“As regards the question of the ‘Maine,’ the truth is that above all precedents there weighed upon the American Commission the inability of giving any satisfactory reply to the Spanish protest, because of the action of the President of the Union—violative of the most elementary dictates of generosity and prudence—on recalling, with language offensive to Spain, the ‘Maine’ incident on the most solemn occasion in the public life of the United States, and when the negotiations for the re-establishment of peace were on the point of terminating.
“The Commission believes, then, that it has done its duty. It understands the treaty concluded is the least prejudicial for Spain that it was possible to obtain in view of the foreign circumstances, which could not but inevitably bear down their heavy weight upon her. It trusts that the coming time will demonstrate this, and it entertains the hope that, despite the solution imposed on the terrible crisis through which the nation has just passed, it may soon recover its strength and grandeur, and it believes, finally, that the honor and the dignity of the fatherland have been saved in these painful negotiations as the most precious remnants of the wreck of the old Spanish colonial empire.”
The subsequent Bale of the Caroline and Ladrone Islands to Germany, for the sum of 5,000,000 pesos, disposed of the last remnants of the Spanish colonial empire. The Ministry of Colonies was abolished. Then followed a series of military and naval courts-martial of the various commanding officers implicated in the capitulations of Manila and Santiago de Cuba, notably Admirals Montojo, Cervera and Generals Augustin, Jaudenes, Linares and Toral. The officers laid the responsibility for their actions at the door of the Ministry of Marine. Minister d’Aunon had to resign.
Another Cabinet crisis resulted in a new Ministry composed of the following members—President of Council and Minister Foreign Affairs, Senor Silvela; War, General Azcarraga; Marine, Admiral Gomez Imaz; Interior, Senor Dato; Finance, Senor Villaverde; Public Works, Marquis Pidel; Justice, Senor Bas.
Later Count Torreanaz succeeded Senor Bas in the Ministry of Justice, and General Weyler became Minister of War.
Weyler’s most formidable rival, Marshal Arsenio Martinez de Campos, former Captain-General of Spain and Cuba, died in 1900 at Zarauz. With Jovellar, he issued the pronunciamiento of Sagoote, through which Alfonso reached the throne. Placed in full command of the Spanish forces by young Alfonso, he ended the civil war by defeating Don Carlos at Pena de la Plata in 1876. Despatched to Cuba, he succeeded in putting a stop to the ten years’ war there by his liberal concessions to the insurgents. Later he was once more sent to Cuba to cope with the final insurrection in that island. But his measures were held to be too conciliatory, and he was recalled in 1895, without having accomplished his task. Campos never recovered from this disgrace.
The accession of King Alfonso XIII. to the throne, as actual ruler, was set for his sixteenth birthday, May 17, 1902. Accordingly his mother delivered her last speech from the throne as Queen-Regent in June of the preceding year.
The complete list of titles falling to the little king upon his accession are in themselves an epitome of Spain’s former historic grandeur. King Alfonso’s full royal titles are: “His Most Catholic Majesty, Alfonso, King of Spain, Castile and Léon, Aragon, the Two Sicilies, Jerusalem, the Canary Islands, the East and West Indies, India, the Oceanic Continent, and King of Gibraltar.”