By the middle of 1897, the Island was a mass of blackened ruins, an expanse of homeless waste. And the flood of insurrection had not been stayed in the slightest degree. Weyler had failed more utterly than Campos. But he had done more; he had aroused in the public mind of America a realization of the stubborn opposition of the Cubans to Spanish rule and the hopelessness of Spain’s effort to reassert it, combined with indignation at her methods. At length, but all too late, Spain awoke to the futility of longer attempting repression, and the necessity of conceding to the Cubans a liberal measure of justice and independence. Weyler was recalled, and General Blanco came to Cuba, bearing in his hand the olive branch of autonomy. He arrived in November and immediately set about reversing the policy of his predecessor. Amnesty was offered to all revolutionists; harsh decrees were annulled or suspended; political prisoners were released; the rigors of reconcentration were relaxed; the officials appointed by Weyler throughout the Island were removed and Cubans invited to take their places; a cabinet was actually installed at Habana and the machinery of home rule put in motion. It was all of no avail. The insurgent leaders in the field positively refused to accept any [Illustration: STREET SCENE, SANTIAGO DE CUBA.] terms short of independence. In this attitude they were encouraged by the _Junta_ in New York who, by the beginning of 1898, felt confident of the early active interposition of the United States. Such a consummation was rendered more probable by the movement, started at the close of the previous year on the part of the Cuban sugar planters, to secretly apprise the United States of their desire for its intervention. The first overt act in the war with Spain was the President’s call for volunteers, issued April 23rd, 1898. Four days later, Admiral Dewey left Hongkong for Manila, where, on the first day of May, he captured or destroyed the Spanish fleet stationed there. June 14th, the first detachment of American troops left for Cuba under General Shafter, and landed in the vicinity of Santiago de Cuba. On the first and second days of July the Spaniards were defeated in the engagement of San Juan, and on the third, Admiral Cervera’s ships were totally destroyed by the American fleet under the command of Captain Sampson. August 12th, a protocol provided for a cessation of hostilities, and on December 10th, a treaty of peace between the United States and Spain was signed at Paris, securing to Cuba absolute freedom on the single condition of establishing “a stable government capable of maintaining order and observing international obligations.” Thus closed the final war of independence, which cost Cuba at least twelve per cent. of her population and two-thirds of her wealth. She emerged from it weak and impoverished, with political and economic structures shaken to their bases, and helpless but for the supporting hand of the United States.