PRELIMINARY STATEMENT.

In order to meet the demand in the United States for information regarding Cuba, its population, resources, products, climate, etc., the Provisional Governor of the Republic authorized the Director of the Cuban Census of 1907, to prepare a compendium containing data compiled from the census reports of 1899 and 1907, and other reliable sources.

Under this authorization the information contained in the present volume is presented. The data have been taken, principally, from the Cuban Census reports referred to above, and from the Handbook on Cuba prepared by Señor Gonzalo de Quesada, Minister of Cuba to the United States, which was published in 1905 by the International Bureau of the American Republics, at Washington, D. C.

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GENERAL DESCRIPTION.

LOCATION AND AREA.

Cuba is the largest, most populous, and most western island of the Antilles. Shaped like the arc of a circle, with its convex side to the north, it extends from 74° to 85° west longitude and from 19° 40′ to 23° 33′ north latitude. It is about 100 miles from Florida, being separated from it by the strait of the same name. About 50 miles to the east is Haiti; about 85 miles to the south is Jamaica; and about 130 miles to the west is the Yucatan peninsula. Its length is about 730 miles (1,594 kilometers); its breadth differs, ranging from 160 miles (200 kilometers), in Oriente province, to 22 miles (40 kilometers), in Habana province. Its total area is 44,164 square miles, of which Cuba occupies 41,634 square miles, the Isle of Pines, 1,180, and the other islands and keys, 1,350. Cuba is larger than Portugal, Belgium, or the Netherlands, and somewhat smaller than Pennsylvania or Virginia.

From a military point of view Cuba occupies a strong strategic position, controlling the entrance of the Gulf of Mexico by the Strait of Florida, the Windward Passage to the Caribbean Sea between Cuba and Haiti, and the Yucatan Channel connecting the Gulf of Mexico with the Caribbean Sea. The first and last of these are the only entrances to the Gulf of Mexico, which is thus controlled completely by the Island of Cuba.

The government of Cuba has jurisdiction not only over the island of that name, but also over the Isle of Pines, lying directly to the south of it, and more than a thousand islets and reefs scattered along its northern and southern coasts.

TOPOGRAPHY.

The north coast is for the most part steep and rocky, and, in the provinces of Matanzas, Santa Clara, and Camagüey, it is bordered by lines of islands and reefs of coral formation, through which passage is extremely intricate and difficult. These islands are low, are in the main covered with mangrove forests, and contain few inhabitants.

The coast in the western part of the island is low, the bluffs ranging about 100 feet in height in Pinar del Río and rising gradually eastward. In Matanzas they reach 500 feet in altitude. In Santa Clara and Camagüey they are lower, but in Oriente the coast is abrupt and rugged, being almost mountainous and rising in a succession of terraces.

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