arbor, and Cuba
is the Italy of America.

The waters of the harbor, admittedly one of the finest in the world,
are most of the time extremely dirty. Many years ago a canal was
commenced which was designed to create a flowage calculated to keep
the harbor clear of the constantly accumulating filth, but it was
never finished, and there remains an evidence of Spanish inefficiency,
while the harbor continues to be a vast cesspool. It would be supposed
that in a fever-haunted region, great attention would be bestowed upon
the matter of drainage, but this is not the case in Havana, or other
cities of the island. Most of the effort made in this direction is
surface drainage, the liquid thus exposed quickly evaporating in the
hot sunshine, or being partially absorbed by the soil over which it
passes.

Havana contains numerous institutions of learning: a Royal University,
founded in 1733, a medical and law school, and chairs of all the
natural sciences. In spite of their liberal purposes and capabilities,
however, there is a blight hanging over them. Pupils enlist cautiously
and reluctantly. Among other schools there is a Royal Seminary for
girls, scarcely more than a name, a free school of sculpture and
painting, and a mercantile school, with a few private institutions of
learning. There is a fairly good museum of natural history, and just
outside the city a botanical garden. Still the means of education are
very limited in Cuba, an evidence of which is the fact that so many of
her youth of both sexes are sent to this country for educational
purposes. An order was at one time issued by the government
prohibiting this, but its arbitrary nature was so very outrageous,
even for a Spanish government, that it was permitted to become a dead
letter. What are called free schools, as we use the term, are not
known in the island; the facilities for obtaining even the simplest
education are very poor. Boys and girls, so far as any attempt is made
to educate them, are taught separately, and really under the eye of
the Church. Priests and nuns are the agents, the former notoriously
making a cloak of their profession for vile and selfish purposes. If
we speak decidedly upon this subject, yet we do so with less emphasis
than do the Cubans. The girls are taught embroidery and etiquette,
considered to be the chief and about the only things necessary for
them to know. These young girls are women at the age of thirteen or
fourteen, and frequen