The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-06-14
CUBA WE'LL LOST.
From the ". Y. Tribune.

From the " Y. Tribune
In a debate in the Cortes on the 25th of last
month, the present head of Spain was pro-
voked to avow that the hatred of Cubans to
the Spanish Government is too great to be
appeased or converted and he might have
added, conquered. He further acknowledged
that men who, at the time of his Captain
Generalship under the Ministry of O'Donnell,
were his devoted friends and counsellors are
now leading the insurgents, or are among the
eXiles in New York straining every nerve for
their cause. Here is a dismal admission for
Spain, and this, too, from the man who is to
become her Regent, and, perhaps, practically
her President 1t speaks reluctantly the unani-
nous opinion of every friend of the Spanish
administration in Cuba and virtually confesses
what Captain-G General Dulce and Maior-Gen
Mena have of late more boldly said, that the
island this time is lost to the mother country
1t is worth remembering that both Marshal
Serrano and General Dulce were once men,
bers of a commission of information an
pointed in 1851 to testify as to the reform ne
cessary to the island, and then declared to
Queen Isabella that without speedy redress of
its grievances it would be hopelessly alienated.
General Dulce has seen his misgivings verified
to the letter. and felt the fatality of opposing
an earnest revolution with bankruptcy and
anarchy. Cuba is lost to Spain, and worse
than lost. Every soldier sent out for her
conquest is a traitor to authority, and repre-
sents so much dearly-bought money thrown
into Il food.
The Spanish Minister at Washington is re-
ported to be exceedingly anxious as to the sit
uation of the authorities in the island Seeing
that his brother, the political Governor at Ha-
vana, contemplates his bodily escape out of
the crisis, this does not surprise us. The best
art of the ambassador will be required to show
us in what way Spain still keeps possession of
her territory, and how it is possible for us at
present to respect her authority. If we recog-
nize the rebels who have expelled General
Dulce and installed a regime of slave-traders,
we surely do offense to those at whose hands
the late Captain-G received his commits
sion If we recognize the President and Con-
gress at Guaimaro, we are still liable to dis
please the friends of those Castilan leaders
who insist that they did us good offices in our
own hour of difficulty. But we see not how
Spain can help acknowledging what is now
plain to the world, that her Cuban possession
Is gone utterly-in forfeit to her misuse of
opportunities, means, men, lands, and what
ever wealth God gives to a country for the
prospering of peoples. Cuba will be free
instead of slave, and the Spanish race will be
the gamer for all that Spanish misgovernment
has forfeited. Her possession will be we'll lost
II Spain but learn to take honest care of her
people at home. She is we'll rid of an heir
loom of her barbarism if she can turn intro
spective eyes upon her own condition and
consolidate freedom, rather than vainly cling
to empire.
One other consideration seems to point to
the Spanish need of renouncing the province
in the tropics. Minister Figuerola's count of
costs for carrying on the Government of Saain
amounts to the great sum of $l5O,OOO 900,
while the budget contemplated by the Repub-
LEANS of the Cortes is no more than 800, 0OO,-
600. The deficit in the minister's estimate
reaches the serious sum of 800, 900, 600, and
we now hear, through the cable, that he has
announced the impossibility of reducing his
budget. The conviction of this news may
alarm Spain, but it is auspicious to Cuba, and
we doubt not the mother country will find it
better to save fifty-fve millions than to waste
ffty-fve millions more for the conquest of a
ruin