Manners and customs -- Fiction; Short stories, American
“That poor fellow needs a doctor,” he said as the carriage rolled up
the avenue, “and he needs an overcoat, and he needs food. He needs about
almost everything, by the looks of him.”
But the voice of the young man in the corner of the carriage objected
drowsily--
“On the contrary,” he said, “it seemed to me that he had the one thing
needful.”
By one o’clock of the day following, Senator Stanton, having read the
reports of his speech in the morning papers, punctuated with “Cheers,”
“Tremendous enthusiasm” and more “Cheers,” was still in a willing frame
of mind toward Cuba and her self-appointed envoy, young Mr. Arkwright.
Over night he had had doubts but that the young man’s enthusiasm would
bore him on the morrow, but Mr. Arkwright, when he appeared, developed,
on the contrary, a practical turn of mind which rendered his suggestions
both flattering and feasible. He was still terribly in earnest, but
he was clever enough or serious enough to see that the motives which
appealed to him might not have sufficient force to move a successful
statesman into action. So he placed before the senator only those
arguments and reasons which he guessed were the best adapted to
secure his interest and his help. His proposal as he set it forth was
simplicity itself.
“Here is a map of the island,” he said; “on it I have marked the places
you can visit in safety, and where you will meet the people you ought to
see. If you leave New York at midnight you can reach Tampa on the second
day. From Tampa we cross in another day to Havana. There you can visit
the Americans imprisoned in Morro and Cabanas, and in the streets you
can see the starving pacificos. From Havana I shall take you by rail to
Jucaro, Matanzas, Santa Clara and Cienfuegos. You will not be able
to see the insurgents in the fields--it is not necessary that you
should--but you can visit one of the sugar plantations and some of the
insurgent chiefs will run the forts by night and come in to talk with
you. I will show you burning fields and houses, and starving men and
women by the thousands, and men and women dying of fevers. You can see
Cuban prisoners shot by a firing squad and you can note how these rebels
meet death. You can see all this in three weeks and be back in New York
in a month, as any one can see it who wishes to learn the truth. Why,
English members of Parliament go all the way to India and British
Columbia to inform themselves about those countries, they travel
thousands of miles, but only one member of either of our houses of
Congress has taken the trouble to cross these eighty miles of water that
lie between us and Cuba. You can either go quietly and incognito, as
it were, or you can advertise the fact of your going, which would be
better. And from the moment you start the interest in your visit will
grow and increase until there will be no topic discussed in any of our
papers except yourself, and what you are doing and what you mean to do.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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