The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1899-04-30
4 GREWSOME tour OF
CUBAN PRISON CELLS
Shadows of Horrors in MORO
and Cabanas Castles.
Dungeons Where Political Offend
ers Entered, Never to Emerge.
TclI-TaIc Rows of BulIet Marks in
the Passage of the Court
OF Death.

Ttulipan. Havana, April 23.--Until a few
weeks ago one might as reasonably have
aspired to make a walking tour of the
moon as a visit with notebook and camera
to the interior of MORO and Cabanas. Even
under the new American regime it was
equally impossible in war time, and now
nobody is admitted without special pass,
countersigned by some commanding Off
Ger.
Last Sunday it was my .sood fortune to
be one of party which spent the day ex-
ploring these two Oldest of Spain's FORTH
cations in Cuba. First came the long car
ride-forty minutes from our suburban
residence TO the other side Of the city past
General Ludiow's headquarters, and Ban
cos late palacio, and the new American
postoffice swarmed with our eager country
men. Past the Columbus Cathedral, where
the great admiral no longer sleeps from
which waves of melody were ro.ling Like
pillows upon shore. Past thousands OF
good Catholics, mostly women, stroiling
leisurely to mathis, mendicants making
stock in trade of their sores and infirmi-
ties, and stalwart Yankee sentiRels patroll-
ing the same beats where Spains ill-fed
boy soldiers YEARLY marched to and fro.
Fast long lines of gaily-caparisoned DON
Keys, tied from head TO tail, with red, blue
and yellow tasseis at their ears and bar-
ness slittering with brass; trains of hsay-
lily laden bullock carts, each poor patient
beast with chain passed through his rose
and head bowed down to the dust by a
weight of wood upon his horns Past men
and women strumming upon guitars in
squatted homes. or sitting idly in open
doors, apparently without care in the
world, while dirty children played around
them naked as the minute they were horn
past all the quaint and varied street life
OF this old town, which to American eyes Is
yet as oddly foreign as the iremotest cor
ner of Europe.
Speaking of unclothed children reminds
me OF an order. promulgated not long ago
by the Government, regulating nakedness
In Havana's horse cars and omnibuses
Though both vehicles charge the same
amount OF fare, the bug infested buses
nave come to be considered second class"
because most generally patronized by the
poorest who can afford to ride; while those
somewhat higher in the social scale con-
line themselves to the cars The order
above mentioned drew the lines of caste
still more closely, by forbidding naked
children and men without shirts TO enter
the cars, but not debarring them from the
buses. Therefore it is common thing
10 see man, clad only in cotton trousers.
nat, and shoes, or child airiIy attired in
necklace, perched aloft In the swayipg
coach, which holds twelve by close crowd
ing. Everywhere in Cuba one sees chill
dren up to i've or six years OF age stark
naked in the streets. often led by their
| parents for promenade; and in the rural
districts they perambulate in q state OF
nature TO considerably later age 1t is
| noticeable that the children OF well-to- do
families sometimes wear socks and shoes.
but nothing else. American teachers under
| the new school system find no end of trou-
BILE with this question of clothes, sending
home all whose human form divine" is
not at least partially covered, to the sur
prise and Indignation of their parents Re-
membering how poor children In the North
go barefooted In the summer time, even to
school. the teachers have gently sug-
| gested to the mothers that the money spent
Tor shoes might better be put Into shirts
and trousers, but so far without avail, the
shoes being considered necessary, the shirts
superfluous.
Arrived at the waters edge. a quarter
| OF mile from the cathedral door and
| WITHIN stones throw OF the new post
office, We secured one of the chicken coop
boats that constantly ply the bay. They
| are all OF the same antique pattern,
brought from southern Spain in some
previous century; and for dos reales oade
uno twenty cents each person. the scar
let-capped Catalan boatman agreed to row
| US across the intervening stretch of water
| to the fortress nearest the city, Moro
Castle, on the farther point was intended
only for defence, while the larger and
nearer Cabanas served also as prison
for political offenders. The former ante
| dates the latter by more than half a CEN
fury, but looks much newer. because its
walls of pale gray coquina-the coral rock
that underlies the islands today as
fresh as ever and the American authori-
ties have just completed its renovation,
outside and in, with lavish use of lime
and whitewash. Cabanas-its painted walls
now streaked and mottled with mold and
weather stains-is yet comparatively I'M
touched, and, happily for curiosity hunt
ers, If not for health, all It's older horrors
remain about as the Spaniards left them.
Its massive battlements, with their faded
pinks and yellows, tower straight up from
| deep, dry moat, unscalable by man or
beast and enclosing space lough for a
good sized town. Having Inhibited our
permit to the sentry, We -ossed the
creaking drawbridge and liked up q
sharply sloping. winding re paved with
small, sharp stones that H. Rsed the feet
like peas in the shoes of peSitentials. Up
and up we toiled, under the broiling sun
always within range of portfolios and SEN
try boxes, whose protruding guns might
easily rake the path of intruders, and
fancy conjured up a myriad of unhappy
ghosts that have passed this canine
doloroso-homesick boy conscripts from
Spain fighting an unwelcone cause, and
heavy hearted prisoners who never re-
turned.
On the Heights of cabnnns.
The view from the summit repays the
toilsome climb-narrow, closely built city
streets, criss-crossed like gigantic chess
board, with church towers and palm trees
and the white camps of American troops
for pawns Regla, Guanabacoa, Vidado
Mariana, Jesus del Monte. and other
handsome suburbs; the historic bay
crowded with shipping in which nearly
every flag in the world is seen but that oil
Spain, and outlining all, the ocean.
/ Here we were halted by other sentinels
and requested to stay while our passes
were sent forward to be approved by tbs
officer of the day. While waiting We turn
ed into a wide. canyon-like passage. form
ed by thirty-foot high walls Of pinkisf
plaster, double row of stunted OAKS
growing along the middle. Tread softly
for this is hallowed ground. At a glance
none can fail to recognize the grewsom,
, place. Breast high, on both sides, the
, walls are peppered with small, circular In
dentations, and the grass beneath is start
lingly rank and green-watered by the
blood of martyrs. Here thousands upor
! thousands OF men, whose crime was love
of liberty. have met death-their faces te
the walls, the firing squad with their backs
against the trees THE deadline," as the
tell-tale row of bullet marks Is called, Is
Il unmistabable, not only on both sides OIL
/ krt In M