Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1910-09-23

1ustly Americas attitude In the Cuban mixup.
, "eyler was the best hated man in Cuba when
lne government Of his nation finally recalled him.
ms DOCK VIII cause him to be cursed the length
"nd breadth of the peninsula
Il wrote It," he saws ito give all the facts
ABOUT my conduct as general in chief a conduct
ADMIRED not only by army officers, high and
low who wrote me nnumerabe letters, but
by priyates. who on their return to the PENN
sua' spoke OF me with enthusiastic fer
vor for which can never thank them enough
various reasons prevented me from doing years
ago (when l could not have freed my mind
from a certain bias) a work which / can 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 | did not wish to sadden Senior
Sagasta by retellng the story of our colonial
disasters neither did feel any pleasure in cen
surfing the ilustrious Gen. Martinez Campos my
predecessor in Cuba, however uncharitably he
acted toward me after his return to the capital"
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 atrocoui.
as his conduct was in many instances it could
not very well 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
presented his own actions In much more favor
able light Unfortunately his knowledge of the
writer's craft is as deficient his fund of infor-
nation touching political economy, general his
tory national anad international politics is
meager
Weyler Is not a diplomat, the slippery land
OF nuauces and innuendos is to him terra incog-
nita; a primitive brute, with rudimentary ethics,
though unhinchingly frank and straightforward.
he never ventures an assertion which cannot be
supported by documents; he never pays any at
tention to hearsay but quotes peoples letters in
extenso.
fascinating type. after all. for the observer
blessed with the sense of history; just imagine
what Weyer would have developed into if he
had not been born some 500 years too late; clad
IN steel he had been riding caparisoned mount
Or II he had been allowed to range over Europe
during the Thirty Years war!
General Weyer's style is very trying; even
his proclamatons vanly modelled after Napoleon
Is oratorical gems. rarely sound the note that
makes a people or an army vibrae. His reIa,
tions of the Cuban campaign with all the facts,
figures, names recorded in haphazard fashion
day by day, is we'll 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
diplomatic meaus') make 1t Well worth while
wading through an otherwise dull shapeess and
indigestibe 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 a pessimistic character of which
the public and the press were seldom appraised;
their confidential correspondence betrayed heart
rending facts more than once poor Gen. Martt
neg Campos had humbly confessed himself beat
en-. while the cabinet led the Spanish nation to
believe that the war practically over.
Weyler himself, when placed In command OF
the Cuban army was not even given what he was
entitled to- an honest account of the situation.
when / landed In Cuba he writes. Il did
not even suspect the terrible conditions that pre-
vailed in the island. | did not know anything