FORT SAN SEVERINO, MATANZAS.
buildings are as handsome and substantial as any to be found outside of Habana. The harbor of Cardenas will be remembered as the scene of the tragedy in which the little torpedo boat “Winslow” and Ensign Bagley figured.
Although sugar-cane is by far the chief product of Santa Clara Province, its tobacco and cattle industries are of considerable importance. There is some ground for the belief that it possesses latent mineral resources of great value. Gold and silver have been found in the Province, and the output of asphalt has reached as much as ten thousand tons in a year.
The City of Santa Clara is situated at a considerable elevation above sea level. It is well laid out, with unusually wide streets, considering the age of the town, which was founded in the seventeenth century. Santa Clara has long been noted for its healthfulness and its exceptionally beautiful women. Although the capital of the Province, its population of somewhat less than seventeen thousand is only about half that of Cienfuegos.
Cienfuegos, on the south coast, has one of the peculiar pouch-like harbors found on several points of the Cuban shore. Centuries ago Las Casas pronounced this harbor to be the most magnificent in the world, an opinion which many naval experts of to-day support. The City, which is comparatively modern, occupies a beautiful site in the lap of a group of hills, backed by rugged mountains. It is one of the most progressive centres of Cuba, with an extensive and constantly growing business.
Trinidad is, after Baracoa, the oldest city of Cuba. It was founded by Velasquez in 1514. It is situated upon the side of a mountain, at an elevation of nearly one thousand feet. Trinidad was at one time a port of considerably more importance than it is at present. The locality seems to possess some peculiar health-giving properties, for the town has long held the reputation of being the most healthful in the Island and is resorted to by sufferers from nervous and pulmonary complaints.
The Province of Camaguey, or Puerto Principe, as it was called under Spanish dominion, is very rich in natural resources, but far less developed than the divisions to the west of it. This, because cattle raising was almost its sole industry until recent years, and because it has only lately enjoyed the advantage of railroad communication. Its area is broken by mountains, between which lie deep valleys and broad