Cuba was divided into three districts, the western, central and eastern. Havana was the capital of the western district, Santiago de Cuba of the eastern and Puerto Principe of the central district. Each district had its governor who was directly under the Captain-General, and under the governor, in charge of the affairs of the larger towns and their out-lying districts, was a lieutenant-governor, who was president of the local council and had control of military affairs for his district. Under the lieutenant-governors were captains, who were located in regions which were not very thickly settled, and who had absolute military power--subject of course to commands emanating higher up--over the affairs, lives and property of the people under their jurisdiction. Each of these officers received his appointment from the Spanish crown, but he was obliged to receive his nomination from the Captain-General, so that these offices too were a source of revenue to that gentleman, and his nominees, when appointed, were subject to his control. The functions of the governors and lieutenant-governors were supposed to be primarily military, and they received the salary which would naturally attach to their rank, but since they also presided in civil and criminal cases in their jurisdictions, as did the Captain-General in Havana, the fees from these proceedings made very fat picking. Now the captains had no salary at all, and the style in which they were able to live depended on the number of fines they were able to impose, and therefore it is not difficult to imagine that they were not easy on any Cubans who came under suspicion of any offense. They received one-third of all fines imposed by them. Each city in Cuba had its Ayuntamiento or council. In Puerto Principe there seem to have been elections for membership to this body, but in most cases seats were bought at enormous prices, and the receipts from such sale went into the Spanish treasury, although the Captain-General received his perquisite for allowing the transfer to be made. He also seems to have had some power of appointment, which was seldom made without pecuniary consideration, and there were some cases where members had hereditary rights to their seats. Not every town had its Ayuntamiento, but in most of the older towns they existed. The Ayuntamiento elected its own mayor from among its members, but they were all subject to the control of the Governor or Lieutenant Governor, who was in line of course subject to the Captain-General. [Illustration: THE OLD PRESIDENTIAL PALACE The official residence of a long line of Spanish Governors and Captains-General is a large and handsome building of stone, tinted white and yellow, facing the Plaza de Armas from the east, and standing on the site of the original parish church of Havana. Within its walls occurred the memorable scene of the final abdication of Spanish sovereignty in Cuba. It has now been replaced by the new Presidential Palace.]