232 CUBA 



still subjected, and the white race of this or any other country 

 has furnished few more exalted examples of patriotism than the 

 mulattoes Toussaint L'Ouverture or Antonio Maceo. 



The experiences of the past have shown that there is no possi- 

 bility of Cuba becoming Africanized without constant renewal 

 by immigration. The 520,000 colored people, one-half of whom 

 are mulattoes, represent the diminished survival of over 1,000,000 

 African slaves that have been imported. The Spaniards had the 

 utmost difficulty in acclimatizing and establishing this race upon 

 the island. While Jamaica and other AVest India islands are a 

 most prolific negro-breeding ground, the race could not be made 

 to thrive in Cuba. 



Those persons who undertake to say what the social conditions 

 of Cuba would be under independence should look elsewhere than 

 to Haiti for a comparison. Even were the population of Cuba 

 black, as it is not, the island of Jamaica would afford a much bet- 

 ter contrast. This island, only about one-tenth the size of Cuba, 

 is composed of mountainous lands like the least fertile portion of 

 Cuba; has a population wherein the blacks outnumber the whites 

 44 to 1 ; yet, under the beneficent influence of the English colo- 

 nial system, its civilization is one of which any .land might 

 be proud, possessing highways, sanitation, and other public im- 

 provements even superior to those of our own country, and such 

 as have never been permitted by Spain in Cuba. Even though 

 Cuba should become a second Haiti, which it could not, there 

 is some satisfaction in knowing, in the light of historic events, 

 that Haiti free, although still groveling in the savagery which 

 it inherited, is better off than it would have been had Napoleon 

 succeeded in forcing its people back into slavery, as he en- 

 deavored to do. 



Another fact which will stand against the Africanizing of Cuba 

 is that it is highly probable that nearly one-half of these 500,000 

 colored people have been destroyed during the present insurrec- 

 tion. A large number of them had but recently been released 

 from the bonds of slavery, and were naturally the poorer class 

 of the island, upon which the hardships have mostly fallen, being 

 generally the field hands in the sugar districts of Habana, Ma- 

 tanzas, and Santa Clara, where the death rate of the terrible 

 Weyler reconcentramiento has been greatest. Three hundred 

 thousand of the 500,000 blacks belonged to these provinces, 

 and of this number fully one-half have been starved to death. 

 The population of Cuba has undergone great modifi3ation 



