d for in the regulations. But it matters not; we are
pursuing the path which will precipitate us into the abyss, if
instantaneous and efficacious help does not come to save the island from
the imminent ruin which threatens it.

"The cause of the liberty of nations has always perished in its cradle,
because its defenders have never sought to deviate from legal
paths,--because they have followed the principles sanctioned by the laws
of nations; while despots, always the first to exact obedience to them
when it suited their convenience, have been the first to infringe them
when they came into collision with their interests. Their alliances to
suppress liberty are called _holy_, and the crimes they commit by
invading foreign territories, and summoning foreign troops to their aid
to oppress their own vassals, are sacred duties, compliances with secret
compacts; and, if the congresses, parliaments and Cortes of other
nations, raise the cry to Heaven, they answer, the government has
protested,--acts have been performed without their sanction,--there is
no remedy,--they are acts accomplished.

"An act accomplished will shortly be the abolition of slavery in Cuba;
and the tardy intervention of the United States will only have taken
place when its brilliant constellation lights up the vast sepulchre
which will cover the bodies of her sons, sacrificed to the black race as
a reward for their sympathies with American institutions, and the vast
carnage it will cost to punish the African victors. What can be done
to-day without great sacrifices to help the Cubans, to-morrow cannot be
achieved without the effusion of rivers of blood, and when the few
surviving Cubans will curse an intervention which, deaf to their cries,
will only be produced by the cold calculations of egotism. Then the
struggle will not be with the Spaniards alone. The latter will now
accede to all the claims of the cabinet at Washington, by the advice of
the ambassadors of France and England, to advance, meanwhile, with surer
step to the end,--to give time for the solution of the Eastern question,
and for France and England to send their squadrons into these waters.
Well may they deny the existence of secret treaties; this is very easy
for kings, as it will be when the case of the present treaty comes up,
asserting that the treaty was posterior to their negative, or refusing
explanations as inconsistent with their dignity. But we witness the
realization of our fear