Havana and the larger cities, is now extended through most if not all of the towns through which suffering exists. Thousands of lives have already been saved. The necessity for a change in the condition of the reconcentrados is recognized in the Spanish government." And yet Spain resented these charitable efforts, as being opposed to her policy. The people of the United States, in sending this money and these supplies, had nothing else in view but charity, a longing to do all that they could to relieve the anguish of an oppressed and tortured people. There was no ulterior motive whatever. A large amount of the sums contributed was diverted to a purpose very different from that for which it had been intended. The Spanish government, more through fear of the condemnation of the other European nations than anything else, voted about six hundred thousand dollars for the relief of the starving reconcentradoes. But this was a ruse, a sum chiefly on paper. General Lee, and his testimony is incontrovertible, says: "I do not believe six hundred thousand dollars, in supplies, will be given to those people, and the soldiers left to starve. They will divide it up here and there; a piece taken off here and a piece taken off there. I do not believe they have appropriated anything of the kind. The condition of the reconcentrados out in the country is just as bad as in General Weyler's day. It has been relieved a good deal by supplies from the United States, but that has ceased now. "General Blanco published a proclamation, rescinding General Weyler's bando, as they call it there, but it has had no practical effect. In the first place, these people have no place to go; the houses have been burned down; there is nothing but the bare land there, and it would take them two months before they could raise the first crop. In the next place, they are afraid to go out from the lines of the towns, because the roving bands of the Spanish guerillas, as they are called, would kill them. So they stick right in the edges of the town, just like they did, with nothing to eat except what they can get from charity. The Spanish have nothing to give." The government and people of Spain now became very much afraid of the attitude of the United States. They knew that something had to be done, so to speak, to throw a sop to Cerberus. Therefore Sagasta, the premier of Spain, conceived the idea of granting to Cuba a species of autonomy. But, with the usual Spanish diplomacy, it was not autonomy at all. It purposed to be home rule, but every article gave a loop-hole for Spain not to fulfill her obligations. It was a false and absurd proposition, intended to deceive, but too flimsy in its fabric to deceive any one. It was rotten clean through, and was opposed by everyone except the framers of the autonomistic papers, General Blanco, his staff and a few others, who hoped, but hoped in vain, great things from the proclamation.