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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Pioneering in Cuba, by John M. Adams
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Pioneering in Cuba
+       A Narrative of the Settlement of La Gloria, the First
+       American Colony in Cuba, and the Early Experiences of the
+       Pioneers
+
+Author: James Meade Adams
+
+Release Date: September 3, 2010 [EBook #33617]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PIONEERING IN CUBA ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Pioneering
+... in Cuba
+
+By
+
+JAMES M. ADAMS
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration: JAMES M. ADAMS.]
+
+
+
+
+PIONEERING IN CUBA
+
+_A NARRATIVE OF THE SETTLEMENT OF LA GLORIA, THE FIRST AMERICAN COLONY
+IN CUBA, AND THE EARLY EXPERIENCES OF THE PIONEERS_
+
+BY
+
+JAMES M. ADAMS
+
+ONE OF THE ORIGINAL COLONISTS
+
+_Illustrated_
+
+CONCORD, N. H.:
+
+The Rumford Press
+
+1901
+
+Copyright, 1901, by
+
+JAMES M. ADAMS
+
+
+TO
+
+MY FELLOW COLONISTS
+
+WHOSE COURAGE, CHEERFULNESS, AND KINDLY SPIRIT WON MY ADMIRATION AND
+AFFECTION
+
+THIS BOOK IS
+
+RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+My excuse for writing and publishing this book is a threefold one. For
+some time I have strongly felt that the true story of the La Gloria
+colony should be told, without bias and with an accurate, first-hand
+knowledge of all the facts. My close relations with the colony and the
+colonists, and an actual personal residence in La Gloria for nearly half
+a year, have made me entirely familiar with the conditions there, and I
+have endeavored to present them to the reader clearly, correctly, and
+honestly. Secondly, I have been imbued with the belief that many of the
+daily happenings in the colony, particularly those of the earlier
+months, are of sufficient general interest to justify their narration;
+and if I am wrong in this, I am quite sure that these incidents,
+anecdotes, and recollections will find an attentive audience among the
+colonists and their friends. It is one of the author's chief regrets
+that the size and scope of this book does not admit of the mention by
+name of all of the colonists who were prominent and active in the life
+of the colony. Thirdly, while in La Gloria, in his capacity as a member
+of the Pioneer Association, the author had the honor to be the chairman
+of the committee on History of the Colony. This committee was not
+officially or outwardly active, but in a quiet way its members stored up
+history as fast as it was made. The author does not dignify the present
+work by the name of history, but prefers to call it a narrative of the
+first year of the colony. He believes, however, that it contains many
+facts and incidents which will be found useful material to draw upon
+when in later years a complete history of the first American colony in
+Cuba may be written.
+
+I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to Mr. V. K. Van De Venter, a
+professional photographer of Dundee, Michigan, for some of the best
+pictures in the book. The other photographs were taken, and in several
+cases kindly furnished gratuitously, by Robin H. Ford, John H. Rising,
+L. E. Mayo, and W. G. Spiker. I am also under obligation to Mr. Spiker
+for the loan of the cut of the lake on the Laguna Grande tract, and to
+Dr. W. P. Peirce for the use of the cut of his pineapple garden in La
+Gloria. All of the pictures in the book are scenes in the province of
+Puerto Principe, and with two or three exceptions, in or around La
+Gloria.
+
+J. M. A.
+
+_North Weare, N. H., December, 1900._]
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE ARRIVAL OF THE COLONISTS IN NUEVITAS HARBOR.
+
+                                                                    PAGE
+A New Sight for Old Nuevitas--The _Yarmouth_ drops Anchor in the
+Harbor--The Vanguard of the First American Colony Planted in Cuba--The
+Beautiful Cuban Coast--Picturesque Appearance of Nuevitas--"Distance
+Lends Enchantment to the View"--Character of the Colonists--Gen. Paul
+Van der Voort--Nearly all the States Represented--"The Only Canuck on
+Board"--The Voyage from New York                                      17
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE JOURNEY TO PORT LA GLORIA
+
+An Irritating Delay--Ashore at Nuevitas--Midnight Row at the
+Pier--Convivial Colonists Clash With Cubans--Ex-Soldier Takes an
+Involuntary Bath--The Cuban Police--Hon. Peter E. Park--The Start for La
+Gloria--Some Intending Colonists Back Out--The Man With the Long, Red
+Face--The Only Woman--The Fleet Anchors--"To-morrow, Four O'clock, Wind
+Right, Go!"--An Uncomfortable Night--Cuban Captain Falls Overboard--Port
+La Gloria Sighted                                                     32
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+A TOUGH TRAMP TO LA GLORIA CITY.
+
+Arrival at the Port--A Discouraging Scene--Mud, Water, and Sand
+Flies--The Memorable Walk to La Gloria "City"--An Awful Road--Battle
+With Water, Mud, Stumps, Roots, Logs, Briers and Branches--Lawyer Park
+Leads the Strange Procession--La Gloria at Last--The Royal Palm--Women
+in Masculine Garb--Col. Thos. H. Maginniss--First Night in La
+Gloria--The Survey Corps--Chief Engineer Kelly--Experiences of the
+Lowells and Spikers                                                   44
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+FIRST DAYS IN THE NEW COLONY.
+
+Isolation of La Gloria--The Camp at Night--Strange Sounds in the
+Forest--The Colonists Happy--Their Excellent Health--Remarkable Cures
+Effected by the Climate--The Agreeable Temperature--Prolonged Rainy
+Season--The "Hotel"--The Log Foundation--A Favorite Joke--The Company's
+Spring--Small Variety of Food--My First Supper in La Gloria--Eating
+Flamingo and Aged Goat--A Commissary With Nothing to Sell--A Fluctuating
+Population                                                            59
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE ALLOTMENT OF THE LAND.
+
+The Character of the Contracts--The Question of Subdivision--Some of the
+Difficulties--Matter Placed in the Hands of a Committee of the
+Colonists--Fair and Feasible Plan Adopted--Gen. Van der Voort's Arrival
+in La Gloria--His Boat Nearly Wrecked--Delay in Getting
+Baggage--Colonists Get Their Land Promptly--The Town as Laid Out--Site
+Well Chosen--Woods Full of Colonists Hunting for Their
+Plantations--Different Kinds of Soil                                  73
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE SUGAR RIOT.
+
+Population of Colony Slowly Increases--Arrival of Second
+_Yarmouth_--Sensational and Ridiculous Reports--Consternation in Asbury
+Park--Laughing Over Newspaper Stories--Excitement Over Sugar--Mass
+Meeting to Air the Grievance--An Unexpected Turn of Affairs--Cable From
+New York Brings Good News--Van der Voort Elected President of the
+Company--Sugar Orators Remain Silent--A Noisy Celebration             86
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+ADVENTURES AND MISADVENTURES.
+
+The Women in the Camp--Mrs. Moller--Her Costume and Extraordinary
+Adventures--How She Entered La Gloria--Roosts in a Tree all
+Night--Builds the First House in La Gloria--Her Famous Cow and
+Calf--Wonderful Bloomers--Ubiquitous Mrs. Horn--Weighed 250, but Waded
+Into La Gloria--Not "Rattled" by a Brook Running Through Her Tent--A Pig
+Hunt and Its Results--Surveyors Lost in the Woods                     94
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE CUBANS.
+
+Good People to "Get Along With"--Their Kindness and Courtesy--Harmony
+and Good Feeling Between the Colonists and Cubans--Their Primitive Style
+of Living--The Red Soil and Its Stains--Rural Homes--Prevalence of
+Children, Chickens, and Dogs--Little Girl Dresses for Company With Only
+a Slipper--Food and Drink of the Cubans--Few Amusements--An Indifferent
+People--The Country Districts of the Province of Puerto Principe     104
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+STEPS OF PROGRESS.
+
+Clearing and Planting--The Post-office--Col. John F. Early--The "Old
+Senor"--La Gloria Police Force--Chief Matthews' Nightly Trip "Down the
+Line"--No Liquor Sold, and Practically no Crime Committed--Watchman
+Eugene Kezar--Religious Services and Ministers--La Gloria Pioneer
+Association--Dr. W. P. Peirce--Mr. D. E. Lowell--Mr. R. G.
+Barner--Important Work of the Association                            118
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+EVENTS IMPORTANT AND OTHERWISE.
+
+Worth of the Colonists--Gen. Van der Voort's New Cuban House--The
+"Lookout Tree"--Its Part in the Cuban Wars--The General's
+Garden--Marvelously Rapid Growth of Plants--First Birth in La
+Gloria--Olaf El Gloria Olson--Given a Town Lot--Temperature
+Figures--Perfection of Climate--The Maginniss Corduroy Road--First Well
+Dug--Architect M. A. C. Neff                                         133
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+SELF-RELIANCE OF THE COLONISTS.
+
+The Man With the Hoe--"Grandpa" Withee Able to Take Care of Himself--Not
+Dead, but Very Much Alive--A Pugnacious Old Man--Mr. Withee Shoots
+Chickens and Defies the Authorities--Big Jack McCauley and His
+"Influence"--"Albany" and the Mosquitoes--Arrival of Third
+_Yarmouth_--Arnold Mollenhauer--John A. Connell--S. W. Storm--The First
+School and Its Teacher                                               143
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+THE FIRST HOLIDAY IN LA GLORIA.
+
+Craving for Athletic Sports--Half Holiday Formally Proclaimed--A
+Beautiful Day--The Colonists Photographed--Lieut. Evans and His Soldiers
+of the Eighth U. S. Cavalry--Successful Sports--Baseball Game--An Event
+not Down on the Program--Excited Colonists--Lawyer C. Hugo Drake of
+Puerto Principe--His Scheme--Ordered Out of Camp--A Night in the
+Woods--Lieutenant Cienfuente                                         155
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+INDUSTRY OF THE COLONISTS.
+
+Pink Orchids on the Trees--Vegetables Raised and Fruit Trees Set
+Out--The Various Employments--Working on the Survey Corps--Chief
+Kelly's Facetious Formula--An Official Kicker--B. F.Seibert--Improvements
+at the Port--Fish, Alligators, and Flamingo--J. L. Ratekin--First Banquet
+in La Gloria--Departure of Maginniss Party--First Death in the Colony--Only
+One Death in Six Months--Lowell's Corduroy Road and Kelly's Permanent
+Highway                                                              166
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+THE FIRST BALL IN LA GLORIA.
+
+A Semi-Anniversary--Town Lots and Plantations Allotted in First Six
+Months--A Grand Ball--French Dancing Master in Charge--Dan Goodman's
+Pennsylvania Modesty--Organizing an Orchestra at Short Notice--The
+Ballroom--Rev. Dr. Gill Lends His Tent Floor--Elaborate Decorations--A
+Transformation Scene--Some Taking Specialties--A Fine Supper--Music in
+Camp--An Aggravating Cornet Player--Singers in the Colony            177
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+A WALKING TRIP TO PUERTO PRINCIPE.
+
+Five Good Walkers--A Halt at Mercedes--Sparsely Settled Country--Cuban
+Trails--A Night in the Woods--A Cripple From Sore Feet--A Pretty Country
+Place--The Cubitas Mountains--Hunting for the Late Cuban Capital--A
+Broad and Beautiful View--Seventeen Miles Without a House--Night on the
+Plain--The City of Puerto Principe--Politeness of Its People--The
+Journey Home--Sanchez' Sugar Plantation--Lost in the Forest--La Gloria
+Once More                                                            186
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+IN AND AROUND LA GLORIA.
+
+Horses That May Have Committed Suicide--Colonel Maginniss "A Master Hand
+in Sickness"--Sudden and Surprising Rise of Water--A Deluge of Frogs--A
+Greedy Snake--Catching Fish in Central Avenue--D. Siefert's
+Industry--Max Neuber--Mountain View--A Facetious Signboard--The
+Sangjai--An Aggravating and Uncertain Channel                        203
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE COLONY AT THE END OF THE FIRST YEAR.
+
+The Saw Mill--The Pole Tramway to the Bay--A Tragedy in the
+Colony--Death of Mr. Bosworth--The Summer Season--The Country Around La
+Gloria--The Cuban Colonization Company--Guanaja--The Rural
+Guard--Organizations in La Gloria--The March of Improvements--Construction
+of Wooden Buildings--Colonists Delighted With Their New Home in the
+Tropics                                                              212
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+                                                PAGE.
+
+James M. Adams                          Frontispiece.
+
+Map of Cuba                                        16
+
+City of Nuevitas, Cuba                             20
+
+Gen. Paul Van der Voort                            26
+
+An Involuntary Bath                                42
+
+Port La Gloria                                     46
+
+Author on Road to La Gloria                        48
+
+Col. Thomas H. Maginniss                           52
+
+"The Hotel"                                        64
+
+The Spring                                         68
+
+Robert C. Beausejour                               82
+
+La Gloria, Cuba, Looking North                     88
+
+First House in La Gloria                           97
+
+Frank J. O'Reilly                                 110
+
+First Women Colonists of La Gloria.               122
+
+Dr. William P. Peirce                             126
+
+Gen. Van der Voort's Cuban House                  134
+
+La Gloria, Cuba, Looking South                    150
+
+Group of Colonists                                158
+
+The Survey Corps                                  168
+
+Interior Gen. Van der Voort's House               182
+
+Agramonte Plaza, Puerto Principe, Cuba            200
+
+Dr. Peirce's Pineapple Patch                      208
+
+Scene on Laguna Grande                            214
+
+
+[Illustration: MAP OF CUBA., PROVINCES.
+
+    1 PINAR DEL RIO
+    2 HAVANA
+    3 MATANZAS
+    4 SANTA CLARA
+    5 PUERTO PRINCIPE
+    6 SANTIAGO DE CUBA
+
+
+
+
+PIONEERING IN CUBA.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+ARRIVAL OF THE COLONISTS IN NUEVITAS HARBOR.
+
+
+Just after noon on January 4, 1900, the ancient city of Nuevitas, Cuba,
+lazily basking in the midday sunshine, witnessed a sight which had not
+been paralleled in the four hundred years of its existence. A steamer
+was dropping anchor in the placid water of the harbor a mile off shore,
+and her decks were thronged with a crowd of more than two hundred eager
+and active Americans. They wore no uniforms, nor did they carry either
+guns or swords; and yet they had come on an errand of conquest. They had
+fared forth from their native land to attack the formidable forests and
+to subdue the untamed soil of the province of Puerto Principe--a task
+which required scarcely less courage and resolution than a feat of arms
+might have demanded in that locality two years before. Well aware that
+there was a hard fight before them, they were yet sanguine of success
+and eager to begin active operations. It was the vanguard of the first
+American colony planted in Cuba.
+
+The vessel that lay at anchor in the beautiful land-locked harbor of
+Nuevitas was the screw steamer _Yarmouth_, a steel ship which, if not as
+fast and elegant as the ocean greyhounds that cross the Atlantic, was
+large and fine enough to have easily commanded the unbounded admiration
+and amazement of Christopher Columbus had he beheld her when he landed
+from the _Santa Maria_ on the coast of Cuba near this point more than
+four centuries ago. Great changes have been wrought since the days of
+Columbus in the manner of craft that sail the seas, but less progress
+has been made by the city of Nuevitas in those four hundred long years.
+The _Yarmouth_, substantial if not handsome, and safe if not swift, had
+brought the colonists to this port without mishap, thus redeeming one of
+the many promises of the Cuban Land and Steamship Company. Since early
+morning the vessel had been slowly steaming along the palm-fringed coast
+of the "Pearl of the Antilles," daybreak having revealed the fact that
+the boat was too far to the eastward, and late in the forenoon we
+entered the picturesque bay of Nuevitas, took on a swarthy Cuban pilot,
+and, gliding quietly past straggling palm-thatched native shacks and
+tiny green-clad isles, came to anchor in plain view of the city that
+Velasquez founded in 1514. We had passed two or three small circular
+forts, any one of which would have been demolished by a single
+well-directed shot from a thirteen-inch gun. These defenses were
+unoccupied, and there was naught else to threaten the established peace.
+
+[Illustration: CITY OF NUEVITAS, CUBA.]
+
+The day was beautiful, freshened by a soft and balmy breeze, with the
+delightful temperature of 75 degrees. Far back in the interior, through
+the wonderfully transparent Cuban atmosphere, one could see the light
+blue peaks of lofty mountains, standing singly instead of in groups, as
+if each were the monarch of a small principality. Their outlines, as
+seen at this distance, were graceful and symmetrical, rather than rugged
+and overpowering like some of their brother chieftains of the North.
+Near at hand the listless city of Nuevitas extended from the water's
+edge backward up the hillside of a long, green ridge, the low, red-tiled
+houses clinging to what seemed precarious positions along the rough,
+water-worn streets that gashed the side of the hill. To the right a
+green-covered promontory projected far into the bay, dotted with
+occasional native shacks and planted in part with sisal hemp. The
+colonists on shipboard, ignorant of the appearance of this tropical
+product, at first took the hemp for pineapple plants, but soon learned
+their mistake from one who had been in the tropics before. Viewed from
+the harbor, Nuevitas looks pretty and picturesque, but once on shore the
+illusion vanishes. Mud meets you at the threshold and sticks to you like
+a brother. The streets, for the most part, are nothing more than
+rain-furrowed lanes, filled with large, projecting stones and gullies of
+no little depth. Sticky, yellow mud is everywhere, and once acquired is
+as hard to get rid of as the rheumatism. The houses, in general, are
+little better than hovels, and the gardens around them are neglected and
+forlorn. When a spot more attractive than the others is found, Nature is
+entitled to all the credit. The shops are poor and mean, and not over
+well supplied with merchandise. The natives, while kindly disposed
+toward the "Americanos," are, for the most part, unattractive in dress
+and person. The few public buildings are ugly and there is not a
+pleasant street in the town. And yet when seen from the harbor the city
+looks pretty, mainly on account of its red-tiled houses, grassy hillside
+slopes, and waving cocoanut palms. The author of the ancient saying that
+"distance lends enchantment to the view," might well have gathered his
+inspiration at Nuevitas.
+
+If the inhabitants of Nuevitas have the quality of curiosity, they
+clearly did not have it with them at the time of our arrival. Although
+it is said on good authority, that the city had never before had more
+than twelve or fifteen visitors at one time, save soldiers or sailors,
+the natives betrayed no excitement and little interest in the advent of
+two hundred American civilians. With the exception of a handful of
+boatmen and a few fruit venders, not a person came to the piers to gaze
+at the new arrivals, and in the town the people scarcely gave themselves
+the trouble to look out of their open dwellings and shops at the
+colonists. This may have been inherent courtesy--for the Cuban is
+nothing if not courteous--but to us it seemed more like indifference.
+The Cubans are certainly an indifferent people, and at this port they
+appeared to have no object or interest in life. They dwelt in drowsy
+content, smoking their cigarettes, and doing their little buying and
+selling in a leisurely and heedless manner. The most of them pick up a
+precarious living with but little labor. These easy-going habits impress
+the close observer as being more the result of indifference than
+downright indolence, for when the occasion demands it the Cuban often
+exhibits surprising activity and industry. He does not, however, work
+for the fun of it, and it never occurs to him that it is necessary to
+lay up anything for the proverbial "rainy day." Accustomed to the
+fairest skies in the world, he never anticipates cloudy weather.
+
+It is quite possible that if we had been arrayed in brilliant uniforms,
+resplendent of gold lace, brass buttons, and all the accompanying
+trappings, we should have aroused more interest, for the Cuban loves
+color, pageant, and martial show, but as a matter of fact, nothing could
+have been plainer and uglier than the dress of most of the colonists. To
+the superficial observer, there was nothing about the invaders to hold
+attention, but to me, who had closely studied my companions and
+fellow-colonists for nearly a week, they were full of interest and
+inspiration. They were, to be sure, a motley crowd, representing many
+states and territories, and several grades of social standing, but they
+were obviously courageous, enterprising, and of good character. In point
+of intelligence and manifest honesty and energy they averaged high--much
+higher than one would expect of the pioneers in a project of this sort.
+They were not reckless and unscrupulous adventurers, nor yet rolling
+stones who sought an indolent life of ease, but serious-minded and
+industrious home-seekers. They had counted the cost, and resolved to go
+forward and achieve success, expecting obstacles, but not anticipating
+defeat. A thoughtful person could not fail to be impressed by the
+serious and resolute manner in which these voyagers entered upon the
+work of establishing a new home for themselves in a tropical country.
+Since the days when the Pilgrim Fathers landed upon the bleak shores of
+New England, I doubt if a better aggregation of men had entered upon an
+enterprise of this character.
+
+The colonists sailed from New York on the _Yarmouth_ on Saturday,
+December 30, 1899, a stinging cold day. It was the first excursion run
+by the Cuban Land and Steamship Company, whose offices at 32 Broadway
+had for several days been crowded with men from all parts of the country
+eager to form a part of the first expedition to establish an American
+colony at La Gloria, on the north coast of Cuba, about forty miles west
+of Nuevitas. Every passenger on board the _Yarmouth_ was supposed to
+have purchased or contracted for land at La Gloria, and practically all
+had done so. The steamer was commanded by Capt. E. O. Smith, a popular
+and efficient officer, and carried besides her complement of crew and
+waiters, two hundred and eleven passengers, all men with one exception,
+Mrs. Crandall, the wife of an employe of the company. The colonists
+represented all sections of the country, from Maine to California, from
+Minnesota to Florida. No less than thirty states sent their delegations,
+two territories, Canada, Prince Edward's Island, and British Columbia.
+All came to New York to make up this memorable excursion. The genial and
+stalwart Gen. Paul Van der Voort of Nebraska, who was commander-in-chief
+of the national G. A. R. in 1882-'83, had led on a party of over twenty
+from the West, several of them his own neighbors in Omaha. The others
+were from different parts of Nebraska, Kansas, and Iowa. General Van
+der Voort was the assistant manager of the company, and a little later
+became its president. He went to Cuba in the double capacity of an
+officer of the company, to take charge of its business there, and a
+colonist to make La Gloria his permanent residence. Honest, affable, and
+humorous, a magnetic and convincing speaker, with a sunny nature
+singularly free from affectation and ardently loyal to his friends,
+General Van der Voort was a natural leader of men, well fitted to head a
+colonizing expedition. One of his sons had been in La Gloria for some
+time working as a surveyor in the employ of the company.
+
+[Illustration: GEN. PAUL VAN DER VOORT.]
+
+General Van der Voort's party, however, formed but a small fraction of
+the Western representation. Twelve men came from Illinois, six from
+Michigan, five from Minnesota, four from Wisconsin, four from Indiana,
+four from Oklahoma--men who were "boomers" in the rush for land in that
+territory--two from Missouri, two from Washington state, one from
+Wyoming, one from South Dakota, and one from California. Ohio men,
+usually so much in evidence, were hard to find, only one man on board
+acknowledging that he hailed from that state. The South was not so
+largely represented as the West, but there were two men from Maryland,
+two from Virginia, two from Georgia, one from Florida, one from West
+Virginia, and one from Washington, D. C. New York state led the entire
+list with fifty-one. Pennsylvania and Massachusetts came next with
+twenty-one each. From New Jersey there were fifteen. Among the New
+England states, New Hampshire and Connecticut followed Massachusetts,
+with five each. Rhode Island contributed four, Maine two, and Vermont
+two. Two of the colonists hailed from British Columbia, one from Prince
+Edward's Island, and one from Toronto, Canada. The latter, a tall,
+good-looking Englishman by the name of Rutherford, cheerfully announced
+himself as "the only Canuck on board." Those who were fortunate enough
+to become intimately acquainted with this clear-headed and whole-hearted
+gentleman were easily convinced that while he might call himself a
+"Canuck" and become a Cuban by emigration, he would remain to the end of
+his days an Englishman, and a very good specimen of his race. If
+Rutherford had not taken part in the "sugar riot"--but that's "another
+story."
+
+The colonists represented even more occupations than states. There were
+four physicians, one clergyman, one lawyer, one editor, one patent
+office employe, small merchants, clerks, bookkeepers, locomotive
+engineers, carpenters, and other skilled mechanics, besides many
+farmers. There were also a number of specialists. The embryo colony
+included several veterans of the Spanish war, some of whom had been in
+Cuba before. G. A. R. buttons were surprisingly numerous. The men,
+generally speaking, appeared to be eminently practical and thoroughly
+wide awake. They looked able to take hold of a business enterprise and
+push it through to success, regardless of obstacles. Several of the
+colonists showed their thrift by taking poultry with them, while an old
+gentleman from Minnesota had brought along two colonies of Italian honey
+bees. Another old man explained his presence by jocularly declaring that
+he was going down to Cuba to search for the footprints of Columbus.
+Accents representing all sections of the country were harmoniously and
+curiously mingled, and the spirit of fraternity was marked. The one
+colored man in the party, an intelligent representative of his race, had
+as good standing as anybody.
+
+The voyage down was uneventful. It occupied four days and a half, and
+for thirty-six hours, in the neighborhood of Cape Hatteras, very rough
+water was encountered. But few on board had ever known such a sea, and
+sickness was universal. The discomfort was great, partly owing to the
+crowded condition of the boat. Many a hardy colonist sighed for his
+Western ranch or his comfortable house in the East. The superior
+attractions of Cuba were forgotten for the moment, and there was intense
+longing for the land that had been left behind. It is a fact hard to
+believe that several on board had never before seen the ocean, to say
+nothing of sailing upon its turbulent bosom. With the return of a smooth
+sea a marvelous change came over the voyagers, and all began to look
+eagerly forward to a sight of the famed "Pearl of the Antilles." We were
+now sailing a calm tropical sea, with the fairest of skies above us and
+a mild and genial temperature that was a great delight after the severe
+cold of the Northern winter. The salubrious weather continued through
+the remaining forty-eight hours of the voyage, and the colonists
+resumed their interrupted intercourse, having but a single subject in
+their eager discussions--always the prospects of the colony or something
+bearing on their pioneer enterprise. The topic was far from being talked
+out when we glided into the tranquil harbor of Nuevitas.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE JOURNEY TO PORT LA GLORIA.
+
+
+The newly arrived colonists found the Spanish word "manana" still in
+high favor at Nuevitas, though it was difficult to fix the
+responsibility for the irritating delays. The Cubans and the officers of
+the company alike came in for a good deal of straight-from-the-shoulder
+Yankee criticism. Some of this was deserved, but not all. The company's
+officers had been handicapped in many ways, and for this and perhaps
+other reasons, had not pushed things along as rapidly and successfully
+as the colonists had been led to expect. It was learned that the town of
+La Gloria was as yet only a town in name, the foundation of its first
+building, the hotel, having just been laid. The lumber for the structure
+lay on the docks at Nuevitas. The company's portable sawmill machinery
+was rusting in the open air at the same place. If the colonists marveled
+at this, their wonder disappeared when, a little later, they tramped and
+waded the four miles of so-called "road" that lay between Port La
+Gloria and La Gloria "city". Nothing daunted by these discouraging signs
+and the many unfavorable reports, the most of the colonists determined
+to push ahead.
+
+Arriving at Nuevitas Thursday noon, January 4, the passengers of the
+_Yarmouth_ were not allowed to leave the vessel that day or evening.
+Many were desirous of exploring the ancient city of Nuevitas, but the
+most frequent and anxious inquiry was, "When shall we be taken to La
+Gloria?". It was a hard question to answer, and no one in authority
+attempted to do so. There were several causes contributing to the delay,
+one of which was the customs inspection and another the question of
+transportation. Communication between Nuevitas and La Gloria was neither
+easy nor regular. The overland route was the nearest, about forty miles,
+but could only be utilized by a person on foot or horseback. At the time
+of our arrival this way was entirely impracticable by any mode of
+travel. The inside or shallow water route was about forty-eight miles
+long, and the outside or deep water course, sixty miles. The officers of
+the company decided upon the latter as the most feasible, and set out to
+procure lighters to convey the colonists and their baggage. This was no
+easy matter, as the business had to be done with Cubans, and Cubans are
+never in any hurry about coming to terms.
+
+Friday morning the passengers of the _Yarmouth_ were permitted to go
+ashore and wake up the inhabitants of the sleepy city, each person
+paying some thrifty Cuban twenty-five cents for transportation thither
+in a sailboat. The Cuban boatmen coined money during our three days'
+stay in Nuevitas harbor. So also did the fruit venders, who came out to
+the steamer in small boats and sold us pineapples, tiny fig bananas, and
+green oranges at exorbitant prices. The fruit looked inferior, but the
+flavor was good. Most of it grew without care, and in a semi-wild
+condition. The colonists were eager to sample any fruit of the country,
+as most of them were intending to make fruit growing their business. The
+"Americanos" succeeded in waking up Nuevitas in some degree, and at
+night a few of them set out to "paint the town red". Only a few,
+however; the great majority behaved remarkably well. The day was spent
+in quietly inspecting the city and its surroundings. Many of the
+visitors bought needed supplies at the small stores.
+
+Saturday was passed in the same way as Friday, the only incident of note
+being a small-sized disturbance which took place at the pier near
+midnight. Three belated Americans, who had done more than look upon the
+"aguardiente", got into a quarrel with a Cuban boatman in regard to
+their return to the _Yarmouth_. The Americans were mainly at fault, the
+boatman was obstinate, and a war of words was soon followed by blows.
+The boatman was getting the worst of the scrimmage when several of the
+Cuban police swooped down upon the party. Two of the Americans drew
+revolvers, but they were quickly disarmed and overcome, one of the trio,
+who wore the uniform of the United States army, which he had lately
+quitted, falling over into the harbor in the scuffle. This sudden and
+unexpected ducking ended the fight; the "Americanos" compromised with
+the boatman, and were allowed to return to the _Yarmouth_. These
+intending colonists did not remain long at La Gloria, although one of
+the three purposes to return. The conduct of the Cuban police upon this
+occasion, and upon all others which came under my notice, was entirely
+creditable. They dress neatly, are sober and inoffensive in manner, and
+appear to perform their duties conscientiously and well.
+
+While we lay in Nuevitas harbor we received several visits from Gen. A.
+L. Bresler and the Hon. Peter E. Park, president and resident manager,
+respectively, of the Cuban Land and Steamship Company, both of whom had
+been stopping in the city for some time. They had acquired the Cuban
+dress and, to some extent, Cuban habits. Mr. Park decided to accompany
+the colonists to La Gloria, and to share with them all the hardships
+that they might encounter on the journey. It was no new thing for Mr.
+Park to make the trip. He had made it slowly along the coast in a small
+sailboat; he had made it in quicker time in a steam launch, and he had
+sometimes gone overland on horseback, struggling through mud and water
+and tangled vines, swimming swollen rivers and creeks, and fighting
+swarms of aggressive mosquitoes in the dense woods. He knew exactly what
+was before him; the colonists did not. General Bresler, strange to say,
+had never been at La Gloria.
+
+It was on Sunday afternoon, at a little past one o'clock, that the
+colonists finally got away from Nuevitas and made the start for La
+Gloria. The fleet consisted of three small schooners loaded with light
+baggage, a little freight, and nearly two hundred passengers. Two of the
+boats were Nuevitas lighters, with Cuban captains and crew, while the
+third was a schooner from Lake Worth, Florida, carrying about twenty
+colonists from that state. This boat, known as the _Emily B._, had
+arrived at Nuevitas a day or two before the _Yarmouth_. Among her
+passengers were four or five women. The heavy baggage of the _Yarmouth_
+colonists was loaded upon yet another lighter, which was to follow
+later.
+
+The colonists embarked upon the sailing craft from the decks of the
+_Yarmouth_, leaving behind a score or more of their number whose
+backbone had collapsed or who for some other reason had decided to
+return home immediately. It is, I believe, a veritable fact that more
+than one of the intending colonists went back on the same boat without
+so much as setting foot on the soil of Cuba. Probably examples of the
+"chocolate eclair" backbone are to be found everywhere. One of the
+returning voyagers was a tall, thin man of middle age, wearing a long,
+red, sorrowful face. It had been apparent from the very start that his
+was an aggravated case of home-sickness. He had shown unmistakable
+evidence of it before the _Yarmouth_ had even left North river, and he
+did not improve as the vessel approached the coast of Cuba. He rarely
+spoke to anybody, and could be seen hour after hour kneeling in a most
+dejected attitude upon a cushioned seat in the main saloon, gazing
+mournfully out of the window at the stern across the broad waters. His
+was about the most striking example of sustained melancholy that ever
+came under my observation, and could not seem other than ridiculous in
+that company. When we slowly moved away from the _Yarmouth_, I was not
+surprised to see this man standing silently upon the steamer's deck. The
+look of unillumined dejection was still upon his face. A man whose face
+does not light up under the subtle charm of the Cuban atmosphere is,
+indeed, a hopeless case, and ought not to travel beyond the limits of
+the county wherein lies his home. There were others who remained behind
+on the _Yarmouth_ for better reasons. Mr. and Mrs. Crandall returned to
+New York because the company's sawmill, which he was to operate, had not
+been taken to La Gloria and was not likely to be for some time to come.
+Mrs. Crandall was the only woman passenger on the voyage down and had
+been fearfully seasick all the way. Orders had been given that no women
+or children should be taken on this first excursion, but an exception
+was made in the case of Mrs. Crandall because she was the wife of an
+employe of the company.
+
+The departing colonists waved their good-bys to the _Yarmouth_, and the
+little fleet was towed out to the entrance of Nuevitas harbor, about ten
+miles, when the schooners came to anchor and the tugboat returned to the
+city. Although it was but little past three o'clock and the weather
+fine, the passengers learned to their dismay that the boats had anchored
+for the night. The furrowed-faced old captain would take no chances with
+the open sea at night and so would proceed no farther. "To-morrow--four
+o'clock--wind right--go!" he said, with a dramatic gesture and what
+seemed to the colonists an unnecessarily explosive emphasis on the last
+word.
+
+The boats were anchored in the narrow entrance to the harbor, where the
+smooth-running tide closely resembled a river. On one bank, one hundred
+yards away, were an old stone fort and a few Cuban shacks. Some of the
+passengers were desirous of going ashore to see the fort and the houses,
+but neither entreaties nor bribes could force the old Cuban captain to
+allow the use of his small boats. The Cubans are fond of waiting and
+cannot appreciate American restlessness. So we were obliged to sit
+quietly and gaze wistfully at the green-clad shore. As night came on, it
+was found that loaves of bread and large chunks of salt beef constituted
+the larder. It was poor fare, but the colonists accepted the situation
+cheerfully and broke bread and ate as much of the greasy meat as they
+could.
+
+It was a radiant evening, with soft, caressing breezes and a star-lit
+sky of incomparable beauty. Many of the voyagers saw the famed Southern
+Cross for the first time and gazed at it long in silent contemplation,
+overcome by that delicious feeling of dreamy content which takes
+possession of one in the tropics. On one of the boats, religious
+services were held, conducted by a Georgia clergyman, the Rev. A. E.
+Seddon of Atlanta, one of the most enthusiastic and uncomplaining of the
+colonists. The singing of hymns was joined in by many of the
+eighty-seven passengers on the boat, and prayers were offered by no less
+than four individuals. It was a singularly impressive scene, not
+altogether unlike what took place on board the _Mayflower_ centuries
+before.
+
+The peaceful evening was followed by a night of great discomfort. The
+passengers were crowded together, and many slept, or attempted to sleep,
+on boxes, barrels, or the lumber which formed a part of the cargo of the
+schooner. I slept, at intervals, on the lumber designed for the hotel at
+La Gloria. Often had I slept in hotels, but this was my first experience
+in sleeping _on_ one. Some of the passengers on the schooners sat up all
+night in preference to lying upon boxes and lumber. We were not,
+however, without entertainment during that long, wearisome night. We had
+a philosopher among us, in the person of quaint old Benjamin
+Franklin--of Griffin's Corners, New York--who talked earnestly and
+eloquently upon his appalling experiences in Confederate military
+prisons many years before. The handful of soldiers of the Spanish war
+were modestly silent in the presence of this gaunt old veteran of the
+great civil strife. Judge Groesbeck, of Washington, D. C., quoted poetry
+and told anecdotes and stories, while the Rev. Mr. Seddon, Dr. W. P.
+Peirce of Hoopeston, Ill., and others, contributed their share to the
+conversation. As we became drowsy, we could hear, now and again, some
+one of our companions giving an imitation of the Cuban captain:
+"To-morrow--four o'clock--wind right--go!".
+
+[Illustration: AN INVOLUNTARY BATH.]
+
+Early in the morning, true to his word, the captain set sail, and as the
+wind was right good progress was made. One of the diverting incidents of
+the morning was the fall of the captain overboard. In the crowded
+condition of the boat, he lost his footing and went over backward into
+the water. He scrambled back again in a hurry, with a look of deep
+disgust upon his rather repulsive face, but the inconsiderate
+"Americanos" greeted him with a roar of laughter. One enterprising
+amateur photographer secured a snapshot of him as he emerged dripping
+from his involuntary bath. A little later one of the Cubans caught a
+handsome dolphin, about two feet and a half long. The crew cooked it and
+served it up at ten cents a plate. As our schooner, drawing five feet of
+water, entered the inlet about fifteen miles from the port of La Gloria,
+she dragged roughly over the rocky bottom for some distance and came
+perilously near suffering misfortune. The other schooners came in
+collision at about this time and a panic ensued. No serious damage
+resulted, however. It was between twelve and one o'clock that afternoon
+that the port of La Gloria was sighted.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+A TOUGH TRAMP TO LA GLORIA CITY.
+
+
+As the fleet of schooners drew near La Gloria port, a row of small tents
+was discerned close to the shore. Elsewhere there was a heavy growth of
+bushes to the water's edge--the mangroves and similar vegetation fairly
+growing out into the sea. Between and around the tents was a wretched
+slough of sticky, oozy mud nearly a foot deep, with streams of surface
+water flowing over it in places into the bay. The colonists were filled
+with excitement and mingled emotions as they approached the shore, but
+their hearts sank when they surveyed this discouraging scene. They
+landed on the rude pier, and after much difficulty succeeded in
+depositing their light baggage in tents reserved for the purpose. Narrow
+boards laid down to walk on were covered with slippery mud, and some
+lost their footing and went over headforemost into the slough. One
+jaunty, well-dressed young man from New Jersey, who had found the trip
+vastly entertaining up to this point, was so disgusted at suffering a
+"flop-over" into the mire that he turned immediately back and returned
+to his home in Atlantic City. And so the sifting process went on among
+the intending colonists.
+
+The conditions at the port at that time were certainly most unpleasant.
+Mud and water were on every hand, and sand flies were as thick as swarms
+of bees, and nearly as ferocious; they allowed no one any peace. The
+company had considerately provided coffee and bread for the landing
+"immigrants", and something of the sort was certainly needed to fortify
+them for what was to follow. Lunch over, such of the colonists as had
+not decided to turn back started for the "city" of La Gloria, four miles
+inland. We found that the electric cars were not running, that the 'bus
+line was not in operation, and that we could not take a carriage to the
+hotel; nor was there a volante, a wagon, a bullock cart, a horse, mule,
+or pony in evidence. Neither was there a balloon or any other kind of
+airship. We learned further that a rowboat could be used only a portion
+of the way. Under the circumstances, we decided to walk.
+
+[Illustration: PORT LA GLORIA.
+
+_Photograph by V. K. Van De Venter, Jan. 25, 1900._]
+
+The road, if such it may be called, led through an open savanna, with
+occasional belts of timber. There had been heavy rains just before our
+arrival, and the trail was one of the most wretched ever followed by a
+human being. For about a quarter of a mile there was an apology for a
+corduroy road, but the logs composing it were so irregular and uneven in
+size, and had been so disarranged by surface water and so nearly covered
+with debris that it all seemed to have been placed there to obstruct
+travel rather than to facilitate it. After the corduroy, the trail was a
+disheartening mixture of water, mud, stumps, roots, logs, briers, and
+branches. Now we would be wading through shallow water and deep mud that
+almost pulled our shoes off; then splashing through water and tall,
+coarse grass; and again, carefully threading our precarious way among
+ugly stumps, logs, and fallen limbs, in water above our knees. At times
+the traveler found himself almost afloat in the forest. He was lucky,
+indeed, if he did not fall down, a misfortune which was little less than
+a tragedy. Before leaving the port we had been advised to remove our
+stockings and roll our trousers above our knees. Few of us had on
+anything better than ordinary shoes, and the sensation of tramping
+through the mud and water with these was far from pleasant. Many had
+rubber boots or leggings in their trunks, but the trunks were still at
+Nuevitas.
+
+[Illustration: AUTHOR ON ROAD TO LA GLORIA. (_Jan. 8, 1900._)]
+
+Notwithstanding the bad road, one hundred and sixty stout-hearted
+colonists set out for La Gloria between 1:30 and 3 o'clock. They
+straggled along for miles, old men and young men, and even lame men;
+some with valises, some with bundles, and many with overcoats. In the
+lead was Peter E. Park, the Detroit lawyer who for months had been
+acting as the Cuban manager for the company. His stalwart form was
+encased in a suit of white duck, and he wore a broad, slouch hat and
+high, leather boots. He looked quite picturesque as he strode through
+the mud and water, apparently trying to impress the colonists with the
+idea that the poor road was nothing to justify making a fuss. Inwardly,
+no doubt, he was somewhat sensitive on the subject of the road; justly
+or unjustly, the colonists blamed him for its condition.
+
+It was hot and hard work, this four-mile walk under a tropical sun, but
+the men bore it with a good deal of patience. I started with a pair of
+rubbers on, but was compelled to abandon them before getting far,
+leaving a large amount of rich Cuban soil in and on them. The scene
+which presented itself was unique and interesting. All sorts of costumes
+were worn, including some young fellows in soldiers' uniforms, and there
+was no little variety in the luggage carried. Some staggered under very
+heavy loads. Quite a number of cameras and kodaks were to be seen. The
+trail led through a rich savanna, soil which is undoubtedly adapted to
+the raising of sugar cane, rice, and cocoanuts. Many palmetto and palm
+trees lined the way. One could not well view the scenery without
+stopping, for fear of losing one's footing. Thorns were troublesome and
+easily penetrated the wet shoes of the weary travelers. The colonists
+all agreed that this road was the freest from dust of any they had ever
+trod.
+
+At last, after two hours of toil and discomfort, we came in sight of dry
+land and the camp. We had crossed two small creeks and seen a few
+unoccupied native shacks. No part of the land had been cultivated. Many
+of us had seen for the first time close at hand the majestic royal palm,
+which is deservedly the most distinguished tree in the island. It is a
+tree without branches, crowned at the top of a perfectly straight shaft
+with a bunch of long, graceful, dark green leaves. The royal palm rises
+to a height of sixty, seventy, and even eighty feet, its symmetrical
+shape and whitish color giving it the appearance of a marble column. It
+bears no fruit, and affords little shade, but it is highly ornamental
+and forms a striking feature of the landscape. The tree often lives to
+be two hundred years old; it has twenty leaves, one of which is shed
+about once a month. It has been stated that the seeds from a single
+tree will support one good-sized hog.
+
+As we approached our destination we passed two buxom women sitting on a
+huge stump. They were clad in shirt waists, belted trousers and
+leggings, and wore broad hats of a masculine type. We silently wondered
+if this was the prevailing fashion among the women of La Gloria, but
+soon found that it was not. Even the pair that we had first seen came
+out a few days later in dainty skirts and feminine headgear. Indeed, we
+found La Gloria, in some respects, more civilized than we had
+anticipated.
+
+It was late in the afternoon of Monday, January 8, 1900, that the one
+hundred and sixty members of the first excursion to establish the first
+American colony in Cuba, reached the camp which occupied the site of La
+Gloria city of to-day. We found about a dozen tents, and as many more
+native shacks occupied by Cubans who were at work for the company. The
+Cubans numbered about fifty, and the American employes nearly as many
+more. There were also a few Florida and other settlers who had reached
+the spot early. Altogether, the population just before our arrival was
+about one hundred, seven or eight of whom were women.
+
+[Illustration: COL. THOMAS H. MAGINNISS.]
+
+The white city grew rapidly after we appeared on the scene. The company
+had tents, which we were obliged to put up for ourselves, and it was
+several hours before we had opportunity to even partially dry our wet
+feet and shoes. All that evening little groups of barefooted men could
+be seen gathered around camp-fires, drying themselves and their
+clothing. The distribution, location, and erection of the tents was
+placed in charge of Col. Thomas H. Maginniss of Philadelphia, Pa., an
+ex-officer of the United States regular army and a veteran of the Civil
+War, who had come down among the colonists on the _Yarmouth_. Colonel
+Maginniss was a handsome man of great stature, youthful in appearance,
+mentally alert and physically active, with very prepossessing manners.
+Although a little past fifty years of age, he looked to be hardly more
+than forty. He was a favorite from the start, and aside from being a
+picturesque personality, soon became an influential power among the
+colonists. So efficiently did he perform his duties in supervising the
+erection of the tent city, that a little later he was regularly given
+the position of superintendent of camp, in the employ of the company.
+He held this post until his return to the States, early in April.
+
+Our first night in La Gloria was not one of sybaritic pleasure. We were
+able to secure some poor cots and one thin blanket apiece. This was
+insufficient, for the nights, or rather the early mornings, were quite
+cold. Some of the men were obliged to sit up all night to gather warmth
+from fires. The rotten cloth on the cots went to pieces, in most cases,
+before the night was over, and, altogether, sleep was at a premium. Many
+of the tents were crowded; in mine were eight persons, representing
+nearly as many states. Fortunately, the insects gave us very little
+trouble. The population of the camp that first night must have been
+nearly three hundred, and the next day it increased to quite that
+number.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+While the colonists did not arrive at La Gloria in any considerable
+numbers until January, 1900, the preliminary operations began there on
+October 9, 1899, when Chief Engineer J. C. Kelly landed with a survey
+corps from Texas. It was a splendid corps of bright, hardy, plucky,
+indefatigable men, skilful in their work and under discipline as rigid
+as that of an army. Chief Kelly was from Eagle Lake, Texas, in which
+state he had become well known through the performance of a great deal
+of important work. He was an exceedingly capable engineer, a strict but
+just disciplinarian, a good financier, and at all times highly popular
+with his men, whose devotion to him was as striking as that often shown
+by soldiers to their colonel or their general. Mr. Kelly was an
+interesting talker, and an athlete and amateur impersonator of no mean
+pretensions. With him he brought, as assistant chief, Mr. H. O. Neville,
+a well-educated, versatile, and agreeable young man. Among the others in
+the Texas party were Sam M. Van der Voort, son of the general, and I. G.
+Wirtz, both of whom later became instrument men. S. H. Packer, also of
+Texas, was one of the corps. From New York came F. Kimble and J. A.
+Messier, the latter familiarly known as "Albany", and from Havana, B. B.
+Lindsley, all three serving later as instrument men more or less of the
+time. All the men above mentioned were efficient surveyors and good
+fellows, each something of a "character" in his way. Among other early
+arrivals, most of whom were attached to the survey corps, were O. V. De
+Long of Havana, H. L. Starker of Chicago, David Porter of Detroit,
+Richard Head of Florida, J. A. McCauley of New York, Will Corlett, and
+Jack Griffith.
+
+The experiences of the members of the survey corps at La Gloria had been
+a continued story of hardship, privation, and exposure. They came in
+before the rainy season had ended, pushing their toilsome way through
+tangled vines and thorny thickets, wading through mud and water, and
+often being compelled to swim swollen creeks. Much of the time they
+patiently worked knee deep or waist deep in water, covered with swarms
+of mosquitoes or other pestiferous insects. Often they had little to eat
+save cornmeal "mush" and boniatos (sweet potatoes); but for all this,
+they were seldom ill and rarely made a complaint. Sleeping in their wet
+clothes, which would not dry in the dampness of the night, they were up
+early each morning ready for another day's attack upon the jungle. The
+fact that they were not more often sick is the best testimonial to the
+healthfulness of the climate of northeastern Cuba that has come under my
+notice. It speaks volumes, especially when it is known that a little
+later men from the Northern states, and even British Columbia, worked
+on the survey corps under similar conditions and with like immunity from
+serious illness. Occasionally, to be sure, they would be poisoned from
+standing too long in water or coming in contact with the guao tree, or
+shrub, but this affliction, while severe, was never fatal. The good work
+faithfully and uncomplainingly performed by the survey corps in and
+around La Gloria, under such trying circumstances, is worthy of as much
+praise and admiration as a successful military campaign. It required
+courage, skill, and patient endurance to move upon and tame this
+tropical forest on the north coast of Cuba.
+
+A handful of colonists followed the survey corps into La Gloria at
+intervals, the first ladies coming in December. These were Mrs. D. E.
+Lowell and Mrs. W. G. Spiker; they came with their husbands. Mr. Lowell
+had been a prosperous orange and pineapple grower in Florida until the
+great freeze came, and Mr. Spiker was a successful photographer in Ohio
+before leaving his state to find him a new home in the tropics. The
+Lowells and Spikers were intelligent and cultivated people who had been
+accustomed to a good style of living, but who were now ready to
+undertake a rough, pioneer life in the strong hope of a bright future.
+The party landed at Palota, northwest of La Gloria, and came in with
+horses and wagon of their own, following the roughest kind of trail for
+the larger part of nine miles. It was a hard and perilous trip; only
+with the greatest difficulty could the horses draw the load through the
+heavy mud and over the deeply gullied road. More than once the team
+seemed hopelessly stuck, but was extricated after a time and the
+toilsome journey continued. At last the bedraggled party reached La
+Gloria, and the first women colonists set foot on the soil of the future
+Cuban-American city. When the _Yarmouth_ colonists arrived, the Lowells
+and Spikers had been living at La Gloria for several weeks; they were
+well and happy, and pleased with the climate and the country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+FIRST DAYS IN THE NEW COLONY.
+
+
+The first few days after our arrival we led a strange and what seemed to
+many of us an unreal life. Shut into a small open space by a great
+forest, with no elevation high enough for us to see even so much of the
+outside world as hills, mountains, or the sea, it almost seemed as if we
+had dropped off of the earth to some unknown planet. Day after day
+passed without our seeing the horizon, or hearing a locomotive or
+steamboat whistle. We had no houses, only tents, and there was not a
+wooden building of any sort within a dozen miles. At night the camp was
+dimly lighted by flickering fires and the starry sky, and through the
+semi-darkness came the hollow, indistinct voices of men discussing the
+outlook for the future. There were always some who talked the larger
+part of the night, and others who invariably rose at three o'clock in
+the morning; this was two hours before light. In the deep forest at
+night were heard strange sounds, but high above them all, every night
+and the whole of the night, the harsh, complaining note of a certain
+bird who seemed to be eternally unreconciled to the departure of day. I
+think it was a bird, but it may have been the wail of a lost soul.
+
+It was lonesome there in the wilds of Cuba in those early days of the
+new colony, and doubtless there was some home-sickness, but the reader
+should not gain the impression that the pioneers were downcast and
+unhappy. On the contrary, they were delighted with the climate and the
+country, despite the difficulties encountered in entering it and the
+deprivations which had to be put up with. From the first, the colonists,
+generally speaking, were more than cheerful; they were happy and
+contented. Buoyant in spirits, eager to explore and acquire information
+concerning the surrounding country, they enjoyed the pioneer life with
+the keenest relish. They laughed at the hardships and privations, made
+friends with each other and with the Cubans, and tramped the woods and
+trails with reckless disregard of mud and water and thorny underbrush.
+The men were astonished to find themselves in such excellent health; the
+more they exposed themselves, the more they seemed to thrive, until
+nearly every man in the colony was ready to say that he was better
+physically and mentally than when he left home. It was the same with the
+women, whose improved health, entire cheerfulness, and evident
+contentment were a revelation to the observer. There are many women who
+take as readily to a pioneer life as do the men. This was notably the
+case in La Gloria.
+
+The colonists had not come to La Gloria in search of a health resort--at
+least, the great majority had not--but that is what they found. Scarcely
+had we set foot on the soil of Cuba when those of us who had
+catarrh--and what Yankee has not?--found that we no longer suffered from
+the affliction. This cure, which proved permanent, was something the
+majority of us had not counted on. Nor had we counted on the entire
+freedom from colds which we enjoyed in the island. But the cure of
+catarrh was of small importance in comparison with the sudden and marked
+improvement in those who suffered from nervous diseases. It is not too
+much to say, that many found the soothing Cuban climate a specific for
+such disease which they had not dreamt of in their philosophy. Those
+with kidney ailments and rheumatism reported themselves improved, and
+there was not wanting evidence that persons with consumptive tendencies
+and other weaknesses would find the air salubrious and a residence in
+this part of the island beneficial.
+
+The temperature at this time was delightful, a close approach to
+perfection, the thermometer ranging from 70 deg. to 84 deg. at noon, and rarely
+falling below 60 deg. at any time of day. It still rained frequently, an
+unusual and remarkable prolongation of the rainy season, which
+ordinarily ends in November, but the water fell in brief showers and
+left the rest of the day bright and clear. Indeed, it was not until
+February that the rain ceased altogether and the dry season fairly
+began. The Cubans declared that they had never known the wet season to
+continue so late.
+
+The long continued rains were held responsible, perhaps justly so, for
+many of the inconveniences and drawbacks which the colonists
+encountered. The company stoutly declared that to these unusual
+meteorological conditions was due the failure to build the road to the
+port which had been promised, and that the absence of the road prevented
+the transportation of the lumber for the construction of the hotel.
+This latter assertion was true beyond all question. The "hotel" was a
+subject of much comment and immoderate mirth. It existed on paper in
+spacious and imposing elegance; it was a splendid structure of the
+imagination. But let it not be thought for one moment that the hotel was
+wholly a myth. Not so; the situation would not have been half so funny
+if it had been. There stood the foundation for the immense building
+squarely across Central avenue, about a quarter of a mile back from the
+front line of the town. A large space had been cleared in the forest,
+and the centre of this opening was the hotel site. The foundation
+consisted of large logs of hard wood, sawed about four feet long and
+stood upright. They were set in cement on stone that was sunk slightly
+below the surface of the ground. How many of these logs there were I
+cannot say, but there was a small army of them, aligned across Central
+avenue and extending far to either side. Under the dim light of the
+stars they looked like a regiment of dwarfs advancing to attack the
+camp. Workmen were putting the finishing touches on this foundation when
+we arrived, but the work was soon discontinued altogether, leaving the
+wooden army to serve as an outpost of slowly advancing civilization. Of
+course, we always directed new arrivals to the "hotel" as soon as they
+came in over the "road" from the port! After a while we became so fond
+of the hotel joke that I think we should have been sorry to see the
+building completed.
+
+[Illustration: "THE HOTEL."
+
+_Photograph by V. K. Van De Venter, Jan. 23, 1900._]
+
+The bad road to the port also cut off all chance of getting the sawmill
+up to La Gloria, and it daily became more evident that we should
+continue to dwell in tents for some time to come. We were destitute
+enough during those first days in the colony. Our trunks had not come,
+and did not for several weeks, and many of us were without change of
+clothing or even a towel. We washed in a small creek which ran through
+the Cuban camp, wiping our hands and faces on handkerchiefs. This and
+other creeks served us well for drinking water, and there was also an
+excellent spring on the company's reserve north of the town. Very little
+freight could be brought up from the port, and hence it was that we were
+not over-well supplied with provisions. There was usually enough in
+quantity, but the quality was poor and there was a painful lack of
+variety. The engineer corps' cook house was hastily enlarged into a
+public restaurant upon our arrival, and did the best it could to feed
+the hungry colonists. Some of the latter boarded themselves from the
+start--purchasing what supplies they could get at the commissary--and
+perhaps had a shade the best of it.
+
+I shall never forget my first supper in La Gloria. It was at the
+company's restaurant. We were crowded together on long, movable benches,
+under a shelter tent. Before us were rough board tables innocent of
+cloth. The jejines (gnats or sand flies) swarmed about us, disputing our
+food and drink and even the air we breathed. The food was not served in
+courses; it came on all at once, and the "all" consisted of cold bread
+without butter, macaroni, and tea without milk. There were not even
+toothpicks or glasses of water. Amid the struggling humanity, and
+regardless of the inhumanity of the jejines (pronounced by the Cubans
+"haheens"), my gentlemanly friend from Medfield, Mass., sat at my right
+and calmly ate his supper with evident relish. He was fond of macaroni
+and tea. Alas! I was not. At home he had been an employe in an insane
+asylum. I, alas! had not enjoyed the advantages of such wholesome
+discipline. Of that supper I remember three things most distinctly--the
+jejines, my friend's fondness for macaroni and tea, and the saintly
+patience and good-humor of our waiter, Al Noyes.
+
+It was not long before there was an improvement in the fare, although no
+great variety was obtainable. We usually had, however, the best there
+was in camp. The staples were salt beef, bacon, beans, and sweet
+potatoes or yams, and we sometimes had fresh pork (usually wild hog),
+fried plantains, and thin, bottled honey. We often had oatmeal or corn
+meal mush, and occasionally we rejoiced in a cook whose culinary talent
+comprehended the ability to make fritters. The bread was apt to be good,
+and we had Cuban coffee three times a day. We had no butter, and only
+condensed milk. It was considerably later, when I ate at the chief
+engineer's table, that we feasted on flamingo and increased our muscular
+development by struggling with old goat. If it had been Chattey's goat,
+no one would have complained, but unfortunately it was not. Chattey was
+our cook, and he kept several goats, one of which had a pernicious habit
+of hanging around the dining tent. One day, just before dinner, he was
+discovered sitting on a pie in the middle of the table, greedily eating
+soup out of a large dish. Chattey's goat was a British goat, and had no
+respect for the Constitution of the United States or the table etiquette
+which obtained in the first American colony in Cuba. The soup was
+dripping from Billy's whiskers, which he had not even taken the trouble
+to wipe. It is certain that British goats have no table manners.
+
+[Illustration: THE SPRING.
+
+_Photograph by V. K. Van De Venter, Jan. 23, 1900._]
+
+But I am getting ahead of my story. The condition of the road to the
+port was so bad for some time after our arrival that it was barely
+possible to get up sufficient provisions to supply the daily needs of
+the camp, to say nothing of other freight. We were in need of almost
+everything to furnish our tents or to begin agricultural operations.
+There was, to be sure, the "commissary," where the company had
+confidently assured us in its advertising literature "every necessary
+article from a plough to a knitting needle" would be on sale "at the
+most reasonable prices." As a matter of fact, the commissary was almost
+as bare as the famous cupboard of old Mother Hubbard, and of the
+commodities that were stored there, very few seemed to be for sale to
+the colonists. After several ineffectual attempts to get what I wanted,
+I entered the commissary tent one day to make a test case. Of Mr.
+Richardson, the man in charge, I blandly inquired:
+
+"Can I get a tin pail?"
+
+"No," with a gentle shake of the head.
+
+"Can I get any kind of a pail?"
+
+"No," with another shake.
+
+"Can I get a tin pan or a wash basin?"
+
+"No," with a shake.
+
+"Can I get a tin dish or an earthen dish or a wooden dish?"
+
+"No," with more shakes.
+
+"Can I buy a tin cup or an earthen mug?"
+
+"No," with a vigorous shake.
+
+"Can I buy a knife, fork, or spoon?"
+
+"No, no," with two quick shakes.
+
+"Can I buy a piece of cloth of any kind?"
+
+"No, sir," stiffly.
+
+"Can I buy an empty box?"
+
+"No, sir, you can't--need 'em all ourselves."
+
+"Is there anything that you have got to sell?" I inquired meekly.
+
+"Well, there is some mosquito netting over there."
+
+I had mosquito netting--but mosquito netting did not make a very good
+drinking utensil. I left the commissary without inquiring for a plough
+or a knitting needle.
+
+The population of La Gloria fluctuated greatly during the first week
+after our advent. Our arrival and the additions of the following day had
+brought the total population of the camp up to at least three hundred.
+The wet and muddy trails, and the backwardness of all improvements,
+increased enormously the feeling of distrust among the colonists, and
+some began to loudly question the security of titles. This alarm, which
+ultimately proved to be entirely unfounded, kept the camp in a ferment
+for a day or two. Oceans of discussion were indulged in, Mr. Park was
+closely and warmly questioned, and there was a general feeling of
+uneasiness and unrest. The result was that when the last half of the
+week had begun, La Gloria had suffered a loss of nearly one hundred of
+its population. Discouraged and disgusted men made their way back to the
+coast, hoping to get transportation to Nuevitas, and thence back to
+their respective homes. There was a delay at Port La Gloria, and a few
+remained there until they had made up their minds to return to the camp.
+The others went on to Nuevitas, but were unable to secure
+transportation at once to the States. The consequence was that nearly or
+quite one half eventually returned to La Gloria, straggling in from time
+to time.
+
+As the week drew to a close the town quieted down, the restless spirits
+having departed. Those of us who remained either had faith in the
+ultimate success of the project, or were at least disposed to give the
+enterprise a fair trial. We were not easily stampeded; and we placed
+some reliance on Senator Park's positive assurance that the deeds would
+be all right. We saw, of course, that the company's affairs had been
+badly managed, and that promised improvements had not as yet
+materialized, but, on the other hand, we had learned from personal
+observation that the land was good, the timber valuable, the drinking
+water pure and abundant, and the climate delightful beyond description.
+The most of those who returned to the States with harrowing tales either
+never got as far as La Gloria at all, or else spent less than
+forty-eight hours in the camp. The majority of the colonists cheerfully
+stuck by the colony, and laughed at the untruthful and exaggerated
+newspaper stories as they were sent down to us from the frozen North.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE ALLOTMENT OF THE LAND.
+
+
+The chief of the immediate problems which confronted the colonists and
+the officers of the company was the allotment of the land. The company
+had purchased it, or secured options on it, in large tracts, some of
+these tracts containing over ten thousand acres each. The colonists had
+contracted for it in small holdings, varying from a town lot, 25 x 100
+feet in size, to a forty-acre tract of plantation land. No more than
+forty acres were sold to any one on a single contract. The contracts
+which could be made were, respectively, as follows: Town lots, three
+sizes, 25 x 100 feet, 50 x 100, and 50 x 150; plantation land, 2-1/2
+acres, 5 acres, 10 acres, 20 acres, and 40 acres. The purchaser paid in
+full or on monthly instalments, as he preferred, being allowed a
+discount of ten per cent. for cash. According to the terms of the
+contracts, he did not purchase the land at all, but bought stock in a
+co-operative company and the land was a gift to him. However, the
+co-operative company feature was always in the background in the mind of
+the colonist, and he felt that he was buying the land and almost
+invariably so termed the transaction. It was the land he had his eye on,
+and his present anxiety was to have a good piece promptly allotted to
+him.
+
+At the company's headquarters in New York, no plan of subdivision had
+been formulated further than a general promise in advertising circulars
+to allot the land in the order of the numbers of the contracts. At first
+glance, this seemed both fair and feasible, but once on the ground at La
+Gloria, some very formidable difficulties loomed up. Of the four or five
+thousand persons who had invested up to that time less than three
+hundred were at La Gloria, and there was not in Cuba even a list of the
+people who had made contracts with the company, to say nothing of their
+respective holdings and the status of their payments. No such list could
+be obtained from New York under several weeks or perhaps months, and
+when obtained would be of little value for the reason that there could
+not possibly be land enough surveyed by that time to allot one half of
+the thousands of investors. Surveying in this dense tropical forest was
+necessarily slow work, and progress had been impeded by the
+long-continued rains.
+
+It was manifestly impossible to make a general allotment of the land at
+once, and yet it was essential that the colonists who had actually
+arrived on the spot should be given their tracts promptly and permitted
+to go to work upon them. The life of the colony seemed to hinge on
+action of this sort. Quite early the company had stated that the
+subdivision would be made about January 1, and when General Van der
+Voort arrived in New York in the latter part of December, he assured the
+colonists who were preparing to sail with him to Cuba that they should
+have their land by January 15. This promise was carried out to the
+letter, and was the only rational course of action that could be pursued
+under the existing circumstances. It undoubtedly saved the colony at
+what was a critical stage. During the voyage down, the colonists on
+board the _Yarmouth_ were greatly exercised over the method of
+allotment; that is to say, many of them were, while others declared that
+they would be satisfied if they only got their land promptly. General
+Van der Voort gave the subject much anxious consideration, seeking to
+devise a plan which should be at once just and practical. He finally
+decided that the fairest and best thing to do was to place the matter in
+the hands of a committee of the colonists, giving them the power to
+prescribe the method of allotment within certain limitations, subject to
+the approval of the colonists on the ground. The general described this
+as the "town-meeting" principle, and his decision gave entire
+satisfaction to the pioneers.
+
+General Van der Voort arrived in La Gloria Thursday, January 11, having
+remained behind at Nuevitas to see the baggage of the colonists through
+the custom house. This accomplished, he took passage for La Gloria on
+board the lighter carrying the trunks, etc. The voyage was not a smooth
+one. The boat came near being wrecked in the rough sea, and suffered the
+loss of its rudder. Finally an anchorage was effected about a dozen
+miles from the La Gloria shore, and General Van der Voort and others
+were taken off in a small boat. The trunks and other baggage were not
+landed until nearly a week later, and it was several weeks before much
+of the luggage reached La Gloria city. The contents of many of the
+trunks suffered serious damage from water and mould, although in some
+cases the things came through entirely uninjured.
+
+General Van der Voort rode from Port La Gloria to the camp on horseback,
+a hard trip, for the road had not improved. The mud and water and debris
+made it a slow and exhausting journey. He assumed charge of the
+company's business in the colony at once. Arrangements were made for a
+prompt allotment of the land, and a committee of nine colonists, with
+Dr. W. P. Peirce of Hoopeston, Ill., as chairman, was chosen to devise a
+plan of distribution. After several prolonged sessions, the committee
+unanimously reported a scheme by which those present should select their
+land from the official map in the order of the priority of their
+purchases. After these, the investors having authorized representatives
+on the ground, the latter holding powers of attorney, were to have their
+chance. In this second class, also, priority of purchase governed the
+order of selection. The report further provided that the investor should
+be allowed a second choice if he found his land to be unsatisfactory.
+This plan, which I believed then and believe now was the best that could
+have been devised, was adopted by the colonists with but a single
+dissenting vote.
+
+On Saturday, January 13, the allotment began, in what was known as
+headquarters tent. The committee which had formulated the plan of
+distribution was in charge, assisted by Chief Engineer Kelly, Architect
+Neff, and others. The town lots were given out first, and by night
+nearly all who were entitled to make selections in these classes had
+been served. The town lot distribution was completed Monday morning, the
+15th. The town was one mile square, and had been laid out and surveyed
+under the supervision of M. A. Custer Neff, civil engineer and
+architect. It was traversed and counter-traversed by streets and
+avenues, appropriately named. These were as yet, for the most part, only
+surveyors' paths cut through the forest, but they were much used as
+thoroughfares to reach town lots and the plantation lands beyond. They
+were rough roads, filled with mud, water, stumps, stubble, and roots,
+but with the advent of the dry season they became more easily passable.
+The highway running through the centre of the town to and from the coast
+was known as Central avenue, and the road passing through the centre at
+right angles was called Dewey street. Around the intersecting point, the
+exact centre of the town, space had been reserved for a large plaza.
+Central avenue and Dewey street were each designed to be one hundred
+feet wide, and were naturally the paths most used by the colonists. The
+former actually extended from the rear line of the town northward to the
+bay, five miles away, while the latter continued from the side lines of
+the town out into the plantation lands to the east and west. The town
+site was well chosen. It has a fair elevation above the sea, a firm,
+hard soil, with steadily rising ground. The front line of the town is
+about twenty feet above tidewater; the centre about one hundred feet,
+and the rear line nearly or quite two hundred feet. Around the town was
+a belt of land a quarter of a mile wide reserved by the company; then
+came the plantations on every side.
+
+When the committee finished the allotment of town lots on the morning of
+January 15, it was found that nearly five hundred lots had been taken up
+out of a total in all classes of about three thousand six hundred. The
+colonists had not been slow in selecting corner lots, and the lots on
+Central avenue and those facing the plaza on all sides were early
+pre-empted. The colonists had faith that a real city would rise on the
+chosen site. When the demand for town lots had been satisfied, the
+committee began at once to give out the plantation land. The choice was
+necessarily restricted to about eight or ten thousand acres to the west,
+southwest, and northwest of the town, which was all that had been
+surveyed up to that time. When this condition was discovered by the
+colonists, the unsurveyed land to the north, south, and east began,
+naturally enough, to appear far more desirable in the eyes of the
+investors than that which had been surveyed to the westward, and some
+refused to make a selection at all, preferring delay to a restricted
+choice. The great majority, however, mindful that they were privileged
+to change if the land was not satisfactory, went ahead and made their
+selections. As a matter of fact, the surveyed tract to the westward was
+probably as good as any, all of the land held by the company being rich
+and highly productive.
+
+The first man to choose his plantation was Dr. W. P. Peirce of
+Hoopeston, Ill., who, it so chanced, was chairman of the committee on
+allotment. Dr. Peirce's contract was No. 2, and it was dated in January,
+1899. But few contracts were made before April of that year. Contract
+No. 1 was not on the ground, and no one present knew who was the
+holder. The allotment was well conducted, and went on quite rapidly. It
+was eagerly watched by a large group of interested spectators,
+impatiently awaiting their turn. Some tried to extract inside
+information from the surveyors, who were supposed to know the relative
+value of every square foot of the land, but the majority either made
+their choice blindly, with knowledge of nothing save the proximity of
+the tract to the town, or trusted to the meagre information they had
+acquired regarding the character of the land in different localities
+during their tramps in the few days since their arrival.
+
+It was a strange scene. Men of all ages and occupations, coming from
+nearly every one of the United States, and several other countries,
+strangers until a few days before, were crowded together in a large
+tent, each anxious to do the best possible for himself, and yet in few
+instances discourteous to his neighbor. It was a good-natured,
+well-behaved crowd, and there was no friction in the proceedings. The
+colonists were satisfied that the plan of allotment was a fair one;
+there was no complaint about anything except the restricted choice.
+Monday night saw the allotment well advanced, and Tuesday it was
+finished. Everybody then on the ground who wished to make a selection
+for himself or those whom he represented had been accommodated, and the
+committee's duties were at an end. Nearly seven thousand acres of
+plantation land had been allotted.
+
+[Illustration: ROBERT C. BEAUSEJOUR.
+
+(_One of the Early Colonists._)]
+
+As soon as they had selected their land from the map the colonists
+scurried out into the surrounding country to find it. The woods were
+full of men hunting their plantations. It was no easy matter to find
+them, since there was nothing to go by but the numbered stakes of the
+surveyors. These were anything but plain guides to the uninitiated, and
+even the more understanding were sometimes baffled by reason of
+indistinct figures or missing stakes. The result was that many viewed
+other people's land for their own, while some, conscious of their
+helplessness, gave up the search for the time being. The majority,
+however, found their land with no more difficulty than was inevitable in
+a long tramp through the rough and muddy paths of a jungle. The
+mosquitoes kept us company, and the parrots scolded us from overhead,
+but there were no wild beasts or venomous snakes to be dreaded. Probably
+there are no tropical forests in the world so safe as those of Cuba;
+one may sleep in them night after night without fear of death or
+disease. This is true, at least, of the country within a radius of forty
+miles from La Gloria, as I can testify from personal experience and
+observation.
+
+In most cases the colonists were pleased with their land when they found
+it, and the changes were comparatively few. A little of the lowest land
+was more or less under water, but even this was rarely given up, the
+holders discovering that it was very rich, and realizing that it would
+be all right in the dry season, and that it could be drained for the
+wet. Some experienced men from Florida showed a decided preference for
+this land, and later it developed that their judgment was good. This
+lowest land was of black soil; that slightly higher was apt to be
+yellow, and the highest red or chocolate. All these different colored
+soils were embraced in the allotment which had been made, and they all
+represented good land. The colonists could never agree as to which was
+the best. Undoubtedly some were superior for certain purposes to others,
+but all appeared to be fertile and gave promise of being very
+productive. The black and yellow soils were almost entirely free from
+stone, while the red and chocolate had some, but seldom enough to do any
+harm. The colonists set to work with energy clearing their town lots,
+and a few began work at once on their plantations. The colony was soon a
+busy hive of industry.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+THE SUGAR RIOT.
+
+
+After the middle of January and the beginning of the allotment of the
+land, the population of La Gloria began to "pick up" somewhat. Colonists
+who had been lingering at Nuevitas, and some new ones who had come down
+from the States by the Munson line, would straggle in from time to time.
+People were coming and going almost every day, but the balance was in
+favor of the colony and the population slowly but surely increased.
+Among the new arrivals were quite a number of women and children. About
+January 20 the advance guard of the colonists who had come on the second
+excursion of the _Yarmouth_ made its appearance. On this trip the
+_Yarmouth_ brought about sixty passengers, the majority of whom finally
+got up to La Gloria. More would have come if Nuevitas at that time had
+not been a hotbed of misrepresentation regarding conditions in the new
+colony. All the unfavorable features were grossly and ridiculously
+exaggerated, while stories of starvation, sickness, and death were
+poured into the ears of new arrivals until many an intending colonist
+became convinced that it would be taking his life in his hand for him to
+make even the briefest visit to La Gloria. Such is the tendency of human
+nature to exaggerate, and to build a big sensation out of a small
+nucleus.
+
+People who had never seen La Gloria were the ones whose representations
+seemed to be most credited in the States and by the new arrivals
+therefrom. I saw a letter received by one of the company's officials at
+La Gloria from a woman in Asbury Park, N. J., who was nearly crazed by
+anxiety for her youngest son, who was then in the colony. She had heard
+frequently from her oldest son, who had been in La Gloria with the
+survey corps for several months, and he had always written very
+favorably of the place, so she said, but she had lately seen an Asbury
+Park man who had returned from Nuevitas and he had told a terrible story
+of suffering and danger in the colony. The woman's letter showed clearly
+that she discredited the accounts of her son and accepted those of the
+man who had brought back a harrowing tale. Why she credited the story of
+a man who never got further than Nuevitas in preference to that of her
+own son, who had been at La Gloria for months, I never could understand,
+especially as the latter was an intelligent and apparently perfectly
+reliable young man. Doubtless mortals are predisposed to believe the
+worst. I looked up the woman's youngest son, and found him well and
+happy, and ready to join with his brother in speaking favorably of La
+Gloria.
+
+[Illustration: LA GLORIA, CUBA, LOOKING NORTH.
+
+_Photograph by V. K. Van De Venter, Jan. 23, 1900._]
+
+Meanwhile, we were living contentedly in La Gloria, enjoying excellent
+health and suffering no serious discomfort, and laughing in uproarious
+glee over the sensational articles which appeared in many of the
+newspapers of the States. With no little surprise we learned from the
+great newspapers of the United States that we were "marooned in a Cuban
+swamp," suffering from "malaria and starvation," and "dying of yellow
+fever and smallpox." As a matter of fact, at that time there had not
+been a single death or one case of serious sickness. The health of the
+colonists remained good through the winter, the spring, and even the
+following summer.
+
+Indeed, the colonists had but few grievances, so few that they would
+sometimes manufacture them out of trifles. Of such was the "sugar riot"
+with its laughable and harmonious ending. One day in the latter part of
+January, when the arrival of provisions was barely keeping pace with the
+arrival of colonists, a small invoice of sugar was brought into La
+Gloria over the bad road from the port. Scarcely had it been unloaded at
+the commissary when the head of the engineer corps took possession of
+about half of it for the surveyors and the boarders at their table, and
+gave orders that the other half should be turned over to the Cuban
+workmen of the company. The carrying out of this order aroused great
+indignation among the colonists who were boarding themselves and had run
+out of sugar, as most of them had. This action of the amateur "sugar
+trust" caused certain of the colonists to sour, so to speak, on all of
+the officers and chief employes of the company, for the time being, at
+least, and mutterings, "not loud but deep," were heard all about the
+camp. Not that there was danger of a sanguinary conflict, but a war of
+words seemed imminent. The "era of good feeling" was threatened.
+
+A day or two later, on the evening of Saturday, January 27, a meeting of
+the colonists was held preparatory to the organization of a pioneer
+association, and it was arranged among some of the leading spirits in
+the sugar agitation that at the close of this session the saccharine
+grievance should be publicly aired. The gathering was held around a
+camp-fire in the open air, in front of headquarters tent. The regularly
+called meeting adjourned early, with a feeling of excited expectancy in
+the air. Something was about to happen. The officers of the company on
+the ground, it was understood, were to be raked over the coals for
+favoring the Cubans and thus perpetrating an outrage on the colonists.
+The colonists whose tempers had been kept sweet by a sufficiency of
+sugar lingered around in the pleasant anticipation of witnessing an
+_opera bouffe_.
+
+But it was the unexpected that happened. Just as the sugar orators were
+preparing to orate, a man with muddy boots pushed through the crowd and
+entered headquarters tent. A moment later the stalwart form of Colonel
+Maginniss emerged from the tent, and in his hand he bore a slip of
+paper. It was a cablegram from New York, which had just been brought in
+from Nuevitas, announcing the election of General Van der Voort as
+president of the Cuban Land and Steamship Company. When the dispatch
+had been read to the crowd, there was silence for an instant, and then
+the air was rent with cheers. There had never been any question about
+General Van der Voort's popularity. The colonists had full faith in his
+honesty and devotion to the colony, and hence looked upon his election
+to the presidency of the company as the best possible security for the
+success of the enterprise. They had been distrustful of the management
+of the company; the choice for the new president inspired them with
+renewed hope and confidence. It was the unanimous opinion that it was
+the best thing that could have happened. He was the right man in the
+right place; he was in La Gloria to stay, and reckoned himself as a
+colonist among them.
+
+The sugar agitators forgot that their coffee had not been sweetened for
+forty-eight hours, and joined heartily in the cheering. In fact, all who
+had "come to scoff remained to pray," so to speak. It was voted to send
+a cablegram to the New York office announcing the deep satisfaction of
+the colonists in the choice made for president. General Van der Voort
+responded to calls and made an excellent speech.
+
+A little later in the evening there was a big demonstration in honor of
+the significant event. More than anything else it resembled a Fourth of
+July celebration. Bonfires were lighted and salutes fired, and the air
+of La Gloria resounded with cheers. The Cubans came over from their
+camp, and after the Americans had got through, started in for a
+celebration of their own. This was partly because of their fondness for
+General Van der Voort and partly on account of their childish love of
+noise and display. The colonists became convinced that night that if the
+Cubans ever become American citizens they will be equal to all of the
+Fourth of July requirements. The noise they made double discounted that
+made by the colonists. They cheered and shouted and fired salutes by the
+hundred. They marched up and down the main street, singing and laughing
+and blowing conch shells. They freed Cuba over again, and had a rattling
+good time in doing it. It seemed as if the racket would never end, but
+about midnight they went jabbering back to their camp. It was the
+noisiest night in the history of La Gloria. But the "sugar riot" was
+averted, and never took place.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+ADVENTURES AND MISADVENTURES.
+
+
+Among the dozen women in the camp, the most striking figure was Mrs.
+Moller, a Danish widow, who came from one of the states, Pennsylvania, I
+believe. I cannot say exactly when she reached La Gloria, but she was
+one of the earliest of her sex to arrive, and achieved the distinction
+of building the first house in the "city." Speaking of sex, it was not
+easy to determine that of Mrs. Moller upon a casual acquaintance. Slight
+of figure, with bronzed face and close-cut hair, she wore a boy's cap,
+blouse, trousers, a very short skirt, and rubber boots, while her belt
+fairly bristled with revolvers and knives. She was a quiet,
+imperturbable person, however, and it was difficult to get her to relate
+her adventures, which had been somewhat extraordinary.
+
+She first came into La Gloria from Palota, where she landed from a boat
+with no other company than her trunk. There was not a living person at
+or near Palota, so, deserting her baggage, she started out afoot and
+alone, and attempted to make her way along the muddy and difficult trail
+nine miles to La Gloria. It was a hard road to travel, with scarcely a
+habitation along the way. Late in the afternoon she reached an inhabited
+shack, and the Cubans invited her to spend the night. Although weary,
+she declined the invitation, and pressed on. Darkness soon overtook her,
+but still she kept on through the dense woods. The trail was exceedingly
+rough, and she stumbled along among stumps, roots, and muddy gullies.
+Every few steps she fell down, and finally becoming exhausted, she was
+compelled to spend the night in the heart of the forest. She had no
+shelter whatever, and no means of making a fire. She sat in the woods
+all night, not being able to go to sleep, her only company being the
+mosquitoes. In the morning she found she had lost her way, but at last
+struck a Cuban trail, and was overtaken by a native horseman. He kindly
+gave her a place in front of him on his pony, and thus she entered the
+youthful city of La Gloria.
+
+Nor was this Mrs. Moller's last adventure. She had an extraordinary
+faculty for getting into trouble. Her trunk, which she had abandoned at
+Palota, was rifled by some one, probably a wandering Cuban, and she
+spent much time in traveling about the country seeking to get the
+authorities to hunt up the offender and recover the stolen goods. On one
+occasion she started in the early evening to walk into La Gloria from
+the port. When she had got about half way darkness came on and she lost
+the indistinct trail across the savanna. Not daring to go further, she
+roosted in a tree all night. Her idea in taking to the tree was that the
+mosquitoes would be less numerous at such an elevation, but she did not
+escape them altogether. Nothing serious happened and she turned up in
+camp all right the next morning. Mrs. Moller had no better luck when she
+rode than when she walked. At one time, while driving from Las Minas to
+Nuevitas in a wagon with another colonist, the team went over an
+embankment in the darkness and was so badly damaged that she and her
+companion were obliged to walk into Nuevitas, twelve or fifteen miles
+distant, along the railroad track. The journey was neither easy nor
+pleasant.
+
+[Illustration: FIRST HOUSE IN LA GLORIA.]
+
+But Mrs. Moller had both pluck and enterprise. She it was who built the
+first house in La Gloria, a log cabin far up in the woods on Central
+avenue. It was put up in the latter part of January. She employed an
+American and a Cuban to construct it, and had it covered with a canvas
+roof. She personally supervised the erection of the house, and when it
+was done planted sunflowers, banana trees, pineapples, etc., around it.
+She lived here alone for some time before she had any near neighbors.
+Mrs. Moller also enjoyed the distinction of owning the first cow, the
+first calf, and the first goat in La Gloria. As these animals roamed at
+large much of the time and were noisy, disorderly beasts, they were
+anything but popular in the colony. They were so destructive to planted
+things, that the threats to plant the cow and her unhappy offspring were
+numerous and oft-repeated, and the subject was discussed in more than
+one meeting of the Pioneer Association. It was said that Mrs. Moller had
+come to La Gloria with the idea of starting a dairy business, and it was
+further reported that she had taken the first prize for dairy butter at
+the World's Fair in Chicago. But the dairy did not materialize, and La
+Gloria long went butterless.
+
+It was a standing wonder with us that the Rural Guards did not disarm
+Mrs. Moller. They frequently met her as she traveled about the country,
+and must have seen that she carried deadly weapons. They did not relieve
+her of them, however, but the American authorities at La Gloria finally
+forbade her to wear her revolvers about the camp. It must not be thought
+that Mrs. Moller always dressed as I have described her. On state
+occasions, such as Sunday services and the regular Saturday night
+meetings of the Pioneer Association, she doffed her blue blouse and
+rubber boots, and came out with a jacket and the most immaculate
+starched and stiff bloomers, gorgeous in light and bright colors. At
+such times she was a wonder to behold. Mrs. Moller spoke broken English,
+and was not greatly given to talking except when she had business on
+hand.
+
+But if Mrs. Moller was the most striking figure in camp, the most
+ubiquitous and irrepressible person was Mrs. Horn of South Bend,
+Indiana. She was one of the earliest arrivals in La Gloria, coming in
+with two sons and a daughter, but without her husband. Mrs. Horn was a
+loud-voiced, good-natured woman, who would have tipped the scales at
+about two hundred and fifty pounds, provided there had been any scales
+in La Gloria to be tipped. She reached La Gloria before the _Yarmouth_
+colonists, but how is something of a mystery. It is known, however, that
+she waded in through miles of mud and water, and was nothing daunted by
+the experience. Never for a moment did she think of turning back, and
+when she had pitched her tent, she announced in a high, shrill voice
+that penetrated the entire camp, that she was in the colony to stay.
+She had lived in South Bend, Ind., and thought she could stand anything
+that might come to her in La Gloria.
+
+Mrs. Horn claimed to be able to do anything and go anywhere that a man
+could, and no one was inclined to dispute the assertion. She had the
+temperament which never gets "rattled," and when she woke up one night
+and found a brook four inches deep and a foot wide running through her
+tent she was not in the least disconcerted. In the morning she used it
+to wash her dishes in. She continued to make use of it until it dried up
+a day or two later. One of Mrs. Horn's distinctions was that she was the
+first woman to take a sea bath at Port La Gloria, walking the round trip
+of eight miles to do so. She was both a good walker and a good swimmer.
+She was delighted with La Gloria and Cuba. Her sons were nearly
+man-grown, and her daughter was about twelve years of age. It was one of
+the diversions of the camp to hear Mrs. Horn call Edna at a distance of
+a quarter of a mile or more. Mrs. Horn may unhesitatingly be set down as
+a good colonist. Though at times too voluble, perhaps, she was
+energetic, patient, kind-hearted, and generous.
+
+When the colonists who came on the _Yarmouth_ first arrived in La Gloria
+many of them were eager for hunting and fishing, but the sport of
+hunting wild hogs very soon received a setback. An Englishman by the
+name of Curtis and two or three others went out to hunt for big game.
+After a rough and weary tramp of many miles, they suddenly came in sight
+of a whole drove of hogs. They had traveled so far without seeing any
+game, that they could scarcely believe their eyes, but they recovered
+themselves and blazed away. The result was that they trudged into camp
+some hours later triumphantly shouldering the carcasses of three young
+pigs. The triumph of the hunters was short-lived, however. The next
+morning an indignant Cuban rode into camp with fire in his eye and a
+keen edge on his machete. He was in search of the "Americanos" who shot
+his pigs. He soon found them and could not be mollified until he was
+paid eight dollars in good American money. The next day the same Cuban
+rode into camp with a dead pig on his horse in front of him. This was
+larger than the others, and the man wanted seventeen dollars for it.
+Curtis, _et al._, did not know whether they shot the animal or not, but
+they paid the "hombre" twelve dollars. The following day the Cuban again
+appeared bringing another deceased porker. This was a full grown hog,
+and its owner fixed its value at twenty dollars. Again he got his money,
+and the carcass as well. How much longer the Cuban would have continued
+to bring in dead pigs, had he not been made to understand that he would
+get no more money, cannot be stated. To this day, Curtis and his friends
+do not know whether they actually killed all those pigs. What they are
+sure of is that there is small difference in the appearance of wild hogs
+and those which the Cubans domesticate. And this is why the hunting of
+wild hogs became an unpopular sport in La Gloria.
+
+The colony had its mild excitements now and again. One evening there was
+long continued firing of guns and blowing of conch shells in that corner
+of the camp where the surveyors had their tents. Inquiring the cause, we
+learned that three surveyors were lost in the woods and that the noise
+was being made to inform them of the location of the camp. The men, who
+had come to Cuba as colonists, had separated from the surveying party
+just before dark and attempted to make a short cut back to the camp.
+They had been at work in a low, wet section two or three miles northwest
+of the town, and their progress homeward was necessarily slow. They had
+not proceeded far when it became perfectly dark and it was borne in upon
+them that "cutting across lots" in a Cuban forest was quite a different
+matter from doing it in some of the States. They were obliged to suspend
+travel and hold up for the night. Although they could faintly hear the
+reports of the guns in the camp they were unable to make their way in
+through the thick woods. The men were without food or anything for
+shelter. Having an axe with them, they chopped down a tree, to keep them
+from the wet ground, and attempted to sleep upon its branches. The hard
+bed and the numerous mosquitoes were not conducive to sleep, but the
+tired fellows finally succumbed. When they awoke in the morning, one of
+them found that he had slipped down and was lying with his legs in the
+water. Not long after daylight they came into camp wet, tired, and
+hungry. It was no uncommon thing for surveyors to get lost, but nothing
+serious ever resulted.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE CUBANS.
+
+
+I am often asked, "How did you get along with the Cubans?" very much as
+inquiry might be made as to how we got along with the Apaches, or with
+the Modocs; and one man said, decidedly, "I think I might like Cuba, but
+I could never stand those Cubans." He had never seen a Cuban, I believe.
+
+We got along with the Cubans very well indeed, much better than with
+some of our neighbors in the States. Judging from our experience with
+the inhabitants of the province of Puerto Principe, there are no better
+people on the face of the earth to "get along with" than the Cubans. We
+found them, almost without exception, courteous, social, kind,
+hospitable, and honest. Indeed, it sometimes seemed as if there was
+nothing they would not do for us that lay within their power. They
+appeared to appreciate kind and fair treatment, and to be eager to
+return the same to us. Those we came in contact with were mainly of the
+humbler classes, but we saw nothing to indicate that those higher in
+the social scale were less friendly and considerate. The Cubans we met
+seemed to like the Americans, and the colonists certainly reciprocated
+the feeling. After a residence of nearly a year among them, Hon. Peter
+E. Park emphatically declared that there was as little meanness in the
+Cubans as in any class of people he had ever fallen in with, and many
+other Americans in La Gloria echoed this sentiment.
+
+I can easily conceive that under abuse the Cubans would exhibit some
+very disagreeable and dangerous qualities, but what people of spirit
+does not under such circumstances? Self-control is not a marked
+characteristic of the Cuban, and he is apt to revenge himself upon his
+enemy in any way he can at the earliest opportunity. But with kind and
+just treatment, he is your friend, and very good friends we found these
+Cubans--we of the colony at La Gloria. Among themselves they are an
+easy-going, good-natured, talkative people, and they display these same
+qualities to foreigners who approach them rightly. Rude they never are,
+but they sometimes show a childish sullenness when offended. Strong in
+their likes and dislikes, they often exhibit no little devotion to
+those whom they esteem or respect, and I believe them to be quite as
+reliable and trustworthy as the average among the inhabitants of the
+tropics. I have heard it said that the Cubans of some of the other
+provinces do not compare favorably with those of Puerto Principe, which
+may be true; yet I cannot help thinking that the race as a whole has
+been much maligned. Under a strong, just government I believe they would
+prove to be excellent citizens, but I do not expect that they will soon
+develop much administrative ability.
+
+Some writers and travelers have done the Cubans justice, but many
+obviously have not. The soldiers of the United States army have an
+unconcealed dislike for them, which the Cubans, naturally enough,
+ardently reciprocate. Perhaps the soldiers expect too much homage from a
+people upon whom they feel they conferred the priceless boon of liberty.
+At all events, in many cases where there has been bad blood between the
+two, it is easy to believe that the soldiers were the most to blame, for
+the Cubans as we met them were anything but aggressive. Many a Yankee
+could take lessons of them in the noble art of minding one's own
+business.
+
+So much for the character of the Cubans. Less can be said for their
+style of living, which in the rural districts and some parts of the
+cities is primitive to the verge of squalor. In the country around La
+Gloria it was no uncommon thing to find a Cuban who owned hundreds or
+thousands of acres of land--most of it uncultivated, to be sure--living
+in a small, palm-thatched hut with no other floor than the hard red
+soil. The house would be furnished in the scantiest way, a rude wooden
+table, a few chairs, and perhaps a rough bench or two. Often there would
+be no beds other than hammocks, no stoves, and sometimes not even a
+fireplace of any description. The meals, such as they were, would be
+cooked in the open front of the shack over a fire usually built on the
+ground. Occasionally the enclosed room which formed the rear of the
+shack would have an uneven board floor, but there were never any carpets
+or rugs, or even a matting of any sort. Of course there was no paint or
+varnish, and very little color about the place save the brown of the dry
+thatch on the roof and the brick-red grime from the soil which colored,
+or discolored, everything it came in contact with like a pigment. This
+red stain was astonishingly in evidence everywhere. It was to be seen
+upon the poles which supported the hut, on all of the furniture, upon
+the clothing of the inmates, and even upon their persons. It looked like
+red paint, and evidently was about as hard to get off. The huge wheels
+of the bullock carts seemed to be painted with it, and the mahogany and
+cedar logs hauled out of the forest took on the color. In a walking trip
+to the city of Puerto Principe I passed through a region about twenty
+miles from La Gloria where nearly all the trees along the road were
+colored as evenly for about two feet from the ground as if their trunks
+had been carefully painted red. My companions and I pondered over this
+matter for some time and finally arrived at the opinion that wild hogs,
+or possibly a large drove of domesticated swine, had rolled in the red
+dust of the highway and then rubbed up against the neighboring trees.
+They were colored to about the height of a hog's back. This seemed to be
+the only reasonable explanation, and is undoubtedly the true one. This
+region was close to the Cubitas mountains, where the Cuban insurgents
+long had their capital and kept their cattle to supply the army in the
+field; it may be that they had also large droves of hogs which roamed
+through the near-by country.
+
+The Cuban homes as I found them in the rural districts around La Gloria
+were not ornamented with books and pictures. Sometimes, to be sure,
+there would be a few lithographs tacked up, and I had reason to believe
+that the houses were not wholly destitute of books, but they were never
+in evidence. The things that were always in evidence were children,
+chickens, and dogs, and often pigs and goats. There was a democracy
+about the domestic economy of the household that must have been highly
+flattering to the chickens, dogs, pigs, etc. They always had all the
+rights and privileges that the children or even the adults had. I have
+seen a two-year-old child and a cat eating contentedly out of the same
+dish.
+
+[Illustration: FRANK J. O'REILLY.
+
+(_One of the Early Colonists._)]
+
+But if the children were always in evidence, their clothing oftentimes
+was not. Nothing is more common in Cuba than to see young children in
+unabashed nakedness. Their nudity is complete, and their unconsciousness
+absolute. In nature's garb they toddle along some of the streets of the
+cities, and in the rural districts they may be seen in the same
+condition in and around their humble homes. Naked babies lie kicking in
+hammocks or more quietly in their mothers' arms, and naked children
+run about at play. I once stopped at a shack to get coffee, and while
+waiting in the open front of the "casa" for its preparation, was
+surrounded by a bevy of bright little children who had neglected to put
+on their clothes. At last it seemed to occur to a pretty four-year-old
+girl that she was not properly attired for company, so she sat down on
+the dirt floor and pulled on a slipper! She appeared somewhat disturbed
+at not being able to find its mate, and hunted quite a while for it, but
+finally gave up the search and accepted the situation, evidently
+concluding that a single shoe was clothing enough in which to receive
+even such distinguished guests as "Americanos." With the adult members
+of the family, also, this nakedness of the children passes as a matter
+of course. The climate is so mild that clothing is not demanded, but I
+caught myself wondering if insects never bite Cubans.
+
+The Cubans are rather an abstemious people. They care little for their
+food and are not given to excessive drinking. Those in the country
+around La Gloria lived chiefly on pork, stewed beans, rice, and boniatos
+(sweet potatoes). It is a mistaken idea that they do not eat much meat;
+they eat a great deal of pork in all forms, and seem to be equally fond
+of wild hog and the domesticated animal. As a matter of fact, there is
+small difference between the two. Both are "razor backs", and have
+practically no fat on them. The flesh tastes about as much like beef as
+it does like the fatted pork of New England swine. The Cubans keep a
+good deal of poultry, but from personal observation I cannot say that
+they eat much of it. The hens and the eggs are small, but the former
+sell for one dollar apiece and the latter for about forty cents a dozen.
+The Cubans in the rural parts of the province of Puerto Principe eat
+very little beef, but this may be because it is not easy to get it,
+while lamb and mutton are unheard of. The Cubans make excellent coffee
+of their own raising, which they invariably drink without milk. Coffee
+alone forms the early breakfast, the substantial breakfast being at ten
+o'clock, and the dinner (la comida) at three or four o'clock. There is
+nothing to eat after this, but there may be coffee in the evening. In
+fact, the Cubans are liable to drink coffee at any hour of the day, and
+they always wind up their two regular meals with it. They are fond of
+sweets, particularly a sort of preserved orange (dulce naranja). It may
+be that they eat fresh fruit, but when I do not know, for I never saw a
+Cuban eating an orange, a banana, or a pineapple. These they sold to us
+at rather excessive prices. The Cubans nearly all drink, but very little
+at a time, and rarely get drunk. Their favorite drinks are wine, rum,
+and brandy (aguardiente). In a holiday week in the city of Puerto
+Principe, the only two men I saw intoxicated were Americans. One was a
+soldier, the other a camp follower.
+
+The Cubans of the rural districts did not appear to be religious,
+although there was apt to be a rude wooden cross fixed in the ground in
+front of their dwellings, possibly with a superstitious idea of thus
+averting evil. These crosses were nothing more than a slender pole,
+eight or ten feet high, stripped of its bark, with a cross piece near
+the top. They were dry and weather beaten, and looked more like a roost
+for birds than a religious emblem. Smaller wooden crosses were to be
+found in the little graveyards that we occasionally came upon. These
+seldom contained more than two or three graves, which were unmarked by
+any visible name or inscription. In the villages there were, of course,
+larger cemeteries, but the country I am writing of was very sparsely
+settled, averaging scarcely more than one or two families to the square
+mile.
+
+The natives appeared to have very few amusements. They hunted somewhat,
+and in the villages and cities had occasional dances of rather a weird
+character. They had cock fights, too, I suppose, but these did not seem
+to be a feature of the country life about us. The rural Cuban spends
+much of his time in riding about the country on his patient and
+intelligent pony, buying supplies and disposing of his small produce.
+When they till their land is a mystery, for they never seem to be at
+work upon it. In fact, very little was tilled at all in the region about
+La Gloria. It was no uncommon thing to find a man owning hundreds of
+acres, with less than one acre under cultivation. This condition was
+usually explained by the statement that everything had been killed out
+during the Ten Years' War, and that the natives were too poor to again
+put their land under cultivation. This was a half-truth, at least, but
+Cuban indifference must have had something to do with it. One of the La
+Gloria colonists once asked an intelligent and good-appearing elderly
+Cuban why he did not cultivate more of his land. "What is the use?" was
+the reply. "When I need money I pick off some bananas and sell them. I
+get for them twenty or twenty-five dollars, which lasts me a long time.
+When I need more money, I pick more bananas." This is the common Cuban
+view. His natural indifference, combined with the exactions of Spanish
+government, has kept his mind free from any thought of making provision
+for the future.
+
+The reader should bear in mind that I have been describing the people of
+the province of Puerto Principe, and mainly of the rural portions
+thereof. I am well aware that in the more thickly settled and more
+prosperous provinces fine country houses are sometimes to be found, and
+the people generally may live somewhat differently and perhaps better,
+but I believe I have faithfully pictured the typical Cuban as he exists
+to-day in the country districts of Puerto Principe, the fertile and
+unfortunate province which has probably suffered more from the ravages
+of war in the last thirty years than any other province in the island.
+It was completely despoiled during the Ten Years' War, and has never
+recovered. Its deserted plantations are now being reclaimed, largely by
+Americans, and ere long will blossom forth with luscious fruits and
+other valuable products.
+
+The slight acquaintance which I had with the Cubans of the cities of
+Puerto Principe and Nuevitas led me to the belief that they did not
+differ greatly from the more intelligent inhabitants of the country
+sections. Among the half hundred Cubans who worked for the company and
+occupied a camp at La Gloria, were many from the cities of the province,
+the others coming from small towns and villages. Most of them had served
+in the Cuban army--the "Army of Liberation", as it was called. Though
+these men had but few comforts, they appeared to be happy and contented;
+they were almost invariably peaceable and good-humored. The Americans
+liked these "Cu-bi-ans"--as some of the colonists persisted in calling
+them--and entire harmony prevailed. It was amusing to me when we first
+arrived to hear some of the Western colonists inadvertently speak of
+them as "the Indians", owing, I suppose, to their primitive mode of
+living. Columbus called them by the same name when, on the 28th of
+October, 1492, he landed on the island at a point not twenty miles from
+what is now Port La Gloria,--but within the last four hundred years the
+appellation of "Cuban" has become well known throughout the world. The
+Cubans must work out their own destiny, but I am satisfied that they
+will steadily progress in the scale of civilization.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+STEPS OF PROGRESS.
+
+
+The opening of the month of February found the colonists in excellent
+health and good spirits, and hard at work on their land or for the
+company. The La Gloria post-office had been established, church services
+were held regularly in a large tent, and the La Gloria Pioneer
+Association had been organized and held its regular meeting on Saturday
+evening of each week. Town lots were being cleared, gardens planted, and
+pineapple plants set out as fast as the land could be prepared and the
+"suckers" obtained.
+
+Through the active efforts of General Van der Voort, a United States
+post-office was established immediately after his arrival. The general
+held the commission as postmaster, and selected for his assistant, Col.
+John. F. Early of Wilber, Nebraska, who had been postmaster of his town
+before coming to Cuba. The general being otherwise engaged, most of the
+actual work of the office fell upon Colonel Early, who was well
+qualified to perform it. Some months later, Van der Voort resigned the
+postmastership, and Early was promoted to the head of the office. The
+post-office first occupied a small space in headquarters tent, but was
+soon moved to a tent by itself near at hand. Here it remained until the
+fall of 1900, when it was moved into a new wooden building constructed
+for it on Central avenue. From the first the office did considerable
+business, which steadily increased. The colonists wrote and received
+many letters, but were loud in their complaints of the irregularity and
+infrequency of the mails. In a measure, this faultfinding was justified,
+but the philosophical were more patient and felt that the colony was
+lucky to have a post-office at all. The remedy was slow in coming, but
+the mail facilities gradually improved. At first the letters were
+collected at the office in a wooden box, but before many weeks had
+passed a regulation metallic receptacle, painted red and marked "U. S.
+Mail," was placed in front of the tent. I well remember the shout that
+went up from the assembled colonists when this reminder of home and
+civilization was brought in on horseback from the port by the mail
+carrier. It seemed almost like having a glimpse of the old home.
+
+The regular sworn mail carrier between Port La Gloria and the
+post-office was Senor Ciriaco Rivas, familiarly known as "the old senor"
+among the colonists, by whom he was much beloved. He was a true-hearted
+gentleman and a brave soldier, being a veteran of the Ten Years' War and
+the later conflict. He was one of the best friends that the colonists
+had, and was their guest and companion on many occasions, and sometimes
+their host. Senor Rivas owned a large tract of land in the neighborhood,
+but lived with his family in the Cuban camp at La Gloria. While scorning
+to take pay from individuals for his services, he assisted the colonists
+in manifold ways. In the summer of 1900 he was named by the government
+as alcalde (magistrate) of La Gloria and the country for five miles
+around, but on the 15th day of the following September he died at
+Nuevitas, lamented alike by Cubans and Americans.
+
+Besides attending to his post-office duties, Colonel Early represented
+large land interests in the colony and gave much time to work in
+connection therewith. He was one of the most enthusiastic of the
+colonists, being delighted with the country and its prospects. Fond of
+hunting and fishing, a lover of birds, trees, and flowers, versatile in
+his tastes and accomplishments, Colonel Early found Cuba much to his
+liking, and complained of nothing save the "hell-hens," as he
+irreverently called the despised jejines (sand flies). He was a veteran
+of the Civil War, and had been something of a politician in his Nebraska
+home.
+
+[Illustration: THE FIRST WOMEN COLONISTS OF LA GLORIA.
+
+        Mrs. Spiker.  Mrs. Horn.  Mrs. Morrison.  Mrs. Matthews.
+    Miss Boston.                     Mrs. Hovora Mrs. Lowell.
+        Mrs. McElman.  Edna Horn.
+        Mrs. Smith.        Mrs. Neff.
+]
+
+Unlike the mining camps of our great West, La Gloria was a moral and
+orderly town. This was largely due to the fact that General Van der
+Voort insisted that no liquor should be sold, a prohibition which was
+rigidly enforced. The result was that there was peace and quiet, and no
+crime save a few small thefts. Very little policing was necessary. At
+the beginning the police force consisted of Mr. George H. Matthews of
+Asbury Park, N. J., whose only duty appeared to be a daily tour of the
+camp in the early evening. Chief of Police Matthews lived in a tent at
+the upper end of the camp. When darkness came on he would light his
+little lantern and "go down the line," as he called his nightly trip
+down the main street and back. The whole operation, including lighting
+the lantern, occupied about twenty minutes. Mr. Matthews also plied the
+trade of a barber, charging twenty-five cents for a shave. It was
+finally decided that if anybody was robbing the colonists, he was the
+man and the police force was abolished altogether. Soon after Mr.
+Matthews and his wife returned to their home in Asbury Park. They were
+well liked, and their departure was regretted. A little later there were
+some actual thefts, generally attributed to negroes who lurked about the
+camp, and Eugene Kezar, from Barre, Vermont, was put on as night
+watchman. He performed this duty faithfully, as he did every duty which
+devolved upon him, and the thefts soon ceased. Much of the time Kezar
+was in the employ of the company in the daytime about the camp,
+supervising the erection of tents, taking care of property, and
+performing manifold duties in the interest of the company and the
+colonists.
+
+The first church service in La Gloria was held on January 14, conducted
+by the Rev. A. E. Seddon of Atlanta, Ga., a minister of the Christian
+church, who was one of the colonists who came on the first _Yarmouth_.
+It was attended by a large proportion of the colonists. Mr. Seddon was a
+good preacher and a cultivated man, but did not long remain at La
+Gloria. Becoming interested in another proposed colony, he took his
+departure from La Gloria soon after the allotment of the land. Next the
+Rev. J. W. Harris of Vermont preached for one Sunday, but he also took
+an early departure. At about this time the venerable Dr. William I. Gill
+of Asbury Park, N. J., joined the colony, and conducted church services
+for some weeks. His health not being good, he was forced to give up
+regular preaching. For a time the congregation was without an
+officiating clergyman, but sermons were read each Sunday by some layman,
+and a Sabbath school was regularly held. With the spring came two
+ministers together, the Rev. James G. Stuart of London, Canada, and the
+Rev. W. A. Nicholas of Huntington, West Virginia. Mr. Stuart's stay at
+this time was temporary, but he preached one Sunday to the edification
+of a good-sized audience. When his leave of absence expired he returned
+to his far away home in Canada, but before sailing he expressed himself
+as being greatly pleased with La Gloria, and made known his intention
+to make it his residence at some future time. He left money to have a
+large tract of land cleared and cultivated. Mr. Stuart had been the
+owner of an orange grove in California, and was satisfied that the fruit
+would do finely in the soil around La Gloria. He was highly enthusiastic
+in his praise of the country. Mr. Nicholas, a minister of the Baptist
+church, succeeded Mr. Stuart in the La Gloria pulpit, and preached
+several weeks. He then returned to West Virginia for the purpose of
+bringing his family to Cuba to establish a permanent home. In June he
+brought his wife and children to La Gloria and resumed his religious
+teaching. He has since preached regularly, and is held in high respect
+by the colonists. Mrs. Nicholas is also very popular in the colony. Mr.
+Nicholas is delighted with Cuba, and is enjoying greatly improved
+health. Besides the preaching and Sunday-school, weekly prayer-meetings,
+teachers' meetings, and choir meetings have been held in the colony from
+its earliest days.
+
+[Illustration: DR. WILLIAM P. PEIRCE.]
+
+The first organization of the colonists, and the force which had most to
+do with shaping the course of affairs in the early life of the colony,
+was the La Gloria Pioneer Association. At a mass meeting in front of
+headquarters tent on the 18th of January, Dr. W. P. Peirce of Hoopeston,
+Ill., was made temporary chairman, and R. C. Bourdette of Dexter,
+Kansas, temporary secretary. James M. Adams, D. E. Lowell, and R. C.
+Bourdette were appointed a committee to draft a constitution and
+by-laws. At a meeting January 27 the committee reported a constitution
+and by-laws, which were adopted, and the following officers were elected
+for a term of six months: Dr. W. P. Peirce, president; D. E. Lowell,
+vice-president; R. G. Barner, secretary; Col. Thomas H. Maginniss,
+treasurer; E. B. Newsom, W. G. Spiker, J. A. Florence, W. M. Carson, and
+Rev. William I. Gill, executive board. The president, vice-president,
+secretary, and treasurer were members of the executive board
+_ex-officio_.
+
+Dr. Peirce, the president, was one of the ablest of the colonists, a man
+of consequence in his state, and possessed of both mental and financial
+resources. Genial, kindly, and humorous, he was much liked by his
+fellow-colonists, and made an admirable presiding officer for the
+association. He had entire faith in the ultimate success of the colony,
+and did much to advance its welfare. Mr. Lowell, the vice-president,
+had been a successful fruit grower in Florida and a leading citizen in
+that section of the state where he resided. He was one of the first of
+the colonists to reach La Gloria, coming in with his wife before the
+first _Yarmouth_ party arrived. He was a substantial and practical man,
+and a valuable prop to the colony, wherein he was popular and
+influential. Mr. Barner, the secretary, was a young man from
+Philadelphia, and was one of the colonists who came on the first
+_Yarmouth_. He was an expert stenographer and typewriter, and a man of
+good judgment and untiring industry. For a time he worked upon the land,
+but was soon taken into the president's office, where he proved to be a
+faithful and efficient clerk and secretary. Well liked among his brother
+and sister colonists, he was given numerous responsible positions as new
+organizations were formed. Colonel Maginniss, the treasurer, was also
+from Philadelphia, and has been before alluded to as the superintendent
+of the camp. His duties as treasurer of the association were not
+arduous, but he performed good service as chairman of the committee on
+transportation. The other members of the executive board were leading
+colonists, and intelligent and practical men.
+
+The executive board appointed the following committees: Transportation,
+Col. Thomas H. Maginniss (chairman), J. A. Florence, S. L. Benham, W. P.
+Hartzell, Thomas R. Geer--the latter resigning, he was replaced by James
+M. Adams; supplies, E. B. Newsom (chr.), D. E. Lowell, W. G. Spiker, E.
+F. Rutherford, M. T. Holman; sanitation, Dr. W. P. Peirce (chr.), G. A.
+Libby, M. T. Jones, W. S. Dunbar, G. H. Matthews; manufactures, D. L.
+Carleton (chr.), W. L. Yard, J. A. Anderson, J. C. Kelly, W. H. Gruver;
+history of the colony, James M. Adams (chr.), A. E. Seddon, Rev. William
+I. Gill, M. A. C. Neff, F. X. Hovora; legal affairs, Gen. Paul Van der
+Voort (chr.), Col. Thomas H. Maginniss, Capt. Joseph Chace, W. M.
+Carson, J. F. Early; education and religious observance, Mrs. Andrews
+(chr.), Mrs. D. E. Lowell, Mrs. W. G. Spiker, Mrs. William I. Gill, Mrs.
+M. A. C. Neff; village improvements, M. A. C. Neff (chr.), D. E. Lowell,
+B. F. Seibert, E. B. Newsom, J. C. Florence, Peter Larsen, H. E. Mosher,
+S. M. Van der Voort, James Peirce, Mrs. Clara Broome, Mrs. J. A. Horn,
+Mrs. G. H. Matthews. Mrs. Andrews did not remain in La Gloria, and hence
+never served on the committee on education and religious observance;
+Mrs. D. E. Lowell acted as chairman and directed the work of the
+committee with zeal and intelligence. As time went on, numerous other
+vacancies occurred in the several committees, but these were filled and
+the work was not retarded. Most of the committees were more or less
+active and accomplished as much as could reasonably be expected
+considering the many obstacles encountered. If the net results
+accomplished by the association at this early stage seem small, it
+should be remembered that it was no slight task to hold the colony
+together in the face of natural obstructions, irritating delays, and
+disheartening disappointments. All these things the colonists had to
+encounter, and the Pioneer Association performed a great work in banding
+the settlers together, staying their courage and preventing a stampede
+in the darkest hours, and in keeping things moving, slowly though it may
+have been, in the right direction. Indeed, it is impossible to conceive
+what the colonists would have done at the beginning without the
+co-operative aid afforded by this organization. Practically the whole
+colony belonged to it during the first few months of its existence.
+
+The meetings were held every Saturday night and were always well
+attended. They were valued not only for utilitarian purposes, but as
+almost the sole amusement enjoyed by the colonists during the week.
+These meetings supplied the place of the theatre, the lyceum, and social
+festivities, and some of the women were heard to say that they looked
+forward the whole week to this regular gathering. Subjects of absorbing
+interest always came up, the speaking was quite good and never tedious,
+and humorous and witty remarks were very often heard and fully
+appreciated. The ludicrous always appealed to the audience keenly. Many
+of the colonists participated in the speaking, and the discussions were
+invariably good-natured. The speakers were sure of close attention and
+generous treatment from their auditors, even from those who might
+disagree with them. The brotherly feeling which pervaded the colony was
+always manifest at these gatherings. Some of the Cubans would often
+attend, and more than once a Spaniard was in the audience. It was a
+strange sight, one of these meetings. In the dim light of two or three
+lanterns, the colonists would be grouped together under a shelter tent,
+some sitting on rude wooden benches and others standing. Those on the
+outskirts were as often under the stars as under the tent. Both the
+audience and the surroundings were picturesque, albeit the whole effect
+was suggestive of a primitive life which few of the colonists had before
+experienced. The scene is one that is not likely ever to be forgotten by
+those who participated in it.
+
+In July, 1900, the Pioneer Association elected new officers, as follows:
+President, D. E. Lowell; vice-president, John Latham; secretary, William
+M. Carson; treasurer, J. R. P. de les Derniers. By this time new and
+more wieldy organizations had sprung up which took much of the practical
+work from the association, the latter becoming more of a reminiscence
+than a potent force. It is still, however, a factor in the social life
+of La Gloria.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+EVENTS IMPORTANT AND OTHERWISE.
+
+
+On the last day of January I became private secretary to President Van
+der Voort, serving in that capacity until my return to the States nearly
+four months later. This position brought me into close and intimate
+contact with all of the colonists, and to no small extent I shared their
+joys and woes. I was made the recipient of their confidences, and was
+sometimes able, I believe, to make somewhat smoother the rather thorny
+paths they had to travel. When I was unable to do this, it was never
+from lack of full sympathy with their trials and hardships. I cannot be
+too emphatic in saying that never in my life have I met an aggregation
+of men and women who were more honest, good-natured, patient, and
+reasonable. To me, personally, they invariably extended the kindest
+consideration, and so, for that matter, did the officers of the company.
+The nucleus for the first American colony in Cuba was beyond all
+question a good and substantial one.
+
+[Illustration: GEN. VAN DER VOORT'S CUBAN HOUSE.]
+
+About the middle of February Gen. Van der Voort moved into his new Cuban
+house, which had been constructed for him by Cuban workmen in an open
+space ninety or one hundred yards back from the main street of the camp.
+The house and most of the tents constituting the camp were on the
+company's reservation just north of the front line of the town. As fast
+as the colonists got their town lots cleared they moved on to them, but
+their places in the reservation camp were often taken by new-comers.
+
+The general's palm house, or shack, was an ingenious and interesting
+piece of work. The Cubans exercised all their marvelous skill in its
+construction, with highly creditable results. When completed it was
+water tight, and cool, comfortable, and picturesque. The house contained
+two good-sized rooms, an enclosed bedroom at the back and an open
+apartment at the front used for an office and reception-room. Until a
+conventional board floor was laid by an "Americano" carpenter, there was
+not a nail in the entire structure. The upright poles, cross pieces, the
+ridgepole, and the rafters and cross rafters, were securely fastened
+together with tough bark and vines, while the roof was carefully
+thatched with palm leaves. The latter were broad, fan-shaped leaves,
+several feet across at the widest part. Each had a stout stem two or
+three feet long. The leaves were laid upon the roof, beginning at the
+eaves, stems pointing to the ridgepole. The leaves were carefully lapped
+like shingles, and tightly lashed by the stems to the rafters and cross
+rafters. If a leak was discovered it was easy to close it by binding on
+another leaf. The leaves used came from what is commonly known as the
+dwarf or cabbage palm. Royal palm bark was used along the ridgepole. The
+back and sides of the house were of palm leaves, as was the front of the
+rear room, a door being cut through it. The front of the outer apartment
+was entirely open. The original floor was of wood cut from the royal
+palm, the rough and heavy boards, or planks, being fastened to cross
+logs by wooden pins. Not proving entirely satisfactory, this floor,
+after a short time, was replaced by a more even one laid by a Yankee
+carpenter. This was the only change made by General Van der Voort in his
+Cuban house, with which he was greatly delighted. When new the
+prevailing color, inside and out, was a beautiful green, which soon
+turned to a yellowish brown. The change did not add to its beauty, but
+it still remained comfortable and picturesque. The cost of such a house
+in La Gloria was about fifty dollars. The general's house was
+wonderfully cool, as I can testify from personal experience, having
+occupied it daily for three months.
+
+Within a dozen yards of the general's house stood a historic landmark
+known as the "Lookout Tree," a gigantic tree used by the Cubans during
+the Ten Years' War and the late insurrection to watch for Spanish
+gun-boats that patroled the coast and for filibusters bringing arms and
+ammunition. It was at or very near Port La Gloria--known to the Cubans
+as Viaro--that the celebrated _Gussie_ landed her arms and ammunition
+for the Cubans, just after the intervention of the United States. Up
+through the "Lookout Tree" grow what appear to be two small and very
+straight trees, about three feet apart; actually, they are the downward
+shooting branches of a parasitic growth, taking root in the ground. The
+Cubans have utilized these for a ladder, cutting notches into them and
+fastening cross-pieces, or rungs, very securely with barbed wire. One
+may climb high into the big tree by this curious ladder, and from the
+top a good view of the coast is obtained. After our arrival the tree was
+sometimes brought into requisition in watching for the boat from
+Nuevitas, and the good climbers among the colonists often made the
+ascent merely for the satisfaction of performing the feat, which was not
+such an easy one as might appear, since the ladder did not reach to the
+top by fifteen or twenty feet.
+
+A space of about half an acre, chiefly in front of the house, General
+Van der Voort had plowed and planted for a garden. Vegetables were sown
+in February and a little later a good number of pineapple plants,
+banana, orange and coffee trees, etc., were set out. The vegetables
+began to come on in April, and the fruit trees and pineapples exhibited
+a thrifty growth from month to month. Small palm trees were also set out
+along the path leading from the house across the garden to Central
+avenue. The company had another and larger garden near by which was
+planted in the latter part of January. Some of its products were ready
+for the table in March, and radishes even earlier. The soil of these
+gardens was not of the richest, being red and containing oxide of iron;
+but, for all that, seeds came up marvelously quick and plants grew
+well. I have known beans which were planted Saturday morning to be up on
+the following Monday. The soil of practically all of the plantations and
+many of the town lots is very rich.
+
+On February 21, the day before Washington's birthday, occurred the first
+birth in La Gloria, a lusty son being born to Mr. and Mrs. Olaf Olson.
+Mr. Olson was one of the most prosperous and progressive of the
+colonists, and his wife was a true pioneer. At the time of the birth the
+Olsons were living in a tent on their town lot on Market street, not far
+from Central avenue. Dr. Peirce was the officiating physician, and the
+infant developed as rapidly, in proportion, as plants in that tropical
+clime. It proved to be a remarkably healthy child. It was promptly named
+Olaf El Gloria Olson, and on the request of the Pioneer Association, the
+company generously made it a present of a town lot. Soon after the birth
+of the child, Mr. Olson moved into a house of his own construction.
+
+The weather at this time was good and the temperature very comfortable.
+Ordinarily the thermometer registered throughout the day from 70 to 84
+degrees of heat. The lowest temperature for January was 55 deg.; the
+highest, 91 deg.. The lowest for February was 56 deg.; the highest, 91 deg.. The
+extremes of heat are nearly as great in winter as in summer, but there
+is much more variation. In summer the temperature ordinarily runs from
+about 78 deg. to 90 deg., but occasionally touches 94 deg., which is the highest I
+have ever known it to be in La Gloria. Even at this figure the heat is
+not oppressive. There is such a refreshing breeze night and day in Cuba
+that one does not suffer from the heat either in summer or winter. The
+climate is so fine at all seasons of the year, that to a New Englander
+it seems absolutely perfect. The colonists worked hard every day under
+the rays of the sun and suffered no ill effects. They came to the
+conclusion that getting acclimated was a "cinch" in comparison with
+enduring the changing weather of the Northern states.
+
+During the first week in February the colonists, such of them as were
+not otherwise employed, began the construction of a corduroy road over
+the worst places on the trail from La Gloria to the port. The work was
+under the supervision of Colonel Maginniss, and from twenty to thirty
+men labored daily for some time. While not of a permanent character,
+this work made the road more passable for pedestrians and animals, and
+was of material aid in the hauling up of provisions and belated baggage.
+By the end of February most of us had got our trunks. The workers on the
+road were employed by the company, with the understanding that their
+wages should be credited upon their land payments, or upon the purchase
+of new land. This was satisfactory to the colonists, and many took
+advantage of the opportunity to acquire more town lots. Many other
+employes of the company also turned in their time for the purchase of
+plantation land or town lots.
+
+On the 19th of February the first well in La Gloria was opened. It was
+at the corner of Market street and Florida avenue, and was dug by a
+syndicate of colonists who lived in that vicinity. Good water was struck
+at a depth of about twelve feet. Many people used the water from this
+well, and a little later it was made considerably deeper. The well was
+square, and the ground was so hard at this point that it was found to be
+unnecessary to stone it. Many other wells were dug soon after, in all of
+which good water was found fifteen or twenty feet below the surface of
+the ground.
+
+Early in February, M. A. C. Neff, engineer and architect, who had been
+in charge of the town site survey, was transferred to the work of
+preparing real estate maps and books. Mr. Neff was a fine draughtsman,
+and his colored maps were a delight to the eye. One of his maps was used
+in the allotment of town lots, another was placed on file at Puerto
+Principe in connection with the recording of deeds, while others were
+sent to the New York office of the company or kept for use in La Gloria.
+Much credit is due Mr. Neff for his part in the upbuilding of La Gloria.
+He was enthusiastic in forwarding improvements of all kinds. Both he and
+his admirable wife considered themselves colonists, and looked forward
+with pleasant anticipations to a permanent home in La Gloria.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+SELF-RELIANCE OF THE COLONISTS.
+
+
+I was deeply impressed by the courage and self-reliance of the
+colonists. From the start they showed a splendid ability to take care of
+themselves. One day early in February a white-bearded old fellow past
+seventy years of age, with blue overalls on and a hoe over his shoulder,
+appeared at the door of General Van der Voort's tent.
+
+"General," he said, "if a man owns a lot, has anybody else a right to
+come on to it and pick fruit of any kind?"
+
+"Not if the owner has a revolver and bowie knife," laughingly replied
+Van der Voort.
+
+"Well," said the man, "I just thought I'd ask ye. A couple o' fellers
+(Cubans) came on to my lot to-day while I was at work there and began to
+pick some o' these 'ere guavas. I told 'em to git out, but they didn't
+go. Then I went for 'em with this hoe. One of 'em drawed his machete,
+but I didn't care for that. I knew I could reach him with my hoe before
+he could reach me with his knife. They went off."
+
+General Van der Voort laughed heartily, and evidently was satisfied that
+the man with the hoe was able to protect himself without the aid of the
+La Gloria police force.
+
+The old man's name, as I afterwards learned, was Joseph B. Withee. Some
+of the colonists who had become intimately acquainted with him
+familiarly called him "grandpa," although he was not the oldest man in
+the colony. His age was seventy-one years, and he hailed from the state
+of Maine. None of his family or friends had come to Cuba with him, but
+he had grown children living in the Pine Tree state. Alone and
+single-handed he began his pioneer life in La Gloria, but he was not
+daunted by obstacles or fearful of the future. On the contrary, he was
+most sanguine. He worked regularly every day clearing and planting his
+plantation, and was one of the first of the colonists to take up his
+residence on his own land. He soon had vegetables growing, and had set
+out strawberry and pineapple plants, besides a number of banana, orange,
+and lemon trees. It was his boast that he had the best spring of water
+in the colony, and it certainly was a very good one. Mr. Withee
+declared that his health was much improved since coming to Cuba, and
+that he felt ten or fifteen years younger. Everybody in the colony could
+bear witness that he was remarkably active and industrious. Once his
+relatives in Maine, not hearing from him, became alarmed, and wrote to
+the company asking if he were alive and in La Gloria. I went down to his
+plantation with the letter, and asked him if he was alive. He thought he
+was, and suspended work long enough to sniff at the idea that he was not
+able to take care of himself.
+
+Mr. Withee was wont to admit that before he came to Cuba he had a weak
+back, but the only weakness we were ever able to detect in him was an
+infirmity of temper which foreboded pugnacious action. Most assuredly he
+had plenty of backbone, and his persistent pugnacity was highly amusing.
+He was always wanting to "lick" somebody, and I know not what my fate
+will be if we ever meet after he reads these lines, although we were
+excellent friends in La Gloria. I can imagine that my friend Withee was
+brought up in one of those country school "deestricts" where every boy
+had to fight his way step by step to the respect of his associates, and
+where it was the custom for the big scholars to attempt each winter to
+thrash the teacher and throw him into a snowdrift. If so, I will warrant
+that Withee was held in high respect.
+
+Withee had a great idea of standing up for his rights, and for a long
+time he was on the war-path, as he confided to me, in pursuit of a
+surveyor who had cut down a small palm tree on his plantation. He didn't
+know which individual of the survey corps it was who perpetrated the
+"outrage," but if the old man found out, one of Chief Kelly's men was in
+for a good licking. Of course, the surveyor was entirely innocent of any
+intent to injure the property of Mr. Withee or anybody else, and cut the
+tree while running a survey line. It was some months after this, in
+September, that the spirit of Withee's revolutionary sires joined issue
+with his fierce indignation, and produced fatal results--fatal to
+several chickens that invaded his premises. A neighboring colonist, who
+lived on the other side of the avenue, kept a large number of hens, and
+allowed them free range. They developed a fondness for wandering across
+the road, and feeding in Withee's well-stocked garden. They didn't know
+Withee. The old man sputtered vehemently, and remonstrated with the
+owner--but the chickens continued to come. Finally, Withee went to a
+friendly colonist and borrowed his gun. Soon after his return home, one
+of the detested hens wandered nonchalantly across the dead line, and
+presently was minus a head. Another essayed the same feat, with the
+result that there were two headless chickens in La Gloria. Withee's aim
+was as good as when he used to shoot chipmunks in the Maine woods. The
+owner of the hens heard the reports of the gun, and came over. He was
+told to go home and pen up his poultry. Taking the two dead chicks, he
+went to the Rural Guards and entered a complaint. While he was gone,
+Withee reduced the poultry population of La Gloria by one more. The
+owner of the hens returned, accompanied by Rural Guards, several
+prominent Cubans, and a few colonists. They had come to take the gun
+away from Withee. The old man stood the whole crowd off, and told them
+to keep their feet clear of his place. They obeyed the order, but told
+him he must kill no more chickens under penalty of arrest. He told them
+to keep the chickens off his premises under penalty of their being
+killed. The old man was left the master of the situation, and the hens
+were restricted to a pen.
+
+Speaking of courage and self-confidence reminds me of a remark of big
+Jack McCauley. There was included in the company's property, about five
+miles from La Gloria, a deserted plantation known as Mercedes. Upon it
+was an old grove of orange trees, which, in the spring of 1900, bore a
+fine crop. For a long time everybody was allowed to help himself at
+will, and Cubans, colonists, and surveyors availed themselves of the
+opportunity to lay in a supply of fruit. At length, as the oranges grew
+riper, orders were given that no one should take more than he could eat
+on the spot, but the oranges continued to disappear by the bagful.
+Stalwart Jack McCauley was at that time employed about the camp by the
+company, and it was decided to station him out at Mercedes, with a view
+to stopping the raids on the orange grove. Before leaving to undertake
+this duty, Jack quietly remarked: "I'll go out there and see if I've got
+any influence, and if not, I'll create some!" Big Jack's "influence"
+proved to be ample, and the balance of the orange crop was saved.
+
+McCauley's close friend and "pardner" was J. A. Messier, familiarly
+known as "Albany." Together they held a large tract of plantation land.
+"Albany" worked as a flagman in one of the surveying parties. Once, when
+the mosquitoes in the woods were more than ordinarily thick and
+ferocious, he made a complaint, a rare thing in him or any other
+surveyor. "They surround you," he said, "and you can't push them away
+because there is nowhere to push them!" "Albany" was the leading big
+snake killer in the colony, and was an adept at stretching and preparing
+their skins. But perhaps his greatest distinction was that of being
+floor manager of the first ball in La Gloria, a notable event which will
+be described in a later chapter.
+
+[Illustration: LA GLORIA, CUBA, LOOKING SOUTH. (_March, 1900._)]
+
+On the afternoon of February 27, the colonists who came on the third and
+last trip of the _Yarmouth_, about sixty in number, reached La Gloria.
+Among them were Arnold Mollenhauer of New York, a representative of the
+company; John A. Connell of East Weymouth, Mass., and S. W. Storm of
+Nebraska. The party was brought up from Nuevitas on the snug little
+steamer _Bay Shore_, and had a very comfortable passage. The _Bay Shore_
+was bought by the company to ply between Nuevitas and Port La Gloria,
+and was to have been used to transport the colonists who came to Cuba on
+the first _Yarmouth_ excursion, but, unfortunately, she came into
+collision with another boat at about that time, and was unfit for use
+for several weeks. This was one of a singular chain of accidents and
+annoyances which gave the colony a serious setback at the very start.
+The _Bay Shore_ proved to be a very unlucky boat, and was laid up from
+one cause or another most of the time. When the _Bay Shore_ was out of
+commission, a sailboat had to be used between La Gloria and Nuevitas.
+
+Mr. Mollenhauer did not remain long at La Gloria at this time, but
+established his headquarters at Nuevitas, taking up the work that had
+been in charge of Maj. P. S. Tunison. Young Mr. Mollenhauer proved to be
+the right man in the right place. He was active and efficient in the
+performance of his duties, and was very much liked by the colonists for
+his gentlemanly bearing, accommodating spirit, and frank and upright
+character. The affairs of the company and the colony took a new start
+when he came to Cuba and assumed charge of the disbursement of the
+funds.
+
+John A. Connell was a prosperous business man of East Weymouth, Mass.,
+and came to La Gloria to make it his permanent home. He was one of the
+most enthusiastic and progressive of the colonists, and gave daily
+expression to his liking for Cuba and his firm faith in the future of La
+Gloria. He was a man of property and of decided ability. Physically, he
+was a giant, being six feet four inches tall, and well proportioned. He
+was fond of athletics and was himself a good athlete. A man of strong
+intelligence, he appeared to good advantage as a speaker. Mr. Connell
+built the first frame building in La Gloria, a modest board structure
+with a roofing of tarred paper, and occupied it as a general store. It
+was situated on Central avenue in the company's reserve. This was not,
+however, the first store in La Gloria. Besides the company's commissary,
+W. G. Spiker started a store in a tent several months earlier. George E.
+Morrison opened a store in a tent on Central avenue just inside of the
+town line at about the same time that Connell started, and did a good
+business until he returned to the States several months later. Morrison
+had lived in many places, including Chicago, Ill., and Central America.
+In practical affairs he was one of the most versatile men in the colony.
+
+S. W. Storm of Nebraska was a veteran of the Civil War, and a good type
+of his class. Cheerful and buoyant, lively as a boy, he entered into the
+pioneer life with a hearty relish, as, indeed, did all of the many old
+soldiers who came to La Gloria. The renewal of camp life under agreeable
+climatic conditions seemed to be a great joy to them. Mr. Storm was
+never known to complain of anything, not even when he severely cut his
+foot while chopping. He brought with him to La Gloria his young son Guy,
+who was soon placed in school.
+
+The first school in La Gloria was started and taught by Mrs. Whittle of
+Albany, N. Y. It occupied a large shelter tent on the reserve, near
+Central avenue. It was fitted up with a board floor, wooden benches,
+tables, etc. The school opened February 26 with six scholars, and though
+text-books were few in number, the pupils made good progress in their
+studies. Mrs. Whittle was an attractive and cultivated lady, and an
+inspiring and tactful teacher. Before the middle of March the school
+had sixteen scholars, and a little later twenty-one. There was also at
+the same time an evening school for men, in which Mrs. Whittle taught
+grammar and spelling, and Mr. Max Neuber of Philadelphia, a prominent
+colonist, gave lessons in Spanish. Tuition was free in both schools,
+which were kept up until Mrs. Whittle and Mr. Neuber returned to the
+States in April.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+THE FIRST HOLIDAY IN LA GLORIA.
+
+
+The first holiday in La Gloria was marked by incidents that will be long
+remembered by the colonists. The credit for the inauguration of the
+movement for such a day belongs to John A. Connell, whose warm Irish
+blood craved athletic sport. Some of the rest of us were not far behind
+him in this particular. Mr. Connell arranged a program of running,
+jumping, wheelbarrow and potato races, etc., and after a conference of
+those interested, it was decided to ask the president of the company to
+declare a general half-holiday. I was delegated to bring the matter
+before General Van der Voort, who entered heartily into the spirit of
+the affair and readily granted our request. Accordingly, a formal
+proclamation was drawn up setting aside Saturday afternoon, March 24, as
+a holiday throughout the colony. The first draft was copied in the
+elegant handwriting of Chief Engineer Kelly, duly signed by President
+Van der Voort and attested by his secretary, and then conspicuously
+posted on the flag-staff which graced Central avenue. Further
+preparations were made for the red-letter day, and a baseball game added
+to the program. I found in my trunk a baseball, which I had brought to
+Cuba, I know not why, except, perhaps, with the American idea that a
+baseball is always a good companion. Simultaneously, the indefatigable
+J. L. Ratekin--one time a soldier in Col. William J. Bryan's Nebraska
+regiment in the Spanish War--dragged out of his kit a good baseball bat.
+Why Ratekin brought this bat to Cuba I cannot say, but I half suspect
+that he thought he might have to use it in self-defence. I am glad to be
+able to state, however, that it was put only to peaceful and legitimate
+uses, and killed nothing save "in-shoots" and "drops."
+
+Saturday, March 24, was a remarkably fine day even for sunny Cuba. A
+cloudless sky of beautiful blue, a temperature of from 80 to 90 degrees,
+and a soft, refreshing breeze combined to make it ideal weather for La
+Gloria's initial holiday. I remember that several bicycles were brought
+out and used on this day, one or two by young women. The muddy trails
+had dried up in most places, so that wheels could be ridden for
+considerable distances on the roads radiating from La Gloria. The dry
+season was fairly on by March 1, and for some time thereafter mud was
+practically eliminated from our list of annoyances.
+
+At noon the several surveying parties tramped in from their distant work
+in the woods, and soon after the colonists began to gather on Central
+avenue from headquarters tent to Connell's store. The women proved that
+they had not left all their finery in the States, while nearly every
+child was in its best bib and tucker. The men appeared in a great
+variety of costumes, but most of them had given more thought to comfort
+than to elegance. It was at this time that the first large group picture
+of the colonists was taken. The opportunity was too good to lose. We
+were hastily grouped across Central avenue, and three amateur
+photographers simultaneously took shots at us. The resulting photograph,
+though on a small scale, is a faithful picture of about half the
+colonists in La Gloria on March 24, 1900. One of the photographers was
+Lieut. Evans of the Eighth U. S. Cavalry, who had arrived in La Gloria
+the day before in command of a pack train consisting of about a dozen
+men and twenty mules. The detachment came from the city of Puerto
+Principe and was touring the country for practice and exercise. It may
+easily be imagined that we were glad to see them, and they seemed
+equally glad to see us. At our earnest solicitation they consented to
+participate in our holiday sports.
+
+[Illustration: GROUP OF COLONISTS. (_March 24, 1900._)]
+
+The sports went off well. There were some good athletes among the
+colonists, but a soldier named T. Brooks succeeded in winning a majority
+of the events. He was a quiet little fellow, but his athletic prowess
+was a credit to the United States army. A few Cubans took part in the
+events, but did not distinguish themselves. The chief attraction of the
+day was the baseball game, which began about the middle of the
+afternoon. A diamond had been laid out in a large open space just east
+of Central avenue, and the ground was remarkably level and hard. It was
+a natural baseball field, and with but little work was ready for use.
+The greater part of the colony, men, women, and children, gathered to
+see the first exhibition of the American national game in La Gloria.
+Among the spectators were President Van der Voort and Chief Engineer
+Kelly. There were also a few Spaniards and many Cubans present. Few of
+the latter, probably, had ever before seen a baseball game, although
+the sport is a popular pastime among the American soldiers encamped near
+Puerto Principe. This latter fact accounts for the proficiency of the
+soldiers who came to La Gloria. They formed one nine, and the other was
+made up of colonists. The latter played well, everything considered, but
+the superior discipline and practice of Uncle Sam's boys made them the
+winners in a close score. The game was umpired by M. T. Jones of
+Williamsport, Pennsylvania, one of the colonists, who came on the first
+_Yarmouth_ and the capable assistant of Superintendent Maginniss about
+the camp. The game ended an hour or two before sundown and closed the
+outdoor sports of a very successful and enjoyable day.
+
+But there was one notable event on that first holiday not down on the
+program, and one which few of the colonists knew anything about at the
+time and of which not many had subsequent knowledge. As I wended my way
+in the direction of my tent near General Van der Voort's house, under
+the mellow rays of the declining sun, three excited colonists
+intercepted me. They were Chief Engineer Kelly, John A. Connell, and D.
+E. Lowell. Drawing me aside from the thoroughfare, they hastily
+informed me that a lawyer by the name of C. Hugo Drake, of Puerto
+Principe, had just come into La Gloria with Lieutenant Cienfuente, the
+owner of the Viaro tract, with the intention of dispossessing the
+colonists of their land. They had ridden in on horseback from Puerto
+Principe, forty-five miles away. Lieutenant Cienfuente was an elderly
+Spaniard who had been an officer in the Spanish army, and Drake claimed
+to have charge, in part, of his business affairs. We had heard from
+Drake before, and knew perfectly well that he had induced the
+landholding Spaniard to come with him to La Gloria. Drake was an
+American, having come to Cuba from Mississippi just after the war with
+Spain and set up as a lawyer and restaurant keeper in Puerto Principe.
+He was a young man of a prominent family, but was reputed to be somewhat
+dissipated. He has since persistently claimed that his errand to La
+Gloria was not to dispossess the colonists, but in reality was in their
+interest. This explanation cannot be accepted, however, except upon the
+hypothesis that the colonists were bound to lose their lands under the
+contracts which they held. This, as the event proved, was a groundless
+fear; their holdings were perfectly secure.
+
+In order to make the situation clear to the reader a little explanation
+is necessary. The Viaro tract, which was the one in question, included
+about two thirds of the town site and a little over ten thousand acres
+of plantation land adjoining. The greater part of this land had been
+allotted to colonists, but no deeds had then been given. The company had
+made a first payment on the tract, and was paying the balance in
+instalments. One of these instalments was overdue when Drake came to La
+Gloria with Lieutenant Cienfuente, who had owned the land, and set up
+the claim that the contract had lapsed. Lieutenant Cienfuente was
+willing to wait a reasonable length of time for his pay, but had become
+suspicious that he was not going to get it at all, and hence was more or
+less under the influence of Drake, who appears to have been a
+self-appointed attorney for the Spaniard. Drake had a great scheme,
+which was to make a new contract directly with the colonists, or newly
+chosen representatives, at an advanced price for the tract. This advance
+was to be divided between Cienfuente and himself, and Drake's share
+would have amounted to $25,000 or $30,000. Of course, in Drake's scheme,
+the only alternative for the colonists was dispossession. Yielding to
+the young lawyer's insinuating representations, Lieutenant Cienfuente
+had agreed to the plan, but he was by no means an aggressive factor in
+it. Meanwhile, the company's officers in New York were concluding
+arrangements to make the overdue payment, which was done a few weeks
+later. With but little hesitation, Lieutenant Cienfuente accepted the
+money from Messrs. Park and Mollenhauer, and Drake's little scheme
+collapsed like a toy balloon.
+
+A part of the above facts only were known to us when Messrs. Kelly,
+Connell, Lowell, and myself had our hurried conference late in the
+afternoon of our first holiday. Mr. Lowell was particularly excited, and
+seriously disturbed by the apprehension that he might have his land
+taken away from him. It was quickly agreed that it was for the mutual
+interest of Drake and the colony that he should not be permitted to
+spend the night in La Gloria. We went over to the house of General Van
+der Voort, and discussed the situation with him. He mingled his
+indignation with ours, and dictated a peremptory order that Drake
+should leave the camp at once. I was commissioned to deliver the
+message, and Messrs. Kelly, Connell, and Lowell volunteered to accompany
+me. After a little search we found Drake near the "old senor's" shack.
+He seemed to divine our errand and came forward to meet us, pale and
+trembling, perhaps from excitement, possibly from fear. Indeed, we must
+have looked somewhat formidable if not belligerent. We were all large
+men, and Kelly was the only one of the four who was not six feet or more
+in height. I gave Drake the paper from the general. Scarcely glancing at
+it, he said, apologetically, in a low tone, "It's all a mistake,
+gentlemen, I meant no harm to anybody." We assured him that we thought
+he would be safer elsewhere than in La Gloria. He did not stop to argue
+the matter, but turning went directly to the shack and saddled his
+horse. We had intended to give him an hour; he was out of La Gloria in
+ten minutes. He was obliged to spend the night in the dense woods.
+
+The treatment of Mr. Drake was not hospitable, but the colonists looked
+upon him as an interloper whose machinations might bring upon them a
+great deal of trouble. I do not think he had any wish to injure the
+colonists, but he certainly had an itching palm for the large stake
+which he thought he saw within his reach. I saw him a week or two later
+in Puerto Principe, and he was amicable enough. He still believed his
+scheme would go through, but it was not long before his hopes were
+dashed. He told me he was heavily armed when in La Gloria, and could
+have "dropped" all four of us, but that he had promised Lieutenant
+Cienfuente not to make any trouble. He surely did not, as it turned out.
+Mr. Drake had the manners of a gentleman, and extended many courtesies
+to me during my stay in Puerto Principe. His resentment on account of
+the La Gloria episode was mainly directed toward General Van der Voort,
+and he emphatically declared that he had already taken steps to summon
+the general into court for the insult.
+
+Lieutenant Cienfuente remained in La Gloria as our special guest. He was
+entertained at the officers' table, was the guest of honor at the
+meeting of the Pioneer Association that evening, and every effort was
+made to make him feel at home. On the following Monday he left for his
+home in Puerto Principe in high good humor.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+INDUSTRY OF THE COLONISTS.
+
+
+The opening of spring did not bring any material change in weather that
+the colonists could detect, save that the occasional rainfall had
+ceased. The temperature for March was about the same as for January and
+February, the lowest recorded by the thermometer being 53 deg., and the
+highest 92 deg.. The weather was delightful and comfortable. There was more
+blossoming of flowers in the woods and the openings, and many a big tree
+became a veritable flower garden, with great clusters of pink orchids
+clinging to its huge trunk and massive limbs. There were several trees
+thus ornamented in close proximity to my tent.
+
+The colonists were now progressing with their work and displaying the
+greatest industry. Considerable clearing had been done, and some
+planting. Gardens were growing well, and the colonists were eating
+potatoes, beans, peas, cucumbers, tomatoes, etc., of their own raising.
+Many thousands of pineapple plants had been set out, and banana and
+orange trees were being put into the ground as fast as they could be
+obtained. Many of the colonists were employed more or less by the
+company in one capacity or another. Some worked on the road, some about
+the camp, a few in the gardens, and still others in the cook-house. A
+number had been employed in the survey corps almost from the time of
+their arrival, while others worked "off and on," according to their
+convenience and disposition. The work of the surveyors was hard and
+exposing, and the fare usually poor and meagre, but for all that the men
+generally liked the employment and there was a constant stream of
+applicants for vacant places. In most cases the applicant knew what was
+before him and hence could appreciate the grim humor of Chief Kelly's
+unvarying formula. After questioning the applicant to ascertain if he
+really wanted to work, the chief would say, facetiously: "All you have
+to do is to follow a painted pole and eat three meals a day." Following
+a "painted pole" through the mud, water, and underbrush of a Cuban
+jungle, especially with an axe in one's hand to wield constantly, is no
+sinecure, but the men did not have to work very hard at their meals! My
+admiration of the pluck and patience of the "boys" on the survey corps
+was unbounded, and, I believe, fully justified. At their table the chief
+had designated an official kicker, and no one else was supposed to utter
+a complaint, and it was seldom that they did. The discipline was like
+that of an army. When a man was ordered to do a thing, two courses lay
+open to him--do it or quit. Usually the orders were carried out.
+
+[Illustration: THE SURVEY CORPS. (_March 24, 1900._)]
+
+One of the most capable and industrious of the colonists was B. F.
+Seibert of Omaha, Nebraska. He was a man of taste and refinement, and at
+the same time eminently practical. He was a veteran of the Civil War and
+a prominent citizen in the Western city whence he came. He had lived at
+one time in California, and there had gained special knowledge of the
+cultivation of fruits, flowers, and ornamental shrubbery. A few days
+after his arrival in La Gloria in January, Mr. Seibert was placed in
+charge of the port, and at once set to work to bring order out of chaos.
+He took care of the large amount of baggage and freight that had been
+dumped in the mud on the shore, placing it under temporary shelter, and
+a little later constructed an ample warehouse connecting with the pier.
+He removed the bushes and debris from the beach, thoroughly drained the
+locality, leveled the ground, cleared the accumulated sea-weed from the
+sand of the shore, extended and improved the pier, and put everything in
+first-class order, until one of the roughest and most forbidding of
+spots became positively attractive. I have rarely seen so complete and
+pleasing a transformation. The Port La Gloria of to-day is a delightful
+place, neat and well kept, swept by balmy breezes from the sea, and
+commanding an entrancing view across the vari-colored waters of the
+beautiful bay to the island of Guajaba, with its picturesque mountains,
+and the other keys along the coast. There is good sea-bathing here, and
+excellent fishing not far away. A few miles down the coast the mouth of
+the Maximo river is reached, where one may shoot alligators to his
+heart's content, while along the shore of Guajaba Key the resplendent
+flamingo may be brought down by a hunter who is clever enough to get
+within range of the timid bird. Assistant Chief Engineer Neville was a
+good flamingo hunter, and we occasionally dined off the big bird at the
+officers' table.
+
+One of the hardest workers in the colony was Jason L. Ratekin, who came
+from Omaha, Nebraska. He was a man of marked individuality, and though
+not overburdened with capital, was fertile in resources and full of
+energy and determination. At first he performed arduous work for the
+company in the transportation of baggage and freight from the port with
+the bullock team, and later went into business for himself as a
+contractor for the clearing and planting of land. He was enthusiastic
+and progressive. Among all the colonists there was none more
+public-spirited, and he demonstrated his kindness of heart on many
+occasions. Once when the bullock team was bringing in a sick woman and
+several small children, and the rough and wearisome journey was
+prolonged into the darkness of the night, he distinguished himself by
+carrying the ten-months-old baby nearly all the way in his arms and by
+breaking into a consignment of condensed milk to save it from
+starvation. Ratekin was a rough-looking fellow, but a more generous and
+kindly nature is seldom met with.
+
+The first banquet in La Gloria was held on the evening of March 26, in
+honor of the fifty-second birthday of Col. Thomas H. Maginniss,
+superintendent of camp, who was about to return to his wife and eleven
+children in Philadelphia. M. T. Jones of Williamsport, Pa., was master
+of ceremonies, and the occasion was highly enjoyable. The banquet was
+served in a tent restaurant on Central avenue, and the guests numbered
+about twenty, several of whom were ladies. The table presented a very
+attractive appearance, and the menu included salads, sardines, salt
+beef, smoked herrings, fresh fish, bread, cake and _lime_-o-nade. Among
+the after-dinner speakers were Colonel Maginniss, General Van der Voort,
+S. N. Ware of Wyoming, Jesse B. Kimes, Rev. Dr. Gill, D. E. Lowell, M.
+A. C. Neff, H. O. Neville, John A. Connell, and James M. Adams. The
+banquet was voted a success by all present.
+
+On Sunday, April 1, Colonel Maginniss and about twenty of the colonists
+left La Gloria for Nuevitas preparatory to sailing for the States. This
+was the largest number of colonists that had departed at one time since
+mid-winter, and their leaving caused some depression throughout the
+colony. This was quickly over, however, and new arrivals soon made up
+for the numerical loss. The Maginniss party included M. T. Jones of
+Pennsylvania and H. E. Mosher of New York state, who had been his
+assistants in the work of the camp, and Mrs. Whittle of Albany, N. Y.,
+and Max Neuber of Philadelphia, Pa., who had been the teachers of the
+day and evening schools. Mr. Neuber and some of the others expressed the
+intention of returning to La Gloria later in the year.
+
+The departure of the score of colonists at this time was marked by a
+most melancholy incident, which was speedily followed by the first death
+in La Gloria. John F. Maxfield of Providence, R. I., a man past middle
+age, who had come to La Gloria on the first _Yarmouth_ excursion, had
+been ill for several weeks with a complication of ailments. Although he
+had the watchful care and companionship of a friend from the same city,
+Capt. Joseph Chace, he became very much depressed and sadly homesick.
+When the Maginniss party was made up to return to the States, he
+believed himself sufficiently improved to accompany it, and braced up
+wonderfully for the effort. When the day arrived, he announced his
+intention of walking to the port, and set out to do so, but was quickly
+picked up and taken down in a wagon. At the pier he was overcome by
+exhaustion, and exhibited so much weakness that it was deemed unsafe to
+place him on board of either of the small and crowded sail-boats. It was
+feared he would not survive the hardships and exposure of the journey
+to Nuevitas. The decision to leave him behind, although kindly meant,
+was a great blow to him, and was believed by some to have hastened his
+death, which took place the next morning. However this may be, it is
+improbable that he would have lived to reach his home in the States.
+Heart failure was the final cause of his death. He had good care at the
+port, but his extreme weakness could not be overcome. Mr. Maxfield was a
+quiet, unobtrusive man, and was held in high esteem throughout the
+colony. He was buried in a pleasant spot in the company's reserve, and
+his funeral was attended by almost the entire colony and some of the
+Cubans. The services were held out of doors in a beautiful glade, and
+were conducted by the Rev. Dr. Gill. It was a most impressive scene.
+This was the only death in La Gloria during the six months succeeding
+the arrival of the first colonists. This low rate of mortality was the
+more remarkable from the fact that a number of invalids came or were
+brought into the colony during the winter. One day there came in from
+the port a wagon bringing a woman who had been a paralytic for years,
+and her sick husband, who had been unable to sit up for a long time.
+They were from Kansas, and were accompanied by grown children and
+friends. The colonists expected there would very soon be two deaths in
+La Gloria, but the sick man, who was a mere skeleton, improved steadily
+and in a few weeks was able to walk about the camp, while his paralytic
+wife was no worse and was considered by the family to be slightly
+better. Considering that the invalids were living in tents without
+expert care, the man's recovery was hardly less than marvelous.
+
+On April 2, work on the corduroy road to the port, which had been
+suspended, was resumed under the capable supervision of D. E. Lowell.
+Mr. Lowell proved to be the best roadmaker who had taken a hand at the
+game up to that time, and, considering the little he had to do with,
+accomplished a great deal. His workmen were from among the colonists and
+he rarely had more than ten or twelve at a time, and usually less, but
+in five or six weeks he had done much for the betterment of the highway.
+No one realized better than Mr. Lowell that this was only a temporary
+road, but it was the best to be had at the time. Later in the year, a
+fine, permanent highway to the port was begun by Chief Engineer Kelly,
+and when completed La Gloria's great drawback will be removed. Kelly's
+is a substantial, rock-ballasted road, twelve feet wide, and graded two
+feet above high-water mark. It will make La Gloria easy of access from
+the coast.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+THE FIRST BALL IN LA GLORIA.
+
+
+Meanwhile, the sale and allotment of plantations and town lots steadily
+continued, until on April 9, six months from the day the surveyors began
+their operations, about twelve thousand or fifteen thousand acres of
+land had been allotted, besides nine hundred and thirty-three city lots.
+Many of the lots had been cleared, and parts of some of the plantations.
+Quite an amount of planting, in the aggregate, had been done.
+
+The survey corps and the colonists agreed that the semi-anniversary of
+the coming of the surveyors to La Gloria should be marked by a
+celebration, and the bold project of a grand ball was set on foot. When
+I first heard of it, I thought it was a joke, but when I saw a long list
+of committees conspicuously posted on Central avenue, and had been
+requested by "Albany" to announce the coming event at the regular
+meeting of the Pioneer Association, I realized that the talk had been
+serious and that Terpsichore had actually gained a footing in La
+Gloria. I was authorized to announce that the ball would be in charge of
+a French dancing master, which was the fact, for Floor Manager Messier
+("Albany") was a Frenchman by birth. The ball and the accompanying
+supper were free to all, but the women of the colony had been requested
+to contribute food--and most nobly they responded--while the men,
+particularly the surveyors, hustled for fruit, sugar, etc. It was a
+cheering sight when big Jack McCauley drove in from Mercedes with the
+mule team, bringing a whole barrel of oranges. These were some of the
+oranges which had been saved by Jack's "influence."
+
+It was no small task to make the necessary preparations for the ball,
+and some of the committees were kept very busy. I was on the committee
+on music, and learned to my dismay, a few hours before the ball was to
+open, that Dan Goodman, the fiddler, had been attacked by stage fright
+and had declared that if he was to be the whole orchestra he would "hang
+up the fiddle and the bow." I interviewed Dan,--who was just as good a
+fellow as his name implies,--and found that he was really suffering from
+Pennsylvania modesty. Accordingly it devolved on me to build up an
+orchestra with Dan as a nucleus. I succeeded beyond my expectations. In
+a short time I had secured the musical services of Ed. Ford, Mr. and
+Mrs. Spiker, and others. The evening came, and like Jerry Rusk, they
+"seen their duty and done it." And it may further be said that they
+"done it" very well.
+
+It was decided to hold the ball in a large canvas-covered structure
+which had formerly been used as a restaurant kitchen and store-house.
+There was only a dirt floor, and hence the matter of a temporary
+flooring became a problem. Boards were almost an unknown luxury in La
+Gloria at that time, but a few were picked up about the camp, and the
+Rev. Dr. Gill kindly loaned the flooring of his tent for the evening.
+Even then, only so much of the ballroom floor was boarded as was
+actually used for dancing. It is not too much to say that the ballroom
+was elaborately decorated. High overhead were fastened graceful and
+beautiful palm leaves, a dozen feet or more in length, and there were
+green wreathes and initial letters flecked with flowers and bright red
+berries. Men, women, and children joined efforts to make the interior of
+the tent a bower of tropical beauty. The effect was most pleasing. Such
+decorations in the Northern states would doubtless have cost a large sum
+of money. Here they cost only a little time and labor. I wish I could
+say that the ballroom was brilliantly lighted, but the gas and electric
+light plants were as yet unplanted, and we had to depend on kerosene
+lanterns suspended from the roof. However, as most of us had been using
+only candles for illumination, the lantern light seemed very good. No
+one thought of complaining that it was dark.
+
+I shall not be able to describe the Grand Ball in all its wondrous
+details, but only to make brief mention of a few of the features which
+particularly impressed me. I remember that as the people gathered
+together we had great difficulty in recognizing each other. We had
+thought we were all well acquainted, but that was before the men and
+women had gone down into the bottom of their trunks and fished out their
+good clothes. The transformation, particularly in some of the men, was
+paralyzing, and after we had identified the individuals inside of the
+clothes, many of us forgot our company manners and opened our mouths
+wide in astonishment. Men who had been accustomed to wear, seven days
+in each week, a careless outing costume, or old, cheap clothes of
+cotton or woolen material, or mayhap nothing more than shirt and
+overalls, had suddenly blossomed out in well-fitting black suits, set
+off by cuffs, high collars, and silk ties. It was a dazzling sight for
+La Gloria. The men had been very negligent of their dress; scarcely one
+had brought his valet with him to Cuba! There may even have been a few
+dress suits at the ball, and I will not make oath that some of the women
+were not in decollete gowns; to be entirely safe, however, I will not
+swear that they were. The women looked very well and so did the men; all
+were a credit to an American colony.
+
+Mr. J. A. Messier ("Albany"), the floor manager and master of
+ceremonies, was attired in neat and conventional dress, and performed
+his duties gracefully and well. The grand march was led by General Van
+der Voort and Mrs. Dan Goodman, followed by Chief Engineer Kelly with a
+daughter of Senor Rivas. I do not find among my possessions a dance
+order, and hence can give no description of it; and I apprehend that the
+others present would have no better success. But there was dancing, and
+a lot of it.
+
+[Illustration: INTERIOR GEN. VAN DER VOORT'S HOUSE. (_April, 1900._)]
+
+Furthermore, it was much enjoyed, both by the participants and the
+spectators. About the middle of the evening some specialties were
+introduced. Chief Engineer Kelly performed a clog dance successfully,
+turning a handspring at the end, and Architect Neff executed an
+eccentric French dance with a skill and activity that brought down the
+house. There was also good clog dancing by some of the younger men.
+
+The ball was attended by nearly the entire colony. This was made
+manifest when we lined up for supper, which was served across the
+street. The procession to the tables numbered one hundred and forty
+persons by actual count. The tables were set under shelter tents, and
+were beautifully decorated and loaded with food. There were meats, fish,
+salads, puddings, cakes, and a wonderful variety of pies, in which the
+guava was conspicuous. Coffee and fruits were also much in evidence.
+Never before had La Gloria seen such a spread. On this occasion the
+women of the colony achieved a well-merited reputation for culinary
+skill and resourcefulness. Except for a few enthusiasts, who went back
+to the ballroom for more dancing, the supper wound up the evening's
+festivities. The semi-anniversary had been properly celebrated, and the
+first ball in La Gloria had proved successful beyond anticipation. April
+9, 1900, may be set down as a red letter day in the history of the
+colony.
+
+Speaking of the ball and its orchestra calls to mind the music in the
+camp in the early days of the colony. There was not much. Occasionally a
+violin was heard; and more often, perhaps, a guitar or mandolin. But the
+most persistent musician was a cornet player, who for a time was heard
+regularly every night from one end of the camp. His wind was good, but
+his repertoire small. He knew "Home, Sweet Home" from attic to cellar,
+and his chief object in life seemed to be to make others as familiar
+with it as himself. He played little else, and the melting notes of John
+Howard Payne's masterpiece floated through the quiet camp hour after
+hour, night after night. Finally, the colonists visited him and told him
+gently but firmly that he must stop playing that piece so much; it was
+making them all homesick. Not long after the cornet player disappeared.
+I think there was no foul play. Probably he had simply betaken himself
+to home, sweet home.
+
+There were many good singers in camp. Some of them met regularly once or
+twice a week and sang gospel hymns. These formed the choir at the Sunday
+services. There was another group of vocalists, equally excellent in its
+way, which confined itself to rendering popular songs. Some of the
+latter, who dwelt and had their "sings" near my tent, would have done
+credit to the vaudeville stage. They were known as the "Kansas crowd."
+It gave me, a native of the Granite state, great satisfaction to hear
+these Kansas people singing with spirit and good expression "My Old New
+Hampshire Home." I was pleased to regard it as a Western tribute to New
+Hampshire as the place of the ideal home.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+A WALKING TRIP TO PUERTO PRINCIPE.
+
+
+It was on the day after the Grand Ball, Tuesday, April 10, that a party
+of us started on a walking trip to the city of Puerto Principe,
+forty-five miles away. My companions, who, like myself, were all
+colonists, were Jeff D. Franklin of Florida, David Murphy of New Jersey,
+A. H. Carpenter of Massachusetts, and a Mr. Crosby of Tennessee. Mr.
+Crosby was a man of middle age; the rest of us were younger, Carpenter
+being a mere youth of perhaps eighteen. All were good walkers. The start
+was made at about 8:30 in the morning. The day was pleasant and balmy,
+but not excessively warm. The trail was now in good condition, and the
+walking would have been altogether agreeable had it not been for the
+packs upon our shoulders. We carried hammocks, blankets, and such food
+as bread, crackers, sardines, bacon, and coffee. One of the party had a
+frying-pan slung across his back. Our loads were not actually heavy,
+but they seemed so after we had walked a few miles.
+
+Our course lay to the southwest, through the deserted plantation of
+Mercedes, where we stopped an hour to eat oranges and chat with the
+colonists at work there. Resuming our march, we soon passed an inhabited
+Cuban shack near an abandoned sugar mill, stopping a few minutes to
+investigate a small banana patch near the road. We had been here before
+and knew the owner. A mile further on we reached another occupied shack,
+and called to get a drink of agua (water). We were hospitably received
+in the open front of the casa (house) and given heavy, straight-backed,
+leather-bottomed chairs of an antique pattern. The agua furnished was
+rain water which had been stored in a cistern, and had at least the
+virtue of being wet. There were at home an old man, a very fleshy
+elderly woman, and two rather good-looking girls, the appearance and
+dress of one of whom indicated that she was a visitor. This was about
+the only shack we saw where there were no young children in evidence. We
+tarried but a few minutes. After making inquiries about the road, as we
+did at almost every house, we continued on our way.
+
+For the next three or four miles we had a good hard trail through the
+woods, but saw neither habitation nor opening. Shortly after noon we
+emerged from the woods into an open space, where, on slightly elevated
+ground, stood two shacks. We had been here before and knew the man who
+occupied one of them. There was no land under cultivation in sight, and
+the only fruit a custard apple tree and a few mangoes. There were a good
+many pigs roaming about, and the shack we entered contained several
+small children. Our Cuban friend seemed glad to see us; his wife brought
+us water to drink, and we were invited to sit down. Our social call
+would have been more satisfactory if we had known more Spanish, or our
+host had spoken English. We made but a brief stay, and on departing
+asked the Cuban to point out to us the road to Puerto Principe. Since
+leaving the woods we had seen no road or trail of any sort. He took us
+around his house and accompanied us for some distance, finally pointing
+out an indistinct trail across high savanna land which he said was the
+right one. This path, which could hardly be seen, was the "road" from
+the coast to the third largest city in Cuba, only about thirty miles
+away! Such are Cuban roads. At times you can only guess whether you are
+in a road or out of it.
+
+What lay before us was now entirely unfamiliar. At about one o'clock we
+halted by the side of the trail for a midday rest and lunch. We were a
+dozen miles from La Gloria, and about an equal distance from the Cubitas
+mountains, through which we were to pass. An hour later we took up the
+march again. We soon entered the woods and found a smooth, firm trail
+over the red earth. We passed through miles of timber, of a fine,
+straight growth. In the thick woods but few royal palms were seen, but
+in the more open country we saw some magnificent groves of them. During
+the afternoon we passed only two or three shacks, but as we approached
+the Cubitas mountains the few habitations and their surroundings
+improved in character. The houses continued to be palm-thatched, but
+they were more commodious and surrounded by gardens in which were a few
+orange and banana trees, and other fruits and vegetables. Some of the
+places were quite pretty. Occasionally we would see cleared land that
+had once been cultivated, but no growing crops of any amount. This part
+of the country had been agriculturally dead since the Ten Years' War.
+How the natives live, I know not, but it is safe to say that they do not
+live well. They raise boniatos and cassava, a little fruit, and keep a
+few pigs. Often their chief supply of meat is derived from the wild hogs
+which they shoot. And yet these Cubans were living on some of the best
+land in the world.
+
+Late in the afternoon, after walking for a mile or more along a good
+road bordered by the ornamental but worthless jack-pineapple plant, we
+came to a wide gateway opening into an avenue lined with cocoanut palms
+and leading up to a couple of well-made Cuban shacks. The houses stood
+at the front of quite a large garden of fruit trees. We called at one of
+the shacks, which proved to be well populated. An elderly man, large for
+a Cuban and well-built, came forward to greet us and was inclined to be
+sociable. His shirt appeared to be in the wash, but this fact did not
+seem to embarrass him any; he still had his trousers. Of a younger man
+we bought a few pounds of boniatos (sweet potatoes) and after some
+urging persuaded him to go out and get some green cocoanuts for us from
+the trees. He sent his little boy of about twelve years of age up the
+tree to hack off a bunch of the nuts with his machete. We drank the
+copious supply of milk with great satisfaction; there is no more
+refreshing drink in all Cuba. As the boy had done all the work, we
+designedly withheld our silver until he had come down the tree and we
+could place it in his hands. We wondered if he would be allowed to keep
+it. Climbing the smooth trunk of a cocoanut tree is no easy task.
+
+We camped that night among the trees by the side of the road a quarter
+of a mile further on. We had made twenty miles for the day, and were now
+on high ground near the base of the Cubitas mountains. The rise had been
+so very gradual that we had not noticed that we were ascending. The
+trunks of all the trees around us were stained for a short distance from
+the ground with the red of the soil, caused, as we believed, by the wild
+hogs rubbing up against them. Our supper of fried boniatos and bacon was
+skilfully cooked by Jeff Franklin, who used the hollow trunk of a royal
+palm, which had fallen and been split, for an oven. For drink we had
+cocoanut milk. By the vigorous use of Dave Murphy's machete we cleared
+away the underbrush so that we could swing our hammocks among the small
+trees. Franklin had no hammock, but slept under a blanket on a rubber
+coat spread on the ground. The night was comfortably warm and
+brilliantly clear. It was delightful to lie in our hammocks and gaze up
+through the trees at the beautiful star-lit sky. There were mosquitoes,
+of course, but they did not trouble us much, and we all slept well.
+
+We were up early the next morning, a perfect day, and after eating a
+substantial breakfast proceeded on our journey. We felt little
+exhaustion from the long walk of the preceding day, but I was a sad
+cripple from sore feet. I had on a pair of Cuban shoes which were a
+little too short for me (although they were No. 40) and my toes were
+fearfully blistered and bruised. There was nothing to do, however, but
+go forward as best I could, so I limped painfully along behind my
+companions, keenly conscious that Josh Billings was a true philosopher
+when he said that "tite boots" made a man forget all his other troubles.
+
+A fraction of a mile beyond our camping place we discovered a well-kept
+shack ensconced in cosy grounds amid palms, fruit trees, and flowering
+shrubs. It was one of the prettiest scenes we saw. We called for water,
+politely greeted the woman who served us with our best pronunciation of
+"buenos dias," and, murmuring our "gracias," went our way with some
+regrets at leaving so pleasant a spot. A mile or two further on we came
+to a distinct fork in the road. One way lay nearly straight ahead, the
+other bore off to the right. While we were debating which trail to take,
+a horseman fortunately came along, the first person we had seen on the
+road that day and the second since leaving Mercedes on the preceding
+forenoon. He told us to go to the right, and we were soon in the
+foothills of the mountains.
+
+It was here that we found a deserted shack behind which was a cleared
+space in the woods of several acres. On this little plantation grew
+bananas, cocoanuts, cassava, boniatos, and other vegetables. As it was
+in the Cubitas mountains near this spot that the Cuban insurrectionists
+had what they called their independent civil government for some time
+prior to the intervention of the United States, and secreted their
+cattle and raised fruit and vegetables to supply food for the "Army of
+Liberation," we guessed that this might be one of the places then put
+under cultivation. It certainly had had very little recent care.
+
+After journeying past some chalk-white cliffs, which we examined with
+interest, we entered the mountain pass which we supposed would take us
+through the town or village of Cubitas, the one-time Cuban capital. The
+way was somewhat rough and rugged, but not very steep. The mountains
+were covered with trees and we had no extended view in any direction.
+All at once, at about 10:30 a.m., we suddenly and unexpectedly emerged
+from the pass, when the shut-in forest view changed to a broad and
+sweeping prospect into the interior of Cuba. What we looked down upon
+was an immense savanna, stretching twenty miles to the front, and
+perhaps more on either hand, broken in the distance on all sides by
+hills and lofty mountains. It was a beautiful sight, particularly for us
+who had been shut in by the forest most of the time for months. The
+savanna was dry, but in places showed bright green stretches that were
+restful to the eye. It was dotted with thousands of small palm trees,
+which were highly ornamental. We could not see Puerto Principe, nor did
+we catch sight of it until within three miles of the city. There was no
+town or village in sight, and not even a shack, occupied or unoccupied.
+The view embraced one vast plain, formerly used for grazing purposes,
+but now wholly neglected and deserted. We did not then know that we were
+to walk seventeen miles across this savanna before seeing a single
+habitation of any sort.
+
+We had seen nothing of the village of Cubitas, and concluded that we had
+taken the wrong pass. We were afterwards told that Cubitas consisted of
+a single shack which had been used as a canteen. Whether the Cuban
+government occupied this canteen, or one of the caves which are said to
+exist in these mountains, I cannot say. The revolutionary government,
+being always a movable affair, was never easy to locate. It was,
+however, secure from harm in these mountains. We noticed later that the
+natives seemed to regard all the scattered houses within a radius of
+half a dozen miles from this part of the mountains as forming Cubitas.
+The post-office must have been up a tree.
+
+After a brief rest on the south slope of the mountains, we resumed our
+march, a wearisome one for all of us and exceedingly painful to me with
+my disabled feet. They seemed even sorer after a halt. My ankles were
+now very lame from unnaturally favoring my pinched toes. The midday sun
+was hot, and we suffered a good deal from thirst. There were no longer
+any houses where we could procure water. We had not seen a stream of any
+sort in the last twenty miles. I staggered along as best I could, a
+straggler behind my companions. A little after noon we came suddenly
+upon two or three little water holes directly in our path. It seemed
+like an oasis in the desert. We could not see where the water came from
+nor where it went, but it was clear and good, and we were duly thankful.
+We ate dinner here under a small palm tree, and enjoyed a siesta for an
+hour.
+
+In the afternoon we met only one person, a Cuban produce pedler on
+horseback. He treated those who cared for liquor out of a big black
+bottle. That afternoon's tramp will linger long in our memories. I
+thought we should never get across that seemingly endless savanna. At
+last, when it was near six o'clock, we reached an old deserted open
+shack which stood on the plain not far from the trail. Here we spent the
+night, cooking our supper and procuring in a near-by well tolerably
+good water, notwithstanding the dirty scum on top of it. We were within
+four miles of Puerto Principe, and my ears were delighted that evening
+with a sound which I had not heard in more than three months--the
+whistle of a locomotive. Our night was somewhat disturbed by rats,
+fleas, and mosquitoes, but we were too tired not to sleep a good part of
+it. The breeze across the savanna was gentle and soothing.
+
+The next morning we walked into the time-scarred city of Puerto
+Principe--that is, the others walked and I hobbled. If possible, my feet
+were worse than ever. In the outskirts, our party divided, Franklin,
+Murphy, and Carpenter branching off to the left to go to the camp of the
+Eighth U. S. Cavalry two miles east of the city near the railroad track,
+and Crosby and I going directly into the heart of the town in search of
+a hotel. We had a long walk through the narrow and roughly paved streets
+before we found one. There is no denying that we were a tough-looking
+pair of tramps. We were unshaven and none too clean. Our clothes were
+worn and frayed, and soiled with mud and dust. We were bent with the
+packs upon our shoulders, and walked with very pronounced limps.
+Everywhere we were recognized as "Americanos," although it seemed to me
+we looked more like Italian organ-grinders. To the day of my death I
+shall never cease to be grateful to the people of Puerto Principe for
+the admirable courtesy and good manners exhibited to us. They did not
+stone nor jeer us; they did not even openly stare at the odd spectacle
+we presented. Even the children did not laugh at us, and the dogs kindly
+refrained from barking at our heels. At all times during our stay of
+several days we were treated with perfect courtesy and a respectful
+consideration which our personal appearance scarcely warranted and
+certainly did not invite. The Spaniards and Cubans seem to associate
+even the roughest dressed American with money and good-nature. The
+humbler children would gather about us, pleading, "Americano, gimme a
+centavo!" while little tots of four years would say in good English and
+the sweetest of voices, "Good-by, my frien'!" It was the soldiers who
+had taught them this. Their parents rarely spoke any English whatever.
+
+We stayed at the Gran Hotel, said by some to be the best in the city.
+It was none too good, but not bad as Cuban hotels run. The terms were
+moderate, $1.50 per day, for two meals and lodging. A third meal could
+not be obtained for love nor money. I bought mine at street stands or in
+a cafe. Not a word of English was spoken at this hotel.
+
+I cannot describe Puerto Principe at any length. It is an old Spanish
+city in architecture and customs, and might well have been transplanted
+from mediaeval Spain. As a matter of fact, it was moved here centuries
+ago from the north coast of Cuba, near the present site of Nuevitas, the
+change being made to escape the incursions of pirates. It has a
+population of about forty-seven thousand, and is the third largest city
+in Cuba, and the most populous inland town. Many of the residents are
+wealthy and aristocratic, and the people, generally speaking, are
+fine-looking and very well dressed. I several times visited the chief
+plaza, which had lately taken the new name of Agramonte, and watched
+with interest the handsome men and beautiful senoritas who promenaded
+there. I was told that late in the afternoon and early in the evening
+the young people of the best families in the city walked in the plaza.
+They were certainly elegantly dressed and most decorous in behavior. The
+plaza was very pretty, with its royal palms and ornamental flower beds.
+It was flanked by one of the several ancient Catholic churches in the
+city. While in Puerto Principe I was in receipt of unexpected courtesies
+from Mr. C. Hugo Drake, the American lawyer alluded to in an earlier
+chapter of this book.
+
+[Illustration: AGRAMONTE PLAZA, PUERTO PRINCIPE, CUBA.
+
+_Photograph by V. K. Van de Venter, Jan. 28, 1900._]
+
+After spending four delightful days in Puerto Principe, I took the train
+to Las Minas, twenty miles to the eastward. There I joined my
+companions, who had preceded me by twenty-four hours. Here we boarded
+the private cane train of Bernabe Sanchez and rode to Senor Sanchez'
+great sugar mill at Senado, six miles away. Senor Sanchez has a pleasant
+residence here, surrounded by fruit trees and shrubs. We saw ripe
+strawberries growing in his garden. Scores of Cuban shacks in the
+vicinity house his workmen and their families. We went all over his
+immense, well-appointed sugar mill, then in operation, and in the early
+afternoon rode on the flat cars of the cane train through his extensive
+plantation for nine miles, the land on either side of the track for all
+this distance being utilized for the growing of sugar cane.
+
+The end of the track left us about eighteen miles from La Gloria. We set
+out to walk home, but late in the afternoon the party accidentally
+divided and both divisions got lost. Murphy and I spent an uncomfortable
+night in the thick, damp woods, and taking up the tramp early the next
+morning, found ourselves, two or three hours later, at the exact point
+near the end of Sanchez' plantation where we had begun our walk the
+afternoon before. We had walked about fifteen miles and got back to our
+starting point without realizing that we had deviated from the main
+trail. Stranger yet, the other division of the party had done exactly
+the same thing, but had reached this spot late the night before and was
+now half way to La Gloria.
+
+Murphy and I made a new start, and after getting off the track once or
+twice, finally reached the Maximo river, crossed it on a tree, and got
+into La Gloria at 5:30 that afternoon, nearly worn out and looking like
+wild men. I had had nothing to eat for forty-eight hours save two
+cookies, one cracker, and half a sweet potato.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+IN AND AROUND LA GLORIA.
+
+
+A very good Book that I wot of contains an Apocrypha. This will have no
+Apocrypha, but I will here relate an incident which did not come under
+my personal observation, but which was told of by my ordinarily
+veracious friend, Colonel Maginniss. At one time during the winter,
+Colonel Maginniss and his assistants had for three days, been searching
+for a company horse that was lost, when a man named Ramsden came to the
+colonel's tent and reported that there was a horse hanging in the woods
+not far away. The colonel and Mr. Jones went to the spot and found a
+large white horse, that had weighed twelve hundred pounds, dead in the
+thicket, hanging by the neck. No formal inquest was held, but it was the
+colonel's theory that this American-born horse could not live on Cuban
+grass, and had deliberately hanged himself. A somewhat similar case I
+was personally cognizant of. A sick horse was reported drowning in a
+shallow pond near the camp. Colonel Maginniss went to the scene on a
+Cuban pony, with a dozen colonists, and after a hard struggle the horse
+was dragged one hundred yards away from the mud and water, and left on
+dry land. Early the next morning it was discovered that the horse had
+worked his way back into the pond and drowned himself. Was this a case
+of animal suicide? It may be said that none of the colonists ever
+resorted to this desperate expedient, even when the sugar gave out.
+
+Colonel Maginniss was "a master hand in sickness." An English woman who
+came to the colony was very ill, and blood poisoning set in. The
+colonel's experience as a family man was now of service. He had the
+woman removed to a large tent, attended her personally and looked after
+the children, calling four or five times daily, and administering such
+remedies as he had. The woman recovered, and gratefully expressed the
+belief that the colonel had saved her life.
+
+Near the end of April there was a sudden and surprising rise of water
+along Central avenue between La Gloria and the port. One afternoon Mr.
+Lowell and his men at work upon the road noticed that the water was
+rising in the creeks and ditches along the way. This was a surprising
+discovery, inasmuch as there had been no rain of any account. The water
+continued to rise rapidly, and when the men left off work late in the
+afternoon it was several feet higher than it had been at noon. It came
+up steadily through the night, so that pedestrians to the port the next
+morning found the water even with the new road all along and over it
+where the creeks came in. Further down toward the port, the savanna was
+flooded in places to a depth of one or two feet. Among the pedestrians
+that morning were several colonists who were on their way home to the
+States, and who, singularly enough, were obliged to walk out of La
+Gloria through mud and water very much as they had walked in several
+months before, although between the two periods there had been for a
+long time a good dry road.
+
+It was that morning that we, in the camp, heard a peculiar rushing sound
+which we at first mistook for water sweeping through the woods. On going
+down the road to investigate, however, we found that the noise was the
+deafening chorus of millions of little frogs--some contended that they
+were tree toads--which had come in with the flood or with the rain
+which fell in the night. Never before had I seen such a sight. The frogs
+were everywhere, on logs, stumps, in the water, and along the road; bits
+of earth jutting out of the water would be covered with them. They were
+all of one color--as yellow as sulphur--and appeared to be very unhappy.
+I saw large stumps so covered with these frogs, or toads, as to become
+pyramids of yellow. Whether frogs or toads, they seemed averse to
+getting wet and were all seeking dry places. I saw a snake about two
+feet long, who had filled himself up with them from head to tail,
+floating lazily on the surface of the water. No less than five of the
+yellowbacks had climbed up on his head and neck, and he had only energy
+enough left to clasp his jaws loosely upon one of them and then let go.
+The snake seemed nearly dead from over-eating. The frogs disappeared in
+a day or two as suddenly as they had come.
+
+At the time of this small-sized flood, a party of surveyors were camped
+upon the savanna near Central avenue and about a mile from the port.
+Their camp was high enough to escape the water, but they were pretty
+well surrounded by it. One of the men, finding deep water running in the
+road, went a-fishing there and boasted that he had caught fish in
+Central avenue! The water soon subsided, and the generally accepted
+explanation of the sudden flood was that it had been caused by the
+overflow of the Maximo, and that there had been heavy rains, or a
+cloudburst, twelve or fifteen miles away.
+
+April was a warm month, but by no means an uncomfortable one. The lowest
+temperature recorded was 67 deg.; the highest, 94 deg.. The weather was
+delightful; the breezes were fresh and fragrant; flowers were blossoming
+everywhere; and the honey bees of this incomparable bee country were
+happy and industrious. So, too, were the colonists. The work of the
+latter was well advanced by the first of May, or, at least, that of some
+of them. As an example of industry, D. Siefert is worthy of mention. Mr.
+Siefert hailed from British Columbia and came to La Gloria on the first
+_Yarmouth_. On the voyage down he was somewhat disturbed over the
+question of getting his deed, but once in La Gloria, he put his
+apprehensions behind him, secured his allotment of a five-acre
+plantation, indulged in no more vain questionings and waited for no
+further developments, but each morning shouldered his axe and attacked
+the trees on his land. He kept up the battle for months, rarely
+missing a day's work. The result was that by May 1, Mr. Siefert, alone
+and unaided, had cleared his five acres of timber land, burned it over,
+and was ready for planting. Other colonists worked hard and effectually
+in the forest, but this was the best single-handed performance that came
+under my notice.
+
+[Illustration: DR. PEIRCE'S PINEAPPLE PATCH.]
+
+Another enterprising and highly intelligent colonist was Max Neuber of
+Philadelphia, who has been before alluded to as one of the teachers in
+the evening school. Mr. Neuber pushed the work upon his land, doing much
+of it himself. Early and late his friends would find him chopping,
+digging, and planting. When he left for the States in April he had five
+boxes packed with the products of his plantation, such as lemons, limes,
+potatoes, and specimens of mahogany and other valuable woods.
+
+A group of industrious workers, most of whom had earlier been attached
+to the survey corps, were in May located and well settled in a place
+which they called Mountain View. This was a partially open tract four or
+five miles west of La Gloria and about a mile from Mercedes. Here the
+young men pitched their tents and swung their hammocks, confidently
+claiming that they had the best spot in all the country round. From here
+the Cubitas mountains could be plainly seen; hence the name of Mountain
+View. A person following the rough trail from La Gloria to Mercedes
+might have seen on a tree at the left, shortly before reaching the
+latter place, a shingle bearing the inscription, "Change Cars for
+Mountain View." If he should choose to take the narrow, rough, and
+crooked trail to the left through the woods, he would ere long come out
+into the open and probably see Smith Everett, formerly of Lenawee
+county, Michigan, lying-in his hammock watching his banana trees grow.
+
+I have before mentioned the irregularity and infrequency of the mails.
+The remedy was slow in coming. The chief cause of the irregularity was
+The Sangjai, which, though designed to be an aid to navigation, was
+often a great hindrance to it. The Sangjai was a very narrow and very
+shallow channel, partly natural and partly artificial, through what had
+once been the Sabinal peninsula. The artificial and difficult part of
+the channel known as The Sangjai was about half way between La Gloria
+and Nuevitas. It had to be used in following the short or "inside"
+water course. This was the route over which went our mail in a small
+sailboat. The Sangjai at one point was so shallow that it contained only
+a few inches of water at low tide and less than two feet when the tide
+was high. It was a hard place to get through at best, and many a
+passenger on craft which went this way had to get out and walk, and help
+push the boat besides! Boats always had to be pushed or poled through
+The Sangjai. If the winds permitted the sailboat to reach this
+aggravating channel at the right time, there was no great delay; but
+otherwise, the boat would be held up for ten or twelve hours. This was
+altogether unpleasant, especially as the mosquitoes and jejines claimed
+The Sangjai (pronounced Sanghi, or corruptly, Shanghi) for their own.
+The mail, like everything else, had to await the will of the waters, or,
+perhaps I should say, the convenience of the moon. The Sangjai played a
+very important part in the early history of La Gloria.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE COLONY AT THE END OF THE FIRST YEAR.
+
+
+My pen must glide rapidly over the events of the summer and early fall.
+The sawmill, which had been so long delayed and so often promised as to
+become a standing joke in the colony, finally reached La Gloria from
+Nuevitas, via the port, on May 30. Nothing was more needed; its
+non-arrival had delayed both building operations and the clearing of
+land. A few weeks later the mill was in operation, to the great joy of
+the colonists. In June the construction of a pole tramway from La Gloria
+to a point on the bay between the port and the Palota landing was begun.
+This was completed on August 14, and transportation operations were at
+once inaugurated. The new landing place was named Newport. On July 16
+the building of a substantial and permanent highway from La Gloria to
+the port was commenced under the supervision of Chief Engineer Kelly,
+and before October 1 the work was well advanced. The chosen route was
+along Central avenue.
+
+The colonists celebrated the Fourth of July with an appropriate
+entertainment. On July 3 the colony witnessed a tragedy in the killing
+of a youth named Eugene Head by a stone thrown by a young Spanish boy.
+The coroner's jury decided that young Head's death was accidental. Both
+boys were residents of La Gloria. The fifth of July was marked by the
+death of a valued colonist, Mr. F. H. Bosworth, a veteran of the Civil
+War. Mr. Bosworth was seventy-one years old, and had not been in rugged
+health for a long time. He was an enterprising colonist, and performed a
+great deal of work for a man of his years and enfeebled physical
+condition. His wife, also a resident of La Gloria, survived him. The
+general health of the colony through the summer was excellent. There was
+but little rain, and the weather was delightful beyond all expectation.
+The temperature ordinarily ranged from about 78 deg. to 90 deg., and never
+exceeded 94 deg.. The colonists came to believe that the summer season was
+even more agreeable than the winter. It was heartily voted that Cuba was
+a good all-the-year-round country.
+
+[Illustration: SCENE ON LAGUNA GRANDE.]
+
+The end of the first year of the colony--reckoning from October 9, 1899,
+when the surveyors began operations--saw much progress toward
+extensive colonization, not in La Gloria alone, but also in the
+surrounding country. The Cuban Colonization Company, organized with Dr.
+W. P. Peirce of Hoopeston, Ill., as president and treasurer, and W. G.
+Spiker of Cleveland, Ohio, as vice-president and general manager, had
+acquired two excellent tracts of land, known as Laguna Grande and Rincon
+Grande, to the eastward of the La Gloria property. These are being
+subdivided and sold to colonists in small holdings. In the Rincon Grande
+tract, on the bay front, the city of Columbia is being laid out, and
+doubtless will soon be settled by thrifty and progressive colonists from
+the United States. It is claimed that this is the exact spot where
+Columbus landed in 1492, and it certainly does answer well the
+historical description. Other colonists had purchased the Canasi tract,
+southwest of La Gloria and adjoining the Caridad property, and Hon.
+Peter E. Park was said to have secured an option on the Palota tract. It
+is understood that these two tracts are to be divided up and sold to
+colonists. The Caridad tract, adjoining La Gloria on the south, had
+passed into the hands of Mr. O. N. Lumbert of New York, and still other
+tracts in the neighborhood were being negotiated for by Americans.
+Judging from the progress of this first year in colonization, there will
+soon be more Americans in this region than Cubans.
+
+The nearest Cuban village to La Gloria is Guanaja (pronounced Wan-ah-ha)
+twelve miles to the northwest, and six or seven miles from Mercedes.
+Before the Ten Years' War Guanaja was a port of some importance, and the
+village is said to have embraced one hundred and eighty houses. But the
+town and surrounding country suffered severely in the long war, and
+somewhat in the later conflict. Now Guanaja consists of one rude wooden
+building, used as a store, and a dozen shacks stretched along the bay
+front close to the water, with a few scattered palm houses further back
+from the shore. The situation is rather picturesque, commanding a
+beautiful view across the brilliant-hued water to Cayo Romano, and the
+surrounding country is pleasant and might be made highly productive. The
+La Gloria colonists sometimes patronized the Guanaja store, and found
+the proprietor accommodating and reasonable in his prices. In the
+country between La Gloria and Guanaja we would often meet members of
+the Rural Guard, in groups of two or three. They were fine-looking
+mounted Cubans, selected by the American military government from among
+the best of the late followers of Gomez, Garcia, and Maceo to patrol the
+country and preserve the peace. They frequently visited us at La Gloria,
+and made a favorable impression.
+
+The La Gloria colony at the close of its first year had several newly
+formed organizations in a flourishing condition. Prominent among these
+was the La Gloria Colony Transportation Company, which owned and
+operated the pole tramway to the bay. Its officers were: J. C. Kelly,
+president; D. E. Lowell, first vice-president and general manager; W. A.
+Merrow, second vice-president; M. A. Custer Neff, chief engineer; R. G.
+Earner, secretary; William I. Gill, treasurer; H. W. O. Margary,
+counsel; and John Latham, E. F. Rutherford, D. W. Clifton, R. H. Ford,
+W. M. Carson, J. A. Messier, directors. The La Gloria Colony Telephone
+Company, organized to construct and operate a telephone line to the bay,
+was officered as follows: J. C. Kelly, president; F. E. Kezar,
+vice-president and general manager; J. R. P. de les Derniers,
+secretary; S. M. Van der Voort, chief engineer and director; J. A.
+Connell, director. The La Gloria Colony Cemetery Association had the
+following officers: J. C. Kelly, M. A. C. Neff, D. E. Lowell, trustees;
+J. C. Kelly, president; H. W. O. Margary, vice-president; E. L. Ellis,
+treasurer; A. B. Chambers, secretary; Rev. W. A. Nicholas, general
+manager; F. E. Kezar, J. C. Francis, S. L. Benham, Mrs. W. A. Nicholas,
+Mrs. John Lind, directors. The Cuban Land and Steamship Company donated
+ten acres of land for a cemetery. The La Gloria Horticultural Society
+had about thirty members, with officers as follows: H. W. O. Margary,
+president; A. W. Provo, vice-president; R. G. Barner, secretary; Smith
+Everett, treasurer. The La Prima Literary Society also had something
+like thirty members, and these officers: H. W. O. Margary, chairman; A.
+W. Provo, vice-chairman; R. H. Ford, secretary; Smith Everett,
+treasurer. The two last named societies jointly purchased a town lot,
+and propose to erect at some future time a building for a hall,
+reading-room, etc.
+
+The colony's first anniversary found improvements marching steadily, if
+not rapidly, on. The sawmill, already alluded to, was busily at work;
+Olson's shingle mill was completed; the two-story frame building on
+Central avenue to be used as post-office; dwelling, etc., was done, as
+were numerous other wooden houses occupied as stores or residences;
+there were half a dozen well-stocked stores doing business, and several
+restaurants and bakeries. Many buildings were in process of
+construction, and much clearing and planting going on. Choice fruit
+trees were being imported, as well as cattle, mules, swine, and poultry.
+The colonists were subsisting in part upon vegetables and pineapples of
+their own raising, and looking confidently forward to exporting products
+of this character in the near future.
+
+Fruit growing was the most popular industry among the colonists, but
+there were those who were looking into the subjects of sugar, coffee,
+tobacco, cacao, rubber, lumber, cattle raising, etc. The outlook for all
+such enterprises seemed highly promising. Urgent needs of La Gloria are
+a canning factory and an establishment for the manufacture of furniture;
+these industries should flourish from the start.
+
+The enthusiasm of the colonists was unbounded; they were filled and
+thrilled with delight over their new home in the tropics. The climate
+was glorious, the air refreshing and soothing, the country picturesque
+and healthful, the soil fertile and productive. Not for a moment did
+they doubt that, after a few short years of slight hardship and trifling
+deprivations, a life of luxurious comfort lay before them. A fortune or
+a competence seemed certain to come to every man who would work and wait
+for it, and in all La Gloria there was hardly a person to be found who
+would willingly blot from his memory his interesting experiences while
+PIONEERING IN CUBA.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+Fortunes in Cuba
+
+     A SHORT ROAD TO A COMPETENCY AND A LIFE AMID TROPICAL DELIGHTS FOR
+     THOSE WHO ARE AWAKE TO THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The Cuban Colonization Company
+
+Owns and holds deeds for two large tracts of the best land in Cuba,
+situated on the north coast in the Province of Puerto Principe, the most
+fertile and healthful portion of the island. This region is being
+rapidly colonized by enterprising Americans, who own and are developing
+thousands of plantations in the immediate vicinity of our holdings. We
+are selling this valuable land in small tracts, from five to forty acres
+each, at a low price, payable in monthly installments. It has been
+practically demonstrated that this soil will produce abundantly all
+kinds of tropical fruits, sugar cane, coffee, tobacco, cocoanuts, etc.
+
+The purchaser of land from us will have no taxes to pay for the first
+three years, and can have a warranty deed as soon as his land is paid
+for.
+
+A discount of 10 pet cent. allowed from regular prices when full payment
+is made at time oL purchase.
+
+An Insurance Policy.
+
+In case of the death of any purchaser we will issue a warranty deed to
+his or her estate without further payment.
+
+REMEMBER--That a 10-acre Orange Grove in Cuba, four years old, is worth
+ten thousand dollars, and will net you from three to six thousand
+dollars annually.
+
+REMEMBER--That in Cuba you can have fruits ripening every month in the
+year.
+
+REMEMBER--That what you would pay for winter clothing and fuel to keep
+you warm in the United States will keep up a home in Cuba, where the
+winter months are perpetual June.
+
+REMEMBER--That in our location are combined a delightful and healthful
+climate, pure and abundant water, and a rich and productive soil.
+
+Send for illustrated booklet and leaflets, giving information concerning
+prices, etc.
+
+CUBAN COLONIZATION COMPANY.
+
+               MAIN OFFICE,
+
+ROOM 367, ARCADE,         CLEVELAND, OHIO
+
+   BRANCH OFFICE. -- -- HOOPESTON, ILL.
+
+OFFICERS
+
+    DR. W. P. PEIRCE, President and Treasurer.
+         W. G. SPIKER, Vice-President and General Manager.
+               G. W. HANCHETT, Assistant Manager.
+                    W. P. PEIRCE, JR., Secretary.
+                           JAMES PEIRCE, Assistant Secretary.
+
+
+Pioneering in Cuba.
+
+A NARRATIVE OF THE SETTLEMENT OF LA GLORIA, THE FIRST AMERICAN COLONY IN
+CUBA, AND THE EARLY EXPERIENCES OF THE PIONEERS.
+
+By JAMES M. ADAMS,
+
+One of the Original Colonists.
+
+In one volume, 16mo., Illustrated with scenes in La Gloria.
+
+PRICE: Bound in Cloth, $1.00; Bound in Paper, 50 Cents.
+
+The book will be sent postpaid on receipt of price by the author, at
+North Weare, N. H., or by the Rumford Printing Co., Concord, N. H.
+
+AGENTS WANTED.
+
+Address the author.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Pioneering in Cuba, by John M. Adams
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