The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1897-03-07

further alarming reports from the Phil
1pplnes, the government is" Disguised
with the performances of Capt. Gen.
Weyler In Cuba, but they dare not re
call him. In this connection a startling
explanation of the inaction of the gov
eminent is limited at. According to The
rumors' circulating here, the areas MS
why Weyler is not reca led are, first,
because he is a pronounce d Eepubli-
can; second, because it IS intimated
that sooner than return to Spain in dis
grace he would procla IA a. republic in
Havana no nnsd' 3zofb 1sjsR snf
The distress is most severe IN the
Biscayn provinces. The people of Leon
are on the verge of starvation, the
crops having been practically destroy
ed by the recent floods, which followed
previous severe drOuth, while on all
sides focks and herds are dying of
famine and disease
In La Mancha the failure of the olive
crop has prevented the peasants from
earning anything the whole winter and
large numbers of them are barely able
to keep body and soul together by sub
sisting on anything prOcurable.
Very many families have not seen q
loaf of bread for months and meat has
been far out of their reach since the
fall. The distress is not confined to
isolated districts All the towns and
villages are afflicted more or less and
as a rule the inhabitants are furnishing.
many of them being reduced to subsist
on acorns.
In this city. for instance. where it
might be expected that the distress due
to crop failures would be hardly felt.
over $500 persons are daily being fed
from charitable sources. Under these
circumstances it is not astonishing that
hundreds of families are emigrating to
Brazil and that thousands of families
would do so had they the means to
leave the country.
Coupled with this great distress are
rumorS of the increasing strregth Of
the Carlist agitation in the Northwest
and Central parts of Spain. This is
causing the greatest anxiety in politi-
cal circles, in spite of the recent formal
declarations of the Carlist senator's and
deputies, that Don Carlos, the pretend
er, will not make any attempt to dis,
turb the peace of the country. so long
as the government has its severe colo
NAL troubles to deal with. The pre-
tender is thus assuming patriotic at
titude which is we'll calculated to win
him many sympathizers, and may be
of material use to him when his ad-
viserS direct that the moment has ar
rived for him to make another ATTEMPT
to reach the throne. That he will do so
sooner or later nobody seems to doubt,
but it would hardly be in keeping with
Spanish chivalry to take advantage at
the present time of the sore distress of
this suffering land.
However, the local newspapers here
and elsewhere are full of curious de-
tails of the propositions and plans of
the Carllsts to take the field when the
signal is given. Incidentally there
seems to have been a bad bmnder COM
mitted by somebody in the Puebla and
San Miguel districts, where a band Of
Carlists recently attempted a rising.
which was promptly suppressed by the
local authorities The insurgent Carl
lists Who were armed were arrested and
imprisoned. On their persons were
found compromising documents When
examined the prisoners confessed thar
! they had expected a simultaneous ris-
ing to take place in other districts.
showing that the instructions they had
received were the result of some mis-
take.
The revelations thus made seriously
alarm the government and the minis
ter OF the interior, and the minister OF
war took the matter in hand The
former telegraphed to the local au-
thorities to closely watch the Carlists
and suspected Carlists, and the latter
wired to the military commanders in the
northern and eastern provinces, in
structng them to vigorously repress
any disturbances. The government
also came to the decision to arm the
peninsula army with Mauser rifles. and
to take steps to hold military man
euvers" in Catalonia This really
means quiet manner of drafting q
large force Of troops into Catalonia
without creating. the alarm that such a
step would cause If done in the man
ner usual under such conditions.
But, despite the precautions Of the
government to avoid exciting the peo-
pie. the distress prevailing, the depres-