THE CUBA REVIEW 



13 



Big Job for Engineers. — Of course, the 

 arm}' engineers will do their best to carry 

 out the wishes of Congress, twice ex- 

 pressed, that an effort shall be made to 

 raise the wreck of the battleship Maine 

 from tlie bottom of Havana harbor, where 

 it lies embedded in twenty-seven feet of 

 slime and ooze. But the engineers are 

 frank to confess that they do not know 

 the extent of the task before them, and 

 they believe that the $300,000 appropriation 

 will not be sufficient. 



The only known method of raising a ship 

 in the condition of the Maine is to sur- 

 round her with a cofferdam from which the 

 water can be pumped, allowing the hull 

 to be drained and the holes in her bottom 

 closed. 



Engineering history fails to disclose a 

 cofferdam of the mammoth proportions 

 which would be required to inclose the 

 Maine, for it must be as long as a city 

 Ijlock and as high as a five or six story 

 Iniilding — that is, from the bottom of the 

 timbers to the top. Its cost would probably 

 exceed the total appropriation. So what 

 the engineers will probably do is to make 

 a thorough preliminary investigation. This 

 will cost a good deal of money and occupy 

 much time. 



In fact it is reasonably certain that 

 Congress will again be in session before 

 the final results are known and the en- 

 gineers can tell just how much money it 

 will cost to raise the ship. Then, if Con- 

 gress should decide to supply the defi- 

 ciency in the appropriation the wreckers 

 will go ahead with their work. Other- 

 wise it seems probable that the Maine will 

 be broken up and removed piecemeal from 

 the bottom of the harbor. — Washington 

 (D. C.) Star. 



The Reciprocity Dividends — "When the 

 reciprocal treaty- with Cuba was urged," 

 says the N. Y. Press, "we heard the 

 argument that a sure way to get Cuba to 

 buy from us was for us to give her a 

 better and bigger selling market in the 

 United States for her products," but "the 

 promised Cuban reciprocity dividends are 

 not yet forthcoming. It finds that ten years 

 ago the trade balance was in favor of Cuba 

 to the extent of $5,000,000 while in 1909 

 it was $63,000,000. Cuba bought $46,- 

 000,000 worth from her neighbor in that 

 period and sold 109,000,000 dollars worth. 



"No one can blame Cuba," it says further, 

 "for buying like other countries in the 

 cheapest market. It is what always happens 

 in international trade, but it is the economic 

 idiocy of the common garden variety of 

 reciprocity that a thing which is supposed 

 to be given to you without your getting it 

 as in the case of Cuba, is of any value to 

 you." 



Influence of the Krag.- — It was not be- 

 cause he could not have everything his own 

 way, but because he could not, with the 

 slightest respect for his authority, accept 

 Mr. Taft's proposals that Mr. Palma re- 

 signed, says the Havana Telegraph. The 

 badness of Mr Taft's judgment, however, 

 has always been patent to the world, and 

 that the Cuban question could have been 

 settled much more wisely and permanently 

 with the Krag, wich will go off, than with 

 the smile which won't come oft", is no less 

 certain. Uncle Sam will know better next 

 time. 



Editor Predicts Crisis — El Comercio, an 

 influential paper of Havana, sees great 

 danger in the shooting affair in the Cuban 

 House when Sehor Mignel was shot at by 

 Manuel Lores, another representative. It 

 said on June 28 : "We are really passing 

 through a deep and perilous crisis. Rumors 

 emanating from the highest political circles 

 foretell a quickly approaching period of 

 fearful violences. To the calm observer 

 of our public life it is plain that the pre- 

 vailing general uneasiness portends future 

 evils. 



"The revolver reigns supreme ; violence 

 is everywhere. The phantom of a new re- 

 volt is rising again to sink the Cuban 

 personality in the shadow of a foreign 

 intervention." 



Cuba May Fix Steel Prices — Bishop 

 Knight, the Episcopal Bishop of Cuba, said 

 in a newspaper interview in New York on 

 July 11th that American mining companies 

 are extremely active on the island. He 

 c[uoted Charles M. Schwab as saying that 

 within a short time Cubanores will fix the 

 price of steel in America. 



Regarding religious and educational ad- 

 vances the Bishop was almost as enthu- 

 siastic. He pointed out that many busi- 

 ness corporations are helping to establish 

 churches and to support ministers and 

 teachers. 



"Sugar and some other industries of 

 Cuba compel the colonization in remote re- 

 gions of employees with their families. It 

 is one thing to depend for labor upon wan- 

 dering Spaniards, here to-day and gone to- 

 morrow. It is another thing to have steady 

 and prosperous help. The only way to 

 have the latter is to provide, so these cor- 

 porations find, good homes, churches and 

 especially good schools," said the Bishop. 



The annexation of Cuba would inject 

 into our citizenship more than 2,000,000 

 people of alien race and tongue, of whom 

 a larger percentage are colored than in our 

 own southern states, and less than half 

 whose adult males can read. — Nezv York 

 World. 



