The Conservative *
of the Maine. Wo also inspected the
fortress prison , Las Cabanas , and went
through its long and devious under
ground passages leading to the numer
ous dark dungeons. Appalling in its
magnitude and grandeur , and stupendous
deus in the outlay of labor and money ,
it is a disgrace to civilization a relic of
inconceivable barbarity. We went also
to Morro Castle. It is interesting more
on account of its massiveness and de
sign , enormous cost in labor and treas
ure , rather than its usefulness as a
modern defense. A visit was made to
the grand old fortress , El Principe , built
without regard to cost , before the days
of modern artillery , but after the per
fection of the science of permanent
fortifications. The cemetery is also
well worth a visit.
Puerto Principe.
About forty hours on a Spanish steam
coaster brings one to Nnevitas , the port
of Puerto Principe Oity , capital of the
province of the same name. The city
has between 85,000 and 40,000 popnla-
ti6n , and is also clean as a pin , another
object lesson for our own cities in that
regard.
American Inconsistency.
Indeed , Americans may not be the
only people who practice not what they
preach , but they have high ideals and
most decidedly like to enforce them
upon others. One of the greatest in
dustries of our country is the manufac
ture of intoxicating liquors. Yet we
prohibit the Indians from making and
drinking tis-win. At a council of the
Apaches the chiefs protested. "White
men make whiskey ; white men drink
whiskey ; why they no let Indians make
tis-win drink tis-win ? " No one could
meet the argument , and all the officer
could say was : "Well , General Orook
has ordered me to have it stopped and I
have to obey , not question , his orders. "
Then a small faction of our people con
ceive that American soldiers should not
be allowed to drink beer , and ally them
selves with those who want to sell sol
diers poisoned whiskey. And run
shady dance houses and concert halls ,
and get congress to prohibit the sale of
beer on any military reservation , while
a gin mill is running in the basement of
the capital and congressmen wipe their
mouths while they vote for the prohibi
tion. Truly consistency is a rare jewel
and probably we have no right to ex
pect to find it in our own acts.
Political Situation.
Everywhere I have been I have tried
to sound those I met , in a quiet way , for
my own information , as to their own
feeling and that of ( he Cuban people on
the form of government they want.
Without an exception they were in
favor of annexation to the United
States , and they aver that to be the feel
ing of all of the intelligent and educa
ted classes of all property owners and
business men , and annexation to the
United States is opposed only by the
ignorant who are still following the
ignis faluus "Liberty , " of which they
have no true conception and which they
have not found under the occupation by
American troops , and which they fear
they will never find under the folds of
our flag and which I am quite sure they
will never find at all. I have yet to
meet any man who believes that the
Cubans can establish and maintain a
government that will be any more satis
factory to the United States than that
of the old Spanish regime. But suppos
ing they can , supposing they establish
and maintain an ideal government , they
will have to have all the costly machin
ery of a general government. They
will have to create aud maintain a navy
and an army , a custom service , light
house service , and fortify their harbors
and maintain ambassadors and ministers
at the capitals of all governments , and ,
if they have any commerce , consuls at
all the great ports of the world and cen
ters of trade , and worst of all , Cuba
would be confronted by the tariff walls
of all nations , while she is now begging
for tariff concessions from us.
On the other hand , annexation to the
United States means for her the most
liberal form of government that of one
of our sovereign states , and probably
more , for in that event she would
doubtless retain all her land as did
Texas. She would be exempt from all
the expenses of a general government
enumerated above , but best of all she
would have free trade with all the
states the best market in the world for
her products and for which she is now
clamoring for concessions only. She
would have the protection of the gen
eral government , assurance of a stable
republican form of government and se
curity for foreign capital investments
which she so sorely needs to develop her
rich resources.
This is only a base outline of the pros
andcons in the case. Never in the his
tory of the world has a people had such
an opportunity. Cuba could well af-
for d1 to pledge millions for annexation.
Willshe ( avail herself of the opportunity ?
That is to be decided by counting noses
with all the chances that the majority
settles a question right.
CHARLES MORTON ,
Lieutenant-Colonel , U. S. A.
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.
The electrograph of Prof. Lancetta
is now at work in several Italian ob
servatories. It consists of an elevated
wire or antenna , connected to earth
through a coherer , which is affected by
electric disturbances in the air and acts
upon a recording apparatus. A light
ning flash , for example , causes the co
herer to ring n bell and make a pencil
mark upon a revolving clock dial. With
an antenna forty feet high on an eleva
tion without surrounding obstacles ! a
thunder-storm can bo detected more
than sixty miles away , and the appara
tus is expected to do valuable service in
signaling the hail-storms so much dread
ed by Italian vine-growers.
For producing low temperatures down
to GO ° O. below zero , M. d'Arsoiival
recommends chloride of methyl evapo
rated in a porous vase. To reach 112 °
or 115 ° below zero , liquid carbonic acid
or acetylene may be used , and may be
conveniently dissolved in acetone.
Liquid air offers the best means of ob
taining greater cold. This should be
slowly dropped from a silvered glass
flask through a rubber tube into a quart
vessel of silvered glass with double
walls , the vessel being placed in a bath
of gasoline. A little more than an
ounce of liquid air suffices for giving
194 ° below zero for an hour.
A remarkable dependence of certain
plants upon others of different kind
seems to have been discovered by M.
Noel Bernard , a French botanist. The
orchids produce many seeds , some of
them millions to the single plant , yet
they are very rare plants , and it was
long supposed to be impossible to grow
them in any way except by transplant
ing the bulbs. Success with the seeds
was at last reached by sowing them in
soil that had contained the adult plant.
From his investigation , M. Bernard
concludes that the seeds germinate only
after they have been penetrated b a
certain species of fungus , and that in
fection of the soil , which would result
from the roots of the older plants , is
necessary for the cultivation of the
young plants.
Mysterious dark bodies ; have been seu
occasionally to cross the sun's disc. 'An
English astronomer has collected ac
curate dates of nine of these transits ,
the earliest being June 6 , 1761 , and he
finds that these dates indicate the ex
istence of two unknown planets , within
the earth's orbit , with periods of alaout
174 and 20 days respectively. One of
these bodies must be hearer the sun
than Mercury , with a mean distance of
about 13,000,000 miles. The other is
calculated to revolve between Mercury
and Venus , at a distance of about 61-
000,000 miles , aud should have a diam
eter of 1,700 to 2,000 miles. At its most
favorable position for observation , it
would appear as a third magnitude star
80 ° from the sun.
Sunflower pith proves to have a spe-
ciflo gravity of only 0.028 , while that of
elder pith hitherto thought the lightest
solid is 0.09 , and that of cork is 0.24.