that the United States had good reason to complain, not only of unjustifiable acts on the part of the local authorities of Cuba, but of the delays and halfmeasures of the Spanish government to accord redress; that the local administration of Cuba, civil and military alike, had, in his conception, been greatly injurious to the interests of Spain herself, even more than to the United States; that, as a jurist, he repudiated on principle the sequestration of the property of foreigners in Cuba; that if the Spanish note of the 15th ultimo should prove acceptable to the President as a basis, he should be prepared to take up each individual grief as presented, and consider and decide promptly; that while not able conscientiously to admit that by the letter of the treaty civil courts were stipulated for to the exclusion of military, yet he was ready so to arrange the ground of controversy in that relation as to put an end to all reasonable complaint in the premises on the part of the United States. "I could but declare the high gratification it afforded me to receive from his lips the communication of these just and elevated statements, which it would be my pleasure to transmit immediately to my government." Mr. Cushing could not fail to exercise his brilliant imagination on the international aspects of the questions arising in our relations with Spain; he quoted an article in the Epoca newspaper that seemed to be inspired by the government, and set it forth in a series of flashing fancies as follows: "The definite references of the Epoca to my interview with Mr. Calderon y Collantes on the 30th, and to the telegrams received from Mr. Mantilla, sufficiently show that the Epoca received its information from some member of the government. "I have never mentioned the contents, date, or even existence of your No. 266 to anybody except Mr. Calderon y Collantes, not even to Mr. Layard, until he came to speak to me concerning it, on the 1st instant, by telegraphic direction from Lord Derby, as reported in another dispatch. "Of course, all which the Epoca says of the contents of that note must have been derived from the government. "Four things are, it seems to me, worth noting in that article: "Ist. In speaking of your No. 266, it undertakes to characterize the first part, devoted to the exposition of particular grievances, but makes no allusion to the second part. "2d. It gives quite a novel turn to the question of intervention and the relations of Great Britain to that subject, supposing it to be on the part of some 'great continental Power' between the United States and Spain. I have no knowledge, nor any ground of conjecture even, as to what Power is thus intended. Is it Germany? Or France? Or Russia? "3d. The Epoca seems to put forward the article of the Herald by way of insinuating the opposition of Great Britain to any positive action of ours on the side of Cuba. "4th. It is observable that the Epoca, thus inspired by the government, does not speak excitedly, or otherwise betray signs of irritation on the part of the government on occasion of the suggestion of our possible intervention, ex nomine, as intimated in your instructions, and also expressly in the oral statement made by me to Mr. Calderon y Collantes." Secretary Fish was constant and strong in urging Mr. Cushing to force upon the Spaniards an impression of the danger of American "intervention." That he was influenced in this insistence by the personal views of President Grant there is inner evidence, and yet it has been a part of the filibuster creed to hold that General Grant was too careful, and to assert that his conservatism comprehended caution in the extreme. European Newspaper Comment on the Cuban-Spanish-American Situation Twenty-two Years Ago-Not Much New in Later Commentary-"Stable Government" Not a New PhraseCuban Troubles Those of Inheritance-Disastrous Influences of the Rebel Policy of the Torch-Suggestion of Bombardment of Our Cities by Spaniards. Considerable agitation was produced in the diplomatic circles of Europe by the steady pressure of Secretary Fish with his instructions to Minister Cushing to bring the Spaniards to conclusions. Repeatedly the Secretary had to qualify the forms of expression of the several ministers intrusted with copies of the formal paper. Mr. Baker was admonished that he had been too strenuous in St. Petersburg in making the most of a prince's politeness, and explained that he quoted the Russian Prince Gortchakoff by an almost unconscious recollection. Mr. Orth, at Vienna, over-played his part a shade, and a supplementary direction was that he should not require a reply in writing to his suggestive communication. The Vienna Presse, of January 5, 1876, contained this expression of Austrian pulchritude: "North America labors vigorously and incessantly to make the Cuban question an international one, and to elevate it to the position of a burning one before the Spanish arms can succeed in making it disappear from the world. To-day it is announced by telegram from New York that the note of the government of the United States to the Powers relative to Cuba proposed the union of Cuba and Porto Rico under one Spanish governor-general. The European diplomacy, which was enlightened with the hearing of the extraordinarily long American document-a copy of the same was not left-might be not disagreeably astonished to learn what actually might be the small meaning of the long discourse. The omission of every conclusion in the document of Mr. Secretary Fish was until now everywhere remarked; he had hitherto excused the European governments from the duty of giving an |