Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-02-16
Am ERICAN VISITORS
Some of the Glasses That Visit Cuba
Now.
TOURISTS CAN'T GET PALACE CARS
Natives Soon Caught On to the
Promoters Schemes.
81 U ROUS RES
Copyright, 1899, by Charles NJ. Pepper1

| in Cuba. The excursion managers are en-
| terprising and their enterprise ought not
| to be discouraged, yet they would have
| shown better judgment by waiting another
year or two before bringing large parties
to the island The hotels which can
ccmmodate a thousand guests could not
be built in a single season, though they
will be constructed in time. The railroad
systems still lack the equipment of Pull
| man or Wagner sleepers which would en-
able the wanE of hotels in the interior to
be viewed with Indifference. individuals
parties of three or four members can
travel around with a fair degree of COM
fort. Most OF the tourists fail to provide
themselves with a geography Of the West
Indies. That is desirable because the rail
| roads do not issue folders. An Ohio party
of eXcursionsts abandoned the remainder
of their trip in disgust when they found
that they could not travel in vestibuled
train of sleepers from Havana to Santiago
| and then ferry over to Porto Rico.
These impressions of visitors who have
their time subdivided into half hours with
given number of things to see in a given
number of half hours doubtless have a
certain value. If the tourists take back
photographs with them they may he res
! cued from the error of thinking that the
Cathedral of Columbus is MORO Castle. and
that the palace is Cabana fortress. Some
of them think it their duty to devote half
young man az one of the hotels telling his
companions that Havana was on the verge
of a bloody revolution, and that II would
take ln,GN American troops to keep the
Cubans and the Spaniards from massacring
one another. He had been in town twenty
four hours. and he knew all the details of
the plot. He and his companions were IN
doubt whether to place themselves unfer
the protection of the military authorities
or to take the afternoon boat for Tampa.
While they were talking ! caught the eye
of the professional Joker in the American an
colony in Havana. When called aside ne
denied that he'had been throwing a scare
into anybody, but he was lying.
Not Sufficiently Americanized.
The tourists complain that Cuba has not
been Americanized as they were led to be-
lieve. The great mass of the population
talk the Spanish language. and this is
nuisance to visitors from the United States.
who expected better things. The street
uTchins know few phrases-'good-bye,'
"aIl right" give me a cent "hurrah for
McKinley'-but this vocabulary is not of
much help to strangers. The cabmen per
sist in not understanding the United States
pronunciation of Spanish names. and In not
knowing that the fault is their own. But,
being cabmen, they refuse to accept the re-
sponsiblity for the wrong directions.
Usually there is a courteous Spaniard or
Cuban who understands English, and who
stlaightens out the trouble. He has a
grumbling thanks for his pains, and prob
ably forms his own opinion of American po-
liteness
most. Spanish dishes did not take their de-
parture when the last of the Spanish troops
sailed for the peninsula. Cuban cooking
has not been fully AmericaniZed. 1t is now
possible to obtain a fairly good beefsteak.
and butter is served with bread. But the
bread is of the healthful and digestible
kind which is baked at the bakeries. while
most of the American tourists prefer the
soft and soggy sort which they get at
home. Vegetables are also cooked after the
Cuban methods. and salads prepared
after the Spanish or French manner Worse
than this is the persistence with which the
inhabitants adhere to their custom Of cof-
fee and light roll for the early morning.
The tourists from the states want heavy
breakfast, and they make known with
hearty American frankness their opinions
of the degenerate Latin race for clinging
to coffee and rolls. Those who bring with
them thirsty threats do not complain. They
find plenty of American bar rooms.
Business Mems Excursions.
The business mems excursions should be
distinguished from the parties of tourists
Most of the business men who have never
visited Cuba before find many things to
surprise them, but they quickly adapt
themselves to their surroundings They
discover that the Havana merchants hav-
ing established trade on certain lines know
how to keep ii. mercantile community
no ones memory runs back to it is a revela-
ton. even to steady-going merchants from
the United States. The methods of trade
may be old fashioned yet it does not take
a long mental process to establish that
these methods have a solid foundation or
they could not have stood through the long
period of industrial decentralization that re-
suited from the insurrection. / think the |
general run of American business men who |
have visited Cuba this winter go back sat
isied that the thing for them to do is to |
open up new lines of trade rather than to |
compete with what is already well estab- |
lshed. They also gain valuable hints about |
adapting their goods to the wants and Gus |
toms of the people who inhabit Cuba. They |
are not likely to mistake a passing |
liking for novelties as settled and |
lasting demand. The owner of one of |
the recently established retail stores lately |
said: 1T amuses me to see Americans |
buying Cuban hats while Cubans come to |
my place to buy American hats and neck |
ties But he knows that this won't last !
long, for after the novelty passes away |
everybody will ne buying the kind of head |
gear that the climate of the country re- |
quires
Though the tourists do not find Cuba |
much to their liking, a larger and more !
important element of Americans is begin |
ming to confess a fondness for the country |
and for the people This includes the army |
officers whose stations permanent |
enough to justify their bringing their fami- |
lies, civilians from the departments in |
troll of administrative offices and private |
citizens whose prospects We're sufficient to |
encourage them in taking up their residence |
for the winter. These classes of Americans |
find that the Latin customs are not SO bad |
and with little change easily adapted |
to those who have lived in other surround
ings. They take coffee with milk and rolls
in the early morning and discover that they
can do half days work before breakfast |
without Inconvenience. Difference in Ian
guage is bar to free social intercourse,
yet it is rot insurmountable.
some Mistaken Ideas.
Some very nice people from the states
thought they were coming to the banks of
the Congo, where the breech ciout and the
bead necklace were the only kind of store
clothes worn by the inhabitants. Their
ingenious confessions of surprise on learn
ing that Havana and its Inhabitants had
not only the rudiments. but also some OF
the refinements, of civilization were less
entertaining to the natives than to their |
own countrymen and countrywomen But
having confessed their surprise they have
found themselves on a better footing
with the people. The theaters have been