The Cubans of the United States, assisted by many of our own people, gathered money, and loaded filibustering vessels that ran the feeble Spanish blockade off the island, and safely landed an untold number of cargoes of arms and ammunition for the struggling patriots, while our own national feeling against Spain still increased as the days went by. It is very true that the Government of the United States did all that it was able to preserve neutrality, and to keep the peace with Spain--nay, more than that--we were at last obliged even to police the seas around the Southern States to prevent those blockade-runners from slipping away from our parts with their loads of arms and ammunition for that devoted island, and we were hardly able to stop them when we had done our best. Thus we were put to endless trouble to watch the seas for a foreign and cruel country, and that country was always laying complaints at our doors because we could watch no better!
[Illustration: _THE DEFENSE OF SANTIAGO._]
When Campos was Captain-General of Cuba, the war for independence in that unhappy island was conducted with some regard to decency and civilized ways; but the Spanish arms made no progress, and the mother country sent over the cruel General Weyler, usually called "The Butcher," and gave him a free hand in putting down the islanders in any way he saw fit. The mind of this bad man seems to have been imbued with all the old Spanish cruelties of the dark ages, and all that tiger-like love for cruelty and bloodshed for which Spain and the Spaniards have always been so notorious. The readers of the public press are no doubt well aware already of the treacherous acts, cruelties and medieval deeds of barbarism to which that monster and his soldiers resorted for the purpose of suppressing the Cuban rebellion. The worst of them all was his gathering the country people into seacoast towns and cities--mainly women, children and old men--where they subsequently died by tens of thousands; and thus the poor, oppressed Cuban nation was weakened at last to the number of at least 200,000, if not more; and by such cold-blooded deeds, and others on a smaller scale, quite as cruel, did that black-hearted Spanish butcher wear down the population of Cuba. He made war upon nature, and shocked the moral sense of the whole world. And yet, this Weyler had the entire approval of the mother country while he thus caused the non-combatant part of the Cubans to perish, when they had the unblushing impudence to carry on the barbarities of the dark ages all over the Island of Cuba, and right before our front door! The false and wilfully-lying messages that even this butcher sent home to Spain from day to day about victories that he had gained over the insurgents were usually contradicted by the American, and other foreign presses next day. Weyler excelled in nothing but writing false dispatches, while the hatred against him increased, both in Congress, and all over the United States. So great, indeed, was the outcry against the Spaniards, that the proud and scornful Dons kept sending more and more soldiers over the Atlantic, to give us to understand by that, that if we Americans dared to interfere between her and what she called "The Ever-Faithful Isle," she would there fight Uncle Sam to the death, and never surrender Cuba!