sand guns. These ships comprised six ships of the
line, twenty-one of seventy to eighty guns each, twenty-six of fifty to
sixty guns, fourteen frigates of thirty to forty guns and fifty-eight
smaller vessels.

But then Spain became jealous--imagine a parent jealous of the success
of its child!--and the ship-building industry was peremptorily stopped.
During the present century, in Cuba only the machinery of one steamer,
the Saqua, has been constructed, and two ships, one a war steamer and
one a merchant steamer, have been built at Havana.

What a commentary on the dominating and destructive
policy--self-destructive policy, too--of Spain!

In 1739, there arose in England a popular excitement for a war against
Spain. One of the chief incidents which led to this was an episode which
caused Thomas Carlyle to call the strife that followed "The War of
Jenkins' Ear."

The English had persisted in maintaining a trade with Cuba in spite of
Spain's prohibition.

A certain Captain Jenkins, who was in command of an English merchantman,
was captured by a Spanish cruiser. His ship was subjected to search, and
he himself, according to his own declaration, put to the torture. The
Spaniards, however, could find little or nothing of which to convict
him, and, irritated at this they committed a most foolish act, a deed of
childish vengeance. They cut off one of his ears and told him to take it
back to England and show it to the king.

Jenkins preserved his mutilated ear in a bottle of spirits, and, in due
course of time, appeared himself before the House of Commons and
exhibited it to that body.

The excitement ensuing upon the proof of this outrage to a British
subject beggars description.

Walpole was at that time prime minister, and, although essentially a man
of peace, he found it impossible to stem the tide, and public sentiment
compelled him to declare war against Spain.

This war, however, was productive of but little result one way or the
other.

But before long another struggle ensued, which was far more reaching in
its consequences.

In 1756, what is known in history as the Seven Years War, broke out.
This seems to have been a mere struggle for territory, and, besides a
duel between France and England, involved Austria, with its allies,
France, Russia and the German princes against the new kingdom of
Prussia.

This naturally led to an alliance between England and Prussia.

Towards the end of the war, early in 1