Near the head of the western extension of Havana Harbor is the Loma of Atares, on whose summit rests a picturesque 18th century fortress of the same name. The hill rises abruptly several hundred feet above the level plain, and commands all approaches to the City both from the south and the west.
The prado or meadow, that extended along the western front of Havana’s embattled ramparts, is today changed into a wide esplanade, along which runs a double driveway for automobiles and carriages. Through the center, between double rows of laurels and flamboyans, are shaded walks, shrubs and rare plants of the tropics. On both sides of this fashionable street, sumptuous mansions, many of them homes of millionaires and distinguished men of this western Paris, have been built since the inauguration of the Republic. Attempts have been made at different times to change the name of this avenue, but the people of Havana, up to the present, have insisted on retaining the term first given it, the “Prado,” that always lay between the City gates and the western forests.
On the east lies the former walled city with its narrow streets and antique buildings and picturesque landmarks of bygone centuries. On the west we have the more modern City, that extends for miles both south and west, where beautiful residences have been erected, some of them palatial in size and appointments. Several of the more prominent hotels, too, are located on the Prado where it forms the western boundary of “Parque Central,” that delightful retreat in the City’s center. In front of the Park was the large gate that gave entrance and exit to the traffic of the old time thoroughfares of Obispo and O’Reilly. Many beautiful club buildings, whose cost ran into millions, are located along the Prado.
At the southwestern corner of the Park is the new National Theatre, a magnificent piece of architecture covering an entire block of ground, and costing some $3,000,000. This theatre is the largest and best equipped place of amusement in Havana, and at its entertainments may be found the elite of the Island republic. The season of grand opera continues for approximately six weeks every winter, during which the best artists of Italy, France, Spain and the Metropolitan Opera of New York furnish entertainment to a music-loving audience, whose taste is as refined and critical as any in the world.
The “Parque Central” covers an area equivalent to two city squares, in which many beautiful shade trees, including the evergreen laurel, the flamboyan, date and royal palms, and other plants and flowers peculiar to the tropics, add shade and beauty to the spot. In its center rises an imposing statue in marble of José Marti.
From this central point the Prado continues south until it terminates in the “Parque de los Indies.” Adjoining on the west is the “Parque de Colon,” with an area equivalent to four large city blocks. Stately royal palms, india rubber trees, flowering majaguas, cocoanuts and rare tropical plants, render this park one of the most interesting in the City.
Leading away from the head of the Parque de Colon we find a wide avenue known as La Reina, that extends westward and upward to the summit of Belascoain, where its width is more than doubled in the Avenue known as Carlos Tercero. This continues west between two long rows of shade trees, outside of which are two more drives running parallel to the main or central avenue.
This continues out beyond the Botanical Gardens, the Quinto de los Molinos, whence the main street curves around the crest of the Plateau of El Principe, and continues on two miles to Colon Cemetery near the further end of the Plateau, on the east bank of the Almandares.
Colon cemetery is one of the finest in Latin America. The monument dedicated to the seventeen firemen who perished beneath the falling wall of a burning house, consists of a single shaft some fifty feet in height, surmounted by the figure of an angel, supporting in her arms an exhausted fireman. Cameos in marble of the faces of the men who died in the performance of duty, are cut around the base of the monument. Another beautiful example of the sculptor’s art stands above the tomb of the “Inocentes,” where lie buried the bodies of the eight youths who were executed by the Spanish Volunteers, at the foot of the Prado on November 27, 1871. In this cemetery are buried also many of Cuba’s famous men and women whose graves are carefully kept, and on Decoration Day are visited by thousands of people, friends, relatives and admirers, who leave their tributes of flowers, kind thoughts and tears.
Music in all its varied forms, from grand opera to the rhythmic beat of the kettle drum, (which plays such an important part in the orchestras of native negroes) probably furnishes the chief source of pleasure and entertainment in the Republic of Cuba. The Havanese have always been a music loving people, and really excellent musicians are common in the Capital.