Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1898-04-29
LIVING IN CUBA.
Little to Fear If One Lives
Wisely.

T.
"h'ch VIII Allny the Anxiety Of
Thousands Of Soldiers ana Their Fire
sides.
Dr. Damaso I. Lame of PHILADELPHIA.
besides being a hysician, is a Cuban. He
was born on the island, passed the first Is
years of his life there, and since his re-
moval to this country has five times re-
visited Cuba in the summer. Certainly he
should know good deal more about it
than we Americans do.
He tells the "Phiadelpha Times" that
yellow fever exists as scourge only in the
low-lying seaport cities anu towns. The
more crowded the population the more
deadly the infection. Havana, Matanzas,
Cardenas, Sagua, Cientuegos, are "focr'
OF the fever. Once you get into the open
country, the germs are rapidly dissipated.
The further inland you travel, the healthier
the climate becomes. The notion that the
fever is epidemic all over the island is wholly
erroneous Among the hills and on the
tablelands it is comparatively unknown.
The doctor says further:-
at is only right that the men should
know what kind of country they are
going into, but it is all nonsense to
brighten them with all sorts of bugaboos
about death staring them in the face and
all that. | tell you that | firmly believe
that if American troops are landed in Cuba
no yellow fever will develop among them
until the cities are taken and The troops
are quArtered there. Then you have an
other problem to deal with. If the men
are sent into garrison in Havana or any
other seaport city, they will be liable to the
same danger of yelo fever which has so
| decmated the ranks of the Spanish sol
diery. Here lately, to be sure, the Span
iards have learned by sad experience the
danger of concentrating the men in the
city barracks and now as soon as reinforce
ments arrive they are sent into the out
skirts of the town"
! The doctors suggestion is that the duty
of garrisoning the cities may well be left
to the Cuban patriots in this country-not
| to the WORKOUT, halfstaNed soldiers of
| Gomez. The American Cubans are ready
and anxious to go, he says, either under
I American officers or their own nationality
men like Nunez or Castillo. But the
| junta cannot equip and send them it
hasn't the money. at will guarantee, .
says the doctor, that with $50 900 or $40,
600 full regiment of Cubans can be raised
in New York city alone-yes, or two, if
need be-in one week" Anyhow, it will
be absolutely necessary (he thinks for our
forces to take along enough Cuban Ameri-
! l. in en- lish nj ,iah
| to act as Interpreters, messengers, scouts
and pioneers, and to clear away the under
brush with their machetes. This last
item is very important, if there is to be
any campaigning on land. The condi-
tions in Cuba are not favorable for mill
tary operations, except of the guerrilla or
der. For instance:
The grass almost grows under your feet,
! and is sometimes four or five feet high.
The roads are a mass of mud, into which
you sink to your shoetops, and in the
woods and forests a tangled Jungle of
thorny vines completely chokes up all the
interstices between the trees, and makes
it impossible to see ahead for more than
eight or ten feet. Only one modern road
exists on the island. This is the road
leading from Havana to Guanajay. 1t is
telford and is the only public work that
the Spaniards have ever done in Cuba No
other road than this would be practicable
for the bringing of artillery to Havana, all
the others being simply tangled bride
paths, overgrown with grass and covered
deep with mud.
Here are DR.. LANES rules for keeping
well in Cuba, and we commend them tc
the careful attention of every young sol
der who hopes and expects to 60 there, as
also to that of the responsible army author
tiles:
81 consider abstinence from alcoholic
beverages of any kind most essential tC
health. 1t is too stimulating, and al
though you will find wine and brandy
on the table of nearly any house of any
pretension in Cuba, it should be severely
let alone by foreigner. Quinine taker
in the morning is one of the best prevent
ives of malaria, and a still better one il
arsenic, although this latter would o.
course have to be given by doctors and no
carried around by the men. Another i'm
portant thing is that all the men SHOULD
be vaccinated before reaching the island
as smallpox has been prevalent there