Eagle River Democrat. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1893-1896, 1895-10-21
CUBAN KNIVES.
The Insurgents Winning Their Liberty
with the Machete.


with the Machete.
There is no weapon in peace or war like
the machete, which the Cubans are now
using in their fight for liberty Every
country has a sword of its own, but Cuba
is the one place whose only sword ana
only instrument of war has been her reap
ing hook or cane knife.
If she frees herself from Spain the most
decisive part of the work must be done
with the Ilachete.
A Cuban leader, in giving to the writ
er his estimate of the chances of the
Cubans, said that the conflict hinged
very largely on how many of the people
in cane fields had good machetes. There
is not csle CUBAN in a hundred who knows
how to use a gun. The farmers have
been denied the use of firearms so long
that those who had fallen into the pos
session of guns in the battles OF the ten
years rebellion often threw them down
when they got into battle and relied
chiefly upon their cane knives. The bat
tie of Baira, in which SO many Spanish
heads were cut off, and which was the
boodiest in Cuban history was won by
cane knives over the best modern repeat
ing rifles in the hands of the Spanlards.
The great execution of the machete
lies in the wonderful skill in handing IT..
There are three classes of these knives.
The first is nothing more nor less than a
sword. % inches in length, made of the
very best spring steel and incased in a
leather scabbard. 1t looks like an or
binary sword, but is much heavier. 1t
is worn by the Cuban officers and gentle
men, The next is an overseer's machete,
very flexible, and with a slight stroke
it will sever a mans head from his body.
But the broad, heavy 16-inch knife is
Cuba's peculiar weapon of Offense and
defense and her principal agricultural
and domestic implement 1t is used for
nearly every service for which we use
knife, an ak, cleaver, pruning nook,
or a scythe. Forests are cleared with
in a butchers shop. Nowhere else in
Spanish America is the machete SO gen
orally used. Nearly the whole of Cuba
is devoted to the cultivation of cane and
tobacco, and every stalk of these crops
is harvested with the machete. Great
skill in handling them is the result.
An army of the most Skillful fencing
masters in Paris could not stand up be-
fore an equal number of Cuban cane
cutters. In one of the engagements a
short time ago, when a detachment of
Spanish cavalry charged upon the Gu
bans in the open, as the onslaught was
made the Cubans are reported to have
caught the Spanish sabers in orquetillas,
or forked sticks, and then cut men off
their horses as if they were nothing more
than stalks of grass.
These regular cane knives, on account
of their peculiar shape, can not be worn
in scabbard. They must be worn
hanging, exposed from the trunk, and
the fact that they can thus be worn at all
denotes that the wearer is one of very
careful habits, for the blade is always
kept as sharp as the very best steel can
be made. Absolutely every male Cuban
wears one. 1t is his most highly valued
piece Of property and he will do almost
anything to secure a good machete. In
the mountains of Southern Cuba he is at
home with his machete. He would not
give it for the best American rife or re-
volver. The underground is too dense
for anything but the passage Of the ma
chete through the bush. He trims his
footpath and waits to spring upon a
Spaniard and behead him. And there is
nothing that a Spaniard breads so much
in Cuba as the work of these knives.
Their stroke is the stroke of death in
nearly every instance.-Boston Home
Journal