The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-02-21
LIFE AND DEATH IN HAVANA.

Fannie B. Ward Among the Reconcen-
 trados-How Valeriano Weyler Has
 Murdered More Than Two Hundred
 Thousand People by Starvation.
 Especial Correspondence of the Journal
 and Courier)
 Havana, Cuba, February IT, 1S9S.- Could the readers of the Journal and Courier have been with me to-day, 1t is safe to say that the United States relief fund for the suffering in Cuba would be largely augmented. Let me give you an account of just one days experiences. I arose with the lark-or rather with the paroquit, which is the early bird of this country--in order to see the rising sun dance upon the sparkling waters of the bay and gild old Moro Castle and illumine the rose pink, sky blue and pea-green house walls. This invierno (midwinter) Is the most delightful season of the year in Cuba-the mornings and evenings the very perfection of weather, the
 middle of the day like August in New Haven and the nights chilly enough to require blanket on ones bed. The sojourner in this fair land needs no better entertainment than can be found at all hours from a balcony.
 The Hotel Pasaje, at which am stay ing, fronts the celebrated Prado, with it's line of statues and double rows of India laurel trees, where the Spanish troops, in uniforms of light blue cot ton, with straw hats-are every morn ing put through their evolutions to the music of two brass bands. In all Cuba there is no such thing as glass win dow. Wooden doors serve instead, usually latticed part way up, those on the ground floor faced with iron bars. Each room of the Pasaje has it's great double doors opening upon a "Juliet balcony'--the latter paved with white marble and railed with iron filagree work. The rooms, by the way, are beautifully foored with blocks of many colored marbles, set in patterns like a patchwork quilt, and so extremely high are the ceilings that one feels as If down in the bottom of well. White washed walls, sky-blue woodwork, crimson bamberltins and lace curtains, beruffled bedstead canopied with orange satin are all as Spanish as anything in Spain; yet, strange to say, the most outrageous constrasts of g1aring colors never seem to swear at one another in these hot climates; but somehow tone in agreeably with the brilliant blue and vivid green of sky and foliage.
 According to Cuban custom, the usu- al desayuno, of bread, hot milk and | coffee, was brought to my room at I | o'clock; and half an hour later I was | on the way with a Cuban lady to visit some reconcentradoes.
 Probably by this time nearly every
 body in the United States knows the
 meaning of the word "reconcentrados," or those who were concentrated. They
 are the country people of Cuba. who were scattered over the island between
 the few large towns. and by Weyler's
 brutal decree were driven from their
 homes and compelled to huddle in the | fortified cities. Ostensibly they took l no part in the war; but the Spaniards
 believe that every Cuban is a rebel at
 heart, and "the Butchers" policy was
 one of extermination. It is a common
 saying here: "If you put a Cuban
 baby in a glass bottle, seal it up and
 send 1t to Spain, the instant the cork
 is removed it will pop out and yell Cuba Libre.'
 | Weyler said that the rebel army was
 recruited from the sons and husbands
 of these country families and that the
 women at home afforded them secret
 aid and acted as spies. The terrible
 war, which is ruining Spain and devas-
 tating Cuba, was no nearer an end af-
 ter three long years, and never would terminate while these spies were eve