railroad upon sticks, in front of the forts, and took cars of sand and
dumped them down, so that they have a mound in front of all the forts
about thirty feet wide and ten feet high. I went over the fortifications
yesterday, and I saw fifteen of those immense 12-inch guns. They say
they can shoot twelve miles. We have got 50,000 troops here in Havana,
and 60,000 in the provinces, and some 40,000 volunteers. These are all
veterans, and all the generals say that it would take an army of 200,000
to beat us. The coast is all supplied with telephone and telegraph
wires, so that any time your boats attempt to land we can have a big
force there in a couple of hours to drive them off. Part of Cervera's
fleet is in Santiago. There is so much mystery about this! Whether the
admiral is there or not, no one seems to know. The rest of the fleet,
some fifteen vessels, is somewhere down in the Antilles, and
Captain-General Blanco says they are going to attack your coast in about
three weeks.

"The _Alfonso XII._ has been turned into a hospital ship, and all her
guns have been taken out of her. You know she is the boat that was
anchored opposite the _Maine_ and had in her the pneumatic torpedoes.
They say a man named Arjona had something to do with the blowing up of
the _Maine_, but I guess it was Weyler's orders. . . .

"The whole city is divided up into sections on what they call the
'Humanity Committee's plan.' They find out who are in sympathy with the
Cubans or with the United States; and in case Havana is bombarded all
these people are going to be thrown into Cabanas or shot. The people are
such fools they think nothing is known about what they are doing."

* * * * *