The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-03-09
SHALL CUBA BE DESTROYED?

NOTWITHSTANDING the assertion 80 persist
emily disseminated by the Spanish officials in
Cuba that the revolution is on its last legs, q
few facts which these same officials have of
late carelessly permitted to reach the outer
world, through their own organs, completely
disprove all their former statements. The
celebrated battle which General Jordan won
over the Spaniards in Camaguey on New
Years day year ago has been cast into the
shade by more than one recent conflict More
numerous bodies of armed men have beeu
engaged on either side and the acknowledged
loss of the Spanish forces, 160 in one fight,
is far greater than any they ever confessed
before. The war therefore is progressing,
and the executions on both sides prove that
it has lost nothing of that ferocious character
which more than once since its commence
ment has caused the civilized world to shud-
der, and excited discussion in various legisla-
tive assemblies.
Some time since President Grant in mes
sage to Congress described this war as an
discriminating" one; and inasmuch as the
shooting of prisoners seems to be general,
the term is not misappled Apart from the
fearful sacrifice of human life, to which there
is no conceivable limit short of the extermi-
nation of the combatants on one or the other
side, the advancing devastation of what was
lately one of the most productive of cultivated
countries is exciting considerable alarm
among other nations. The Span
iards burn and destroy every village or assem-
blage of huts or clearing from which they
drive the Cubans, trusting that the impossi-
bility of obtaining the necessaries of life may
induce them to surrender; while the Cubans
publicly proclaim that they expect to win
their independence as much by the torch as
by the sword. 1t is, they say, only by means
of the productions of the soil of Cuba that
Spain is enabled to war against its sons.
n,.1~z
ducing, with a population of something less
than two millions of people, the value of
about two hundred and fifty million dollars
year. The industries of which this enormous
sum was the product were about equally
divided between the cities and the country,
that is to say between manufacturing and
agriculture. Of the thirty million acres
which Cuba contains, only some two and
half millions are devoted to sugar cane, to-
bacco, coffee, and other exportable crops the
remainder consists of pasturage and forests.
Of course, the war has greatly diminished
the produce of Cuba, and as the island for
merly furnished about half of ali the sugar
made on the globe, it is patent that it's value
to the outside world has greatly decreased;
while it is self. evident that if the war be not
stopped, or its character mitigated the island
will ere long be converted into desert.
This war has now been waged for nearly
thirty months. How long is Christian civili-
zation to stand coldly by and passively
abet it?
International law and public opinion forced
England, France, and Russia to interfere in
favor of the independence of Greece. What
was the duty of the civilized nations of Eu-
rope in 1927 in regard to Greece is manifestly
the duty of America and Americans to-day in
regard to Cuba. Let those politicians, pa
triots, and pseudo-p philanthropists who object
to intervention in Cuba on the plea of
manifest destiny" take warning from the
condition of devastated and depopulated San
Domingo. Since emancipation, tropical agri-
cultural products and the means of their pre-
duction should be very carefully dealt with
If we wait little longer, the Cuban pear will
be not ripe but rotten when it falls.
PREPARATIONS FOR THE PRESIDEN-