1901 



GLEANINGS iN BEE CtTLttflJE. 



811 



RAMBLE 211. 



A Trip to the Isle of Pines. 



HY KAMBLRK. 



While on the voj'age from New Orleans to 

 Havana I made the acquaintance of a par- 

 ty of Iowa people. In this party were the 

 heads of fifteen families, and a few of the 

 heads had their entire families and the 



keenan's apiaky. 



hired man with them. These people were 

 the brawn and sinew of Northern Iowa. 

 They were anticipating- fair climes and 

 good fortune. Verily these farmers, with 

 their high sense of right, are the salt of the 

 earth. They were upon their journey to 

 the Isle of Pines, where an advance party 

 had purchased 20,000 acres of land, and 

 the next thing on the program was to settle 

 that tract and make it jiroduce much fruit 

 where none was produced before. 



The reason why these good people chose 

 the Isle of Pines for a colony is that they 

 have an abiding faith that the 

 island will become a portion of 

 the United States. They claim 

 that, according to the treaty 

 of Paris, it is already ceded to 

 the United States. The fa- 

 mous Piatt resolution also em- 

 bodies this in the provisions. 

 Rut the Cuban convention left 

 1 he matter open for further con- 

 sideration. These people are 

 SI) full of faith that they will 

 be under the stars and stripes 

 that they have named their 

 new colonj' Columbia. 



I became greatly interested 

 in these people; and, finding 

 a couple that had kept bees 

 in Iowa, and were acquainted 

 with Gleanings, I resolved to 

 embrace the first opportunity 

 to visit the island. 



When I was visiting Mr. 

 Moe he was entertaining the 



same desire ; and in due time, when there 

 was a let-up in the honey-flow, we two 

 turned our steps southward. We expected 

 to have several bee-men with us; but busi- 

 ness matters interfered, and it was finally 

 we two. We were advised by real-estate 

 men and others to take our bicycles, for 

 wheel-riding was practicable on the island, 

 and horse-hire expensive, and therefore we 

 took our wheels. 



When leaving Havana bj' 

 rail we find matters a little 

 peculiar. It is first, second, 

 and third class fare and coach- 

 es; but it was not so much in 

 the classes as it was in the 

 personclle. For instance, third- 

 class fare for the 30 miles from 

 Havana to Batabano is $1.04, 

 while for our aristocratic 

 wheels we each had to pay 

 $1.50. 



It is worth while to ride in a 

 third-class car, as there is 

 such a variety of subjects to 

 study — whites, blacks, Creoles, 

 a jolly crowd too. Pigs and 

 chickens are carried around 

 by hand so much in Cuba that 

 the matter is regulated on the 

 train. A person is allowed to 

 carry one rooster in a first- 

 class car, and in a third-class 

 car half a dozen chickens and 

 one pig ditto. A Cuban behind me had two 

 chickens with legs tied. The black man 

 in front of me had something portly in a 

 sack. It might have been a pig. And, just 

 as sure as you live, after all is said and 

 done in the States about the canteen in our 

 army, here was virtually a canteen on the 

 train. Here was a cupboard with an ar- 

 ray of bottles, and the lad who dispensed 

 oranges and sandwiches passed the bottle 

 to whoever desired a drink. These people 

 confine their drink mostly to wine, and 

 they do not get into the gutter on that quite 



FOLKSDOKK'S home and AI'IAKY. 



