The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-03-01
SC0VEL IN GOOD LUCK.
GETTING AT THE INSIDE FACTS Of
SOME CUBAN AFFAIRS.

The Correspondent Lucky in Escap-
ting with His Life-WeyIer's Orders
No More Rigorous Than Wer,
Grant's-Harding Davis Searching
Story Laughed At
From w. e. Curtis Havana Letter to the
Chicago Record.
Just now an attempt is being made IN
the United States to excite public opinion
over the treatment Of Sylvester Scovel
the correspondent of the New York
World, who was captured by the Spanish
troops while coming from camp Of the
insurgents Mr.. Scovel is a very lucky
young man. His friends should be con-
graduating him instead of trying to
arouse public Indignation. He has re
peatedly violated the ordinary laws of
war. He has openly defed the orders of
the captain general, issued to the public
generally, and to himself in particular
He has been twice arrested and twice re-
leased and sent out of the country. Yet
he returned to Cuba and repeated his of
Tense for third time under an assumed
name, bearing a forged passport. If he
had behaved in a similar manner during
our civil war he would have been shot
without further ceremony, and now PEG
pie are crying about Spanish cruelty be
cause he has been arrested and lodged in
Jail to await trial.
Does any one suppose that Cen Grant
or Gen. Lee would have permitted Mr..
Scovel or any other newspaper CORE
spondent to pass back and forth at will
between the union and confederate lines,
carrying messages, oral and written be-
tween the confederate leaders and their
sympathizers in the north or between the
union leaders and their sympathizers in
the south, even if he happened to be a
foreigner and writing for a foreign news
paper with a very pronounced policy? If
Mr. Scovel had been guilty of the same
bravado in the Franco-Prussian war he
would have been shot at daylight the
morning after his arrest.
1t is only justice as well as the truth
to say that the orders of Gen. Weyler
concerning non-combatants are no more
rigorous than those issued by Gen. Grant
during the late civil war in the United
States, there have been no horrors here
that will approach those of Andersonville
and Salisbury; and nothing has occurred
in the history of the present struggle half
as atrocious as the massacre at Fort Pill
low. Score tary Stanton arrested more
people in Washington and Baltimore for
treason than Weyler has arrested in Ha-
Vana, and although the prisons in this
country are not as comfortable as those
in the United States it is as easy to keep
out of them if people mind their own
| business.
The treatment of Americans in Cuba is
blissful compared with the treatment of
Spaniards in the United States, although
properly this is not our revolution. and
we have no business taking sides. In a
recent letter from Jacksonville 1 described
| the boycott that had been declared against
the Spanish consul In that city and the
| American lawyer who was acting as
| counsel for the Spanish government in
the prosecution of the filibusterers No
body ever speaks of them except upon
| official business or to insult them. They
| dare not go to church or to any place
| of amusement or public resort for fear of
| melting a riot They could not live at a
| hotel. No hotel would receive them. ct
| Gen Lee is one of the most popular men
| in Havana, and he is treated with the
| greatest respect and Difference by officials
| and the public. The comic papers pub
| fish cartoons to express their satire of
American sympathy and the policy of our
| government, but Americans are very
kindly treated here by everybody, and tire
authorities are especially careful to avoid
| every excuse for friction or compiled ton
with the United States. They fear that
any overt act may be used 70 justify IN
tervention. This is understood by Ameri-
| can citizens living here, and they presume
upon It to a degree that is not justified.
Mr.. Richard Harding Davis created a
little diversion a few weeks ago by COM