r whole duty and all international
obligations to Spain with friendship, fairness, and fidelity, and with
a spirit of patience and forbearance which negatives every possible
suggestion of desire to interfere or to add to the difficulties with
which she has been surrounded.

The Government of Spain has recently submitted to our minister at
Madrid certain proposals which it is hoped may be found to be the basis,
if not the actual submission, of terms to meet the requirements of the
particular griefs of which this Government has felt itself entitled to
complain. These proposals have not yet reached me in their full text.
On their arrival they will be taken into careful examination, and may,
I hope, lead to a satisfactory adjustment of the questions to which
they refer and remove the possibility of future occurrences such as
have given rise to our just complaints.

It is understood also that renewed efforts are being made to introduce
reforms in the internal administration of the island. Persuaded,
however, that a proper regard for the interests of the United States and
of its citizens entitles it to relief from the strain to which it has
been subjected by the difficulties of the questions and the wrongs and
losses which arise from the contest in Cuba, and that the interests of
humanity itself demand the cessation of the strife before the whole
island shall be laid waste and larger sacrifices of life be made, I
shall feel it my duty, should my hopes of a satisfactory adjustment and
of the early restoration of peace and the removal of future causes of
complaint be, unhappily, disappointed, to make a further communication
to Congress at some period not far remote, and during the present
session, recommending what may then seem to me to be necessary.

The free zone, so called, several years since established by the Mexican
Government in certain of the States of that Republic adjacent to our
frontier, remains in full operation. It has always been materially
injurious to honest traffic, for it operates as an incentive to traders
in Mexico to supply without customs charges the wants of inhabitants on
this side of the line, and prevents the same wants from being supplied
by merchants of the United States, thereby to a considerable extent
defrauding our revenue and checking honest commercial enterprise.

Depredations by armed bands from Mexico on the people of Texas near
the frontier continue. Though the main object of these inc