We love peace. We are not a military nation, but whenever the time of peril comes the bulwark of this people rests in the patriotism of its citizens, and this nation will be safe for all time, because 75,000,000 of people love it and will give up their lives to sustain and uphold it.

The war brought us together; its settlement will keep us together. Reunited! Glorious realization! It expresses the thought of my mind and the long-deferred consummation of my heart's desire as I stand in this presence. It interprets the hearty demonstration here witnessed and is the patriotic refrain of all sections and of all lovers of the republic.

Reunited! One country again and one country forever! Proclaim it from the press and pulpit! Teach it in the schools! Write it across the skies! The world sees and feels it! It cheers every heart, north and south, and brightens the life of every American home. Let nothing ever strain it again. At peace with all the world and with each other, what can stand in the pathway of our progress and prosperity?

Uncle Sam-"It took me three months to lick Spain, but there's no telling how long

it will take me to lick these stamps."-Minneapolis Journal.

CHAPTER II.

STORY OF CUBA'S STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM-A CENTURY OF
REVOLUTION WHICH LED TO THE WAR BETWEEN
THE UNITED STATES AND SPAIN.

EFORE entering upon the historic incidents and events of the Spanish-American war it is important that the reader should know something of the long struggle of Cuba for independence and the causes of the many revolutions in the "Pearl of the Antilles" from the time it came under Spanish rule.

The Cubans are not a warlike people. On the contrary, they are peaceable, amiable and pleas

ure-loving.

"No people are so easy to govern as the Cubans," said General Vargas. "Treat them courteously and kindly, let them go unmolested about their business, do not interfere with their amusements and you can do with them almost anything you like."

Yet these patient, peace-loving people have either been in revolt or have been fomenting a revolution since 1823. In fact, they knew neither peace nor security from the time they came under Spanish rule until by the powerful intervention of the United States the shackles were broken from their limbs and the galling yoke of Spain lifted from their weary necks.

The history of Cuba for the last century has been written in the blood of her brave sons. It has been a century of dishonor for Spain, but she has paid dearly in blood and treasure and territory for the oppressions she has visited upon her American colonies. Once she was the ruler of more than half the North American continent, all of Central and South America and the islands of the southern coasts. To-day she is one of the smallest of European powers, without owning or exercising authority over a foot of land in the Western Hemisphere.

During the first three centuries of Spanish sovereignty in the New World, Cuba was neglected most of the time and wholly ignored a part of the time by the mother country. Near the end of the eighteenth

1

century she began to take a lively interest in her island colony and a system of injustice and oppression was practiced which kindled the fires of revolution and has kept them burning intermittently ever since. There was a Cuban revolution in 1823, another in 1826, another in 1830, another in 1848, and others in 1850, 1851 and 1855. Then came a brief lull in open hostilities, while the Cuban patriots prepared for the "Ten Years' War," beginning in 1868 and ending in 1878. Following this came an uprising in 1879 and another in 1885.

As there had been ten years of war, there were ten years of comparative peace until February 24, 1895, when the revolution began which culminated in the Spanish-American war, the outcome of which gave to Cuba Freedom and Independence, for which she had fought so long.

What were the causes that led the peace-loving Cubans to wage an almost continuous war against Spain for nearly a century?

The answer is to be found in the history of every Central and South American republic which has thrown off the yoke of Spain. Instead of seeking to develop the resources of her American colonies and to promote the welfare of the colonists, Spain has used them merely to swell the income of the home treasury and to enrich the fortunes of the dishonest officials she sent to rule over them. Every industry has been extortionately taxed.

One of the first products of Cuban soil to acquire importance at the beginning of the last century was tobacco. The government at once monopolized its cultivation, sale and manufacture to such an extent that the planters several times rose in armed rebellion, and many times destroyed their fields rather than submit to being robbed of all their profits and a part of their labor. A better idea of the extent of the extortion and imposition practiced is shown by the fact that a Cuban could not hold a reception at his house until he had first obtained a license and paid for it.

In the levying of taxes and the distribution of revenue the Cubans have had no voice nor vote. That was all done by the mother country. Every year they were compelled to pay from $26,000,000 to $30,000,000 in taxation. Of this enormous sum only $700,000 was expended in Cuba for internal improvements, and not one cent for education. The balance of it was disbursed as follows: To pay interest on Spanish debt, $12,000,000; army and navy of Spain, $7,000,000; salaries of Spanish officials in and out of the island, $8,000,000.