (which he called sneakfulness)? 1-100 to kill: nearly dead. Bitter words? 1-1000 to kill. Hate? Quite dead. Anger? 1-10 to kill. Cruelty? Dead. I can't? 1-1,000,000,000 to kill. Delay not? Pretty nearly dead: half to be killed. Bashfulness? Nearly dead. Proudfulness (his own term)? Dead.

HIS EXPLANATION OF THE PARTS OF AN ENGINE.

66

November 6, 1896. -He said to-day, "What does atmosphere mean?" I said, "The air around us." Then he said: Does the air mean atmosphere, or does atmosphere mean air? I thought atmosphere meant a kind of sickness. Oh, it's esterics [hysterics] I meant-what I was thinking of. Why do they call it 'esterics? They might call it can't stop it.""

I heard him say to-day to a little girl whose word he doubted, "Honest and truthly?"

November 24, 1896.-Today he asked his mother whether the germs of

whooping cough got themselves (meaning the cough by "it"). She said, "No." He said, "Then how do they give it to us?"

We have been reading a story in which the giants

He said, from memory, that the fairies to help you kill the giants were loveful

HIS PET BUTTERFLY FEEDING ON HIS FINGER.

ness, courage, self-control, obedience, honesty, patience, good temper, kindness, diligence, courtesy, gratitude, and

[graphic]

persever

[blocks in formation]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small]

66

234

234

468 addition.

234

2

this need. One day I saw him slip a cover over some of the letters on the upper row of the chart, by hanging an envelope by its flap on the upper edge of the chart. I asked him why he did it. He replied, "I wanted it so I can learn the letters without seeing them-so," illustrating by first covering a and b and then writing the letters, then moving the envelope along over e and d, and so on. April 23, 1897.

He said to his mo

тво

[blocks in formation]

2) 468 multiplication.

234 division.

[blocks in formation]

A LESSON AND ITS RESULT: EARLY ATTEMPTS AT
SUBTRACTION, DIVISION, AND MULTIPLICATION.

July 21,1897.-The accompanying illustration shows one of his efforts to understand the principle underlying addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, after I had explained to him with

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

"W

A CENTURY OF CUBAN DIPLOMACY-1795 TO 1895.

BY PROFESSOR ALBERT BUSHNELL HART.

HETHER the West Indies are naturally parts of the North American continent is a question of curious speculation," said Thomas Pownall in 1780; "the whole must in the course of events become parts of the great North American domain." That a century and a fifth have passed without the fulfilment of this prophecy is a marvel in the his tory of a changeful world; and it is the purpose of this article to show why Cuba, the most valuable of the West Indies, has so long lain within the boundary of the Spanish Empire.

What Cuba has been and is, all the world knows the first important land to be discovered by Europeans; with its neighbor, Porto Rico, the last remnant

VOL. XCVII-No. 577.-18"

of a mighty Spanish empire in America. How Cuba has been governed and exploited for four centuries is a matter of history; the colonial policy of Spain has from the beginning, and in all her colonies, aimed to throw the profits of colonial trade into the hands of home merchants. The rigor of the system has defeated its own ends, for it invited evasion; and corruption of the colonial official has from time immemorial been a part of the foreign merchant's expense account. Yet from the first one colony has furnished enough taxes and customs to give a large revenue to the mother-country; that colony is Cuba.

For this tropical island has the natural elements of great wealth; its area of

43,000 square miles has a sea-coast of over 2000 miles; it is accessible in nearly every part, and stands at the crossways of two international highways, from the United States to eastern South America, and from Europe to the Gulf of Mexico. Besides its staple crops of sugar and tobacco, it has valuable timber, fruit, and minerals, and its exports were in 1894 worth more than a hundred million dollars. Politically it is now the only West India island of consequence; and it has steadily increased in population and importance.

As for the Spaniards in Cuba, they are not governors, but masters; they have held by military garrison, and they are a race not much disturbed by human suffering. They were worse slave-masters even than Anglo-Saxons; they have for ages been accustomed to a vindictiveness in war which finds vent in the massacre of prisoners and the pillage of non-combatants. Their system of legal procedure, like that of all Latin nations, shocks the Anglo-Saxon by its harshness to the suspect and its cruelty to the convicted. Colonial authorities have a despotic power, and they cannot be effectively controlled from Spain. The Cubans are of the same race, but in all the Spanish colonies the native Spaniard has held himself, and is held by the home government, above the colonist whose father was a Spaniard. Under such circumstances, the administration of Cuba has always been exasperating to neighboring peoples, and most of all to the United States.

Political and race elements in Cuba have been much confused, owing to the negro population, and to a division of sentiment among white Cubans. Up to 1878 six classes might be distinguished in the population-Spaniards, white Cubans adherent to the Spaniards, white Cubans opposed to the administration, mulattoes (many of them owners of property), free blacks, and slaves. In 1895 there were but two distinct classes-a Spanish party of Spaniards and Cubans, and a Cuban party. Throughout the century, how ever, others besides Spaniards and the Cubans have taken part in Cuban affairs. Professional Spanish - American revolutionists, such as Santa Anna and Lopez, have planned to rouse the sluggish Cubans; for many years there has been a class of Cubans who have naturalized in the United States and then returned to

Cuba to live; and a small but ardent class of native Cubans, often Spanish subjects, has made the United States a base of revolutionary schemes. Finally, in all the Cuban troubles there have been plenty of Americans born who were eager to join in expeditions to Cuba, and thus in war on Spain.

Diplomatically speaking, Cuba has been not a subject, but an object; it has no authority to negotiate or settle any foreign question. Cuban diplomacy is only Spanish diplomacy at long range, for the Captains-General have great authority to disturb foreign residents and to take foreign property, but none to redress grievances or to make indemnities. Every disputed question is settled-or, rather, is put off-at Madrid, and impatient AngloSaxons get weary of the Spanish Foreign Office, where everything is promised and nothing is done.

One reason for habitual diplomatic delays is that Spain has been for a century a declining power, and takes refuge in procrastination. The Spaniards governed ill in 1795, but at least they governed widely; from the Mississippi River to the Pacific, from Oregon to Cape Horn, from the boundary of Georgia to the Dutch in Surinam, from the La Plata southward-coasts, islands, and interior were Spanish. Yet that seeming empire was already shattered; and in the first third of the century the Spanish continental empire crumbled away, till Spain remained an American power only in retaining Cuba and Porto Rico.

The Spanish nation was still warlike and tenacious; it lost its colonies not because they were strong, but because the home country was decaying. In 1795 Spain was swept into the maelstrom of the Napoleonic wars, and the French treated her in succession as an enemy, ally, dupe, dependent province, and despairing rebel. When in 1807 the King of Spain was put under lock and key by Napoleon, the Spanish colonies began to take charge of their own affairs, and they never for a moment acknowledged French domination. In 1814 they returned to a nominal allegiance to Spain; but they had tasted the sweets of independence; they broke loose again, and by 1823 Spain had nothing left on the continent of America except an empty claim to sovereignty and the two castles of Callao and San Juan de Ulloa.

Since that time the hold of Spain on Cuba has always been that of a harsh administration in a disaffected province. The Spanish principle has been that of "stick fast"-to grant nothing in privileges, reforms, territory, or humane treatment, except under pressure. If the Cubans wanted a better government the only method that they knew has been to revolt. Under these conditions Cuba would long since have ceased to be Spanish had there not been a third element in the problem-the will and the diplomacy of the United States of America.

Said John Quincy Adams in 1823: "From a multitude of considerations Cuba has become an object of transcendent importance to the commercial and political interests of our Union. Its commanding position.... the nature of its productions and of its wants, furnishing the supplies and needing the returns of a commerce immensely profitable and mutually beneficial, give it an importance in the sum of our national interests with which that of no other foreign territory can be compared, and little inferior to that which binds the different members of this Union together."

The commercial and military reasons upon which Adams dwelt have grown stronger in the last three-quarters of a century, for trade has advanced, and the enormous development of the Mississippi Valley and of the Gulf coast, and the likelihood of an Isthmian canal, give new strategic importance to the holder of Cuba. A strong national sympathy for the Cubans has also shown itself whenever, as in 1822-6, 1849-51, and 1868-78, the Cubans have seemed likely to throw off the Spanish rule.

Another factor is the land-hunger of the people of the United States - their natural, hearty, and irrepressible desire to make a large country larger; their conviction that Anglo-Saxon civilization must prevail over Latin civilization where they come in conflict. Since so much of our present territory has fallen from or been wrested from the hands of Spain or Spain's successors, perhaps we feel that the reversion of Cuba is ours.

With so many strong interests in Cuba, it was long ago predicted that the United States would seize it; but a study of the records of the century's diplomacy shows that, on the contrary, conservative prin

ciples have long ago got a lodgement in the national consciousness, and have held the nation back from interference. Toward Spain, for instance, the United States has been usually friendly; and we have understood that no third power could take Cuba if Spain were upheld there; but it has been a general belief that Spanish rule would eventually break down by its own weight. Toward other powers the United States has always said "hands off" whenever they showed an inclination for Cuba. Toward the Cubans there has been the feeling that in any quarrel with Spain they must be in the right, but that they could not give assurance of a permanent, orderly government. In any commotion in Cuba the rights of Americans are to be vigorously protected, and no other nations have any right to take part in the controversy. As for annexation, as often as an opportunity to acquire Cuba has come, the nation has deliberately refused.

It is the purpose of this article to show how these various principles have grown up during the hundred years from the first Spanish treaty in 1795 to the second Cuban rebellion of 1895. The century's diplomacy may be conveniently divided. as follows: (1) From 1795 to 1807 we desired friendship and commerce with all the Spanish dominions, including Cuba. (2) In 1807-9 we feared the annexation of the whole Spanish Empire to France. (3) In 1819-26 we feared the annexation of Cuba by England. (4) From 1826 to 1845 we feared and probably prevented the independence of the Cubans. (5) From 1848 to 1861 successive administrations feared both Spanish and Cuban mastery, and strove to annex the island. (6) In the insurrection of 1868-78 the first care of our government was the protection of its own citizens, and its second interest was the stopping of a devastating civil war; though annexation seemed possible, it was put aside. (7) From 1878 to 1895 the United States strove to extend its commerce with Cuba and to protect investors, without questioning Spain's control.

No one can study Cuban diplomacy without coming to strong convictions; but it is not the purpose of this article to applaud, to defend, or to criticise, our national policy. It is the historian's duty to relate facts in their logical connection; the reader's privilege to make deductions for himself; the statesman's difficult task

« PreviousContinue »