The Story of the Philippines / Natural Riches, Industrial Resources, Statistics of Productions, Commerce and Population; The Laws, Habits, Customs, Scenery and Conditions of the Cuba of the East Indies and the Thousand Islands of the Archipelagoes of India and Hawaii, With Episodes of Their Early History; The Eldorado of the Orient; Personal Character Sketches of and Interviews with Admiral Dewey, General Merritt, General Aguinaldo and the Archbishop of Manila; History and Romance, Tragedies and Traditions of our Pacific Possessions; Events of the War in the West with Spain, and the Conquest of Cuba and Porto Rico

by Murat Halstead

CHAPTER XII

The American Army in Manila.

Why the Boys Had a Spell of Home Sickness—Disadvantages of the
Tropics—Admiral Dewey and his Happy Men—How Our Soldiers Passed
the Time on the Ships—General Merritt's Headquarters—What Is Public
Property—The Manila Water Supply—England Our Friend—Major-General
Otis, General Merritt's Successor.

The American soldiers in the Philippines were most devoted and cheerful, patient under hardship and pleasantly satisfied that they were as far to the front as anybody and seeing all there was to see during the siege of Manila. They were out in tropical rains, and the ditches they waded were deep with mud unless filled with water. They were harassed by the Spanish with the long-range Mausers at night and insufficiently provided a part of the time with rations. At best they had a very rough experience, but kept their health and wanted to go into the city with a rush. They would rather have taken chances in storming the place than sleep in the mud, as they did for twenty days.

When the defenders of Manila concluded that the honor of Spain would be preserved by the shedding of only a little blood in a hopeless struggle and fell back from very strong positions before the advance of skirmish lines, and the American columns entered the city, keeping two armies—the Spaniards and the insurgents—apart, and, taking possession, restored order and were sheltered in houses, it soon began to occur to the boys, who came out of the wet campaign looking like veterans and feeling that they had gained much by experience, that they were doing garrison duty and that it was objectionable. The soldiers who arrived on the Peru, City of Pueblo and Pennsylvania were shocked that they had missed the fight and disgusted with the news of peace. They had made an immense journey to go actively into war, and emerged from the ocean solitude to police a city in time of peace. It was their notion that they lacked occupation; that their adventure had proved an enterprise that could not become glorious.

The romance of war faded. Unquiet sensations were produced by the stories that there was nothing to do but go home, and they would soon be placed aboard the transports and homeward bound. Besides, the climate was depressing. The days were hot and the nights were not refreshing. The rations were better and there were dry places to sleep, but there was no inspiring excitement, and it was not a life worth living. War—"the front"—instead of offering incomparable varieties, became tedious—it was a bore, in fact. How could a crowded city and thronged streets be attractive in a military sense, or the scene of patriotic sacrifice, when the most arduous duty was that of police? Was it for this they had left homes in Oregon, Montana, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Nebraska, Utah, California and Colorado?

There came an episode of homesickness. It was about time in a soldier's life to contrast it with the farms and the villages, the shops, mines and manufactories. They were kept busy on guard and in caring for themselves, in activities as the masters of a strange community, but the novelties of the tropics lost their flavor. What did a man want with oranges when there were apples? What was a rice swamp compared with a corn field? Think of the immeasurable superiority, as a steady thing, of an Irish potato to a banana, or a peach to a pineapple! What was a Chinese pony alongside a Kentucky horse, or a water buffalo with the belly of a hippopotamus and horns crooked as a saber and long as your arm to one who had seen old-fashioned cows, and bulls whose bellowing was as the roaring of lions? The miserable but mighty buffaloes were slower than oxen and, horns and all, tame as sheep—the slaves of serfs!

As for the Chinese, if there were no other objection, they should be condemned because too numerous—faithful, perhaps, in a way, but appearing with too much frequency in the swarming streets. And the women, with hair hanging down their backs, one shoulder only sticking out of their dresses, the skin shining like a scoured copper kettle; a skirt tight around the hips and divided to show a petticoat of another tint, a jacket offering further contrasts in colors, slippers flapping under naked heels, faces solemn as masks of death heads—oh, for the rosy and jolly girls we left behind us in tears! How beautiful were the dear golden-haired and blue-eyed blondes of other days! The boys wanted at least tobacco and aerated waters to soothe themselves with, and if there was not to be any more fighting, what was the matter with going home?

They also serve, however, who only stand and wait—there are no soldiers or sailors in the world who are in a position of greater interest and usefulness than those of the American army and navy who hold fast with arms the capital city of the Philippines. The army, though much exposed, has not suffered severely from sickness. There has been an intense and protracted strain upon the men of the ships, but they have recovered from the amiable weakness for home, and they are not merely well; they are more than plain healthy—they are hearty and happy! There is the light of good times in their faces. One thing in their favor is they have not been allowed to eat unwholesome food, and the floors of the warboats and every piece of metal or wood that is in sight is polished and glistening with cleanliness. The soldiers will feel better when the postoffice is in working order and they will do better by their organs of digestion when they are not deluged with fizz—that is, pop, and beer made without malt, and the strange, sweetish fruits that at first were irresistible temptations.

"Come with me and see the men of the Olympia," said Admiral Dewey, "and see how happy they are, though they have been shut up here four months." And the men did look jolly and bright, and proud of the Admiral as he of them, and they were pleased when he noticed, kindly, the hostile little monkey, who is the mascot, and the other day bit the Captain.

The health of the boys was preserved at sea by systematic exercise. Not a transport crossed the Pacific that was not converted into a military school, and each floating schoolhouse had about 1,000 pupils. They were put through gymnastics and calisthenics when, as a rule, they were barefooted and wore no clothes but their undershirts and trousers. There was even a scarcity of suspenders. The drill-masters were in dead earnest, and their voices rang out until the manifestation of vocal capacity excited admiration. The boys had to reach suddenly for heaven with both hands and then bring their arms to their sides with swinging energy. Then they had to strike out right and left to the order "Right!" "Left!" until the sergeant was satisfied. Next each foot had to be lifted and put down quickly at the word of command; then it was needful that the legs should he widely separated in a jump and closed up with vigor; then the spinal columns swayed forward and back and all the joints and muscles had something to do. This was no laughing matter to any one, though it was funny enough from the ordinary standpoint of civil life. This medicine was taken day after day, and seemed to vindicate itself.

It was esteemed a good thing for the boys to perspire from exercise. There was no trouble, though, when south and west of Honolulu, in having substantially Turkish baths in the bunks at night, and there were queer scenes on deck—men by hundreds scantily clothed and sleeping in attitudes that artists might have chosen to advantage for life studies. It was necessary for those who walked about, during the hours thus given to repose, where the enlisted men took their rest with their undershirts and drawers around them, to be careful not to tramp on the extended limbs. Once I feared I had hit a soldier's nose with my heavy foot when stepping over him in a low light, and was gratified that my heel had merely collided with a big boy's thumb. He had gone to sleep with his head protected by his hand. I paused long enough to note that the sheltering hand if clinched would have been a mighty and smiting fist; and I was doubly pleased that I had not tramped on his big nose.

Not infrequently, when we were steaming along the 20th parallel of north latitude—that is to say, well in the torrid zone—and were wafted by the trade winds that were after us at about our own speed, heavy showers came up in the night and spoiled the luxurious content of those who were spread on the decks. The boys got in good form through the longest journey an army ever made—for the distance is greater from the United States to the Philippines than from Spain—and every week the skill of a soldier in acquiring the lessons of the climate and the best methods of taking care of himself will become more useful, and the tendency will be to settle down to the business of soldiering, make the best of it and accept it as educational—an experience having in it the elements of enduring enjoyments. "The days when I was in Manila, away down in the south seas, but a little way from the island from which came the wild man of Borneo," will be pleasant in remembrance, and there will be perpetually an honorable distinction in identification with an ambitious yet generous enterprise, one of the most remarkable a nation can undertake—not excepting the Roman conquests all around the Mediterranean, and that touched the northern sea, invading England.

In the later days of August there were in the prisons of Manila, which answer to the penitentiary and jail in the American States, 2,200 prisoners, one of whom was a Spaniard! The prisons are divided only by a high wall and contain many compartments to assist in classification. There are considerable spaces devoted to airing the prisoners, and one in which the privileged are permitted to amuse themselves with games. The guard consisted, when I visited the place, of sixty-three soldiers from Pennsylvania. There were many women imprisoned. One who had been shut up for more than a year was taken into custody because she had attempted rather informally to retake possession of a house of which she had been proprietor and out of which she had been fraudulently thrown. Her crime was a hysterical assertion of her rights and her uninvited tenants were Spaniards.

One of the buildings contained the criminals alleged to be desperate, and as they stood at the windows the chains on their right legs were in sight. It was plainly seen in several cases that the links of the chains used were about three inches long and that three or four turns were taken around the right ankle. In a group of prisoners waiting for supper to be handed them in pans in the open air a large number wore chains. Many of the prisoners were incarcerated as insurgents, having offended by refusing to espouse the Spanish cause or by some other capital criminality in that line of misconduct! A commission was investigating their cases and the Filipinos who had not satisfied the Spanish requirements were represented by an able lawyer who was well informed and disposed to do justice. Sixty-two of the inmates of the penitentiary held for discontent with the Spanish system of government were to be discharged as soon as the papers could be made out.

Many most interesting questions arise in connection with the capitulation of the Spanish army. It was agreed that the Spaniards, upon surrendering and giving up the public property, should be entitled to the honors of war. It was expressly understood that the arms the troops gave up were to be retained. In case the Americans abandoned the islands or the Spaniards departed the rifles should be given them, and usage would seem to determine that this return of weapons must include the Mausers in the hands of the troops now prisoners of war and the cartridges they would carry if they took the field.

Then arises a difficulty as to the precise meaning of the words "public property." There were laid down by the Spaniards about 12,000 Mausers and Remingtons, and there were 10,000 in the arsenals—22,000 in all. It is admitted that 12,000 personally surrendered rifles go back to the Spaniards, whether they or we go away from the islands—as one or the other is sure to do—but the 10,000 stand of arms in the arsenals come under the head of "public property," and so should be retained permanently by the Americans. The number of ball cartridges a soldier starting out to make a march carries is 100. There were surrendered more than 500 rounds to the man. The public money was public property, of course, and General Greene demanded the keys to the vault containing it. The Spanish authorities objected, but yielded after presenting a written protest. The money consisted of Spanish and Mexican dollars, a lot of silver bars and change fused into one mass, and some gold in the same state, also $247,000 in copper coin, which was regarded, under the old dispensation, good stuff to pay poor wages to poor men and women.

There are some fine points about customs. The American flag floats over the city, and the importers and exporters want to know what the charges are and how much the private concessions must be. Some of these people ran around for several days with the object of placing a few hundred Mexican dollars in the hands of officials, where they would do the most good, and could not find anybody ready to confer special favors for hard cash. These pushing business men had been accustomed to meet calls for perquisites, and did not feel safe for a moment without complying with that kind of formality. They turned away embarrassed and disappointed, and were surprised to learn that they were on a ground floor that was wide enough to accommodate everybody.

It should be mentioned in this connection, also, a Mexican dollar passes in Manila for 50 cents American. The price of Mexican dollars in the banks of San Francisco and Honolulu is 46 and 47 cents. The way it works is illustrated in paying in a restaurant for a lunch—say for two. If the account is $2 you put down a $5 United States gold piece and receive in change eight Mexican dollars. If you buy cigars at $40 per 1,000 a $20 American gold piece pays the $40 bill. There is now pretty free coinage of Mexican dollars and they answer admirably as 50-cent coins. That is one of the ways in which free coinage of silver removes prejudices against the white metal; no one thinks of objecting to a Mexican dollar as a half-dollar, and our boys, paid in American gold, have a feeling that their wages are raised because all over the city one of their dollars counts two in the settlement of debts. These useful American dollars are admitted free of duty.

The headquarters of the American administration in Manila are in the city hall, situated in the walled city, with a park in front that plainly has been neglected for some time. It also fronts upon the same open square as the cathedral, while beyond are the Jesuit College and the Archbishop's palace. Just around the corner is a colossal church, and a triangular open space that has a few neglected trees and ought to be beautiful but is not. A street railroad passes between the church and the triangle, and the mule power is sufficient to carry at a reasonable rate a dozen Spanish officers and as many Chinamen. The fare is 1 cent American—that is, 2 cents Philippine—and the other side of the river you are entitled to a transfer, but the road is short and drivers cheap. There is a system of return coupons that I do not perfectly understand. The truth about the street railway system is that there is very little of it in proportion to the size of the city, but the average ride costs about 1 cent. If the Americans stay there is an opening for a trolley on a long line.

There is no matter of business that does not depend upon the question: Will the Americans stay? If they do all is well; if they do not all is ill, and enterprise not to be talked of.

The most important bridge across the Pasig is the bridge of Spain. The street railway crosses it. The carriages and the coolies, too, must keep to the left. It is the thoroughfare between the new and old cities, and at all hours of the day is thronged. It is a place favored by the native gig drivers to whip heavily laden coolies out of the way. A big Chinaman with powerful limbs, carrying a great burden, hastens to give the road to a puny creature driving a puny pony, lashing it with a big whip, and scrambles furiously away from a two-wheeler whirling along a man able to pay a 10-cent fare.

In other days when one passed this bridge he faced the botanical gardens, which had a world-wide reputation, an attraction being a wonderful display of orchids. There were also beautiful trees; now there are only stumps, disfigurements and desolation—some of the horrors of war. The gardens were laid waste by the Spaniards as a military precaution. As they seem to have known that they could not or would not put up a big fight for the city, what was the use of the destructiveness displayed in the gardens, parks and along the boulevards? The fashion of taking a garden and making a desert of it and calling it one of the military necessities of war is, however, not peculiar to the chieftains of Spain.

Crossing the bridge of Spain to the walled city and turning to the right there are well-paved streets bordered with strips of park beside the river, that is rushing the same way if you are going to headquarters; and the object that tells where to turn off to find the old gateway through the wall, with a drawbridge over the grassy moat, is a Monument to Alphonse, whose memory it is the habit of these people to celebrate. Approaching the city hall (headquarters) there is a white-walled hospital to note; then comes a heavy mass of buildings on a narrow street, and the small square already styled in this article a park, and we arrive at the grand entrance of the official edifice. The room devoted to ceremony is so spacious that one must consent that magnitude is akin to grandeur. There is the usual double stairway and a few stone steps to overcome. On the right and left under the second lift of stairs were corded the Spanish Mausers and Remingtons and many boxes of cartridges. I have several times noticed soldiers tramping on loose cartridges as though they had no objection at all to an explosion. You can tell the Mauser ammunition, because the cartridges are in clips of five, and the little bullets famous for their long flight are covered with nickel. The Remington bullets are bigger and coated with brass. Something has been said to the effect that the Remington balls used by the Spaniards are poisonous and that it is uncivilized to manufacture them. The object of the Mauser and Remington system in covering the bullets, the one with nickel and the other with brass, is not to poison, but to prevent the lead from fouling the rifles. The point is almost reached in modern guns of 2,000 and 3,000 yards range where the friction of the gun barrel and the speed of the missile at the muzzle are sufficient to fuse unprotected lead, and at any rate so much of the soft material would soon he left in the grooves as to impair accuracy and endanger the structure of the arm.

Right ahead when the first stairs are cleared is a splendid hall, with a pair of gilded lions on a dais, and some of the boys had adorned these beasts with crowns of theatrical splendor. The arms of Spain are conspicuous, and in superb medallions illustrious warriors, statesmen, authors, artists and navigators, look down from the walls upon desks now occupied by American officers. Above this floor the stairs are blocks of hardwood, the full width of the stairway and the height of the step, and this earthquake precaution does not detract from the dignity of the building, for the woodwork is massive and handsome. A marvelous effect might be produced in some of the marble palaces of private citizens in our American cities by the construction of stairways with the iron-hard and marble-brilliant wood that is abundant in Puerto Rico, Cuba and Luzon. The hall in which the city council met, now the place of the provost-marshal's court, is furnished in a style that puts to shame the frugality displayed in the council chambers of our expensively governed American cities, where men of power pose as municipal economists.

In the elevated chair of the President, faced by the array of chairs of the Spanish councilmen, or aldermen, sits the provost-marshal judge, and before him come the soldiers who have forgotten themselves and the culprits arrested by the patrol. On the wall above him is a full-length likeness of the Queen Regent—a beautiful, womanly figure, with a tender and anxious mother's solicitous face. She looks down with sad benignity upon the American military government. There is also a portrait of the boy king, who becomes slender as he gains height, and rather sickly than strong. It may be that too much care is taken of him.

In the corner room at the end of the corridor Major-General Otis received at his desk the news that Generals Merritt and Greene were ordered home, and that he was the major-general commanding and the chief of the civil, as well as the military department of the government. He had already found much to do and tackled the greater task with imperturbable spirit and a habit of hard work with, his friends say, no fault but a habit that is almost impracticable of seeing for himself almost everything he is himself held responsible for. If he has a weakness of that sort he has a rare opportunity to indulge it to the full extent of his personal resources. He certainly dispatches business rapidly, decides the controverted points quickly and has a clear eye for the field before him. His record is a good one. When the war of the States came on he was a New York lawyer—his home is at Rochester. Near the close of the war he was wounded on the Weldon road, along which Grant was extending his left wing to envelop Petersburg. He was struck by a musket ball almost an inch from the end of the nose, and the course of it was through the bones of the face under the right eye, passing out under the right ear. He was "shot through the head," and suffered intensely for a long time, but maintained his physical vitality and mental energy. His face is but slightly marked by this dreadful wound. He has been a hard student all his life, and is an accomplished soldier, as well as an experienced lawyer. His judicial services in court-martials have been highly estimated. Altogether he is well equipped for executing the various duties of his position. He will "hold the fort in good shape." In an adjacent room, Assistant Adjutant-General Strong, son of the ex-mayor of New York, a young man of much experience in the national guard and a sharp shooter, sticks to business with zeal and knowledge, and in a very few days established a reputation as a helper.

So much has been said in disparagement of the "sons of somebodies" that it is a pleasure to put in evidence the cleverness and intelligent industry of Captain Strong, late of the 69th New York, and of Captain Coudert, of New York.

General Merritt took possession of the palace of the governor-general, overlooking the river, a commodious establishment, with a pretentious gate on the street, a front yard full of shrubbery and rustling with trees, a drive for carriages and doors for their occupants at the side and a porte cochere, as the general said with a twinkle of his eye, for the steam launch which was a perquisite of the Governor. The commanding general of the Philippine expedition enjoyed the life on the river, along which boats were constantly passing, carrying country supplies to the city and returning. The capacity of canoes to convey fruit and vegetables and all that the market called for was an unexpected disclosure. There were unfailing resources up the river or a multitude of indications were inaccurate. The General's palace is more spacious than convenient; the dining room designed for stately banquets, but the furniture of the table was not after the manner of feasts, though the best the country afforded, and the supply of meat improved daily, while the fruit told of the kindly opulence of the tropics.

There was a work of art in the palatial headquarters that the commanding general highly appreciated—a splendid but somber painting of the queen regent in her widow's weeds, holding the boy king as a baby on her right shoulder, her back turned to the spectator, gloomy drapery flowing upon the carpet, her profile and pale brow and dark and lustrous hair shown, her gaze upon the child and his young eyes fixed upon the spectator. This picture has attracted more attention than any other in Manila, and the city is rich in likenesses of the queen mother and the royal boy, who, without fault have upon them the heavy sorrows of Spain in an era of misfortune and humiliation; and it will take some time for the Spanish people, highly or lowly placed, to realize that the loss of colonies, as they have held them, is a blessing to the nation and offers the only chance of recuperation and betterment in Spain's reputation and relations with the world.

The governor-general's palace, with General Merritt for General, was a workshop, and the highly decorated apartments, lofty and elaborate, were put to uses that had an appearance of being incongruous. The cot of the soldier, shrouded in a mosquito bar, stood in the midst of sumptuous furniture, before towering mirrors in showy frames, and from niches looked down marble statues that would have been more at home in the festal scenes of pompous life in the sleepy cities of dreamy lands. There was no more striking combination than a typewriting machine mounted on a magnificent table, so thick and resplendent with gold that it seemed one mass of the precious metal—not gilt, but solid bullion—and the marble top had the iridescent glow of a sea shell. This was in the residence of the General, his dining and smoking rooms and bedrooms for himself and staff, the actual headquarters being next door in the residence of the secretary-general. Here was a brilliant exhibition of mirrors, upon some of which were paintings of dainty design and delicate execution, queerly effective. The tall glasses stood as if upon mantles. There were other glasses that duplicated their splendors; through the open doors down the street, which was the one for the contemplation of the gorgeous—and down the street means into the modern end of the city—was the residence of the Spanish Admiral of the annihilated fleet, Montijo. It had been the property of and was the creation of a German, who got rich and got away in good time with $1,000,000 or more, selling his house to one of the rich Chinese, who had the fortune, good, bad or indifferent, to become the landlord of the Admiral whose ships disappeared in a vast volume of white vapor on the May morning when the Americans came and introduced themselves.

General Greene's headquarters were in the house the German merchant built, the Chinese millionaire bought, and the Admiral, without a fleet since the 1st of May, rented. The furnishing was rich; there were frescoes that were aglow with the tropic birds and window curtains that were dreams. The vast mansions of the ex-officials were not, however, such as would have been sought as accommodations for the management of the military and other affairs, and there was much lacking to comfort; but as the hotels after the siege were not tolerable, the officers had to discover houses in which they could develop resources, and the public property was that of those who conquered to the extent to which it had belonged to those displaced.

The Americans got out of the chaotic hotels soon as possible, for there were some things in them simply not endurable. They rent houses and employ servants and set up housekeeping. The newspaper correspondents have been driven to this, and they are comparatively happy. They have found ponies almost a necessary of life, and food that is fair is attainable, while the flowing hydrants remove a good deal of privation and apprehension. The water is from an uncontaminated stream, and though slightly soiled after heavy rainfalls, it is not poisonous, and that is what many American and European cities cannot truthfully say of their water supplies. The demand for houses by the Americans has raised the views of the proprietors. The street on which the official Spaniards meant to flourish, as Weyler, Blanco and others had done before them, and had not time to reap a harvest of plunder before the days of doom came, would be called by the citizens of Cleveland, O., the Euclid avenue of the town. It runs out to the old fort where the Spaniards made their stand "for the honor of the arms of Spain." The English and German and Chinese successful men reside in this quarter. The majority of those who have provided themselves with houses by the river and fronting on the street most approved, looking out through groves and gardens, are Chinese half-castes, claiming Chinese fathers and Philippine mothers. These are the most rapacious and successful accumulators, and they would all be glad to see the Americans stay, now that they are there, and have shown themselves so competent to appreciate desirable opportunities and understand the ways and means, the acquirements and the dispensations of prosperity as our troops entered the city by the principal residence street, it was noticed that guards were left at all the houses that displayed the British flag—a reward for English courtesy, and the feeling of the troops that the British are our friends.