he new Havana, the city outside the old wall, is about as old as Chicago
but not nearly as tall. There is no reason why it should be. Here are wide
streets and broad avenues, and real sidewalks, some of them about as wide
as the entire street in the old city. About 1830, the region beyond the
wall was held largely by Spaniards to whom grants of land had been made
for one reason or another. These tracts were plantations, pastures, or
unimproved lands, according to the fancy of the proprietor who usually
lived in the city and enjoyed himself after the manner of his kind. Here
and there, a straggling village of palm-leaf huts sprang up. The roads were
rough tracks. To Governor-General Tacon seems due much of the credit for
the improvement beyond the walls. During his somewhat iron-handed rule
several notable buildings were erected, some of them by his authority.
The most notable feature of the district is the renowned Prado, a broad
boulevard with a park between two drive-ways, running from the water-front,
at the entrance to the harbor, southward for about a mile. A few years ago,
rows of trees shaded the central parkway, but they were almost entirely
wrecked by the hurricanes in 1906 and 1910.

A half mile or so from its northern end, the Prado runs along the west side
of the Parque Central, the most notable of the numerous little squares of
walks and trees and flowers. A block or two further on is a little park
with an excellent statue, known as La India. Opposite that is another
really beautiful park, from the western side of which runs a broad street
that leads to the Paseo de Carlos Tercero, formerly the Paseo de Tacon, one
of the monuments left to his own memory by one of Cuba's most noted Spanish
rulers. The Paseo runs westward to El Castillo del Principe, originally a
fortress but now a penitentiary. The Prado stops just beyond the companion
parks, La India and Colon. These originally formed the Campo de Marte, laid
out by General Tacon and, in his time, used as a military parade ground.
In a way, the Parque Central is the centre of the city. It is almost that,
geographically, and perhaps quite that, socially. In its immediate vicinity
are some of the leading hotels and the principal theatres. One of the
latter, facing the park on its western side, across the Prado, is now known
as the Nacional. Formerly it was the Tacon, a monument to that notable man.
There is quite a story about that structure. It is somewhat too