CUBAN CITIES: HAVANA 109 



plain, spreads out in a beautiful picture. The yellow-col- 

 ored houses with their red-tiled roofs, mottled by green 

 trees, and the glaring white rocks and surf, make a bright 

 and airy picture in the tropical sunlight. The harbor is a 

 quadrangle with its four sides indented by land, so that it 

 has the outline of a dried hide. The upper left-hand arm 

 of this, as one looks out toward the sea, may be imagined 

 to represent the long and narrow outlet to the sea ; the up- 

 per right-hand limb, a shallow and sickly swamp projecting 

 to the northeast ; the lower right-hand limb, the embayment, 

 or ensenada, of Atares. Havana's water-front borders the 

 western side, and Regla, the Brooklyn of Havana, lies 

 opposite. 



The bay was once much larger than at present, and is 

 here and there fringed by plains of old alluvial sediment, 

 upon one of which the city was first built. This beautiful 

 landlocked body of water is alive with shipping. Steamers 

 and war-vessels of all nationalities ride at anchor in the 

 middle of it. The masts forming a forest on the eastern 

 side are those of sailing-vessels, largely American, loading 

 their cargoes of sugar at the wharves of Regla. There 

 are many small local sailing-vessels, while hundreds of 

 dories or feluccas with many-colored sails are constantly 

 passing from place to place, carrying passengers from city 

 to steamer or across to the fortifications. Large ferry- 

 boats also cross between Havana and Regla. In the latter 

 city are located most of the sugar warehouses, the bull- 

 ring, and the principal railway-station. For a mile or more 

 between this village and Morro Castle the precipitous cliffs 

 of the east side of the harbor are surmounted by fortifica- 

 tions, known as the Cabanas, built of white masonry. In 

 the southern end of the bay, where it is broadest and most 

 shallow, rises a conical hill, Atares by name, which is also 

 surmounted by antique battlements. Here Crittenden and 

 other Americans of the ill-fated expedition of 1851 were 

 shot. The Havana side of the harbor is bordered by a low 

 and continuous sea-wall, with landing-steps protected by 



