ports are not great; and, in fact, sugar is the one staple. All Cuba
has but one neck--the worst wish of the tyrant.

As to education, I have no doubt that a good education in medicine, and
a respectable course of instruction in the Roman and Spanish law, and
in the natural sciences, can be obtained at the University of Havana;
and that a fair collegiate education, after the manner of the Latin
races, can be obtained at the Jesuit College, the Seminario, and other
institutions at Havana, and in the other large cities; and the Sisters
of the Sacred Heart have a flourishing school for girls at Havana. But
the general elementary education of the people is in a very low state.
The scattered life of planters is unfavorable to public day-schools,
nay, almost inconsistent with their existence. The richer inhabitants
send their children abroad, or to Havana; but the middle and lower
classes of whites cannot do this. The tables show that, of the free
white children, not more than one in sixty-three attend any school,
while in the British West India islands, the proportion is from one in
ten to one in twenty. As to the state of education, culture and literary
habits among the upper classes, my limited experience gives me no
opportunity to judge. The concurrent testimony of tourists and other
writers on Cuba is that the habits of the Cuban women of the upper and
middle classes are unintellectual.

Education is substantially in the hands of the government. As an
instance of their strictness, no man can take a degree at the University
unless he makes oath that he does not belong to, has never belonged to,
and will not belong to, any society not known to and permitted by the
government.

REFLECTIONS

To return to the political state and prospects of Cuba. As for those
persons whose political opinions and plans are not regulated by moral
principle, it may be safely said that, whatever their plans, their
object will not be the good of Cuba, but their own advantage. Of those
who are governed by principle, each man's expectation or plan will
depend upon the general opinion he entertains respecting the nature of
men and of society. This is going back a good way for a test; but I am
convinced it is only going to the source of opinion and action. If a
man believes that human nature in an unrestrained course, is good, and
self-governing, and that when it is not so, there is a temporary and
local cause to be assigned for the deviation;