The Republican journal., 1899-07-06

confidential and free advice will be sent bv
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Constipation is a little illness that if
neglected builds a big one Dt PieTce's
| Pleasant Pellets cure constipation.
| "---- ---- ------------
day of the week, all the business places
are open as usual, stores, markets and
other establishments, doing their best.
Clenfuegos has an extraordinary number
of cafes, saloons and club houses, in all of
which liquor is dispensed, and the games
of chance and skill, SO dear to Cuban
hearts, are played. One sees drinking
places at every corner, filled with little
tables, around which are men PLAYING
domnoes. Gin is the fayorite tipple, con
siderably diluted. Light Spanish wines
are also drunk, and numerous ''refrescos, -
made from native fruits. 1t is rare indeed
that anybody to the manner born ever be
comes Intoxicated" SO rare that the
spectacle of a drunken American soldier
reeling down the streets creates as much
excitement as a fire and congregates the
gamins of the city.
/ On the Sunday evening in question |
was an interested spectator at a popular
bal de masquera, OF masquerade ball.
which was attended by Cienfuegos "40O"
! The beautiful club house was brilliant
with electric lights, flowers aud gilded
mirrors, and the music was a strange but
| inspiring combination of saxophone, ket-
tle-drum, brass horn, guitars, gourd-r rat
tie and scratch gourd. The women only
We're masked, and wore home made dom
| inoes of pink or black cambria. AT first
all the ladies sat banked against the walls,
/ like rare flowers on exhibition, while the
men wandered awkwardly around in
groups, waiting fol some daring fellow to
! lead the assault; but once the ice was
| broken, no further bashfuness delayed
the proceedings, and the fun waxed fast
and furious till morning The tavorte
figure is the "danzOn," as the Cuban
waltz is caled-the strangest dance this
side of the Congo. 1t is a ''rouDd dance, "
but not at all like the waltz as we know it,
for in it each couple does not occupy more
than two feet square space and remains as
if glued to the spot from start to finish
| hardly lifting their feet from the floor,
| but swaying and wriggling their bodies to
and fro, while clasped IN each others arms,
with a movement suggestive Of ''hoochee-
! coochee'' and other oriental dauces. Mean
while the music fairly tingles in ones
veins. 1t is an irregular, barbaric medley
the throbbing OF deep toned guitars, the
rasping of scratch gourds and the sharp,
staccato click of gourd-rattles, mingled
with the intermittent, mutfied thunder of
drums-all wild and passionate, in har-
mony with the ardent nature of the half
| Spanish, half negro population.
'From grave to gay, from lively 10
severe is short transition often met in
Spanish A merica The hospitals and
asylums have the mo admittance" sign
out on Sundays probably because all
concerned prefer the bull fight, OF some
other recreation, to entertaining strangers,
and so we were compelled to defer our
tour of inspection until Monday. First
to the great Hospital de Carload, well out
of the city in high and airy location.
| We found in its office a group of U. S.
army officers paying off the employees for
wages earned during the past two months,
and learned that Major Hisel, the U. S.
army surgeon ill charge OF the Province of
Santa Clara, has been providing liberal
rations. including eighty pounds Of fresh
meat every day. The institution is a city
property, in normal times entirely sup
ported by the municipality, and receives
not only the sick of Cienfuegos, but those
from other towns in the province. For
these charge is made against the towns
in which the patients belong, but now-a-
DAYS the outside towns cannot pay their
bills and CieufuegOs has no municipal
revenues available for the purpose. The
hospital building proper though a very
LARGE one. not having sufficient capacity,
an adjoining building, which has been
occnpied by the Spanish cavalry, was
taken for the sick, and now, all together,
there are about 400 patients. The old
cavalry barracks, used for men only, has
no floor. and is in dirty, wretched condi-
ton. Most of the patients are in hammocks
for want of cots. Most conspicuous in
the main building is the operating room,
equipped in better days with line cabl-
net of surgical instruments, adjustable
glass table, and sterilzing apparatus, all
of the best quality. Now an outfit of
disinfecting appliances is badly needed,
but there is no money TO buy it. The
medical and surgical staff are doing
wonderfully well with what they have,
according to their lights. Infected cloth
ing is roasted in tin box, placed IN the
oven of the kitchen range--often with
the dinner cooking above it! The first