Cuba Past and Present. Richard Davey
to the lightest cream, and the coolies or Chinese.
For three hundred years Cuba was exclusively inhabited by Spaniards, or people of Spanish descent. The political and religious conditions of the country were therefore far more favourable to peace and unity, and the island was much less difficult to govern, than in these troublous times of ours.
The "Cubanos" are the descendants of Spanish colonists, who have inhabited the island for at least two generations. The slightest admixture of African blood debars the enjoyment of this distinction. The first Spanish immigration into Cuba began very soon after the conquest of the island, and consisted mainly of adventurers who had accompanied the earlier expeditions, and who settled permanently in the country, after having returned to Spain, and transported their wives, and such members of their families as were ready to follow them, to their new homes. Almost all these individuals were either of Castilian or Andalusian origin. A few years later, emigrants began to come in from the Basque Provinces, and from Catalonia.
The descendants of these early colonists form the present aristocracy of Cuba, and many of them bear names which have cast lustre on Spanish history.[6]
Cuba was governed, for over three centuries, by the laws which bound the other Hispano-American colonies. These were framed by Philip II., and are still known as Las Leyes de Indias.
The unbending nature, and jealous religious orthodoxy of the Spaniards, offered scant encouragement to the establishment of settlers of any other race or faith. The Inquisition soon reigned in the island, in all its gloomy and mysterious horror. To its merciless pressure, and frequently cruel action, we may perhaps ascribe the instinctive hatred of the "powers that be"—so characteristic of the modern Cuban—even as hereditary memories of the doings of Mary Tudor and her Spaniard husband have implanted a sullen distrust of the Spanish nation in the breast of the average Englishman.
From the physical point of view, the Cubans are inferior to their Spanish forefathers, a fact which may be attributed, perhaps, to the effect of an enervating climate on successive generations. Still, it has been remarked that they do not seem to have deteriorated, intellectually, to the same extent as the descendants of the French and other European Creoles in the West Indies. They are lithe, active, and occasionally very good-looking, in spite of their pasty complexions and somewhat lustreless dark eyes. They are certainly more progressive in their ideas, and more anxious to educate their sons, at all events, to the highest possible standard, than are their Spanish cousins. A remarkable impetus was given to education in Cuba by the celebrated Las Casas, who governed the island from 1790. He increased the endowment of the University of Havana, which had been established in 1721, and greatly extended its sphere of action, by creating several important professorial chairs, and notably one of medicine. He assisted the Jesuits in improving their colleges. It should be noted, to the credit of this much maligned order, that the Fathers provided their pupils with a thorough classical education, and also instructed them in foreign languages.
During the great Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods there was considerable chaos in the island, and the vigilance of the censorship became so relaxed, that the large towns were flooded with French and Italian literature of an advanced kind, and the ex-pupils of the Jesuits devoured the translated works of Voltaire, Rousseau, and Beccaria with an avidity which must have sorely scandalized their orthodox instructors. The Voltarian spirit thus introduced amongst the better class of Cubans has endured to this day, and though they pay every outward respect to their religion, they are exceedingly sceptical both in thought and speech. During the last seventy years, again, the country has been overrun by Americans, who have introduced every form of Protestantism, from Episcopalianism to Quakerism, and even Shakerism. This large acquaintance with varied schools of religious thought has had its effect in broadening the horizon of the Cuban mind. Many young men are sent to schools and colleges in the United States, in England, in France, in Germany even, or else to the Jesuits' colleges at Havana and Santiago. Yet the mother country refused for years to admit even the best class of Cubans to any share in the administration of the island, and though within the last two decades this rule has been somewhat relaxed, the result, politically speaking, has not always been satisfactory, even to the natives. In the legal and medical professions they have attained brilliant success, and some very large fortunes have been made. The majority, however, follow the life of planters, or engage in mercantile pursuits. Here again there is cause for trouble. In bygone days the Spanish hidalgos were granted large estates in Cuba, and though they rarely visit the country, they still retain them, entrusting the management of their property to agents and overseers. Among these absentee landlords are the Aldamas, Fernandinas, dos Hermanos, Santovenios, and the Terres, whose palaces in the Cerro quarter of Havana have stood uninhabited for years, except, perhaps, for an occasional and rare winter visit. Still there are, or were, until quite lately, many wealthy Cuban planters who reside on their plantations, with their wives and families. A few years ago—I daresay it is so still, on such estates as have not been devastated by the Rebels or the Spaniards—the grown-up sons lived with their parents, each attending to a separate department of the plantation, until the father died. Then one of them—the eldest, as a rule—took over the whole estate, paying each of his brothers a proper proportion of his net yearly earnings, and if sufficient frugality was exercised, he was able to pay them a share of the original property into the bargain. But even when these events took place, they did not necessitate the separation of the family.
The Cubans are naturally a domestic and affectionate people, exceedingly happy in their home relations. In many a Hacienda, from one to four or five families will live most peaceably, under the same roof. The men, as a rule, make excellent husbands, and are passionately fond of their children, whom they are apt to spoil, and often ruin, by allowing the coloured servants to over-indulge them. In these patriarchal homesteads, the children, being not a little isolated from other society, become exceedingly attached to each other. When the girls attain a marriageable age they are placed in seclusion, under the charge of a governess, or else sent to one or other of the great convents in the Capital managed by French and Spanish nuns of the Sacré Cœur, Assumption, and Ursuline orders. The results of this system are not always fortunate. Premature marriages abound. Many a Cuban is a father before he is eighteen years of age, by a wife a couple of years his junior—a fact which may account, even more, perhaps, than the much-blamed tropical climate, for the physical inferiority of the race. Then again, as is invariably the case in slave countries, a pernicious laxity in morals is tolerated, and Cuban life, in cities and plantations alike, will not, I have been assured on good authority, bear too close investigation. If the ancestors were devoted to their Voltaire and their Jean Jacques, the modern descendants are equally zealous readers of all the most suggestive French and Italian novels. The fine literature of the mother country has never found much favour in Cuba, and the educated islanders are far more intimately acquainted with Zola, Gaboriau, Gyp, and Huyssman than with Cervantes, Calderon, Lope, and Fernan Cabalero. They do not even patronise their own national drama, preferring modern French and Italian plays. It is a curious fact that even really excellent Spanish troupes have failed to attract audiences in Havana, whereas French and Italian companies have done tremendous business during the few weeks of their stay in the city. I shall have occasion to speak elsewhere of the great love of music which has long distinguished the Cubans, whose principal Opera House has been kept up all through the century to a pitch of excellence worthy of one of the great European capitals.
The Cuban women, even in the lower classes, are generally far better looking than the men. Those of the upper ranks are often extremely fascinating. Their features are small and delicate, their eyes dark and fine, and their hair magnificent. Their feet and hands are small, and although they cannot vie in grace with their Andalusian sisters, they have a distinct and striking charm, peculiar to themselves. They have a regrettable weakness for plastering their faces with rice powder, to an extent which sometimes makes them look absolutely ghastly, and, like most Creoles, they are apt, except on formal occasions, to neglect the elementary duty of personal neatness. They are fond of lolling about in their own homes, in wrappers, none of the cleanest, and are much addicted to swinging in hammocks, coiling themselves up on sofas, and, above all, rocking lazily to and fro, in low American chairs.
Of society, even in the city of Havana, there is little or none. A few large parties are given by the wealthier families in the winter season, but very few