The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-05-01

ton of the natives by overwork, starva-
ton, and direct murder must have pro
cceded at the rate of 1900 year. for in
155S-viz.. less than fifty years after the
arrival of the first colonis ts-the race of
the. aboriginal midas had become wholly
extinct.
In 1865 the population consisted Of about
SEQ whites, go half-breeds and some $500
negroes, altogether less than 1900 or hard
ly one human being per English square
mile. Ten years after the importation of
African slaves began in earnest the cheap
ness OF land attracted settlers from Cuba
and Hayti, and the population then rose
till in 1885 1t attained it's maximum of CO.,
600, though large tracts of fertile lands on
the east coast have never been cultivated
since the massacre OF their original own
ers. The upland valleys have been like
wise neglected. and there is no reason to
doubt that under happier auspices the pop
ulatiOn of the island exceeded l,OOOO00, and
that the work of manslaughter. direct and
Indirect must have been carried on at the
rate of 10000 a year.
The negroes of San Domingo were only
saved by the transfer of the island to the
colonial possessions of France. There is
no doubt that the new government was
more than once inclined to suppress re-
bellion at the price of every insurgents
life, and the secret Instructions of Gov.
Clarke seem to imply that the first consul
had made up his mind to sanction policy
of that sort. But the French man hunters
lacked the qualihca tons of their Spanish
eXamplars, and the war of races ended
with the victory of the acclimatized dar-
kies.
The negro instruction recently reported
from Santiago de cuba is not the first ris-
ing of that sort which the Spanish slave
holders have contrived to quell by methods
of their own. How can we expect a poor
district like this to furnish oats enough
for the support of our cavalry" a French
officer asked Marshal Davoust in north
ern Poland. Il don't expect it myself
confessed the marshal, but 1t is a good
plan to demand the impossible to insure
the performance of the practicable" In
n sir In of hVa ho ,,at,
ders of the Spanish Cuban troops ordered
their men to turn the lands of the rebel
into a desert. and thus bullied many of the
Insurgents to accept the terms of subse-
quent offers of compromise. Besides. in
stead of hiding their barbarites. the Span
ish campaigners took care to give them
the utmost possible publicity, or even ex-
aggerated them in bulletins intended to
fall into the hands of the rebels on the
plan recommended by the Duke of Alba in
his plan for the suppression of the revolt
in the Netherlands.
In 1928 the population of Cuba had al
ready been reduced two-thirds, when
King Charles v published an edict prohib-
iting the colonists' practice of taking the
law into their own hands. and ordering
the Indian dcserters and insurgents should
thereafter be tried in due form of law,
after having been regularly indicted and
committed to prison.
But the result of that well-meant ukase
was only modification of the customary
sentences of death In the foul atmos-
died as fast as they had formerly died
in the camp of the ore mines and it would
really seem as if the entire race of the
American aborigines was especially liable
to lung diseases as a result of protraCted
indoor life. THE natives of TERRA del
fuego," says J. r. Spears in his article
on the End of our Continent have
been ruined by their friends. The Indians
who have thrived when naked and living
on seal blubber, persisted in the farm
houses OF the mission settlements Their
children, who had been sturdy and strong
in tWig Wigwams, died in the well-warmed
orphanage Every child taken into it
died. Pneumonia and consumption be-
came epidemic plaques
In the sultry air of Cuba epidemics of
that sort proved even more speedily ia
tai, and between overwork, dungeon air.
starvation and the fangs of the blood
hound varied by the occasional fusillades
and autos-da-fe, the native population
of the island melted away with ever in
creasing rapidity. and the victims of the
Matanzas perpetrated in the West Indies
and the adjoining coastlands of Central
America, i'm the course of the sixteenth
century alone, have been estimated at
the portentous aggregate of 100000
-Kickwire: What a beautiful whine
you use in asking for a dime. You really
ought to have that voice cultivated
Dismal Dawson: Well, | don't know
but | might be willin' to have 1t culti-
vated-say under the irrigation SYSTEM
Indianapolis JOrunal