The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-07-07
SUNDAY IN CIENFUEGos.

Fair Cubans on Dress Parade-The
Washer Abroad in the Land-A Bal de
Mascara-The Most Important Port of
| Southern Cuba.
! Especial Correspondence of the Journal
| and Courier.)
| Cienfuegos, June 3-During the war
| it was officially stated that in Havana
were twenty women to one man-exclu-
sive of the soldiers stationed there-the
| other nineteen men being off with the
| insurgent army disabled in the hospit-
ais, Or lying in their graves This
dearth of men was even more apparent
| in interior towns; and to this day tha
surplus woman is almost as numerous
| as in Paraguay after Lopez wars.
Promenading the plaza of Cienfuegos on
| a Sunday afternoon, with all the local
world one meets crowds of wel-dressed
ladies' and at comparatively rare inter
walls a self-conscious and manifestly
much valued person of the sterner sex.
Possibly there may be some other corner
of the world wherein the men, young,
middle-aged and old, usurp the female
prerogative of paint, powder and per-
fumery but 1t Is so. I have not been
there. Travellers in tropical countries
have learned to expect the beauty-mask
on female countenancas, (put on, 50 they
say, to obviate the greasy Look produced
by perspiration in a warm climatic; but
when the powder is piled on the coarser
faces of men, drifted into hair and
beard, lodged in ears and eyebrows,
aud plowed into burrows down the
cheeks by trickling streams of sweat.
the effect is CHASTITY. To this unnatural
whiteness the addition of carmine,
dabbed in vivid spots on lips and cheek
bones imparts to the wearer the appear
ance of a galvanized corpse. And then
the tooth-pick toed exalted -heeed pa
tent feathers of the Cuban dude, his
scents. beside which SIMPSONS strength
would have been that of an infant and
his ties of aggressive hues that seem to
swear continually at all surrounding OBJ
jects, complete a picture which plainly
advertises unfinished rooms to rent in
the upper story This unsexed creature
usually makes "mashing' the end and
aim of his existence, infesting the pla-
zas church doors and all places fire.
quented by his female adorers; and he
really ought to be exterminated with
Paris green as blight on the landscape
Not many months ago bread was 50
scarce in Cuba that thousands died of
starvation; but the times have never |
been so sadly out of joint that any scar |
city of face-powder was apparent, even
among the lowlest, The Cuban wo-
man, young or old, considers it a more |
indispensable adjunct to her toilet than |
mere soap and water--a primal necessi- |
/. ~, ;at, ;r how, |
religious duty to foster and preserve. |
Thus all classes and conditions are we'd |
ded to the powder-puff, from the grande |
dame of fashion to the neglected little |
orphan in the asylum-from the crum- |
pied visaged octogenarian to the rosy |
checked child of half a dozen summers.
Go into any Cuban school and you will
find teachers and scholars alike unspar
ingly garnished a powder-box and the
rag, or bit of channels, with which to ap-
ply it, in every desk and tucked along
side the chalk on the blackboards. In
shops where female clerks are employed,
and in the big tobacco factories where
two or three hundred girls are at work
rolling cigarettes, the same thing is
true. One morning I visited 'Ba COro-
ma the largest tobacco factory in Ha-
Vara. Ten O'Clock was the breakfast |
hour of the employees and when the
hands of the clock pointed to a quarter
to ten, every girl stopped work and
reached for her powder-box. They are
not paid by the day but according to
the number of cigarettes they roll, In
the opinion of them all, that intervening
fifteen minutes was needed in which to
assume the CHASTITY mask of powder, in
order to make themselves presentabls !
before going on the streets
Cienfuegos is particularly gay on Sun
days, the resident clergy being so ac-
as to have the last service