42
REVOLUTION" stalks again in Cuba.
The unhappy island of unrest,
whose fair soil has for a century
been soaked in the blood of insurgents
and their tyrants. Is once again in tur-.
moil.
Three brief years of peace. Interven
ing since the achievement of independ
ence, are now over, and the traditional
warfare is resumed.
When Estrada Palma. once chieftain
of a political junta, quit his quiet
school at Little Falls. New York, to
become the first President of the Cu
ban Republic, he little knew what a
complex problem awaited him. The spirit
that kept Cuba fighting for liberty
against Spain grew not only from a de
sire for liberty. It was the expression
of the restless mind of the Cuban that
never Is at peace and turns to strife on
the least excuse.
After being freed from Spain, Cubans
wanted the fruits of freedom at once.
They saw no reason why' they should
wait. During the period that the United
States remained in control, the strength
of Washington was able to preserve or
der, but it was inevitable that strife
should come under the Palma regime.
The disappointed seekers for patron
age had to be heard from. Quentin
Bandera, a brave general in the Cuban
Wars of the last 30 years, thought it
no more than a fair reward that he
should be Chief of Police, but Palma,
a man of education, shrank from put
ting in a place of power a man who cquld
not write his own name.
They made Bandera a door-keeper at
J7S a month, and he nursed his griev
ance till at -the first outbreak of revolt
he took the part of the insurgents. His
death under the machetes of the Cuban
guards a few weeks ago took from the
Insurgents their best fighting leader.
Leaders Xot Lacking.
But the revolt will not lack for lead
ers. There are always lots of them to
THIRTEEN enjoys among numerals
a dual position peculiarly its own.
It is somewhat singular that a
number regarded by some so sacredly as
to bo reverently venerated should have
acquired in the eye of others an unpop
ularity stigmatized by all that is evil,
unlucky and undesirable.
Passing ewiftly from the remoter ages
of superstition to more modern times of
seemingly sounder reasoning, one finds it
typical alike of good and evil according
to the particular circumstances of the
care. Superstition dies hard, and while
the 20th century, with its ripening intel
ligence is wonderfully able to accept with
alacrity what the revolution of ages has
brought about in so many desirable di
rections, one sees it clinging here and
there, like linipets to the rock, some per
sons even still going so far as to refuse
to dine In a company of 13 lest death
should thereby claim too soon an unwil
ling victim. This notion is popularly sup
posed to have arisen through that memor
able meal from which Judas rose to meet
hi doom.
Nothing is more surprising than the in
consistency and contrariness at times of
the human race. Dr. G. Russell Forbes
has recently drawn passing attention to
what is recorded in verse on the marble
table in the chapel of the Trlclnium Pau
perum in Rome, adjoining the Church of
. St. Gregory on the Caelian hill namely,
that Pope Gregory the Great was in the
habit of entertaining every morning 12
poor men. On one occasion Christ ap
peared as the 13th and 'henceforth 13. be
came "lucky" for the time being. Here,
as elsewhere in the numeral world, may
be observed a strong tendency to let
fancy take so powerful a possession of
the mind that it appears to that abnor
mal imagination no longer as fancy, but
JC
; ri-v
arise when the fires of insurrection stir
the Pearl of the Antilles.
Such men as Velez Garcia. General
Carlos Garcia and General Justo Gar
cia, sons of General Calixto Garcia, Gen
erals Monteagudo and Loynaz del Cas
tillo and Colonels Piedra ano Alberti are
relentless fighters who will stick to their
cause, right or wrong, with that perti
nacity that seems peculiarly characteris
tic of the Cuban rebel.
The target at which they are aiming
is said to be President Palma, and fear
Is felt by many that the Chief of the Re
public may fall by the assassin's hand.
Precautions have been taken by the
army and police authorities to extend
every protection to Palma at all times.
In such crises there. is always a large
degree of danger from within. President
Palma has been to especial pains to as
sure the loyalty of all parts of his gov
ernment. He has called into confer
ence all the chiefs of his various depart
ments, has armed the customs employes,
and Increased the guard around the
treasury.
Seditious proclamations have been
traced to their source as far as pos
sible, and the publishers . punished.
Warnings have been posted in all parts
of the Republic forbidding all persons to
take part in any movement inimical to
the present authority, and promising sum
mary justice on those who do.
Ever since the triumph of Palma and
the Liberal regime at the recent election
started the talk of rebellion, the police
have been gathering the names of the
disturbers in Havana and other centers,
and these are under surveillance so that
they may be arrested at the first open
act of treason.
There is little of a political Issue in
the revolt. It is rather the personal ad-
Is Thirteen 'Really an Unlucky Number?
as fact. Thirteen, however, was th svm
bol of death considerably earlier than the
beginning of the Christian era. If the
tarot or gipsies' gospel be referred to it
will be found that the 13th card is repre
sented by a skeleton with his scythe. This
symbolism may be traced through ancient
oral tradition to the 13th letter of that
sacred word of the Hebrew Kabbalah,
lod-he-vau-he. a word never, it is sup
posed, uttered by the Israelites them
selves, and only by the high priest once
a .year. A number being attributed to
each letter of the alphabet, every word
in due course gained a numerical value,
and 60. from this ancient conception of
an occult meaningfin numbers certain re
sults were attained. As the principal doc
trines of the Kabbalah endeavored to
portray not only the nature of the deity,
the divine emanations, the cosmogony
the creation, the nature of the angels and
of men. but also their destiny, it can be
understood how "death" became associ
ated with its "own" number.
The Thirteenth Guest.
Sitting down as the 13th at dinner
was. we are told in the old Norse myth
ology, deemed "unlucky" by the Scan
dinavians because at a banquet in the
Valhalla Loki. the Scandinavian god
of strife and evil, intruded himself on
one occasion, making the "13th" guest,
and succeeded in his desire to kill,
with an arrow of mistletoe. Balder, the
god of peace. It is noticeable that in
this Instance the 13th guest was the
emblematic embodiment of evil. In
the case of Pope Gregory the 13th
gruest was the symbolic omVn of good.
"Thirteen," says Wynn Westcott in
his treatise on numbers, "was the sa
cred number of the Mexicans and the
people of Yucatan. The method of
computation among the Mexican
priests." he continues, "was by weeks
of 13 days their year being 28 weeks
of 13 days and one over. Thirteen
THE SUNDAY OKEGONIAX. PORTLAND, SEPTEMBER 23, 1906.
V
venture of those whose ambitions have
been disappointed by the Palma regime.
Skilled In Guerilla Warfare.
In the conflict between the government
and the mal-contents, there will be little
open fighting. Methods in Cuba tend dis
tinctly to bushwhacking. It is the policy
of the revolutionists to be mosquitoes.
to take advantage of a knowledge ' of
the country, to strike a swift and un
expected blow, then disappear from the
danger of vengeance, to return for an
other blow as soon as the chance of
fers. The Cubans are masters at this style
of warfare. They employed it against
Spain with such good success that the
flower of Castillina generals and troops
returned in disgrace from Cuba, with
reputations ruined by months of non
success. . This was the policy of Marti and of
the incomparable Gomez. It was the un
doing of Spanish generals like Weyler,
Compos, Arolas and Linares.
Quartermasters' and commissaries
problems, the bane of regularly organ
ized armies, the Cuban insurgent simply
eliminates. He scorns such a supposedly
military necessity as a base of supplies.
He lives upon the country. He does
habitually what Sherman did In Georgia
and Sheridan In the Shenandoah Valley.
In a pinch he can subsist on a yard
or two or sugar cane cut from the field
with his convenient machete, which was
an implement of husbandry, by the way,
long before it became a dreaded weapon
of war, and a." few yams or plantains
years formed an indiction a week of
years the 13 days over forming an
other week. Four times 13, or 52, was
their cycle.' In Yucatan there were
13 snake gods." He draws attention,
too, to the fact that old authors speak
of 13 as a number used to procure
agreement among married people.
Thirteen, it should be pointed out, is
the number of the Hebrew - word
"achad" "unity."
We find from the old Julian calendar
that the feast known as epulum Jovls
took place on November 13, and, ac
cording to the Breviary of Salisbury,
festivals were, before the reformation,
held on January 13 August 13. October
13 and September 13.
Europe Generally Prejudiced.
In opposition to this the Turks. Rus
sians, Italians, French and English
have all shown themselves more or less
prejudiced, from time to time, against
"13." Moore in his diary refers to a
dinner of 13 at line. Catalini's when
a French countess was hastily sum
moned to remedy the grievance. French
prejudice, if report be true, has even
gone so far as to delete the dreaded
figure from their door numbers, while
individuals styled quartoziennes have
held themselves in readiness to avert
by their presence a supposed foreshad
owing calamity. Tet prior to 1825 the
Irish, superstitious in many ways
though they be. could calmly carry
about with them a coin worth just 13
pence.
Thirteen the "baker's dozen" is. of
course, everywhere regarded as includ
ing a vantage loaf. "Would you not."
pertinently asks Dr. Forbes in contend
ing for the luck lurking in 13, "rather
have 13 guineas than 12?"
A Thirteen Club at one time made it
self conspicuous in a ludicrous endeav
or to upset this widely spread preju
dice and other ill-foreboding omens by
boldly breaking mirrors and otherwise
Successfully
for a Century, They Know How to
Worry Palma
! V
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make him a sufficient, though frugal,
dinner. So the Cuban Insurgents' most
efficient commissary generals are the
warm sunshine and the marvelous soil
of his lavishly fruitful Island.
As for quartermaster's supplies, fili
busters must, for the most part,- furnish
the insurgent with his arms and ammu
nition, and often these supplies are scant
enough. The immediate bodyguard of
old Maximo in the days of 1S96 were a
fairly well equipped body of riflemen,
but the vast- majority of his followers
and those of the dreaded Maceo had lit
tle or nothing in the way of long range
firearms, except what they took from
the Spaniards.
Many had old-fashioned revolvers slung
about their almost naked waists, and
practically all carried and knew how to
use the keen-edged, heavy machete knife.
With camp equipage, except of the most
primitive and portable kind, the insurgent
In the field disdains to cumber his move
ments. While In camp a thatched hut,
hastily knocked together from cane, bam
boo or palm branches, readily serves the
purpose of a shelter. In a country per
ennially balmy, clothing is the least of
his troubles. He usually goes bare
footed from choice. If not from necessity.
Four Generations of Fighters. :
In the present conflict both sides un
derstand the art of guerilla warfare, for
both practiced it against Spain. What
they were able to do shoulder to shoulder
they must now accomplish against each
other, and unless the United States should
be forced to intervene to protect its own
identifying themselves with skulls and
skeletons, black cats, cross-eyed wait
ers and coffin-shaped salt cellars, so
that the London Spectator In 1S94 found
itself unable to refrain from facetious
ly exclaiming: "Who could have be
lieved that there were 169 men In Lon
don so singularly lacking in humor?"
Mention might also be made of the cel
ebrated Thirteenth regiment of whom
it was spoken: "Gallant deeds in all
parts of the country for upward of 106
years, combined Vith excellent conduct
in quarters, have obtained for the regi
ment the respect of the country, and the
queen (Victoria) has graciously named it
after her royal consort in testimony of
its many and varied services."
Our Original Thirteen States.
Attention may now be turned to sev.
eral lately revived instances in the an
nals of American history of thirteen be
ing felicitous rather than the reverse.
The country of this ever increasingly
prosperous people was. it is contended,
discovered on the 13th, comprised ' orig
inally thirteen states, and the national
motto, intentionally or, not. "E Pluribus
Unum." consists of just thirteen letters.
The American eagle claims to have ex
actly thirteen feathers on each wing.
General Washington when raising the
republican standard was saluted by thir
teen guns. It might also be styled the
"Land of Thirteen."
A remarkable example in evidence of
the influence which personal feeling may
have over one's opinion is worth recall
ing. Bismarck is credited with holding
in supreme veneration the number three,
but he had a particular antipathy to it
when preceded by the figure one, and
would never, it is said, sit down to dine
if he happened to be the thirteenth at
table. Pythagoras declared three to be
the "perfect" number, typical of "be
ginning, middle and end." Bismarck's
reasons for his predilection were briefly
Fighting Spain
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iriterests. the turmoil will certainly
lengthen out over a considerable period.
The daring of the rebels is shown by
stated at the time of his death. He
served three masters; he was responsible
for and fought in three great wars; he
signed three treaties of peace; he ar
ranged the meeting of' three emperors;
he establishd the triple alliance; in the
Franco-German war he had three horses
killed under him: he had three names
(Bismarck, Schoenhausen and Lauen
burg); he acquired three' titles (count,
prince, duke); the ancient arms of his
family are a leaf of clover and three
oak leaves. His family motto, "In Trini
tate robur" "Strength in Trinity" was
surely In itself sufficient td give a mean
ing in this particular direction. So close
ly were his feelings associated with the
triple number that the caricaturist rep
resented him with three hairs on his
head. He had three children. Under his
administration the conservatives, national
liberals and ultramontanes were formed.
These circumstances considered, then it
is hardly to be wondered at that Bis
marck should have had a penchant for
"three'" rather than for " thirteen."
"Wagner's Preference.
Richard Wagner, the musician, on the
other band, preferred "thirteen." Born
in 1813, fate endowed him with a name
of thirteen letters and In course of time
allowed him to compose thirteen works.
His "Tannhauser" was finished on April
13. and was first performed in Paris
on March 13. He left Bayreuth on Sep
tember 13 and died on February 13.
Ever In the present year of grace folks
may be found firmly believing that there
is "luck in odd numbers," not alone in
three and thirteen, but in seven also.
As shown In a former paper, like "three"
and "thirteen," "seven" has played no
inconspicuous part in the story of the
past. Had Cobden been a man of con
stitution a little less matter of fact he
might have dwelt with a sense of satis
faction on the number seven, for was it
not owing to the power of seven men
AM? A
the fact that one of their number. Senor
Pino Guerra, a former representative, re
cently captured San Luis, a town of
about S00O inhabitants. He did it with
a force of 400 men. This so emboldened
the rebels that they began plans on Ha
vana, and these, it is said, are being de
veloped gradually, open action being with
held till some underhand coup, as for
instance the taking off of Palma puts
them in a position to strike.
President Palma has at his command
some 6000 troops. The strength of the
rebellion, numerically, is problematical.
Probably a victory would swell the num
bers by magic, and a defeat would cause
just as great a shrinkage.
In the ranks of the insurrectionists are
the scions of four generations of fighters
against the existing order.
Some boast that their great-grandfathers
fought with Bolivar in the gallant
effort of 1826, that might have accom
plished Cuban freedom but for the at
titude? of the United States.
The year 1848 saw another outbreak
when the grandfathers of the present
malcontents strove for a breaking of the
yoke that bound them to Madrid. Again
the United States Government declined
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to give sympathy, though other Nations
that- pitied the woes of Cuba had prom-
ised to help.
Sacredly Venerated by Some People and Stigma
tized as Evil by Many Others.
and the patience of seven years that
those crushing corn laws were in the end
so completely conquered and overthrown?
"Luck will come if it can" was, in sub
stance, what Carlyle tersely and soundly
predicted, to which one ventures to add:
Yes, and in the train of three and seven
and thirteen, irrespectively and in spite
of rather than because of any particular
number. The reflection carries with it
an amazing amount of comforting conso
lation. But it should not be forgotten
that while awaiting its appearance one
may actually be speeding its advent in
a calm pursuance of the Chelsea philos
opher's sensible counsel: "Work work
hard: work well."
An instance in which this may be seen
and in association with the so-called "un
lucky" number is in the time-honored and
still popular game of whist. Thirteen
cards are dealt out to and rigorously de
manded by each player. It depends
largely, of course, upon the player him
self whether these thirteen cards are
turned to his advantage or disadvan
tage. One more remark anent thirteen. At
roulette quite recently "thirteen" was re
ported having come up "three times in
succession," losing the casino, it was
stated, no less than 5.000 pounds ster
ling, enough, one would think, to upset
the prejudiced attitude of many a. su
perstitious mind.
The Forgotten Gift.
She had been cleaning up her "den"
and came across various and sundry
unfamiliar books in the process. After
thinking hard she had restored tiiem
all to their rightful owners with a fine
and conscious sense of virtue. Only
one remained and one night the man
with whom she connected this particu
lar book called. She brought it out.
"Here's a little old book of yours,"
she announced in her usual flippant
way, "and I wish you'd take it home.
During the period between 1?26 and the
beginning of President Grant's adminis
tration it is estimated that 250.V0 lives
were sacrlfied in the effort of Spain to
suppress the rebelion. Of these four
fifths were Spaniards, which gives some
little idea of the difficulties attending
the suppression of a revolt In the island
of unrest.
In Grant's administration the Spanish
government was permitted to fit out six
teen gunboats in New York, which act
the Cubans denounced as a bitter as
sault on liberty by the Nation which
should be freedom's champion.
In 1S71 the Cubans had gained so much
that they overran the island, but Span
ish control of the sea thwarted their
hopes of independence. Xinder Cespedes
the Cubans won battle after battle, in
flicting serious injuries on the enemy,
but never being able to drive him out.
The fathers of the present rebels took
part in this war, and they continued to
engage In the Intermittent struggle of
30 years till finally the United States
was forced on the right side of the quar
rel, and chased Spain off the Western
Hemisphere.
But a republic for Cuba has not meant
peace for Cuba, and perhaps never will.
The spirit of strife burns without cessa
tions and uprisings follow uprisings. Per
haps before he is through with it all,
Estrada Palma will regret that he left
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. his peaceful school to become the shinlns
I target in a country where peace is
stranger.
I've given it house room long enough.'
He took the book and looked at hee
rather queerly.
"All right," he said, but there wal
no enthusiasm in his tone.
"It's yours, isn't it?" she demanded.
"Well, not exactly." he replied. "I
gave it to you for a birthday present
about two years ago."
Now she is writing her name la
every book she owns.
I
The Unexpected.
W. A. Glasgow, Jr., of the Interstate)
Commerce Commission's counsel, smiled.
He had been interrogating a reporter ia
his hotel, and the reply he received was
unexpected.
"That was an unlooked-for answer,
truly," he said. "It was like the answer;
the policeman gave to the good citizen.
"A good citizen, breathless and excited,
ran up to a large, calm policeman one
day and cried:
" 'Officer, there's a terrible fight going
on around the corner to the right.'
" 'Thank you. sir. I'll do as much for
you some day. sir, said the policeman,
gratefully, as he took the turning to the
left and quickly disappeared."
He Followed Style.
The press agent of a successful farc
produced during the past Winter tells of
his experience with the compositors of a,
paper in Chicago who persisted in "boil
ing down" the advertising matter sub
mitted to them. The press agent hadi
wrlten for one of the Chicago dailies
poetical "ad." reading as follows:
"From half-past eight till half-past ten.
You laugh and laugh and laugh again."
To the indignation of the advertising
man, the compositor set up the adver
tisement thus:
"From S:3D till 10:30
You laueh and laush and laugh asaln.'
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