In the 19th century the press in Spain became the main forum of the bourgeoisie, as representative of this class as well as that of the intellectuals. However, it also carne to reflect the views of the various social, political, and economic groups in which society was divided, with a clear purpose to form an opinion. Freedom of the press provided these groups with a unique opportunity to voice and attemp to extend their opinion in newspa¬pers as well as magazines on a number of issues, including the colonial one. Against this background, the present paper aims' at establishing the degree to wich news coverage of the Cuban conflict attracted the interest of a specific urban society, that of Seville; and, beyond that, whether the same newspapers formed opinion on this issue; in other words, whether public and published opinion correlated on the Cuban War and the end of Sapin's colonial empire.DGICYT, PGC (PS94-0054)Peer reviewed