Haiti and Santo Domingo was, of course, clearly in mind, but the objection went deeper than that. Those who are interested may read with profit the debates in the Congress of the United States, in 1826, on the subject of the despatch of delegates to the so-called Panama Congress-of that year. On the whole, it is not pleasant reading from any present point of view. Our cherished Monroe Doctrine was one of the fruits of this period, and in the enunciation of that policy the affairs of Cuba were a prominent if not the dominant force. The language of this doctrine is said to have been written by Secretary Adams, but it is embodied in the message of President Monroe, in December, 1823, and so bears his name. In April, of that year, Secretary Adams sent a long communication to Mr. Nelson, then the American Minister to Spain. For their bearing on the Cuban question, and for the presentation of a view that runs through many years of American policy, extracts from that letter may be included here. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, WASHINGTON, April 28, 1823. "In the war between France and Spain, now commencing, other interests, peculiarly ours, will, in all probability, be deeply involved. Whatever may be the issue of this war, as between these two European powers, it may be taken for granted that the dominion of Spain upon the American continent, north and south, is irrecoverably gone. But the islands of Cuba and Porto Rico still remain nominally, and so far really, dependent upon her, that she possesses the power of transferring her own dominion over them, together with the possession of them, to others. These islands, from their local position are natural appendages to the North American continent, and one of them, Cuba, almost in sight of our shores, from a multitude of considerations, has become an object of transcendant importance to the commercial and political interests of our Union. Its commanding position, with reference to the Gulf of Mexico and the West India seas; the character of its population; its situation midway between our southern coast and the island of St. Domingo; its safe and capacious harbor of the Havana, fronting a long line of our shores destitute of the same advantage; the nature of its productions and of its wants, furnishing the supplies and needing the returns of a commerce immensely profitable and mutually beneficial,--give it an importance in the sum of our national interests with which that of no other foreign territory can be compared, and little inferior to that which binds the different members of this Union together. Such, indeed, are the interests of that island and of this country, the geographical, commercial, moral, and political relations, that, in looking forward to the probable course of events, for the short period of half a century, it is scarcely possible to resist the conviction that the annexation of Cuba to our federal republic will be indispensable to the continuance and integrity of the Union itself."