On their arrival in Cuba the poor wretches who survived the ordeal began to fare better. E. M. Masse, a French traveler and writer, in his work "L'Isle de Cuba et la Havane" describes the quarters in which they were lodged. They were the _baracones_, the famous barracks originally destined for the troops which were to take Pensacola, and that had cost four million pesos, though they could have been put up for a few thousand. At the time of his visit to Havana, some of the contractors who had made this handsome profit on the buildings were still in jail. He goes on to say that immediately on landing the negroes were taken to these barracks, waiting to be sold. They contained one immense room, covered with straw and divided into three compartments. The first was for the employees or jailers; the second for the women slaves, the third for the men. There was a spacious court or yard with a kitchen in one corner. In this yard they spent their days, shielded from the sun and the rain by tents. They were permitted to bathe in the sea. The writer looked at the spectacle with an artist's eye. For he remarks that he had always considered the pose of the Venus of Milo unnatural, until by observing these women slaves at their bath in the surf, he found that the identical pose was frequently assumed by them, and hence must have been natural. The only garment obligatory as long as a slave was not sold, was a kerchief; if somebody made them a gift of another kerchief, they made of it a turban or wore it like a sash. The freedom which they enjoyed in this brief interval between landing in Havana and being sold, may in the lives of the majority have been the only freedom they were to know. Being merchandise, it was of course in the interest of the slave traders to have them appear well when put on the market. Hence the food they received was wholesome. They were also encouraged to indulge in their wonted amusements and could be seen marching or dancing around in the yard, as they raised their voices in song. The African who had just arrived and spoke only his native tongue, was called _bosale_; the slave who was born in Africa, but spoke Spanish and knew the trade he was destined for, was called _ladino_. Children of African or European origin born in Spanish America, were called _criolles_, from which the French derived the term in use today: creole. Miscegenation was not favored in Cuba. When the immigration from Santo Domingo brought into the island a great number of mulattoes, quadroons and octoroons, the color line was severely drawn. A woman of colored origin with a perfectly white and very beautiful daughter was known to have denied her child in order to make it possible for her to marry a Havanese. Many of these women were far better educated than the native Cubans; M. Masse says that the art of conversation, unknown in Havana society, flourished only in their homes. But they were rigidly barred from the drawing-rooms of the wealthy Havanese.