Remains A Deep Mystery

Havana, Feb. 17.- The city of Havana is ablaze with excitement, consternation and bewilderment. All along the wharves and quays the people throng in black, buzzing, mystified mastes, and out in the harbor, scarce a stone's throw from the shore, black, charred masses, all of the United States cruiser Maine, blown out of the water last niglit by a mysterious explosión, that yet remains above the watert edge. tmolder steadily with fitful bursts of flame. The hospitals are full of wounded men - men of the blue jacket and the foreign tongue. Every one strives to excel his neighbor in kind attention. The Spanish sailors work like beavers in the effort to relieve the injured and clothe the few survivors. The soldiery of Spain, Marshal Blanco himself directing them, are rendering every assistance to the luckless sailors of the north and the Havana firemen have simply outdone theraselves in deeds of generosity. The hatred of los Yankees and the spite against los Gringos are all forgotten and the horrible carBage of the night has made all men kin and brought Spaniard and American together in the fraternity of sufferIng and disaster. The explosión which destroyed the Maine took place at 10 o'clock last night- an hour when the honest sailors bad retired, while most of the officers had returned from the gayeties of the city. The cause is as yet all unknown. Whether the magazine of the ship was fired by accident or treachery, whether bomb or torpedo placed beneath the bow sent the Maine to the bottom of Havana bay and its blue jackets to their long home no man knows - perhaps no man shall ever know. All that sailors and officers of the fated craft can say is that there was a crash and a roar - that men wgre hurled headlong from their bunks upon the cabin floors, and that out of the darkness, the grinding of bursting timbers, the surging of the water rushing back to flll the great chasm torn by the explosión, carne the screams of wounded men and long red jets of flame. Ten minutes later and the Maine, all aflre from stem to stern, bega nto settle in the water. Over the side went the sailors, halfclad or ciad not at all, flinging themselves into the bay, still dazed, bruised and bleeding. Out of the red murk and the horrible uproar could be iheard the Ioud voices of officers, ing and directing, cool and plucky in the face of death, showing even in that hour of horror the grand courage and steady discipline that won at New Orleans and Mobile- the grandeur of Farragut, the iron nerve of the Kearsarge's crew upon the rock of Roncador. There were no weak souls nor cowards there; the officers held place and power even as at a dress review, and to their coolness and their courage is due the faet that the panic did not result in even heavier loss of life than the explosión and the water caused combined. There was rush and hurry in Havana and the Spaniards bent every energy to fiaving of the doomed Americans Out from the great black sides of the Spanish warships flew boat after boat and the Spanish sailors never pulled faster oars. Over the bay they skimmed seizing here an arm extended from the water in the last struggle of the drowning man, grasping there a drenched bluejacket, until the boats were full of rescued men and no more living bodies could be found upon the surface of the ■water. Tugs and small boats were flying to the rescue, and before the flre could reach the rearward rail every living soul aboard the Maine had been removed. No one knows how many brave sailors died in the crash of the explosión, in the flamea that seized the ship, or in the waters of the harbor. Estimates range all the way from 100 to 200, with two officers among the missing. On shore all is yet activity, and has been from the moment the shock of the explosión wrecked every window in Havana. Capt.-Gen. Blanco was among the first to realize what had happened, and he has spared no exertion to aid Capt. Sigsbee's men Admiral Manterole and Gen. Solano have proven worthy coadjutors, and the Spanish sailors and soldiers alike have done all that was in their power. Capt. Sigsbee was not hurt. The explosión took place directly under thi quarters of the common sailors, missing the officers' cabin by many yards It is not yet known whether Jenkins and Merritt, the missing officers, werp lost in the confusión of the night 01 were ashore and consequently safe from any danger. ' Speeulation as to the cause of the explosión continúes unabated and the wildest theories are advanced. Cubai sympathizers will probably hold thal treacherous and vengeful Spaniard' blew up the Maine. The partisans o! Castile will hold, with equal firmness that Cubans dynamited the ship te arouse popular frenzy against Spain and Admlral Manterole has laconicalland grimly sald that the explosión wa caused by a grenade hurled over the aavy yard. Some evea ay that the ex plosión did not occur upon the Malne at all, but was caused by the shock from an explosión in a Spanish magazine directly opposite the spot where the Maine was anchored - a circumstance, if true, which the Spaniards wlll doubtless use to coníirm their theory that Cubans did the deed. The wounded sailors now in hospital declare that they are utterly at a loss as to the cause of the explosión - that they were all asleep when the crash carne, and that all they could do was to piek themselves up from the floor, grope their way amid falling timbers, smoke and fíame and take to the water and the Spanish boats. They count themselves lucky to escape with their lives and have as yet given little time to speculation as to the cause of the disaster.