the Senate he said: "I have a right to speak. I give to you a message from silent lips; and if I held my peace when such a question is under discussion, if I refrained from testifying to the atrocious cruelties inflicted upon the people of Cuba, I should falter in my trust; I should fail in my duty to one whose heart was broken while a nation hesitated."

He was one of many whose voice was for intervention, even though intervention should mean war. Without regard to party, the people of the United States, more unitedly than they ever had been before on a question of such import, urged Congress and the President to move for the relief of Cuba. But the executive end of the Government was-as it should have been-conservative to the last. There was to be no blind rushing into war, no official action which should precipitate a conflict between nations, if any less costly course could be found. In the very midst of that pause, when popular clamor and administrative reserve held equally balanced through the midwinter season, came the one astounding event which swelled the popular clamor to a roar, and stilled utterly the voice of caution.

The Maine was blown up!

Lying in the harbor of a nation still "friendly," in the "noon of the night," an American battle-ship on a visit of courtesy was destroyed by a submarine mine in the supposed security of Havana harbor. Captain Sigsbee, of the sunken craft, appealed to the American people for a suspension of judgment until an investigation could be had. But the nation had decided. The case had been tried. The Spaniards were found guilty in the court of American common sense. The Maine was blown up on the night of February 15, 1898. April 20 President McKinley cabled to Minister Woodford, at Madrid, the ultimatum of the United States: Spain must retire from Cuba and Cuban waters within thirty days, or take the consequences. The next day, before he could present the demand of his Government, General Woodford was handed his passports, by order of the ministry at Madrid, and thus officially terminated the friendly relations of the two governments. It was the final act in a remarkable succession of events which proved Spain's contempt for the United Stateswhich illustrated her remarkable ignorance both of the power against which she flung her

self and the result that was morally certain to follow.

April 25 Congress, responding to a special message from the President, declared war with Spain to be in existence, and that it had existed since April 21, when Spain herself had severed relations with our Government. That same day the President's proclamation was given to the world. And the end for which so many forces of humanity, of justice and of national and individual interest had labored through fifty years was accomplished. The protest of a Christian nation against such savagery as heathens have not equaled was recorded.

It is a little curious to reflect just here on the service Mr. Roosevelt had rendered his country in the short year of his labor in the navy department. So far as the army was concerned, there was a distressing state of "unpreparedness.' The word is not agreeable to the ear, but it expresses the situation wonderfully well. So far as numbers went, the army was wholly inadequate. A new force had to be secured. Volunteers must be called for. They must be armed, clothed, equipped, paid and drilled. Not one step had been taken in preparation for the event