Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1910-09-23

SuSuIy Americas attitude in the Cuban mix-up
Weyier was the best hated in Cuba when
1ne government of his nation finally recalled him.
This book will cause him to be cursed the length
and breadth Of the peninsula.
wrote It,, he says, Ito give all the facts
ABOUT my conduct as general in chief, conduct
admired not only by army officers high and
1oW' who wrote me innumerable letters, but
by prlVates, who, on their return to the PENN
suia, spoke Of me with an enthusiastic fer
vor for which l can never thank them enough
Various reasons prevented me from doing years
ago (when [ could not have freed my mind
from certain bias) work which 1 now
do in perfect peace of mind. thanks to the
time that has passed, and which has soothed
the irritation due to the injustice suffered at
the hands of some men.
Furthermore 1 did not wish to sadden Senior
Sagasta by retelling the story of colonial
disasters; neither did I feel any pleasure in CEN
suring the illustrious Gen Martinez Campos, my
predecessor in Cuba, however uncharitably he
acted toward me after his return to the capital"
A perusal of the book fails to prove that Wey-
Ter kept his promise to treat the subject with
perfect moderation the generals blood is still
boiling, and with some justification, for atrociou'
his conduct was in many instances, it could
not very we'll be criticized in Spain by the Span
Ash government
Had Weyler been endowed with the literary
genius of Marriott or Las Cazes, he could have
made a much stronger case against Spain and
able light. Unfortunately his knowledge of the
writer's craft is deficient his fund of infor-
NATION touching political economy, general his
tory national anad International politics Is
meager.
of nuances and innuendos is to him terra incog-
Dita. a primitive brute with rudmentary ethics,
though un1fnchngly frank and straightforward,
he never ventures an assertion Whlch cannot De
supported by documents; he never pays any at
mia OK
extenso.
A fascinating type, after ALL for the observer
blessed with the sense OF history; just imagine
what a Weyer would have developed into If he
had not been born 500 years too late; clad
in steel he had been riding a caparisoned mount.
or if he had been allowed to range over europe
during the Thirty Years war!
General WeyIer's style is very trying; even
his proclamations vainiy modelled after Napoleon
is oratorical gems, rarely sound the note that
makes a people army vibrate. HIS rela-
tious of the Cuban campaign with all the facts
figures names recorded in haphazard faShlon
day by day, is well nigh unreliable
But the documents he publishes in support of
his thesis (some of them of a confidential char
acter and which must have been secured through
"dipIomatic means'D make it well worth while
wading through an otherwise DUH shapeless and
Sndigestible piece OF writing.
First of all we are made to realize how hope
less the plight of the Spanish commanders had
become in the island when Weyler took the stu
alton In hand; the many generals who preceded
him had been losing ground from day to day;
their cables to the Spanish government gave
information of pessimstic character of which
the public and the press were seldom appraised;
their confidential correspondence betrayed heart
rending facts; more than once poor Gen. Mart
nee Campos had humbly confessed himself beat
en-, while the cabinet led the Spanish nation to
believe that the practically over.
Weyler himself, when placed in command or
the Cuban army, was not even given what he was
entitled to- an honest account of the situation.
when 1 landed in Cuba" he writes. I did
not even suspect the terrible conditions that pre-
vailed in the island l did not know anything