A subtle document that. Hidden carefully in the denunciation of slavery is a call to organization to form societies. We shall see later how important and potent those societies were and that their objects were something far different from the destruction of slavery. The paper closed with a clear cry for freedom for Cuba. It cannot be disguised that those who had the real good of the island of Cuba at heart, patriots, Cubans who loved their country, men who longed to stand upright, to put off the yoke of Spain, and to look the inhabitants of free countries in the face as equals, were withdrawing their heartfelt allegiance from Spain, and were longing for independence. That this desire had been created by Spanish oppression, and nurtured by Spanish injustice, is a self-evident fact. The causes which led to the insurrections by which Cuba was torn from this time on until she obtained her independence, we must leave for another chapter. There are two matters most pertinent to this investigation, which we must first discuss: The attitude of the United States toward Cuba at this period, and the revolt of the other Spanish colonies, led by Simon Bolivar, "The Liberator." CHAPTER XXI Cuba, so rich and fertile, was an object of desire, not alone to America, but at least equally to the countries of Europe. Thus England cast covetous eyes at Cuba, and some of the English papers intimated that the United States was anxious to acquire the island, and that if England wished to save her West Indian trade, she had best look to her interests and, if possible, wrest Cuba from Spain. Probably the strongest feeling in the United States in the early part of the nineteenth century was that Cuba must not pass from the hands of Spain into those of any other power, and that if Cuba was to be separated from Spain it must be either as an independent country or by annexation to the United States. The desire for annexation, _per se_, did not appear to be so strong as the feeling that the United States must not allow either France or England to acquire Cuba, and there were, of course, strong political and geographical reasons for this decision. In a former chapter we have recalled some of the circumstances of that time, and have cited some of the authoritative utterances of American statesmen concerning Cuba in the first half of the nineteenth century. Let us now recur to that part of Cuban history in its chronological order.