ley, and the
dwelling-house to be the fort of the Cabanas. Still, no town and no
harbour; and yet ahead we see, high upon a rocky cliff, a queer-looking
old castle, with guns frowning from its embrasures, and its variegated
walls looking as if they were ready to fall into the waves dashing at
their base. That is the Morro Castle, which, with the battery of
Aguadores, the battery of the Estrella, and the above named Cabanas,
commands the approaches to the harbour and town of Cuba.

"The rocky shore above and below the castle has scattered along it the
remains of several vessels, whose captains, in trying to escape from the
dangers of the storm, have vainly sought to enter the difficult harbour,
and the bleaching timbers are sad warnings to the mariner not to enter
there except in the proper kind of weather. And now we are up to the
castle, and a sharp turn to the left takes us into a narrow channel and
past the Morro and the battery adjoining, whose sentry, with a trumpet as
big as himself, hails our vessel as she goes by; and soon we find
ourselves in a gradually enlarging bay, around which the mountains are
seen in every direction. As yet we have seen no town, and no place where
there will likely be one; but now a turn to the right, and there, rising
from the water's side almost to the top of the mountains, is seen Santiago
de Cuba, with its red roofs, tall cathedral towers, and the green trees of
its pretty Paseo, lighted up by the evening sun, forming a brilliant
foreground to the hazy blue mountains that lie behind the city....

"Rising gradually from the bay, upon the mountainside, to the high plain
called the Campo del Marte, the city of Santiago reaches in its highest
point 160 feet above the level of the sea, and commands from almost any
portion superb views of the bay at its feet and of the majestic ranges of
mountains that surround it. With a population of about fifty thousand
inhabitants, it has regularly laid out streets and well-built houses of
stone in most portions of the city; though being built as it is on the
side of a hill, many of the streets are very steep in their ascent, and
from the constant washing of the rains, and the absence of side-walks, are
anything but an agreeable promenade.

"The town was founded in 1515, by Diego Velasquez, considered the
conqueror of the island, who landed here in that year on his first voyage;
and it was from here that Juan de Grijalva, in 1518, started on his
expe