Benjamin Moore Norman

“ Two mighty oceans on the east and west, two mighty continents on the north and south, and embracing, in the singular arrangement of its slopes and levels, all the climates and productions of both and of all, it seems to have been, for ages, we know not how far back, the theatre of all the art, the seat of all the power, the centre of all the refinement and luxury, of the western hemisphere. There are some remarkable works of art, and wonderful traces of ancient civilization in South America, as well as some singular remains of a once numerous and powerful people in the north. ”

“ One group of old buildings, of Spanish architecture, situated near the humble church that consecrated the public square, shows many marks of its ancient grandeur, even in its present state of desolation and decay. [Pg 109]
It is painful to stroll through the streets of a city of our own times, once full of life and bustle, but now falling into the decrepitude of a premature old age. It is like walking among the sepulchres of the living; and the few signs of life that remain, only serve to give intensity to the shadows of night that are deepening around it. ”

“ But roads will have an end, especially when every rod of the way is replete with all that can gratify the eye, and regale the sense, of the traveller. The forty-five miles of travel that take you to Guiness, traversing about four-fifths of the breadth of the island, appear, to one unaccustomed to a ride through such garden-like scenery, quite too short and too easily accomplished; and you arrive at the terminus, while you are yet dreaming of the midway station, looking back, rather than forward, and lingering in unsatisfied delight among the fields and groves that have skirted the way. ”

“ This bloodless revolution was accomplished without any additional public expense or burdensome tax upon the people, by a wise administration and righteous application of the ordinary resources of the government. Such, and more, were the blessings bestowed upon Cuba by Tacon. Such are the glorious results of the public career of one whose highest ambition and whose proudest aim seemed to be, the elevation of his countrymen—the welfare, security and happiness of mankind. ”

“ Envy and contempt are, by their very natures, evil-eyed, uncharitable, and arrant liars. They see through a distorted medium. They judge with one ear always closed. And he who receives their decisions as law will generally abuse his own common sense and good nature, by condemning the innocent unheard. Secondly, if the society which Cuba might enjoy may be judged of by the known urbanity and hospitality of individuals, it might become, by the breaking down of these artificial barriers, the very paradise of patriarchal life. ”

“ It is no slight gratification, it must be allowed, to be enabled, by so feeble an effort, to make all one's friends, as well as a portion of the great world unknown, compagnons de voyage in all our rambles—to bring them into such a magnetic communication with our souls, that they shall at once see with our eyes, and hear with our ears, and enjoy, without the toil and weariness of travel, all that is worthy of remembrance and record, in our various adventures by sea and land. ”

“ The antiquities of the old world, buried for so many ages in midnight oblivion, had remained through a long course of centuries, the standing enigma of Time. With the help even of some imperfect records from the archives of ancient history, and the aid of what seemed to be a fair line of tradition, the origin and purpose of many of them, and the hidden meaning of their hieroglyphical embellishments, had continued to be an inexplicable mystery quite down to our own times. ”

“ If the intelligence of the people had been such as to justify the comparison,—if there had been more real patriotism, more sincere love of liberty among the principal actors in these bloody dramas, one might say, that the Florentine Histories of the middle ages had been re-enacted in Mexico. How different the struggle, both in its manner and in its results, in our own blessed land. But let us not triumph over our less favored and weaker neighbors. ”

“ With a variety of humors, but for the most part with light hearts, we committed ourselves to the mercy of a kind Providence, a capricious element, and a competent and gentlemanly captain; and, setting aside such regrets as the sensitive mind cannot but indulge, in bidding adieu to the land of its birth, the companions of youth, and the faithful friends of after years, to visit distant and dangerous regions, to invite disease and brave death in many forms, we were probably as happy and merry a company as ever pursued their trackless path over the bounding deep. ”

“ It is a magnificent tree, and whether seen in clusters, or alone, is always beautiful. With its tall straight trunk, and its richly tufted crown of fringed leaves, waving and trembling in every breath of air that stirs, and glistening in the sun with a beautiful lustre, it has a glory and a grace peculiar to itself. It was so abundant in this region, at the time of the conquest, that the Panuco was then called the Rio des Palmas, the River of Palms. ”

“ In a state of society like that which has existed in Mexico, for many years past, it would seem a difficult task to erect monuments to illustrate the services of their great men. Revolution succeeding revolution, and dynasty chasing dynasty, in rapid succession like the waves of the sea, a successful leader has scarcely time to reach the post his high ambition has aimed at, and procure a decree for a triumph and a monument, before a rival faction has obtained possession of all the outposts, and begins to thunder under the walls of the capital. ”

“ It is easy enough to make a theory, and to support it manfully, as long as you can keep your eyes shut to every fact that militates against it. But alas! the great majority of such creations vanish as soon as the eyes are opened, even as the pageant of a dream vanishes before the morning light.
But, not to lose sight of my own good theory, let us return to my little images, and to the thoughts which they have suggested, in relation to the long agitated, and still unsettled question of the origin of the first inhabitants of this continent. ”

“ In all ages, among all nations, where written records have been wanting, tradition has supplied the blank, and, generation after generation, the story of the past has been transmitted from father to son, and celebrated in the song of the wandering bard, till, at length, history has seized the shadowy phantom, and given it a place and a name on her enduring scroll. This is the fountain head of all ancient history. True, it is often so blended with the fabulous inventions of poetry, that it is not always easy to sift out the truth from the fiction. ”

“ Surrounded by luxurious groves of orange and other fruit trees,—by coffee and sugar plantations,—in full view of the table lands, proximating towards the mountains, and enjoying from November till May, a climate unequalled perhaps by any other on the face of the globe; the fortunate visitor cannot but feel that, if earth produces happiness in any of its charmed haunts, "the heart that is humble might hope for it here;" and the invalid, forgetting the object of his pursuit, might linger forever around its rich groves and shady walks. ”

“ But, if he had never acted any other part on the stage of life—if the term of his public and private usefulness had been limited to the brief period of his chief magistracy in Cuba, he had won a fame nobler than that of princes, fairer, worthier, and more enduring than that of the proudest conquerors earth ever saw. The memorial of such a man can never be found in marble, or in epitaph. It is written in the prosperity of a people, and of the nations with whom they hold commercial intercourse. It lives, and should for ever live, in the gratitude, admiration and reverence of mankind. ”

“ If the portrait of Montezuma, in the second volume of Prescott's Conquest of Mexico, be taken as a genuine likeness, it is plain that he did not belong to the American race. There is no mark of the Indian about it.
It will be admitted, I suppose, that Art, in all ages, and among all nations, is but a humble imitator of Nature. The Sculptor, and the Painter, works always by a model. His beau ideal is the highest form of living beauty which he sees around him. ”

“ It was the powerful and heroic race of the Huestacos that once dwelt here; a race so hated by the ruthless invaders of Mexico, that, if they had had power to accomplish their fiendish desire, not a vestige of that noble people would have been found remaining. ”

“ With these splendid and solemn reminiscences always before their eyes, with all the hallowed and affecting associations that ever linger about the ancient homes of a cultivated people,—the temples of its worship, the palaces of its kings and nobles, the sepulchres of its founders and fathers, always present and constantly renewed to their minds, is it possible they could, in three brief centuries, forget the tale, and lose every clue to their own so gloriously illustrated history. ”

“ A rude hovel with mud walls, and a single room, is all they aspire to, in the way of a dwelling. The land is rich and fruitful to excess, and the lounging, listless Indian is the only insurmountable obstacle to its profitable cultivation and improvement. In the hands of our southern planters, or of the sturdy farmers of the northern and western states, this whole region would become a paradise of perennial fruits and flowers, and teem with the golden treasures of every clime under heaven. ”

“ Its houses are many of them going to decay. Its theatre is in ruins, and the spacious octagonal amphitheatre, once the arena for bull-fighting, the favorite spectacle of the Spaniards, both in Spain and in the provinces, and much resorted to from all quarters in the palmy days of piracy and intemperance, is now in a miserably dilapidated condition; affording the clearest proof of the immoral nature and tendency of the sport, by revealing the character of those who alone can sustain it. Tacon and temperance have ruined Regla. ”

“ It has often been found easy, where no just cause of quarrel exists, to make one; and it is a matter of marvel that the same profound wisdom and far-reaching benevolence, that found means to justify an aggressive war upon China, because, in the simplicity of her semi-barbarism, she would not consent to have the untold millions of her children drugged to death with English opium—cannot now make slavery, or the slave trade, or piracy, or something else of the kind, a divinely sanctioned apology for pouncing upon Cuba. ”

“ The Indians of Central America, bear as little resemblance to those of our country generally, as the Spaniards among whom they dwell do, to us. They do not, in any place, live by themselves, as independent tribes. They have no peculiar habits of life, or of warfare—no hunting—no sports peculiar to themselves—and none of the customs of their ancestors preserved, to distinguish them from the mass of people about them. It is only their complexion, their poverty, and generally degraded condition, that marks the difference between them and their neighbors. ”

“ Their abject poverty and destitution of the common comforts of life, seems to cramp all their energies, and dishearten them from any attempt to better the condition of their children. And, indeed, under their present civil and political institutions, but few advances could be made, even if the people were ambitious to improve. For the government, like all despotisms, is jealous of the intelligence of its subjects, well knowing that a reading, thinking people must and will be free.
Cuba was the fifth of the great discoveries of Columbus, and by far the most important of the islands he visited. ”

“ Here European civilization, and European depotism first planted its foot in the elysian fields of the west. Here the dreadful work of subjugation, and extermination commenced a work, which, in three brief centuries, under the banners, too, of the Prince of Peace, and in the name of Christianity, has blotted from the face of the earth a mighty family of populous nations, some of them far advanced in civilization and refinement, leaving only here and there a scattered and almost exhausted tribe, bending under the yoke of slavery, or flying before the continual encroachments of the white man. ”