“The improved special fast facilities furnished by the Pennsylvania Railroad, the Atlantic Coast line, the Plant system of railways, and its new, swift, and superb steamships, carry you from the American to the Cuban metropolis in three days.
“While the north shore of the island has three important harbors—Havana, Mantanzas, and Cardenas—the former is incomparably the finest and most spacious; the city, to the west of the gleaming bay, is a rare study in Moorish, Saxon, and Doric architecture. The scene has been thus pen-pictured:
“‘On the east side, where the close jaws of the harbor open, and clambering up the mountain side where frown the landward outworks of Moro Castle, is Casa Bianca, with its queer villas and structures, each one standing out in this wonderful daylight of the tropics in such distinctness, and with such a strange seeming of approaching and growing proportions, that, in your fancy, the houses individually become great pillared temples. In and over and through this dreamful spot, away up the side of the mountain, thread and run such indescribable wealth of vegetation that, as you look again and again, the clustered, shining houses seem like great white grapes bursting through a glorious wealth of vines and leaves.
“‘Beyond Casa Bianca the bay debouches to the east. Here is a veritable valley of rest. Every half a mile is a little cluster of homes set in a marvellous wealth of rose and bloom. Beyond this valley are seen pretty villages, each with its half-ruined church, whose only suggestion of use or occupation is had in the din of never-ceasing chimes; and still beyond these are uplands which almost reach the dignity of mountains, upon whose far and receding serrated heights an occasional cocoa tree or royal palm looms lonely as a ghostly sentinel upon some mediæval tower.
“‘Farther to the south lie the great Santa Catalina warehouses, where the saccharine source of Cuba’s wealth is stored in huge hogsheads, or rests dark as lakes of pitch in tremendous vats. Behind these is Regia, the lesser Havana, across the harbor, with its churches, its quaint old markets, its cockpits, its ceaseless fandangoes and its bull pen. Over beyond this, set like a gleaming nest in the crest of the mountains, a glimpse is caught of Guanabacoa, full of beautiful villas, beautiful gardens and fountains, and in the olden times the then oldest Indian village of which Cuban legends tell. Beyond Regia to the south, and upon the shores of the bay, is the ferry and railroad station, whence thousands reach the outlying villas, or leave the capital for the various seaports of the northern coast; and right here, night and day, is as busy and interesting a spot for the study of manner and character as may be found in all Cuba. At this station is seen a famous statue to Edouard Fesser, founder of the Havana warehouse system. The entire southern portion of the bay, where some day the barren shore line will be lined with great warehouses and docks, is filled with old hulls of sunken steamers and ships, conveying the keenest sense of desolation, and the shore here rises to uplands bare as Sahara, until, skirting to the right, the bold mountain, Jesu del Monte, is seen; and then come the great outlying forts extending far around to the sea. Between you and these, if still aboard-ship, you see Havana’s domes and minarets, and, to all intents, you are anchored in a sceneful harbor of old Spain.’
“This schedule of the quick mail service performed by the elegant steamers, Mascotte and Olivette, of the Plant line, in connection with the railway system heretofore mentioned between Tampa and Key West, in the east, affords but a few brief hours of rest in the harbor at Havana. Upon the first appearance of the Olivette, fresh from her conspicuous performances in distancing the fleet of steamers which accompanied the racing yachts of the international regatta, the writer had the good fortune to be among the invited guests who paid a visit to this magnificent vessel, which is justly the pride of her distinguished owner, Mr. H. B. Plant, the President and Managing Director of the Plant System of railways and steamships.”
