O BEGI THE YEAR 189 RIGH BY UBSCRI FOR :THE WEEKLY BAIETI‘I N Y. WEEKLY NNINNNN. BOTH PAPERS Sent to anv Address FOR. I ‘ ne "- Dollar! ADDRESSALL ounces T0 GAZETTE; BANG Senor Capote VicegPresident of the Republic Here. WANTS ' ENTIRE FREEDOM Says Outside Control Will Not Be Toler- ated—Expresses the Gratitude of the Cu- I ban People Toward the AmericanNa- . tion for Procuring Them Their Liberty. but Is Surprised at the Slowncss of the Operations. New York, May 23,—The ‘Heraid pub- lishes the following interview with Sen— or Capote, vice president of "the Cuban republic, who is now on his way to Washington: “I desire you,” he said, “to thank the great American people and their gov- ernment for the resolution they have made to free us from the tyranical rule of Spain. The people of Cuba be— lieve in the good faith of the people of America. They believe in their honesty of purpose to free Cuba, and are con— fident of their ability .to do so, but it must be borne in mind that the load- star of the Cuban is not merely free- dom from the dominion of Spain but in- dependence from outside control, how- ever benificent that ontrol might be, and absolute non-interference by others in the management of our own affairs. 'Cuba free and independent is the watchword of Cuban liberty. “We in Cuba have been somewhat surprised at the slowness as yet of the operations, but we are content to wait, believing the delay has been part of the plan of the American commanders and that the future will show'the wis- dzom of the course adopted. Suffering of Spanish Soldiers. “I do not believe the war will last long. Our spies in the Spanish camps report great misery, starvation and dis- comfort among the troops. Tlhe Span- iards are morally defeated, and a de- cided movement will bring thousands now undecided to our camp. I cannot, of course, say what will be the result of the objective point, but I can say that a definite plan has been decided upon, and only awaits lthe word to be set in motion.” The Herald’s correspondent gave Sen- or Capote the first detailed news of the Manila fight. He had heard only Span- ielh versions, and said: “It is a great victory—a noble vic- tory, worthy of American sailors and their traditions. I only wish news from Sampson will be equally good. My vis- it to Washington is partly financial, partly political. I cannot say what it is, but it is connected with the internal organization of the island, and for the co-operation of the American forces. I shall not interfere with Senor Palma, but my visit will enable Washington to know exactly my government’s views, with the view of a firm mutual under- standing." Insurgents Awaiting Our Army. “The Cuban commanders await some decisive step on the part of your gen- erals. If you can open up and maintain communication with the Cuban armies and give us a plentiful supply of arms and ammunition we will free Cuba without the loss of an American sol- dier. “Our position on the field is precari- ous. For lack of supplies we cannot concentrate our troops. Our camps shift from place to place according to food conditions. We are hampered and embarrassed for lack of ammunition. We cannot arm the men we are able to. put in the field. “Open up communication, give us arms and supplies and we ask no more. “As to the eventual settlement of the island, when the war is ended and when the last Spanish soldier has left Cuba, the work of the provisional govern-ment will be ended. The people of Cuba, whatever their class or sympathy, will then say how we shall be governed. There will be no reprisals, no confisca- tion, no distinctions. The past will be forgotten in hopes for the future. “As 'to the present military situation, we are awaiting the development of the American plans. General Garcia is at Battamo, and can concentrate 10,000 to 12,000 troops around Santiago in a few days’ time to protect an American landing. General Rodriguez, in the west, can throw 15, 000 troops to assist in an assault on Havana “Lieutenants Fremont and Rowan have put the plans of your war de- partment in Gomez's and Garcia’s pos- session. These have been modified by our commanders, and have gone back for acceptance and execution. I expect a. definite movement very soon. POLO FINALLY GETS OUT. the Spanish Minister at Last Ends Hls Vacation in Cauada. Montreal, Juebec, May 23.—Seno‘r Po- lo, ex-Spanisih'minister to Washington, and party, sailed on the steamship Do- minion Saturday for Liverpooi,'en route to Madrid. It is understood Senor du Bosc, ex-chiarge d’affaires at Washing- ton, left the boat at Quebec and will either remain there or return here. A United States secret service man was also a passenger. Blanco Srnds Rosy Reports. Madrid, May 23.——A dispatch from Havana. announces that two American warships shelled Guantanamo on Fri— day without doing any damage. eral Blanco won another “victory.” He says the American ships, “in order to deceive the garrison, hoisted Spanish flags, but were immediately recogniZed and repulsed. ”’ General Blanco also reports that the. . Spanish soldiers have defeated several insurgent bands in the provinces of Matanzas and Havana. As usual, sev- eral insurgents have been killed. ' —‘_ Six Prize Ship-r Condemned. Key West, Fla.,1uay 23.—In the Uni- ted States cc1.rt, Judge James ,W. Locke presidn g, s’x of the to be legal primes 11d were ordered sold sit/auction. . Gen- , Spanish - .ships seized as rr’zes were adjudged THE EVENING GAZETTE. NUBAN OFFICIAL TALKS 411—: PHILIPPINES T0 BE HELD. General Merritt To Be Clothed, I With the Powers of a. Colonial I Governor-General. Washington, May 23. ——The permanent possession of the Philippines is strong- 1y indicated as the tie termined policy of 'the United States in the action taken . by the president in- two important mat- ters, following closely in the line of the extraordinary development which the project to reinforce Admiral Dewey has assumed in the last two weeks, the strength of the military expedition in '- that time haying been raised from 5,000 to 15,000 men, while the proportion of regulars to volunteers was maintained of Major General Merritt. The second important development in the Philippine matter to-day related to the scope of the authority which Gener- al Merritt will exercise when he reaches the islands. In addition to his military authority as commanding general of the recently organized army depart- ment of the Pacific, he is apparently to be clothed with powers similar to those exercised by a governor general in foreign colonial establishments. The state department, under the direction of the president, has been engaged for several days preparing elaborate in- structions for General Merritt, which are regarded as strictly confident-1a Both Secretary Alger and Secretary Long have been frequently consulted in regard to these instructions, which are understood to attach certain plenipo- tentiary attributes to the commanding general. The difficulties attending the dispatch of the Monterey to a base fully seven thousand miles from home are serious, but the navy department is fully pre- pared to overcome them. The Mon- terey’s total bunker capacity is 236 tens, and with this amount of fuel she is capable, under natural draught, at a speed averaging from eight to ten knots, of accomplishing two thousand miles straightaway. It will be possible after leaving Hon- olulu to take advantage of the numer- ous small islands extending in a chain fully 2,000 miles to the westward of the Hawaiian group and to lie to in their lee and recoal from the collier. The arrival of the Monterey at Ma- nila,— together with 1th e rehabilitation of the forts at the entrance of that bar- bor, which will be speedily -accom- piished when General Merritt’s advance guard reaches there, is relied on to make the American position in the East impregnable to any force which Spain can spare from the defence «of the pen- insula. The Monterey is at present command- ed by Lieutenant Commander James William Carlin,,w'r.o has been attached to the vessel as executive officer almost continuously since she was placed in commission, over five years ago. He succeeded to the command when Cap- tain Clark was suddenly detached six to the Atlantic. SPANISH FLEET SHORT OF COAL. When TheyReached Curacoa the Sailors Had Had routing, but Beans to Fat for Five Days and Coal Was Badly Needed. Port au Prince, May 23.-Rear Admi- ral Osbon arrived here on the Dutch steamer Prlns Frederik Hendrik, from Curacoa, where he met «the Spanish fleet, consisting of the cruisers Vizcaya, Infanta Maria Teresa, Equidibo (pre- sumably, the Almirante Oquendo) and the Cristobal Colon and two torpedo boat destroyers. The Spanish squadron took on three hundred tons of bad coal and one hun- dred tons of provisions and left Cura— coa on Sunday evening at 6 o ’.clock At ‘half past ten 0 ’clock they could still be sighted steaming westward. The ships have little or no coal and scant supplies of provisions The al- lowance to the men of one ships' crews for five days had been nothing but beans. The torpedo boat; destroyers are al— most empty, and in such condition that they would be unable to do much dam- age. It is the general belief hey Ehat the battleship Oregon by this time has join- ed Rear Admiral Sampson‘s fieet, en- abling him easily to’be victorious over the Spanish fleet. . FCRTS SHELLED AT NEUVAl'iS. Gen. Blanco Wires News of a Bombard ment by the American Fleet. Madrid, May 23. —-An ofiicial dispatch from General Blanco says some Ameri- can warships shelled rhe forts guarding the water approach to Neuvitas, Prov- ince of Puerto Principe, on Thursday night last. N uev1tas, otherwise La-s Nuevitas del Principe, is a small town on the north— east coast of Cuba. It is the port of Puerto Principe, capital of the province of that name, and is situated about 52 miles by rail from the city of Puerto Principe. , The harbor is about fifteen miles in length and about seven and a half miles broad]. It is approached by a passage known as the .Puerto de Nuevitas, which is about three-fourths of a mile wide, on an average. The population of .Nuevitas is about 2, 000 souls. Nuevitas would seemingly be an excellent place to land troops for the purpose of advancing on the city of Puerto Principe, which is the center of the province of that name and com- mands that part of Cuba. Puerto Principe has a population of about 30, 000 and is one of the most im- iportant cities in Cuba. To Cut the Galveston Cable. Madrid, May 23,—The information re- ceived here as to the whereabouts of the Spanish Cape Verde squadron is contradictory. The government main- itains absolute secrecy on the subject. 'But, it is 'officially declared, if the Americans cut the Cuban cable, the Spaniards will retaliate by cutting the Galveston cable, so as to interrupt Southern Pacific communication. General Shatter Assumes Command :1 Tampa. I General Shatter has assumed com- mand of the Fifth Army COrps, com- I posed of the regular and volunteer. ‘ troops stationed at Tampa and vicinity. at one-third, largely through the efforts , weeks ago to bring the Oregon around' A...— .of the battle of Manila bay. -.-——~ . ANNY WA___ITS_ 0N NAVY Admiral Sampson Will Be Given the First Chance. at Spaniards. THE CABINET GENSOEED ,___—. u The Oiegon Repotts that She is Ready for Business Alter Hei Ciulse from San Francisco—Scions of Noble Sires seem in Favor With the Administration—Han- rison and Blaine; Sworn in-Department Officials Will Not Talk. Washington, D. 0., May 23.—Naval officers in this city bell ve that the greatest crisis of the war is near at hand. The belief is growing that the Span-- i511 and American fleets are graduallly nearing each other and that before many more days have passed news will be heard of a great conflict. From what leaks out at the navy de- partment, despite the strict orders in regard to secrecy, it is evident that un- less the plans of the administration are upset,’Admira.l Sampson will soon en- counter Admiral Cervera. : Oregon in No Need of Repairs. 'The reports to the department from the Oregon show that she needs no re— pairs to her machinery after her 13,000 miles' continuous run. The Buffalo, which came with the Oregon from Brazil, is to be overhauled Newport News, furnished with ar- or, given a good battery of five- inch guns and altogether made a very ef- fective modern cruiser. This will take about two months. \, Harrison and Blaine Sworn in. Major and Inspector General Russ‘ell P. Harrison of the volunteer army and Assistant Adjutant General James G. ”Blaine have taken their oat’hs of ofiice‘ at the war department. It is said that Mr. Blaine has been assigned to the staff of General Merritt, in which case he will accompany that officer to the Philippines. No News Given Out by Navy Department. The navy department gives out no news touching the movements of the American or Spanish squadrons. What the officials most fear is the effect that might" be produced upon our people by greatly exaggerated and misleading re- ports from Spanish sources of some great naval engagement in which the Spaniards would claim a victory. It is realized that first news of an engage- ment in the neighborhood of Cuba or to the eastward may reach the United States through the Spanish cables via Madrid, and these are almost certain, no matter What the result may be, to make such a claim for victory for the Spanish side as is even'now put forth by the Spaniards in Havana inthe case Obviously the only manner in which the truth could be discovered would be through our own official reperts. President McKinley has established a “censorship" over the cabinet. Here— after only Secretary Long of the navy department and Secretary Alger of the war department are to possess the war secrets. The other members of the cab-' lnet are to know only such news as the president and his war aids may think advisable to tell them. Army Will Wait An Navy. General Miles says that nobody knows When the invasion of. Cuba will occur. He says that this will depend entirely upon the developments in the navy and repeated the statement made frequently before that the army is waiting for the naval branch. As soon as the Spanish fleet is safely 1 out of the way there will be no more delay in sending troops to the island. Before surrendering command of the department of the East General Mer- ritt formed a plan of the troops that should occupy camp Black. He chose the ments, and three from Pennsylvania, making six troops, or about 7, 000 men for the encampment. General Merritt concluded his busi- ness at the war department Saturday noon and at 3 o’clock began his jour-. ney ”to San Francisco. There will be between 1200 and 1,500 men in the first detachment to go, and General Ander- son will proceed at that time. Spanish Warships Not Allowed to Coal. There is nothing to report as to‘the movements of the Spanish torpedo boat destroyer Terror, and the hospital ship Alicante. which are still at Fort de France. The Spanish consul there made a desperate attempt to allow the British steamer Twickenham to dis- charge rher coal cargo or to supply the Terror and Alicante with coal, but the government positively refused to allow this to be done. Sampson Places Mlore Scouts. 'Key West, May 23.——The departure of the Bancroft, the Castine, the Hele- na and the Wilmington under “hurry orders," is taken by naval men to mean that Sa’mpson .has thrown out a. second line of scouts to the southwest, where the Cincinnati: and Vesuvius are sup- posed to be watching the Yucatan chan- nei. Old pilots here belieVe that the Span- ish fleet might easily work west with- out being discovered and be able to break the blockade if the fleet arrived: , before Sampson or Sdhley. Venezuela Honors Harrison. Washington, May 23.-——Ex-President Harrison has, it is learned upon lhigh authority, been selected by the govern- ment of Venezuela. as counsel to' repre- sent it before the board of arbitration appointed to settle the historic bounr dary dispute between Great Britain and Venezuela. War Does Not Iu'crease Bread Rate. Washington, D. C. May 23. '——Com- plaints are going up all over the coun— try because the bakers are raising the price of bread. Some have attributed this to the war, but Secretary of Agri- culture James Wilson says the cause of 1t lies in the fact that the world’ I last wheat crop was short something 11.33 £00, 000, 000 bushels , three remaining New York regi-w .- STRICKEN BY HEAT. LATE DETAILS OF THE HOT WAVE 1N ' AUSTRALIA. vlli'ightfnl Sights Amid the Sufl‘ersrs o: Sydney—At the Melbourne Observatory 1 109.5 Degrees lVere Registered Undel Se1e1e Shade. ' A wei1d story of aridlty, where 111‘- is usually parched and dry, where men drop dead with thirst and fishes periéli in the shallow lakes in the city park: and birds fall stricken from the skies ‘comes from far off Australia. It is an annual event at the Anti podes* where the 24th of December corresponds with our longest day in 111. dsummer. Christmas in Australia is the season of intense heat. But this year the terrific hot wave was a little later thah usual, though when it came‘itftransformed the greats) part of the'co'ntinent" into a hot over and baked men’s skin like bread. ' For the term of two weeks succeed ing fiecember 30th, tlie pavements in cities like Sydney, Melbourne and Vic toils Were burning people’s feet Horses were struck dead under the sun’s rays as With a. shock of electric ity; and on the cattle and sheel ranges hundreds of thousands of ani. mals perished in consequence of the springs and creeks running dry. the Melbourne Observatory, 107.3 de grees were registered under severe shade, a record which was increased two days later to 109.5 degrees unde: the same. conditions. At a gazabo of a town, called Omeo, perched in the winds of that sweltering land, the rec . ord was 105 degrees, while at a certain part of the well settled colony of Vic toria the‘ushade was no less than 111 degrees. Nor was this unprecedented At a place called Croki, in 1896, tin temperature was 121 degrees and a1 Perth it was 117 degrees. A writer in' descantlng on this drought says, faint under the white, blinding skies. The harvests shrivelled. The on chards with all their leafy promisa were smitten as with the blast of a fur- nace; the country and the sun was like an adobe of blood." It is stated. that grapes were actually cooked upon tha on which they” stems of the vines grew; and all human activity was sus pended in the public offices and on government contracts for four hours each day. The heat was so thorough- ly oppressive that men could do little more than lie down or immerse them: selves in cool waters during the day. During a single day the 410,000 inhabi- tants of Sydney consumed 19, 500, 001' gallons of water or almost fifty gal. ions per head, the average consump tion for New York in a. day of com spending summer heat being eighteen gallons per capita with our thousand: of factories in full blast. “During, this period which last: without intermission for two weeks 01 more, bathing is most necessary in order to avoid sunst’roke. The streets of Sydney are kept washed down with water each day in a. constant effort to lower ' the blistering temperature. This, however, does not satisfy the in- habitants, and the city authorities have to shut off the water supply for severa; “hours each day in order to prevenl waste, the people being thus put upon ‘shOrt commons llN the public interest much as 8. ships’ .ofllcers stint the sup- ply of provisions in a. shipwreck. The mertality. in Sydney especially- among. babies ls unprecedentedly high during this annual visitation of sunstrokc which cuts off the very old and young and neither spares manor beast or live ing thing. - Last year the heat, while greatest in New South Wales was also general-- throughout Australia; but the capric- iousness of the climate was So variable this year that while horses were smit- ten: and mad dogs foamed in the streets of Sydney or cattle fell' dead in- the neighboring pastures, therewas a de- luge of rain in Brisbane; and the sew—- ers and waterworks burst with the pressure of rainfall. In other words. while five of the six colonies of the Queen were being roasted, and when men could only venture into the harvest A1 “The earth seemed to‘ the grass turned to dust oves' . the wide plains; a lurid haze covered fields by moonlight to save the rem- . nant of the blighted crops the sixth colony was inundated with water to such an extent of humidity that most of the farm crops were levelled down and rotted in the floods. There was constant high winds all over the Island continent in this sense, however, that while a tornado of wind and rain were pelting themselves over Queensland with the fury characteris tic of warm southern count1ies—de straying crops and demolishing sheep farms e11 route—~there was a very dif- ferent: sort of a storm in V1cto11a and New South Wales. An unusual feat- ure of the hot wave that prevailed in these latter provinces was that a high wind resembling a. blast from the fiery hosts of Hades blew over the country, reaching a velocity of fifty or Seventy- five miles an hour. It was a wind that caught the fumes and glow of the parched plains and of the burning sands over which it swept being here and there fanned into a more furious degree of insufierahle and oppressive dryness, by the frequent blush- fires that were spontaneously generated in its track by the friction which the wind produced. Most of these brush fires were the direct result cf the wind and heat. Once started they rushed through the half-scorched prairies as would a. fire through dry tow, gather ing up dust from the baked and blazing fields and darkening the skies for hundreds of miles with blinding cloud ‘ of smoke, and which after enveloping the cauntry were still traceable in the . 5 atmosphere at a distance of some two hundred miles on sea. Mexico has had fi fty-iiNe Presidents since 1821. - \
Norwalk Chronicler