The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-10-30

has been a source of gain to nearly all
who handled the money contributed
| for the purpose. During the blockade
/ and uD TO the present time, enough
money has been contributed, in ha-
! vana alone, TO feed every one of the
| city's 10000 reconcentrados three
square meals a day. For instance.
cents a day buys enough food for
each hungry one. 1t is sufficient TO
give each a quart of soup and half
a pound of bread daily. The money
was contributed by private subscrip-
tions, gathered by the government s
agents-enough money to spend s., 400
daily in giving the $4,000 poor their
s cents worth of food. But instead
of a quart of soup and half a pound
OF bread daily, the reconcentradoS re-
ceived a quart of soup and a half pound
OF bread weekly. In other words, the
s cents for each starving one was
extended once every seven days, in
stead of every day. The balance,
which was a magnificent amount, was
put down as expense" This matter
will probably never be investigated,
although there are reliable witnesses
in the city who will testify that one
merchant alone has made $4,000 as his
share of the profits of feeding the poor.
Officials who were in poverty before
the war are now buying city real es-
t2.e.
Gambling houses are wide open in all
the principal streets. With the inter-
prefer from the Inglaterra hotel, the
correspondent visited seven of these
houses in one evening, all within gun
shot of Blanco'S palace. The principal
patrons of the tables are Spanish army
officers. These gambling houses were
given license at the beginning of the
war, and were made to pay a heavy
tax, which was TO swell the fund for
feeding the starving. Within the past
few days the government has ceased
feeding the starving. but the gambling
houses are still doing business, and
still paying the heavy tax.
ODD BUSINESS WAYS
Business methods in Havana have
always been peculiar. Counting out
the retailers. the merchants are divid-
ed into two classes, the importers and
the wholesalers. There are four i'm
porters and % wholesalers. The
wholesalers do no importing, but
Dorters; the reason being that Cuban
or, rather, merchants in
Cuba, long ago ruined their credit
with the outside world. OF recent
years il has become the custom to re-
fuse TO sell to wholesalers IN Cuba I'M
less the house making the purchase
has representative banker in the port
from which the shipment is made.
Thus, the four importers of Havana,
able to place money on deposit at the
ports of shipment, control all the trade |
with the outside world.
Among all the Havana merchants,
business methods are characterized by |
lOoSeneSS that is astonishing to an !
American A merchant, for example, |
wishes 5000 cash to pay for a con-
signment of goods. He sends a clerk |
with verbal message to another mer- |
liant, who promptly hands over the /
money. Then the borrower, having /
iniShed some transaction that was |
pending during the day. sends back the |
ash to the lender. There is no note, /
10 memorandum. This is going on all |
he time. These are merely cash 1
oans of convenience, based upon word |
# honor, and their security is the GER
ain knowledge that sales will be eff
ected to make possible their redemp-
ion.
in the city, but rates of ex-
hange are peculiar. An American
ive-dollar bill is worth eight Spanish
liver dollars: but Spanish paper dol
ar, the currency of the Bank OF Spain.
5 worth only cents in our money.
The prices of the most ordinary arti-
les are still exorbitant. For a bottle
f mucilage, sold for cents in New
-ork. one pays 10 cents in silver here.
| paper of pins is 50 cents; a siphon of
eltzer, so cents. New York and Chi
ago daily newspapers sell here for 40
ents each. The retailers who sell
hese articles are, if nothing else DO
te- The correspondent asked a notion
ealer of whom he bought some pins
D direct him TO the office of the Eng
sh consul. The polite dealer promptly
anne from behind his counter and per
onaiiy conducted the correspondent to
ne consulate, seven blocks away, leav-