“Extract from a report of H. O. Bauman, chief of Bureau of Lands survey party No. 27. Report dated June 30, 1913:
“In 1905 the applicant (Fernando Asirit) entered an application for homestead and proceeded to clear the remainder of the land not already cleared. Sometime during the following year or two, this Catalino Sagon began to clear a piece of land included in the homestead application. When Fernando Asirit saw the man cleaning the land, he told the man that that particular land was included in the homestead and that the work he was doing was useless. Catalino admitted this to me personally. However, the applicant to show his good faith, paid Catalino a sum of ten pesos for the small area that he had cleaned and took a receipt therefor and Catalino left the land. Now when the private surveyor came in 1910, this Catalino appears and claims this land despite the fact that he never cultivated nor occupied the land and that he received payment in full for the work that he had done in clearing an acre of the land. When the land was surveyed in 1910, Catalino at the request of a politician of Ilagan, made a protest against the land and between the two they frightened the applicant into letting this Catalino have possession of the land. Since 1910, Catalino has not cultivated the land but loaned it out to another person, Frederico Mayer by name. Personally, Catalino did not ever cultivate or live on the land. The politician who has been stirring up this trouble is Gabriel Maramag, third member of the Provincial board. The applicant is an old man seventy years old and this Maramag had the old man fined ₱125.80 for refusing to let these two have his land. They also told him that if he persisted in refusing to let them have the land, they would fine him ₱500. As the old man has no such amount and being thoroughly bulldozed by these cheap politicians, he had no other course to pursue. The co-partner of the third member is the Sheriff Joaquin Ortega against whom the people are very bitter on account of his shady dealings. It might be noted here that these men are under investigation by the Constabulary now for accepting money illegally. Furthermore this Maramag has the plans of the land of a great many men in his house and thus has a hold on them and they cannot do anything without his consent.”
[2] The best evidence of what the average Filipino cultivates is found in the free patents. Of the 15,885 free patents applied for the average area is declared to be 7¾ acres; 4,025 Free Patents have been actually surveyed; their average area is only 5 acres.
Chapter XXXI
The Philippine Forests
Would that I had adequate words in which to describe the wonders of the Philippine forests, through which I wandered almost daily for four years, and which I love to revisit whenever the opportunity presents itself! Their majestic stateliness and magic beauty defy description. I have seen them swept by hurricanes when huge branches crashed down and mighty trees thundered to earth, imperilling life and limb, and I have seen them in the still noons of the tropics when not a leaf stirred. At times they are vocal with songs of birds and ceaseless din of insects, and again they are as silent as the grave. Who could do justice to the endless variety and beauty of tree-trunk, leaf and flower; the exquisite drapery of vines, ferns and orchids which covers the older forest monarchs; the weird masses of aërial roots which lead superstitious natives to believe some trees to be haunted, and small wonder; the ever changing light and shade bringing out new beauties where one least expects to find them; the endless differences in the flora due to variations in altitude and in the distribution of moisture?
In Mindoro, Palawan and Mindanao we find tropical vegetation in its absolute perfection; in the highlands of northern Luzón we meet our old friends, the pine and oak, while beside them grow strawberries, raspberries, huckleberries, jacks-in-the-pulpit and other friends of our childhood days.
Surely the Philippine forests should be preserved, but not for their beauty alone! In them the people have a permanent source of wealth, if they can only be made to realize it and to take proper measures to protect it. Certainly no other country has a greater variety of beautiful and serviceable woods. Some of them are so close-grained and hard that they successfully resist the attacks of white ants, and prove almost indestructible even when buried in the earth. Others will not stand exposure to the weather, but last indefinitely under cover and are excellent for inside framing and finishing. We have the best of cabinet woods, such as ebony, camagon, narra,[1] acle, and tindalo. From some of our trees come valuable gums, such as almaciga[2] and gutta percha. Others produce alcohol, tan barks, dyewoods, valuable vegetable oils or drugs. The so-called “Singapore cane,” so highly prized by makers of wicker furniture, grows abundantly in Palawan. Great areas are covered with a bamboo which makes an excellent paper pulp.
In short, the Philippine forests should be like money in the bank for the inhabitants of the islands. There are in this world wise people who under ordinary circumstances spend only the interest on their money; and there are others who spend the principal while it lasts. To which class do the Filipinos belong?