234 



CUBA. 



pulsory. The National Assembly is to meet 

 biennially. The High Commissioner was forbid- 

 den for two years to contract a loan or to im- 

 pose new taxation. At the suggestion of Kussia 

 it was decided by the occupying powers to sub- 

 mit the Constitution to the revision of the 

 diplomatic corps at Rome, Admiral Canevaro, 

 who had been the chief in command of the inter- 

 national squadron, now being Italian Foreign 

 Minister. The draft of the Constitution, as 

 amended by the Assembly, was passed unani- 

 mously on March 1(5. The prohibition against 

 loans "was waived in respect of one of 4,000,000 

 francs to reimburse the powers, who promised 

 to advance that sum in order to cover past defi- 

 cits and to procure timber for the rebuilding of 

 the demolished villages. Later the Government 

 was authori/ed to borrow 5,000,000 francs more 

 at 3 per cent., to be used in making advances to 

 the peasantry, both Christian and Mohammedan, 

 to enable them to re-establish their homes. The 

 representatives of the four powers objected to 

 certain articles of the Constitution tending to 

 restrict the free exercise of the Moslem religion 

 and the legitimate rights of the Sultan, articles 

 which had the effect of increasing the exodus of 

 Mohammedans; also to articles infringing the 

 rights secured to foreigners by the capitulations, 

 and to one conferring on the Assembly power to 

 elect a successor to Prince Georgios and to revise 

 the Constitution in case of a vacancy. The Coun- 

 cil of the High Commissioner was constituted on 

 April 30 as follows: Education and Public Wor- 

 ship, M. Yamalaki, M. Sphakianaki having de- 

 clined the post; Justice, M. Venezelos; Interior, 

 M. Koundouros; Finance, M. Foumis; Posts and 

 Telegraphs and Public Safety, Hassan Skylianiki 

 Bey. M. de Blonay, the Swiss financial adviser 

 of the Prince, was not made one of the council- 

 ors. The administration of the districts, pre- 

 viously under the jurisdiction of France, Great 

 Britain, Italy, and Russia, was handed over to 

 the new civil authorities in July. 



CUBA, an island of the West Indies, formerly 

 a Spanish colony; since December, 1898, in the 

 military occupation of the United States. The 

 treaty of peace by which Spain relinquished her 

 authority over the island was signed by the 

 Peace Commissioners at Paris on Dec. 10, 1898, 

 and was ratified by the United States Senate on 

 Feb. and by trie Queen Regent of Spain on 

 March 17, 1899. The United States Congress af- 

 firmed the independence of the island as a pre- 

 liminary to armed intervention, yet after the 

 surrender of the Spanish posts to United States 

 officers a military government was established by 

 orders of the President of the United States until 

 such time as the Cuban people shall organize a 

 stable government. The United States Govern- 

 ment meanwhile assumes responsibility for the 

 preservation of order and the protection of life 

 and property. A military governor general was 

 appointed, with residence at Havana, and a mili- 

 tary governor, who shall receive instructions from 

 the Governor General for each of the seven mili- 

 tary departments. Major-Gen. John R. Brooke 

 was appointed Governor General; Brig.-Gen. 

 Leonard Wood, governor of the province of San- 

 tiago; Brig.-Gen. L. H. Carpenter, governor of 

 the province of Puerto Principe; Brig.-Gen. J. C. 

 Bates, governor of the province of Santa Clara; 

 .-Gen. James H. Wilson, governor of the 

 province of Matanzas; Major-Gen. Fitzhugh Lee, 



the United States volunteers, governor of the 

 province of Havana and also of the province of 

 Pmar del Rio; and Brig.-Gen. William Ludlow 

 governor of the city of Havana. 



Area and Population. Cuba is a narrow 

 island, 720 miles long, with an average width of 

 80 miles, hot and unhealthful in the low coast 

 regions, but temperate in the mountainous in- 

 terior. About a tenth of the surface has been 

 brought under cultivation. Extensive areas have 

 never been explored, and the primeval forest cov- 

 ers 20,000 square miles. The total area is esti- 

 mated at 45,872 square miles. The population at 

 the census of 1887 was 1,631,687, of whom 528,998 

 were negroes and mulattoes. Three fourths of 

 the population were totally illiterate, yet there 

 are 843 public schools, besides the state-supported 

 university at Havana. Compulsory education 

 was enacted in 1880. The population of Havana, 

 the capital, was 200,000 in 1894; of Santiago de 

 Cuba, 71,307; Puerto Principe, 46,641; Holguin, 

 34,767; Sancti Spiritu, 32,608; Cienfuegos, in 1892, 

 27,430; Cardenas, 23,680. The inhabitants of 

 Cuba are divided into the whites, the colored, 

 the blacks, and the Chinese. The whites are 

 Creoles or natives of Cuba, who are mostly plant- 

 ers, farmers, professional people, and traders; 

 Spaniards, about 30,000 in number, residing 

 mostly in Havana, and constituting to a great 

 extent the commercial and capitalist class and 

 that of the skilled artisans; Canary Islanders, 

 who have been brought over to work on the 

 plantations; and various foreigners. The ne- 

 groes are mostly descendants of slaves imported 

 from the west coast of Africa during this cen- 

 tury, and are therefore less civilized and ambi- 

 tious than the negroes of the United States, but 

 they are hardier and stronger and more willing 

 to perform hard and steady labor; the mulattoes 

 and colored, furnishing the domestic servants, are 

 about equal in number to the blacks ; the Chinese, 

 about 20,000 in number, were brought into Cuba 

 after the suppression of the slave trade in 1869 

 to labor as coolies on the plantations, but their 

 treatment was so severe that the Chinese Gov- 

 ernment refused to allow further importations. 



Finances. The revenue for 1898 was esti- 

 mated at 24,755,760 pesos, of which 11,890,000 

 pesos were from customs duties. The ordinary 

 expenditure was put down at 26,119,124 pesos, of 

 which 12,602,216 pesos were required for the debt, 

 5,896,741 pesos for the Ministry of War, and 

 4,036,088 pesos for the Ministry of the Interior. 

 The extraordinary revenue and expenditure was 

 estimated at 80,000,000 pesos. 



The Cuban debt was calculated to amount to 

 70,220,000 sterling in 1896, including 10,000,- 

 000 due the Spanish Government. By the issue 

 of the war this debt remains an obligation of 

 Spain, but Cuba, which had received practically 

 no benefit from the loans, contracted mainly for 

 military repression, is relieved of the whole of it. 



Commerce and Production. The soil of 

 Cuba is so exceedingly fertile that sugar cane has 

 been grown in the same fields for a century with- 

 out the aid of fertilizers. The mountains are of 

 coral formation, and the lowlands, especially in 

 the east, are composed largely of fossil remain^ 

 of marine fauna rich in lime and phosphates. 

 Sugar is the chief product, and after that to- 

 bacco, which is manufactured into the finest 

 cigars that are smoked in Europe or America, or 

 exported to the United States to be made up 

 there into cigars. It is the established type of 

 cigar tobacco, and can not yet be grown else- 

 where of a quality equal to the Cuban tobacco, 

 especially that of the Vuelta Abajo district of 

 Pinar del Rio. In this western province most 

 of the tobacco is raised, while the central prov- 

 inces are given up mostly to the cultivation of 

 sugar cane. Coffee was formerly a more impor- 



