[4] Mr. Canon; also Craig. [↑]
[5] The letter will be found in a later chapter. [↑]
[6] Craig, p. 165. On Retana’s return from the Philippines he became connected with “La Politica de España en Filipinas,” an organ of reaction and most furiously opposed by “La Solidaridad.” From 1895 to 1898 he was the chief editor of this virulent sheet, which was undoubtedly maintained by the friars as their mouthpiece in the capital. Compare Blair and Robertson, Vol. LII, p. 164. [↑]
CHAPTER XII
“EL FILIBUSTERISMO”
For Spanish or Filipino ears, “filibuster” has nothing of the comic or disreputable suggestion that it bears to the American. In the Philippines of Rizal’s day it denoted a person opposed to the existing régime, an insurgent, whether advocating peaceful or violent means of separation from Spain. “El Filibusterismo” means a movement for Philippine independence.
In this novel again, the chief figure is Ibarra, the hero of “Noli Me Tangere.” It was Elias, not Ibarra, that was struck with the bullets of the Civil Guards when they were pursuing his banca; Ibarra escaped unhurt. He made his way out of the country and now returns after some years, disguised and under an assumed name, to seek the revenge upon which all this time his heart has been brooding. The difference between the Ibarra that refused Elias’ prayer to lead the people and this Ibarra become now hopeless of any peaceful remedy betrays once more the change we have already noted as coming over Rizal’s most cherished convictions and in spite of himself. A struggle was going on between what he still wished to believe and what his judgment told him was inevitable, and in the conflict he grew in hardihood. From the savage vengeance that pursued his sisters, brothers, [[216]]father, and mother when it had failed to reach him, he was beginning to learn how idle was the hope to win reform by merely ladylike appeals. Yet the book was not of purpose any signal to popular revolt. What he intended was solemn warning. So far the Filipino has stood and asked for justice, still patient, still holding out the friendly hand. Wronged hearts will not always accept scurvy affronts; men will not always put up with kicks when they ask fair play. This Filipino whom you despise and trample on nineteen years in twenty and who, in the twentieth, throws you into a panic, is not the human dish-cloth you are pleased now to imagine him. He has in him the capacity for a great and memorable revenge, and upon your heads he will pull down your structure if you do not hear him.
Other characters of the first book reappear in this. Father Salvi, the lascivious friar whose machinations brought about Ibarra’s downfall; Capitán Tiago, Doña Victorina, and Basilio, the son of Sisa. Ibarra calls himself Mr. Simoun. His pretended business is that of a traveling merchant of jewelry and laces; his real occupation is to spy out the land, to lay plots against the governing class that ruined him, and, if possible, to release Maria Clara from her convent prison. The narrative is chiefly concerned with these plots and their failure; but behind them always seems to show a grim figure telling Government that such plots will not always fail.