manufacturers have tried several times to stop it for one reason or another, but it has invariably brought on a strike, and the workmen have won. When the war came General Weyler stopped the reading in the factories because there was so much of what he thought was seditious in the newspapers, and because he also thought that the readings fomented trouble in the city. As soon as the war was over, the reading was resumed. I attended one of these readings at the factory of J. Vales & Co. The reader sat in a high chair, where he could be seen by all the workers. The president of the labor union rang a bell for silence; and then, with a rasping voice that carried the words sharply into every part of the room, the reader began his literary selection for the day. It was a Spanish translation of Les Misérables. Later he read the daily newspaper. The reader is always selected by competition. Trials are held, and then the workmen vote as to a choice. A committee in charge selects the works to be read. Sometimes a vote is taken among the workmen when there is divided opinion as to a programme. Usually a very high grade of fiction is selected. Travel, history, and humor also play a part in the readings, and the result is that the average cigarmaker in Havana has an acquaintance with literature. that few persons in his grade of life possess.

The cigar factories in Havana are found in most cases in buildings the exteriors of which resemble stores and dwellings. There are few plain buildings, such as are built for factories in the United States. Some old mansion or building that could be adapted to any of a halfdozen purposes is used. There is a larger percentage of

loss in the making up of the raw material than in the United States. It is customary to allow each workman in Cuba to make from five to ten cigars a day for his personal consumption out of the material on which he is working. When that material is of the very finest quality, a leaf that is made into cigars selling for from thirty cents to a dollar each in this country, one can see that the perquisites of cigar-makers are costly to their employers. It is a custom, and that is above all questions of profit and loss, especially when the boss loses.

The wages of the men run from $20 to as high as $35 a week. There is an apprenticeship system. Extensive use is also made of the labor of women and girls. The women and girls make from one dollar to one dollar and a half a day, and are employed in a variety of tasks. They select and grade wrappers, and many of them are employed in the cigarette departments of the factories. They also do some of the packing work, prepare boxes, and place labels on the cigars. The women are of all ages. As a rule, they work in rooms by themselves.

Before the war the annual crop of Cuban tobacco was about 600,000 bales of 100 pounds each. About two-fifths of it was used in Havana in cigar and cigarette making, and the other three-fifths was exported. The crop for 1899 probably ran close to 300,000 bales, despite the scarcity of labor.

The pathway of returning prosperity to Cuba ran through the tobacco-plantations first. It was through the revival of the tobacco industry that the people of the island knew what the blessing of peace meant in a commercial sense.

J

CHAPTER XVII

HAVANA'S NEW POLICE FORCE

OHN MCCULLAGH, former chief of police of New

York city, strolled down the Prado in Havana one

day in February, 1899, and cast a critical eye over eight hundred men drawn up in double rank in companies and battalions. The men were in citizens' dress, and they stood at attention. They were the men who had been selected from twenty-four hundred applicants for membership in Havana's new and first real police force. They ranged from 5 feet 6 inches to 6 feet 4 inches in height. Every eye was towards the front and every man was alert. They were nervous, but keenly intelligent; nearly one half were well dressed. The rest had made an effort to hide deficiencies in personal appearance. Nine-tenths were in excellent physical condition. Here and there thin and drawn features told a story of the hardships of campaigning or of illness. Most of them had been advocates of Cuba's freedom, and probably one-half of them had served in jungles in the starved so-called Cuban army. It was plain, as McCullagh went down the ranks, that there was an esprit de corps. Pride in the work and an eagerness to show efficiency were stamped on every face. Except for their

ages, they looked like West Point "plebes" after being lined up for the fourth or fifth time.

Several American army officers, detailed to give instruction in drilling, were within call as McCullagh sauntered to the right of the line.

He called an interpreter, who summoned the battalion's chiefs and captains.

"I want the men to move by fours right," he said, "and then form company front and march up the Prado."

The interpreter told the assembled officers what the order was; the army officers gave a word of explana

tion, and then a great jabbering and gesticulation began. The officers all talked at once. They shrieked at one another; they threw their hands this way and that; they took measured steps here and there; then they cooled down into an animated jabbering, and finally one after another ceased talking and assumed an air of calm. In a flash the storm broke again. McCullagh had been standing, half-amused, but with cold exterior, off at one side. His brow now became wrinkled, he bit his lower lip, opened his mouth to speak, checked himself, clinched his hands, and then blurted out in a sharp order:

"Interpreter, tell those men to quit talking, and go and do it!"

The officers gave a searching glance at the former New York chief of police. He smiled, and they started off with animation. Shrill commands in Spanish rang down the lines. At last "Forward, march" was given, and the entire body of men moved off at a quick pace. Then they formed company front, and at last John McCullagh was happy.

"Good! good!" he shouted. "Very good! Bueno!"

It had all been done in ten days. It was a show well worth seeing, and it was a worthy source of pride. Only ten days before had the first man in the parade passed his physical and mental examination. If John McCullagh has had one superior quality of excellence as a policeman, it has been as a disciplinarian, a drill-master, and he has always showed it in controlling a large body of men. Raw and crude as was his material in this case, from a military standpoint, his skill-one might almost say his genius-showed itself as those men marched up