Whatever may be said of Havana, the capital city of the Island of Cuba, however sonorously its high-sounding name, San Cristobal de la Habana, may be rolled forth, what titles of Queen of the Antilles, Key of the New World, or other titular effervescence may be thrown about it by the sentimental Spaniard, or the vivid-minded visitor, the plain, prosaic fact remains that Havana for centuries has smelt bad, and man's other four senses are utterly routed from any field of enjoyment when his nose goes on the warpath. Unfortunately Havana has, for this reason, never been the city of delight that Nature intended it should be for at least one third of every year of its existence. In the great majority of instances bad smells arise from a condition of sanitary neglect which means bad health; and Havana has been, to all intents and purposes, a plague spot for centuries. Yellow fever is always present, malarial diseases of all kinds are prevalent, smallpox rings the changes at every opportunity, and every ill that tropic flesh is heir to has found a home and government encouragement in Havana. This chapter on Cuba's capital city is thus introduced because, before anything else is done looking to the reorganisation and the regeneration of the city and the Island, thorough measures for the health of the people must be formulated and put into immediate and active operation. With the new order must come thousands of new people; and if these newcomers, accustomed, as the poorest of them are, to better sanitary regulations and conditions than have existed in Havana and Cuba, are permitted to enter the Island and inhale its deadly stenches, Cuba will become an international cemetery and it will receive a backset worse than the worst Spain ever did for it.