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The Record of Desolation and Despair: Cubans

An April 23rd letter gives a summary of the prostration of Cuba, the collapse of her finances and industries, showing the progress of the policy of desolation. We quote from the New York Sun this most shocking compilation of the evidences of material disaster:

The receipts at the custom house, which have usually amounted to from $40,000 to $50,000 daily at this time of the year, have fallen to an average of $20,000. Some days even $16,000 is not reached. The fact is due to the general poverty of the country produced by the war and the reduction of imports. The sugar product is only 8 per cent. of its average amount in times of peace. About 1,000,000 tons of sugar have been produced in the Island annually, but only 80,000 tons were produced this year. These 80,000 tones have come from sugar estates which were permitted to grind by the insurgents, contrary to their rule and in accordance with private arrangements with the insurgent government. The sugar planters are loosing all hopes of a good crop next season. It is said that Gen. Gomez will issue a proclamation prohibiting grinding next year. Some say that the proclamation will come from the Cuban delegation in the United States, as Senor Estrada Palma, the Cuban delegate there, has received orders from President Salvador Cisneros to issue it. It is reported also that Senor Emerterio Zorrilla, a rich Spanish sugar planter now in New York, has written to his friends in Havana that there is no possibility of a mometary arrangement with the Cuban delegate at New York to secure permission to grind. "The island," says Senor Zorrilla, "is condemned to destruction. I think that sensible Spaniards ought to look for some terms of peace that will satisfy the Cubans and prevent the total ruin of the Greater Antilles."