CUBANS AND SPANIARDS.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 211, 16 July 1887, Page 8 (Supplement)

CUBANS AND SPANIARDS.

"Cubans hate Spaniauls," said a Spanish gentleman recently, "and do all in their power to show their hostility to us. They look upon us as their masters and oppressors who hold the whip over their heads and only wait a favourable opportunity to lash them with it. It is true that they are largely employed in Spanish houses here, but they are treacherous employers, and will try, on the slightest pretext imaginable, to create dissatisfaction and trouble among their fellows. They think we regard them with suspicion and enmity, bub such is not the case. We entertain; no illfeeling, against, them whatever, and treat them just as well as we treat our own countrymen. In many cigar factories ov ned by .Spaniards two-thirds of the men employed are Cubans, and yet they accuse us of discriminating against them and of taking the bread out of thoir mouths in favour of Spaniaids. They are for-ever striking and compelling thoir employers to shut down, thus seriously injui ing their business, and in some instancen it has been found necessary tolemovr factories to distant parts of thecountry. I recall one instance of this. A prominent Spanish firm of cigar manufacturers was obliged to remove the factory fiom New Yoik to Tampa, Fla. A week ago one of the foremen in the factory, a Spaniard, was murdered by some of the Cubans employed in the shop, and another was gi\ en tvventy-four hours' notice to leave or be .shot, and now the mm expects every day to hear that the bookkeeper down there has either been threatened or killed. " But the most exaspei ating thing about the matter is that as soon as a Cuban becomes too poor or lazy to work and take care of himself here, he goes to some chaiitable institution managed by Spaniards, the race he hates, and asks to be sent back to Cuba. American.-,, too, entertain strange notions in respect to Spanish character. They look upon us as a nation of cut-throat 0 and assassins, and cla^s us with the dangerous Italians. Do you suppose an American jury would acquit 'a Spaniaul of murder, however jusliliablo ? Ido not. I admit thab Spaniards are quick-tempered and rash* but they seldom commit crime, as a little thought on the subject will show. The Spaniai db here are orderly and industrious,, and control vast business interests in tins city.