THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR. 402 American Government had sent for the starving people. The provisions Igot very little of, as the Spaniards confiscated them and took them to their barracks, saying that, as they were American property, they were contraband of war. Mr. D'Acosta was more free with cash, but Ipreferred food, as there was no proper food tobuy. But Ihad to do what all had to do— buy beef, herbs, etc., etc.— whatever it was, and not question anything— horse, dog, or cat. C has stood the blockadewell,as she goes to the hospital, and, without anyone inviting her, takes the tub and commences to wash and assist the sick just for a biteof food; otherwise she also would have been a victim to starvation. In Havana they have one thing which we have not got here— viz. a cooking depot (cocina economico) kept up by the municipality, where poor or rich can get a breakfast or dinner for five cents, and very good foodat that, according to what peoplefrom Havana sa}-. But Matanzas is too poor and too mean to have such a beneficialinstitution. Washerwomen and cooks were the only ones who could scrape a living duringthe blockade."

the north coast of Cuba and expended valuable supplies of ammunitioninuseless andineffective bombardments. He wouldhave at once united his powerful array of battleships with Commodore Schley's squadron of swift cruisers. These cruisers might have rendezvoused in a neutral harbour in the Windward Islands on the eve of the declarationof war and made an immediatestart for the Cape de Verde Islands as the vanguard of the fleet. Cervera, even if he hadbeen ready to put to sea at once (and he was anything but ready), would not have been able to elude them. He would have been blockadedat St. Vincent or destroyedin a battle in the Atlantic. The seizure of the Canaries and a blockade of Cadiz would then have at once brought home to Spain itself that hostile pressure that would have enforced an early peace. Meanwhile friendly Cubans would not have been starved to death in the vain hope that their sufferings wouldin some wayinfluence MarshalBlanco to surrender Havana.

Perhaps the reasons why this apparently obvious course was not adopted were that in the first place there was a false impression in the United States as to the actualconditionof affairs in Cuba itself. Considering the means of obtaining information which the Government at Washington possessed, this false impression should not have existed, at least in official circles. But it did. The Cuban sympathisers, and their advocates in the "yellow press" and in the war party in Congress, had persuaded themselves and the public that the Cuban insurgents had almost conquered the island,that the Spanish garrison wasreducedto extremities, and that little more than the appearance of Sampson's fleet on the Cuban coasts would end the conflict. We have seen how Senator Gallinger,fresh from a tour in Cuba, had predicted that if war came it would not last a fortnight ; howMr. Pulitzer,of the New YorkJournal,the chief organ of the" yellow press," proved tohis own satisfaction that a bombardment of Havana and San Juan in Puerto Rico would finish the conflict in a few days,so that" it would hardly be war, but it would be magnificent" ; laow regular officers in high command joined their voices to these misleading prophecies of journalists and senators, GeneralMerritt declaring that he was willing to undertake the immediate conquestofCuba with 30,000 men, and General Shaftersaying he could turn the Spaniards out with only 5,000, not foreseeing thatbefore three months were out he would have failed at the If the writer's estimate of the mortality be true,it would seem that the blockade resulted in the loss of at least as many Cuban lives as were everset to the accountofGeneral Weyler's "reconcentration decree." And, notwithstanding the testimony of the correspondent just quoted, it is doubtful whether the miseries inflicted,not only on the Spanish garrison,but also on thefriendly civil populationof Cuba, did much to hasten the surrender of Spain. Even though there was scarcity in Havana itself, Marshal Blanco had done what every commander of a fortress in war must do, and had secured sufficient supplies to keep the troops under his orders tolerably well provided. It is clear that if AdmiralCervera'sfleet had not shut itself up in Santiago, a city which was not a fortress and was not prepared to stand a siege, the war would have been prolonged till the autumn, and it would have been necessary to concentrate the American navy andland a large army for thereduction of the island capital. It was not the blockade but the destruction of Cervera's squadron that brought the war to an end. This beingso, it is difficult to see why the Cabinet at Washington did not realise at a much earlier stage of the struggle that the true objective of their own navy was the Spanish fleet. Had thisbeen recognised,Admiral Sampson would not have wasted weeks in patrolling