NOT CIVIL BUT MILITARY.
To those persons who may possibly criticise these suggestions as tending to encourage a lower standing of living, thereby indirectly aiding in the lowering of wages, I will simply say that I am not giving suggestions for methods of civil life but only military suggestions to be acted upon in time of war. The battle is now on. No conflict of the past ever appealed more strongly to the sublime qualities in human nature than the present war of the people against the united plutocracy of all countries. It is therefore appropriate and timely to give any and all suggestions that may be of value to those bearing the brunt of the people's battle.
Can it be urged against the half starved Cuban patriots that because they have learned how to subsist through months on roots and berries, and sugar cane their habits are likely to lower the standard of living in Cuba? In answer the smallest boy would say that the Cubans eat berries this year in order to eat watermelons next year, that they chew slippery elm and sheep sorrel to-day in order to have roast beef, oysters and plum pudding to-morrow. They are now eating the food of the animals and sleeping in the open fields with the beasts and dying, as the cattle die, by order of a butcher, that their countrymen and their children and their children's children hereafter may live as free men, enjoying the heritage of a free Cuba and all the varied gifts of civilization.
Did our forefathers of the Revolutionary War lower the standard of living and decrease wages or injure the cause of labor or of trade-unionism, because, in fighting for country they were willing to go without shoes, staining with blood from their wounded feet the projecting icy rocks that gashed them as they marched against the British? Oh, no! Our forefathers went without shoes that we might have them. They went hungry and cold and gave up their individual comforts and lives, that we, their descendants and fellow-countrymen, might have greater comforts, increased liberties and life more abundant.