The History of Cuba Volume V Part 3

Steam and sail vessels are leaving Havana for different parts of the world every day in the year, and it is a fact of which the Republic has reason to be proud, that under normal conditions, or up to the beginning of the great war, a greater amount of tonnage entered and left the Harbor of Havana than that of any other city of the Western hemisphere, with the exception of New York. Dredging is still going on with new wharves in process of construction and projected, so that today frontage on the bay is valuable and hard to secure at any price.

Owing to its excellent transportation facilities and to the local market furnished by the City of Havana itself, the growing of fruits and vegetables, within a radius of one hundred miles from the capital, has proved more profitable than in other parts of the Island.

Although several small streams flow to the north and south of the dividing ridge, pa.s.sing through the center of the Island, none of them, either in length or depth, could well be termed rivers.

The Almandares, that has its origin in a group of magnificent springs near the western center of the Province, meanders through a comparatively level valley, emptying into the Gulf of Mexico, some three miles west of Havana Harbor. The mouth of this stream, with a depth of twelve or fourteen feet, accommodates schooners that come for sand and cement at the factory.

The Vento Springs, already referred to, are a most valuable a.s.set of the City of Havana, since the abundant flow of water, that through skilful engineering has been conveyed some eight miles into the City, is of excellent quality. The quant.i.ty of water, with economy, is sufficient, according to engineering estimates, for a city of one or two millions.

In the latter part of the 16th century the Italian engineer Antonelli cut several ditches across the intercepting ridges and brought water from the Almandares River into the city of Havana, not only for domestic purposes but in sufficient quant.i.ty to supply the s.h.i.+ps that dropped into port on their long voyages between Spain and the eastern coast of Mexico.

On November 7, 1887, the famous Spanish engineer D. Francisco Albear y Lara completed the present aqueduct and system of water works by which the springs of Vento are made to contribute to the present Havana, with its 360,000 inhabitants, a supply of excellent drinking water, although only a small portion of the flow is utilized.

Owing to the peculiar coral and soft limestone formation on which the soil of this province has been deposited, numerous lagoons and rivers flow beneath the surface at various depths, ranging from 30 to 300 feet.

These, when found and tapped, furnish an abundance of splendid fresh water, seldom contaminated with objectionable mineral matter. At the Experimental Station at Santiago tiago de las Vegas, a magnificent spring of water was discovered at a little over one hundred feet in depth.

Other springs have formed a shallow lagoon just south of the city of Caimito, the exit from which is furnished by a small swift running stream, that after a surface flow of five or six miles suddenly plunges down into the earth some forty feet or more, disappearing entirely from view and never reappearing, as far as is known. Like many other streams of this nature, it may come to the surface in the salt waters of the Caribbean, off the south coast.

The disappearance of this river takes place within a hundred yards of the railroad station, in the town of San Antonio de los Banos, and furnishes rather an interesting sight for the tourist who is not familiar with this peculiar phenomenon.

Although the City of Havana is considered one of the most delightful winter resorts in the Western Hemisphere, there are many who claim, and with reason perhaps, that the Capital has many advantages also as a place in which to spend the summer. Many visitors from the Gulf States in summer have been loath to leave Cuba.

The mean annual temperature of Havana varies only twelve degrees throughout the year. During the winter the mercury plays between the two extremes of 58 and 78 degrees, with an average of about 70. During the summer the temperature varies from 75 to 88 degrees, although there are occasional records where the mercury has reached 92 degrees. Even at this temperature, however, no great inconvenience is experienced, since the cool, strong, northeast winds, that blow from the Atlantic, straight across the Island, sweep into the Caribbean the overheated atmosphere that otherwise would hang over the land as it does in the interior of large continents, even in lat.i.tudes as high as northern Canada.

This continual strong current of air, that blows from the Atlantic during at least 300 days in the year, with its healthful, bracing influence, tempers the heat of the sun that in lat.i.tude 22 is directly overhead, and probably prevents sun strokes and heat prostrations, which are absolutely unknown in Havana at any time of the year.

During the first Government of Intervention, American soldiers in the months of July and August, 1900, put s.h.i.+ngled roofs on barracks and quarters built at Camp Columbia, in the suburbs of Havana, without the slightest discomfort. Officers who questioned the men with more or less anxiety, since they were not accustomed to the tropics, were laughed at for their fears, the soldiers declaring that, "although the sun was a little hot, the breeze was fine, and they didn't feel any heat." Of the thousands of horses and mules brought from Kentucky and Missouri not one has ever fallen, or suffered from heat prostration in the Island of Cuba.

The nights are invariably cool, so much so that even in July and August, during the early morning hours, a light covering is not uncomfortable.

There is every reason to believe that in the near future summer resorts will be successfully established on many of the elevated plateaus and mountainous parks in various sections of the Island.

The Province of Havana, even during the times of Spanish rule, had three or four fine military drives radiating to the south and west of the Capital. Since the inauguration of the Republic, these highways, shaded with the evergreen laurel, the almendra, flamboyant and many varieties of palm, including the royal and the cocoanut, have been converted into magnificent automobile drives, to which have been added many kilometers of splendidly paved roads known as carreteras, which connect the towns and villages of the interior with each other as well as the capital with the princ.i.p.al cities of other sections of Cuba.

Along these highways every three or four miles, are found road repair stations supported by the Department of Public Works, in which laborers to whom the keeping up of the road is a.s.signed, live, and which shelter the necessary rollers and road builders under their direction. These stations are well built, well kept, and sometimes rather picturesque in appearance. Their presence should be a guarantee of the permanence and extension of good road-building in Cuba.

The political, social and commercial heart of the Republic of Cuba centers in the city of Havana, hence the province shares more directly in the national life and prosperity than any other. Cables, wireless stations and pa.s.senger s.h.i.+ps of various lines coming and going every day in the year, maintain constant touch with outside world centers.

The Presidency, the various departments of the Federal Government, the Army, Navy, higher Courts, Congress and Universities all pursue their activities at the capital. The surrounding province, therefore, although the smallest of the Island, will probably always remain the most important political division of the Republic.

CHAPTER V

PROVINCE OF PINAR DEL RIO

Topographically, the Province of Pinar del Rio is perhaps the most picturesquely beautiful in the Island. Owing also to its variety of soils, mahogany red, jet black, mulatto or brown, and the grey sands of the south and west, Pinar del Rio offers marvellous opportunities for many agricultural industries. Tobacco, of which it produces over $30,000,000 worth annually, has always been the most important product of this section of Cuba.

This Province, with its area of 5,764 square miles, owing to the fact, perhaps, that it lay west of Havana, the capital, and thus outside of the line of traffic and settlement that began in the eastern end of the Island, has played historically and politically a comparatively small part in the story of the Pearl of the Antilles. Its capital, Pinar del Rio, located about one hundred and twenty-five miles west of Havana, on the Western Railroad, was founded in 1776, and claims today a population of 12,000 people.

The delightful aroma and flavor of the tobacco grown in the section of which this city is the center, and whose quality has been equaled in no other place, has rendered this province, in one way at least, famous throughout the entire civilized world.

The topography of the province is more distinctly marked than that of any other in Cuba. The greater part of the surface, including the entire southern half, together with the coast plains between the mountains and the Gulf of Mexico, is quite level. Rising almost abruptly from the flat surface, we have the western terminus of the great central chain of mountains that forms the backbone of the Island. This begins near the sh.o.r.es of Guadiana Bay and extends in a northeasterly direction throughout almost the entire length of the Province. The main or central ridge of the Pinar del Rio system is known as the Sierra de Los Organos, or Organ Mountains, owing probably to the fact that the sides of these mountains, in many places, form great perpendicular fluted columns, whose giant organ like shafts reach upward for hundreds of feet.

From this western terminal point the mountains rapidly widen out like an arrow head, so that between San Juan y Martinez on the south, and Malos Aguas on the north, the foot hills approach close to both coasts. On the south, however, they quickly recede towards the Capital, some twenty miles north, whence they continue throughout the northern center of the Province in a line more or less direct, leaving the southern half a great, broad level plain.

On the north coast, from the harbor of San Gayetano east, the mountains with their adjacent foothills follow more closely the sh.o.r.e line, until at Bahia Honda, sixty miles west of the city of Havana, they come almost down to the head of the harbor, gradually receding a little from this point east, until the chain disappears some ten miles west of the boundary line that separates Pinar del Rio from Havana.

Strange as it may seem, nature in her mysterious caprice has twice repeated the form of a shoe at separate points in the outline of the south coast of Cuba. The first, known as the Peninsula of the Zapata, with its definitely formed heel and toe, is in the Province of Santa Clara; and again a second perfect shoe; that resembles with its high heel set well forward a slightly exaggerated type of the shoe so popular with the women of Cuba and all Latin American countries, forms the extreme western terminus of the Island and is almost separated from the mainland by a chain of shallow lakes. It extends from Cape Francis on the east to Cape San Antonio, some seventy-five miles west, with an average width of only about ten miles. Just in front of the heel we have the indentation known as the Bay of Corrientes, while on the opposite side, or top of the foot, lies the quiet and protected Bay of Guadiana.

The lighthouse of Cape San Antonio is located on the extreme western point. From the toe to the heel, following the arch of the foot for forty miles, runs a low range of hills that introduce the mountain system of Cuba, developing later into the great central chain that continues to the other end of the Island.

Between the City of Pinar del Rio and Vinales, the range is broken up into three parallel ridges, the central one composed of limestone, while the other are of slates, schists and sand. The highest peak, known as the Pan de Guajaibon, has an alt.i.tude that has been variously estimated from 2500 to 3,000 feet. It rises abruptly from the narrow plain of the north coast, about eight miles, southwest of the harbor of Bahia Honda, and is difficult of ascent. The various parks, plateaus and circular basins or sumideros, often of large extent, with subterranean exits, form strangely picturesque spots that burst on the traveler, mounted on his st.u.r.dy sure footed pony, unexpectedly, and if a lover of scenery he will leave with sincere regret.

One of these charming valleys, known as Vinales, lies between two prominent ridges, about twenty miles north of the City of Pinar del Rio, and is in many respects the most glorious bit of scenery in all the West Indies. A splendid macadamized automobile drive winds from the capital up along the foot hills to the crest of the ridge, whence it descends, crosses the valley, cuts through the northernmost ridge, and continues on to La Esperanza, on the north sh.o.r.e of the Province.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE VINALES VALLEY

A scene in the heart of the wonderland of Pinar del Rio, which innumerable tourists have declared second to no other spot in the world in romantic beauty and fascinating charm. The combination of cliffs and plain, with the rich coloring of tropical flora, is so bewildering as to create the illusion of a stage-setting made for scenic effect by some master artist.]

Rex Beach, the novelist, writer and traveler, looked down from his auto into the valley for the first time in 1916. Stopping the machine suddenly, he jumped to the ground and stood spellbound, looking down into that beautiful basin, over a thousand feet below. After a moment's pause he exclaimed: "I have visited every spot of interest from northern Alaska to Panama, and traveled through many countries, but never before in my life have I met anything so picturesquely, dramatically beautiful as this valley, this dream garden that lies at our feet. There is nothing like it in the Western Hemisphere, probably not in all the world."

The length of the basin is not over twenty miles while its width varies from three to ten. The floor is level, covered with rich waving gra.s.s, watered by a little stream, that comes meandering through the valley, dives beneath a mountain range, afterwards to reappear from a grotto-like opening on the northern side, beyond the valley, whence its waters eventually find their home in the Gulf of Mexico.

The peculiar, almost unreal, indentations of the northern ridge are silhouetted so vividly against the sky above that from the southern sh.o.r.e of the valley one is inclined at times to believe them fantastically formed clouds. The remarkable feature, however, of Vinales lies in the peculiar round-topped mountains that rise abruptly from the level surface below, and project themselves perpendicularly into the air, to a height varying from 1,200 to 2,000 feet.

Unique imposing formations, resulting from millions of years of tropical rains and rock erosion, are covered with dense forests of strange palms and thousands of rare plants, whose varied foliage seems to be peculiar to this isolated spot in the western central part of Pinar del Rio.

These singular dome-like lomas of Vinales, looming up so unexpectedly from the valley below, are usually accessible from one side, although but very few people seem to have taken the trouble to climb to their summits. All of these mountains and foothills, composed of limestone formations, are honeycombed with caves, some of them of rare beauty.

Shortly after the founding of the Republic, a group of men composed mostly of naturalists and scientists, representing the Smithsonian and like inst.i.tutions in the United States, together with several Cuban enthusiasts in the study of nature, spent several months studying the fauna and flora of the Vinales Valley. In fact they rambled and worked through most of the line of foothills that traverse Pinar del Rio between its central ridges and the Gulf of Mexico. Some of the party were specialists in tertiary fossils, others in the myriad varieties of submarine life. These latter spent considerable time studying the various species of radiata, mollusca, crustacea and allied forms of life on the inner side of the long coral barrier reef which parallels the sh.o.r.e of the province of Pinar del Rio, from Bahia Honda to Cape San Antonio. Many new varieties of the snail family, also, were discovered and studied.

In this connection it may be stated that a very rare variety of the palm family, the Microoyco Calocoma, commonly called the Cork Palm, found only in Pinar del Rio, seems, owing perhaps to some unfavorable change in climate or surrounding conditions, to be disappearing from earth. Not more than seventy specimens are known to exist and these are all growing in an isolated spot in the mountains back of Consolacion del Sur.

Several of them have been transplanted to the grounds of the Government Experimental Station for study and care. One also has been removed to the grounds of the President's home at El Chico. The palms are not tall, none reaching a height of more than twenty feet, with a diameter of perhaps eight inches.

This rare palm is one of those miraculous survivals of the carboniferous age that by some strange protecting influence have survived all the great seismic upheaval and geological changes wrought on the earth's surface during the millions of years since the epoch, when this and similar varieties of carboniferous plants were the kings of the vegetable world. Their dead forms are frequently found imprinted in the coal fields of Pennsylvania and Brazil, but only in Cuba has this family of ancient palms persisted, mute survival of an antiquity that probably antedates any other living thing on earth. So slow is the growth of this remarkable plant, that only one crown of leaves appears each year. By simply counting the circles of scars left by the fallen leaves, it is clearly demonstrated that many of these remnants of a remote geological past were living in the mountains of Pinar del Rio long before Columbus dreamed of another continent. Some of them are today over a thousand years old, and may have antedated the fall of Rome, if not the birth of Christ on earth.

A strange variety of indigenous wild legumes, belonging probably to the cow-pea tribe, is found growing luxuriantly in the low sandy soil of the southwestern coast. The vine forms a splendid cover crop of which cattle are very fond, while the peas, although small, are delicious eating.

Plants of the lily family are found in great quant.i.ties in some of the fresh water lagoons of this Province, the ashes of which furnish 60% of high-grade potash.

Back in the mountains of Pinar del Rio, an exploring party from the Experimental Station came across, most unexpectedly, a little group of five immense black walnut trees. No one knows whence came the seed from which they sprung, since the district has never been settled, and the black walnut is not known in any other part of the Island. It is quite probable that many, if not all, of the forest trees of a commercial value in the Gulf States, and perhaps further north, would thrive in Cuba if planted there.

There is much fine, valuable hard-wood timber in the mountain ranges of Pinar del Rio, between Vinales and Bahia Honda, but lack of facility for the removal to the coast will probably cause it to remain unmolested for some years to come.

The extreme length of Pinar del Rio, from southwest to northeast, in a straight line, is nearly two hundred miles, while its average width is fifty. The rivers and streams all have their sources in the central divide, and flow to the north and south, emptying into the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. None of these, of course, are available for navigation more than a few miles up from their mouths, and while serving as drainage streams during the rainy season, many of them, unfortunately, cease to flow during the dry months of February and March.

Some of them, with sources in large springs, back in the mountains, could be used very advantageously, with small expense, for irrigation purposes, thus rendering adjoining lands, especially in the tobacco and vegetable district, doubly valuable. With the control of the water supply, the profit to be made from these lands, on which three or four crops may be gathered a year, would seem almost incredible, especially if compared with the returns of similar lands in the United States.

As an ill.u.s.tration, in any of the rich sandy soils bordering streams like the Rio Hondo or Las Cabezas of the south coast, or the Manimani or the Mulata of the north coast, whose waters are always available for irrigation purposes, in January, February or March corn and cow peas may be planted on the same ground in the early spring. Crops from these may be gathered in late May or June, and the same land planted in carita beans, sweet potatoes or squash, that may be removed in September, leaving the field to be again planted in October with tobacco, peanuts, yuca, potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, egg plants or okra, that when gathered in January and February will bring splendid returns in either the local markets of Havana, or the early spring markets of the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts of the United States.