These executions made the people desperate. The secret societies which had been forming all over Luzon had up to this time been merely local lodges of the great society of Freemasons. Now they were turned into political societies, with a definite aim, and that aim was to win greater liberty for the Filipinos. These societies afterwards played a very important part in the history of the islands.
Shortly after the uprising at Cavite, another revolt occurred in Zamboanga; but this was put down with the help of the Moros. After the Cavite insurrection, the native regiment of artillery was disbanded, and a regiment of artillery from the Peninsula was brought to the islands.
In spite of all these disturbances, considerable public work was done during the next few years. The ports of Legaspi, Tacloban, and Leyte were opened to foreign commerce in 1873–1874, and in 1875 the famous Bridge of Spain across the Pasig River, in Manila, was built and thrown open for public use. The opening of the Suez Canal was a helpful thing to the commerce of the Philippines, and under wise and just government there might have been a time of prosperity for the country.
THE GROUNDS OF THE CAVITE ARSENAL.
In 1877 Don Domingo Moriones y Morillo (dō min´gō mō rē ō´nās ē mō rēl´yō) became governor-general. When he arrived in Manila, the King’s Regiment, the mainstay of the Spanish forces in the islands, was in revolt. This revolt had been kept a secret by the retiring governor-general, for fear of the result if the natives should learn the truth. The new governor-general caused the regiment to be drawn up in line and numbered. When this had been done, every tenth man was told off to be shot next morning. Moriones was afterwards persuaded to spare many of these men, but the ringleaders were all shot; some others were put into prison for long terms, and about fifty of them were sent back to Spain in disgrace.
The term of office upon which he entered with such vigor was marked by a number of very good acts on the part of the governor-general. His name should be remembered with gratitude in Manila, for it was he who caused the public waterworks to be built. Over a hundred years before, a patriotic governor-general, Don Fernando Carriedo (fer nän´dō cä rē ā´dō), had left a fund to provide the city with a suitable water supply. This money was to be kept at interest until the fund grew large enough for the purpose, and it had increased so much that work should have been begun a good many years before. But those having the money in charge were not willing to give it up, and it was only after a bitter struggle that Governor-General Moriones was able to get Carriedo’s wishes carried out. This enterprise was a great blessing to the city of Manila, as the value of a pure water supply cannot be over-estimated.
Moriones also did what he could to get appropriations from the treasury to pay off the tobacco growers, whose condition was at this time pitiful indeed. They had not been paid for some years, while at the same time they were not allowed to grow any other crop by which they might maintain themselves. In 1881 this tobacco monopoly, which had worked such wrong to the people, was ended by royal decree of King Alfonso XII.
PUMPING STATION, CARRIEDO WATERWORKS.