There have been no end of difficulties about the dock. When it was finished it was so big and heavy that it was very doubtful if any ship could safely tow it across the Atlantic. The shipbuilders added a false bow and stem to the dock, to make it cut its way through the water a little, and in this fashion it is now being brought to Cuba; but the gravest doubts are entertained as to the possibility of its ever reaching its destination. It is feared that in case of a severe storm the hawser, or strong rope by which it is towed, will part, and the costly floating dock be left drifting about the ocean, a danger to mariners.
But this is not the half of the trouble over the dock.
The greatest annoyance in regard to it is that it was built without properly considering the amount of water it would draw; that is to say, the depth of water necessary to float it.
Now that the dock is on its way to Cuba, it is found that it draws too much water for the bay of Havana, and cannot be brought in and used there.
When this unpleasant news was communicated to General Weyler, he cabled to his agent in New York, asking him to send a dredging-machine over to Havana immediately. To the General's mind the whole affair was simple enough: he would get a dredging-machine, scoop out a channel, and have the dock in place in no time.
He was therefore much angered to receive a reply that there were several kinds of dredging-machines, and that to send him a machine that would do the work properly it would be necessary to know the nature of the soil of the bottom of the bay.
Now no one has ever dredged Havana Bay since the city was first founded in the sixteenth century, and there are no means at hand of obtaining the desired information. There will therefore be some delay before the required investigation can be made.
Added to this, the New York firm sent him word that a special machine will have to be constructed to dredge to the depth required by the floating-dock, that it will take six months to build such a machine, and another six months to dredge the bay. This makes one year before the $900,000 floating dock now on its way to Cuba can be of any use to Spain.
It seems a cruel waste of money at an hour when Spain is so poor.