Various Minerals.
Lead.—Galena is found in Tayabas and in Camarines Norte; in the latter province there is found chromate of lead with ferruginous quartz. This ore is often found mixed with iron or copper pyrites, and sometimes with blende.
I have seen samples of galena from Cebú which was said to be auriferous, but I have never heard that any of these ores have been worked anywhere in the islands.
If it should be found profitable to smelt the gold-bearing ores, as is so splendidly done at Denver, Col., the galena will be necessary to the success of the process.
Red Lead is found in Camarines Norte and other places.
Graphite.—In 1891 some pieces of this valuable mineral were shown to me by a native, who said he had found the ore in Mindoro, but he would not say from what locality.
Quicksilver.—I have seen small bottles of this handed round by native disciples of Ananias. But I have never seen a bit of cinnabar or other ore of mercury, and I shall not believe there is any of this metal in the Philippines until I see the ore in situ, or have good testimony to that effect.
Sulphur abounds; there are several places where it can be obtained in large quantities near the volcanoes.
Asbestos.—This curious mineral would not strike a native as being of value.
All I can say about it is that at the Madrid Exhibition of 1887 a specimen of this substance was shown by the Civil Governor of Ilocos Norte as having been found in that province.
Yellow Ochre is found in Batangas, Camarines, Albay, Leyte and Antique, amongst other places.
Kaolín is found in Manila, Batangas and Camarines Sur, and probably in many other places.
Marble of a yellowish colour has been quarried at Montalban. I have used some of it, but found it full of faults, and not very satisfactory.
Plastic Clays for pottery and for making bricks and tiles abound.
Mineral Waters.—As might be expected in a volcanic region, hot springs and mineral waters of very varied constituents abound.
I do not think that the analyses of these would interest the general reader.
I may say that I have derived great benefit from the hot-springs of Los Baños on the lake, and greatly regretted that I could not remain at the extraordinary vapour baths of Tibi near Tabaco.
Chapter XVII.
Manufactures and Industries.
Cigars and cigarettes—Textiles—Cotton—Ahacá—Júsi—Rengue—Nipis—Saguran—Sinamáy—Guingon—Silk handkerchiefs—Piña—Cordage—Bayones—Esteras—Baskets—Lager beer—Alcohol—Wood oils and resins—Essence of Ylang-ilang—Salt—Bricks—Tiles—Cooking-pots—Pilones—Ollas—Embroidery—Goldsmiths’ and silversmiths’ work—Salacots—Cocoa-nut oil—Saddles and harness—Carromatas—Carriages—Schooners—Launches—Lorchas—Cascos—Pontines—Bangcas—Engines and boilers—Furniture—Fireworks—Lanterns—Brass Castings—Fish breeding—Drying sugar—Baling hemp—Repacking wet sugar—Packing tobacco and cigars—Oppressive tax on industries—Great future for manufactures—Abundant labour—Exceptional intelligence.
The manufactures of the Philippines, such as they are, have been mentioned when describing the different tribes or peoples and only a summary is necessary here.
The making of cigars and cigarettes employs probably 30,000 people in the Province of Manila, the vast majority being women. But the best cigars are made by men who have been trained under skilled operatives brought from Havana.
A vast improvement has taken place since the Government monopoly has been abolished, and now the Manila cigars are as well-made and are put up in as tastefully decorated boxes as the Havanas.
Cigarettes are now largely made by machines; the Compañia de Tabacos de Filipinas having rows of them in their factories.
Textiles are made in hand-looms all over the Archipelago by the women in their spare time.
Group of women making Cigars.
To face p. 158.
But in certain Provinces large numbers of women are regularly employed at the loom-working for those who make a business of it. In Ilocos and Union very excellent coverlets, sheets, serviettes, handkerchiefs and towels are woven from cotton, as well as the fabrics called abacá, júsi or rengue, nipis, saguran, sinamay and guingon. This last is very suitable for military or naval uniforms; it is a blue cotton cloth similar to what sailors call dungaree.
In some of the towns of Pampanga and Bulacan, notably in Baliúag where the people are specially clever and industrious, excellent silk handkerchiefs are woven. In Camarines and Albay the fabrics of abacá are more commonly woven, and in Cebú the women are accustomed to work at the loom.
But it is from Ilo-ilo and neighbourhood that a very large trade is done with the other islands in many kinds of textiles. There also the Visayas work industriously at it as a trade and produce most beautiful fabrics of piña, silk, cotton, and abacá, as well as the cheaper sorts for the use of the working classes. In some of the mixed materials a beautiful effect is produced by running stripes of silk, either white or of the most brilliant colours, lengthways through the piece. I have sent some of these júsi dress fabrics to ladies in England and they have been greatly appreciated when made up by a bonne faiseuse.
They are very suitable for wearing in the Philippines or elsewhere in the tropics, being light and gauzy. This material, as well as some of the other fine gauzy fabrics, takes a long time to make in a hand-loom, the advance is imperceptible. I should like to put some of the calumniators of the Filipinos to work a hand-loom and make a dress-length of júsi. I think every one would recant before he had made a yard.
At the Philippine Exhibition of 1887 there were more than three hundred exhibitors of textiles, and one of them, the Local Board of Namaypacan in the Province of Union, showed one hundred and forty-five different kinds of cloths.
There are several rope-works at Manila and the material used is abacá, the ropes produced are equal to any to be had anywhere.
In Camarines Sur both harness and hammocks are made from this material.
In the Provinces ropes are made of cabo-negro, a black fibre from the wild palm, said to be indestructible; of burí, of fibre from the anabó, of the bark of the lapuit, and of rattan. Bayones or sacks for sugar, estéras or sleeping mats, hats and cigar cases, and baskets of all sorts, are made at different places and from the commonest up to the very finest. That called the Tampipi is now regularly kept in stock in London, and is very handy for travelling.
There is a lager beer brewery in Manila that must have piled up money since the American garrison arrived.
Alcohol is distilled both from sugar and from the juice of the nipa-palm (Nipa fructicans).
The oils and resins of Ilocos have been mentioned when describing the Ilocanos; they are not exported, finding a ready market in the country.
Essence of Ylang-ylang is distilled in Manila and other towns; it used to fetch formerly 1000 francs per kilogramme.
Salt is made at many places between Parañaque and Cavite.
Bricks, tiles, cooking pots [bangas], stoves [calanes], sugar moulds [pilones], and draining pots for the pilones [ollas], are made in many provinces.
The industry of the women is also shown by the very beautiful embroideries of all sorts, either in white or coloured silks or in gold or silver. Some of this latter work, however, is done by men.
In some cases they introduce seed-pearls or brilliant fish-scales in their work. The slippers worn by the women on grand occasions are often works of art, being richly embroidered in silver and gold on cherry coloured velvet.
Some notable pieces of goldsmiths’ and silversmiths’ work have been done in Manila, and in the provinces some of the natives carve bolo handles and other articles out of buffalo horn and mount them in silver with much taste.
The salacots, or native hats, are beautifully woven by hand from narrow strips of a cane called nito [lygodium], and the headmen have them ornamented with many pieces of repoussé silver (see Illustration).
Cocoa-nut oil is expressed in the province of the Laguna, in Manila and other places. Soap of the ordinary kind is manufactured from it.
Saddles and harness are made in all the leading towns, and the ordinary country vehicle, the carromata, is made in the chief towns of provinces and some others; but some of the components, such as the springs, and axle-arms and boxes are imported. But in Manila really elegant carriages are constructed, the leather for the hoods, the cloth for the linings, the lamps, as well as a good deal of the ironwork, being, however imported.
Salacots and Women’s Hats.
To face p. 160.
Author’s Office, Muelle Del Rey, SS. Salvadora and Lighters called “Cascos.”
To face p. 161.
In former years large frigates have been built, armed, and fitted out at Cavite and other ports, but at present the ship-building industry is in decadence, and the shipwrights capable of directing so important a job have died out. The increasing scarcity and high price of timber is now a difficulty, and sailing vessels are in little demand. Small steamers and launches are now built, but larger steamers are ordered from Hong Kong or Singapore, or, in case of vessels well able to make the passage, the order goes to England.
The native craft called lorchas, pailebotes, pontines, barotos, paraos, cascos, guilálos, barangayanes, bangcas, vintas and salisipanes are still built in large numbers. The last are very light and fast craft used by the Moros on their piratical expeditions.
Engines and boilers for steam launches are made in Manila, church bells are cast of a considerable size; iron castings are also made.
Amongst the miscellaneous articles manufactured are all sorts of household furniture, fireworks and lanterns. Dentists, painters, sculptors and photographers all practise their trades.
There is no doubt that the Filipinos have learnt a certain amount from the Spaniards as regards their manufactures; but, on careful consideration, I think they have learnt more from the Chinese. Their first sugar-mills were Chinese and had granite rollers, and from them they learnt the trick that many a moulder might not know, of casting their sugar-pans in a red-hot mould and cooling slowly and so getting the metal extremely thin yet free from defects. The casting of brass cannon and of church bells has been learnt from them, and doubtless they taught the Igorrotes how to reduce the copper ores and to refine that metal. Again, the breeding of fish, an important business near Manila, and the manufacture of salt round about Bacoor comes from them. I am not sure whether the hand-loom in general use is of the Chinese pattern, but I think so.
Distilling the nipa juice is certainly a Chinese industry, as also the preparation of sugar for export. This is done in establishments called farderias, and is necessary for all sugar made in pilones or moulds. The procedure is described under the head of Pampangos, and an illustration is given of the process of drying the sugar on mats in the sun.
Many native men and women and numbers of Chinese coolies are employed in Manila, Ilo-ilo, and Cebú in preparing produce for shipment.
The hemp used to come up from the provinces loose or merely twisted into rolls to be pressed into bales at the shipping ports, but of late years several presses have been erected at the hemp ports in Southern Luzon and on the smaller islands.
There are a number of hemp-presses in Manila, each requiring about sixty coolies to work it, and one or two clerks to attend to the sorting and weighing.
They were paid so much per bale pressed.
Steam, or hydraulic presses, would long ago have been substituted but for the fact that the clerks or personeros were each allowed one or two deadheads on the pay list, and this was so profitable to them that they strongly opposed any changes, and none of the merchants cared to take the risk of the innovations.
Two presses were set in line, astride a pair of flat rails, a small one called the Bito-bito for the first pressure on the pile of hemp, and the large one to squeeze down the bale to its proper size.
They were simply screw presses having hardwood frames set deep into massive stone foundations and surrounded by a granite pavement.
A pair of these presses, i.e., a Bito-bito and a press erected in Manila under my direction in 1888, cost $4400, the woodwork foundation and pavement costing $2850, and the screws, nuts, capstan-heads, etc., costing $1550. The small press had a screw 4 inches diameter and 6 feet long, and was worked by two or four men. The large press had a screw 8¼ inches diameter, and 12 feet long.
Both screws worked in deep gun-metal nuts and had capstan-heads. When the large press was near the end of its travel the capstan bars were manned by forty coolies putting out their utmost strength and shouting to encourage each other as they tramped round on the upper floor keeping step.
The turn out was about 250 bales from daylight to dark. Each bale weighed 2 piculs, say 280 lbs., or eight to the English ton. The bales should measure 10 cubic feet, that is a density of 28 lbs. per cubic foot. The hemp could be pressed into a smaller volume, but it is asserted that the fibre would be seriously damaged. Sometimes from careless pressing the bales measure 12 cubic feet. They swell after leaving the press and after being moved.
At the date I have mentioned, the charge for screwage was 50 cents per picul, but it has been raised since then.
Dry sugar was exported in its original bags, and loading and shipping cost 12½ cents per picul. Wet sugar usually required repacking for export, and the charge for discharging the coaster and rebagging was 17½ cents per picul, as well as 12½ cents for loading and shipping.
It lost 2½ per cent. in weight in repacking and 10 per cent. during the voyage in sailing vessel to Europe or America. So that altogether one-eighth of the total was lost to the shipper, and there was a good perquisite to the skipper or mate in pumping the molasses out of the bilges.
The repacking was usually done by natives, and the old mat bags scraped by women who receive half the sugar they save. The mats are sold to the distillers and are thrown into their fermenting vats, to assist in the manufacture of pure Glenlivat or Bourbon whisky, Jamaica rum or Hollands gin.
In 1891 I saw on board a steamer just arrived from Antwerp hundreds of cases containing empty gin bottles packed in juniper husk, the labels and capsules bearing the marks of genuine Hollands.
They were consigned to one of the Manila distillers, and must have enabled that respectable firm to make a large profit by selling their cheap spirit as imported liquor.
Undoubtedly the manufactures and industries of the Philippines are in a primitive condition, but the tax called the Contribucion Industrial has discouraged improvements, for as soon as any improved machinery or apparatus was adopted, the tax-gatherer came down upon the works for an increased tax. Thus any sort of works employing a steam-engine would be charged at a higher rate. This tax, if it cannot be abolished, should be reformed.
There is a great future before the manufactures of the Philippines, for the people are industrious, exceptionally intelligent, painstaking and of an artistic temperament, so that an ample supply of labour is always available for any light work if reasonably remunerated. They will not need much teaching, and only require tactful treatment to make most satisfactory operatives.
Chapter XVIII.
Commercial and Industrial Prospects.
Philippines not a poor man’s country—Oscar F. Williams’ letter—No occupation for white mechanics—American merchants unsuccessful in the East—Difficulties of living amongst Malays—Inevitable quarrels—Unsuitable climate—The Mali-mali or Sakit-latah—The Traspaso de hambre—Chiflados—Wreck of the nervous system—Effects of abuse of alcohol—Capital the necessity—Banks—Advances to cultivators—To timber cutters—To gold miners—Central sugar factories—Paper-mills—Rice-mills—Cotton-mills—Saw-mills—Coasting steamers—Railway from Manila to Batangas—From Siniloan to the Pacific—Survey for ship canal—Bishop Gainzas’ project—Tramways for Luzon and Panay—Small steamers for Mindanao—Chief prospect is agriculture.
The commercial prospects of the Islands are great, even if we do not instantly take for gospel the fairy tales we are told about Manila becoming the centre of the trade of the Pacific. There can be no doubt that if peace and an honest administration can be secured, capital will be attracted and considerable increase in the export of hemp, tobacco, and sugar will gradually take place as fresh land can be cleared and planted. As I have elsewhere said, the Philippines in energetic and skilful hands will soon yield up the store of gold which the poor Spaniards have been so mercilessly abused for leaving behind them. But the Philippines are not and never will be a country for the poor white man.
A white man cannot labour there without great danger to his health. He cannot compete with the native or Chinese mechanic, in fact he is not wanted there at all. For my part, I would never employ a white man there as a labourer or mechanic, if I could help it, more especially an Englishman or an American, for I know from experience what the result would be. As foreman or overseer a white man may be better, according to his skill and character.
Now let me, as soon as possible, expose the absurdity of a mischievous letter, which I fear may already have done much harm, but I hope my warning may do something to counteract its effects. I quote from the Blue Book so often mentioned: pp. 330–1.
Mr. Williams to Mr. Day.
U. S. S. Baltimore, Manila Bay,
July 2nd, 1898.
Sir,
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
If long occupation or possession on the part of our government be considered, I believe early and strenuous efforts should be made to bring here from the United States men and women of many occupations—mechanics, teachers, ministers, ship-builders, merchants, electricians, plumbers, druggists, doctors, dentists, carriage and harness makers, stenographers, type-writers, photographers, tailors, blacksmiths, and agents for exporting, and to introduce American products natural and artificial of many classes. To all such I pledge every aid, and now is the time to start. Good government will be easier the greater the influx of Americans.
My despatches have referred to our present percentage of export trade. If now our exports come here as intestate, duty free, we have practical control of Philippine trade, which now amounts to many millions, and because of ingrafting of American energy and methods upon the fabulous natural and productive wealth of these islands, can and probably will be multiplied by twenty during the coming twenty years. All this increment should come to our nation and not go to any other.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
I hope for an influx this year of 10,000 ambitious Americans, and all can live well, become enriched....
(Signed) O. F. Williams,
Consul.
I venture to say that the man who wrote this astonishing letter, taking upon himself the responsibility of advising “early and strenuous efforts” to send from the United States thousands of men and women of many occupations to Manila, and of assuring them that “all could live well and become enriched,” knew nothing at all about the state of the Philippine Islands, and is a most unsafe guide.
What on earth would all these tradespeople find to do in the Islands? Where could they be housed? How could they be supported? If they came in numbers, the doctors and druggists might indeed find full employment prescribing and making up medicine for the many sufferers from tropical ailments, especially the typhoid fevers, that would attack the unacclimatised immigrants and the ministers could earn their daily bread by reading the Burial Service, whilst the type-writers would be busy typing letters to friends at home announcing the deaths that occurred; and warning them against coming to starve in Manila. But I defy any one to explain how the ship-builders, electricians, plumbers, tailors and blacksmiths are to make a living. As regards merchants or agents for exporting, I may say that Americans have not been very successful in Manila in this capacity. The great and influential firm of Russell & Sturgis came to grief through over-trading, and another noteworthy firm, Messrs. Peele, Hubbell & Co. failed from rash speculations in sugar, and not from any persecutions by the Spanish authorities, as has been falsely stated in a magazine article. I speak with knowledge on the matter, as I was well acquainted with this firm, having been their Consulting Engineer for the construction of the Slipway at Cañacao for which they were agents. I think it only right to say that the gentlemen who were heads of these American firms were worthy upholders of the high reputation of their country. They failed, but no imputations rested on the characters of the partners, and I have always heard them spoken of with great respect, especially amongst the natives.
Those of them who were personally known to me were men who invariably showed every courtesy and consideration to all who came in contact with them, whether Europeans or natives. Notwithstanding their misfortunes they were a credit to their country, and they did a good deal towards the development of the trade of the Philippines.
I believe that the estates of Russell & Sturgis when realised, paid all their liabilities in full, and besides left considerable pickings in the hands of the liquidators and their friends. Two or three firms were built up out of their ruins. Some Chinese half-castes and natives had received heavy advances from this firm, especially about Molo and Yloilo. One well-known individual had received $60,000, and when summoned before the court he claimed the benefit of the ‘Laws of the Indies,’ by which his liability was limited to $5. The judge, however, ordered him to repay the principal at the rate of a dollar a month! I had this information from the judge himself.
River Pasig, showing Russell and Sturgis’s former office.
To face p. 166.
Curiously enough, American merchants have been equally unsuccessful in other parts of the Far East. Many will remember the failure of Messrs. Oliphant & Co., the great China merchants, agents for the American Board of Missions,[1] notwithstanding their desperate effort to retrieve their position by reviving the coolie trade with Perú, and in later days Messrs. Russell & Co. of Hong Kong also came to grief.
I can give no explanation of the reasons for these four great failures, but I conjecture that all these firms were in too much of a hurry, and tried to “hustle the East.” Yet in face of this calamitous experience, Oscar F. Williams advises more to come, “pledges every aid,” and predicts that “trade can, and probably will, be multiplied by twenty during the coming twenty years.”
For my part, I should think it great progress if the exports and imports of the Philippines could be doubled in twenty years. The idea of sending plumbers to Manila where lead pipes are not used, is a comicality only matched by the suggestion that tailors are wanted amongst a population dressed in cotton shirts and trousers, and where the white people wear veranda-made white duck suits.
Both notions are more suitable for a comic opera than for an official document.
There is only one more paragraph in this letter that I need comment on.
Mr. Williams says: “Good government will be easier, the greater the influx of Americans.”
To those who know the East there is no necessity to argue on this point. I therefore state dogmatically that the presence of white settlers or working people in the Islands would add enormously to the difficulties of government. This is my experience, and during the Spanish Administration it was generally admitted to be the case.
In British India the Government does not in the least degree favour the immigration of British workmen. The only people who are recognised as useful to that country are capitalists and directors of Agricultural or Industrial enterprises.
A large number of American mechanics turned loose amongst the population would infallibly, by their contempt for native customs, and their disregard of native feeling, become an everlasting source of strife and vexation. Impartial justice between the parties would be unattainable; the whites would not submit to be judged by a native magistrate, and the result would be a war of races.
It may be taken as probable that there is no crime, however heinous, that could be committed by an American upon a native, that would involve the execution of the death penalty on the criminal.[2] On the other hand, I can quite believe that natives laying their hands upon Americans, whatever the provocation, would be promptly hanged, if they were not shot down upon the spot. The natives, it should be remembered, are revengeful, and will bide their time; either to use the bolo upon one who has offended them, to burn down his house, set fire to his crop, or put a crow-bar in amongst his machinery. I fear that American brusqueness and impatience would often lead to these savage reprisals.
I think, therefore, that the American Administration of the Philippines should be empowered to prevent or regulate the immigration of impecunious Americans or Europeans whose presence in the Islands must be extremely prejudicial to the much-desired pacification. No, the poor white is not wanted in the Islands, he would be a curse, and a residence there would be a curse to him. He would decay morally, mentally, and physically. The gorgeous East not only deteriorates the liver, but where a white man lives long amongst natives, he suffers a gradual but complete break-up of the nervous system. This peculiarity manifests itself amongst the natives of the Far East in the curious nervous disorder which is called mali-mali in the Philippines and sakit-latah amongst the Malays of the Peninsula and Java. It seems to be a weakening of the will, and on being startled, the sufferer entirely loses self-control and imitates the movements of any person who attracts his attention. It is more prevalent amongst women than men. I remember being at a performance of Chiarini’s Circus in Manila, when General Weyler and his wife were present. The clown walked into the ring on his hands, and a skinny old woman amongst the spectators who suffered from the mali-mali at once began to imitate him with unpleasing results, and had to be forcibly restrained by the scandalised bystanders.
Tower of Manila Cathedral after the Earthquakes 1880.
Suburb of Malate after a typhoon, October, 1882, when 13 ships were driven ashore.
Running amok marks a climax of nerve disturbance, when the sufferer, instead of committing suicide, prefers to die killing others.
He usually obtains his wish, and is killed without compunction, like a mad dog.
Both natives and white residents are at times in rather a low condition of health, and if after exercise or labour they fail to get their meal at the proper time, when it comes they cannot eat. In its lighter form this is called desgána or loss of appetite, but I have seen natives collapse under such circumstances with severe headache and chills. This more serious form is known as traspaso de hambre, and is sometimes the precursor of fever and nervous prostration.
The Roman Catholic Church has had the wisdom to recognise and make allowance for the liability of residents and natives of the Philippines to this serious disorder, and has relaxed the usual rules of fasting, as being dangerous to health.
Amongst the Europeans who have been long in the Islands, many are said to be “chiflado,” a term I can only render into English by the slang word cracked. This occurs more particularly amongst those who have been isolated amongst the natives.
It is not easy to account for, but the fact is undeniable. I have heard it ascribed to “telluric influence,” but that is a wide and vague expression. Perhaps the explanation may be found in the extreme violence of the phenomena of nature.
The frequent earthquakes, the almost continuous vibration of the soil, the awe-inspiring volcanic eruptions, with their sooty black palls of ash darkening the sky for days together, over hundreds of miles, the frightful detonations,[3] the ear-splitting thunder, the devastating rage of the typhoons, the saturated atmosphere of the rainy season, and the hot dry winds of Lent, with the inevitable conflagrations, combine with depressing surroundings and anxieties to wreck the nerves of all but the strongest and most determined natures. If to all this the white resident or sojourner in the Philippines adds the detestable vice of intemperance, or even indulges in a liberal consumption of spirits, then instead of merely shattering his nerves, he is likely to become a raving maniac, for it takes much less whisky to bring on delirium tremens there, than it does in a temperate climate.
Long sojourn in some other lands appears to act in a different manner. In tropical Africa it seems to be the moral balance that is lost. The conscience is blunted if not destroyed, the veneer of civilisation is stripped off, the white man reverts to savagery. The senseless cruelties of Peters, Lothaire, Voulet, Chanoine, and of some of the outlying officials of the Congo Free State are not mere coincidences. They must be ascribed to one common cause, and that is debasement by environment. The moral nature of a white man seems to become contaminated by long isolation amongst savages as surely as the physical health by living amongst lepers.
If a poor white man wishes to sink to the level of a native, he has only to marry a native woman, and his object will be fully attained in a few years. But he will find it very much to his pecuniary interest, for she will buy cheaper and sell dearer than he can, and will manage his house and his business too, most economically. Some of her relations will come and live with him, so that he will not feel lonely, and a half-caste family will grow up round about him, talking the dialect of their mother, which he, perhaps, does not understand. But if the poor white man takes out a white wife, he will probably have the pain and distress of seeing her fade away under the severity of the climate, which his means do not permit him to alleviate. White women suffer from the heat far more than men. Children cannot be properly brought up there after the age of twelve. They must either be sent home to be educated, or allowed to deteriorate and grow up inferior to their parents in health, strength, and moral fibre. When I think of these things, I feel amazed at Oscar F. Williams’ presumption in writing that letter. I hope that not many have taken his advice, and that any who have will call on him to fulfil his imprudent pledges.
However, now I have done with the poor white man. Capital is the great necessity of the Philippines. The labour is there if Generals Otis and McArthur have left any natives alive.
More banks are wanted. At present there are three important banks in Manila, and two of them have branches in Yloilo. The Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation has the largest resources; next comes the Chartered Bank of India, Australasia, and China, and lastly the Banco Español Filipino. The first two give the most perfect facilities for business. I was only interested in importing, but certainly nothing more could be desired by an importer than their system of opening credits against shipping documents; for practically he only had to pay for the goods when they arrived in Manila. All their business was done in the most expeditious manner, and I could suggest no improvement on their methods.
The Banco Español Filipino was in a measure under government control, its procedure was consequently very slow, and its ways those of bygone days.
These banks, however, did not advance money to cultivators to clear lands, plant crops, or erect machinery, as the returns are too slow, not to say doubtful. Yet this is what is wanted; banks in Manila and the chief towns that will advance money for such purposes, under the advice of experts personally acquainted with the cultivators and their lands. Such a business certainly requires great intelligence and discernment.
Still there is a future for such banks, for agriculturists have to pay enormous rates of interest and commissions for money to carry on their plantations. Such banks could also finance timber-cutters, gold miners, and other bona fide workers.
Amongst the enterprises I have recommended when writing about the Pampangos, and others engaged in planting sugar-cane, is the establishment of central sugar factories in suitable localities. Such undertakings, judiciously administered, would have every prospect of success.
There is also room for paper-mills, rice-mills, cotton-mills, and saw-mills, but all these, especially the last, need careful consideration for the selection of the locality where they are to be placed. The manufacture of various kinds of leather could be greatly extended and improved. There is employment for more coasting steamers and schooners. The latter and hulls of small steamers can be built in the country from the native timber.
Although the development of means of communication is all-important, it is evident from the configuration of the Archipelago that no great length of railway is required, nor would it pay to construct them in so mountainous a country. Water-carriage is all-important. In Luzon a line of railway might be made from Manila to Batangas with a branch into the Laguna province. It would traverse a fertile and thickly-populated country.
A short line of railway or electric tramway from near Siniloan on the Lake to the Pacific would be most useful in giving access to and developing the eastern coast, or contra costa, as it is called. This coast is very backward in every way, indeed from Baler to Punta Escarpada on its extreme north, it is quite unknown, and remains in the possession of the Dumagas, an aboriginal tribe of heathen savages of low type, just as at the time of the Spanish conquest; and it would be worth while to study the question of cutting a ship-canal through this narrow strip of land if the mouth could be protected from the Pacific surf. There is also Bishop Gainza’s project that might be revived, that of cutting a canal for country craft from Pasacao in Camarines Sur to the River Vicol. In Negros and Panay some short lines from the ports through the sugar lands might pay if constructed very economically.
Tramways between populous towns not far apart in Luzon and Panay would probably pay very well, as the people are fond of visiting their friends.
It will probably be many years before Mindanao will be in a position to warrant the construction of railways. The island has relapsed into barbarism as a consequence of the withdrawal of the Spanish garrisons and detachments, and of nearly all the Jesuit missionaries.
It could, however, give employment to a flotilla of small steamers and sailing vessels on its northern and southern coasts.
Such is my opinion in brief upon the possibilities of the development of industries and commerce.
That the commerce of the islands, now mainly British, will ultimately pass into American hands, can scarcely be doubted. They are not yet firmly seated in power, but their attitude to British and foreign firms is already sufficiently pronounced to allow an observant onlooker to make a forecast of what it will be later on.
Dominating Cuba, holding the Philippines, the Sandwich Islands and Porto Rico, the Americans will control the cane sugar trade, the tobacco trade, and the hemp trade, in addition to the vast branches of production they now hold in their hands.
[1] Their Hong was colloquially known as Sion Corner.
[2] See the sentence of court-martial on Julius Arnold, musician of M Company, 25th Infantry, for murdering a woman under the most atrocious circumstances it is possible to imagine.
[3] The Krakatoa explosion was heard all over the Southern Philippines like the firing of heavy guns, although the distance in a straight line is over 1500 miles. This will give some idea of the loudness of volcanic explosions.
Chapter XIX.
Life in Manila.
(A Chapter for the Ladies.)
Climate—Seasons—Terrible Month of May—Hot winds—Longing for rain—Burst of the monsoon—The Alimóom—Never sleep on the ground floor—Dress—Manila houses—Furniture—Mosquitoes—Baths—Gogo—Servants—Wages in 1892—The Maestro cook—The guild of cooks—The Mayordomo—Household budget, 1892—Diet—Drinks—Ponies—Carriage a necessity for a lady—The garden—Flowers—Shops—Pedlars—Amusements—Necessity of access to the hills—Good Friday in Manila.