As the sun declined, I sat watching the islands. We were passing by what is known as the inner course. They lay fair and fragrant as so many Edens afloat upon a body of water as beautiful as any that mortal eyes have ever seen. Huge palms rose high in air, their long feathery leaves swaying softly in the golden light. Darkness fell like a curtain; but the waters now gleamed like nether heavens with their own stars of phosphorescent light.
On the voyage to Japan, a fellow passenger asked if I were sure that Iloilo was my destination in the Philippines and, being assured that it was, informed me that there was no such place on the ship’s maps, which were considered very accurate. The Island of Panay was there, but no town of Iloilo.
Iloilo (é-lo-é-lo) is the second city in size of the Philippines. It stands on a peninsula and has a good harbor if it were not for the shifting sands that make it rather difficult for the large steamers to come to the wharf and the tide running very high at times makes it harder still. There is a long wharf bordered with huge warehouses full of exports and imports. Vast quantities of sugar, hemp and tobacco are gathered here for shipment. It is a center of exchange, a place of large business, especially active during the first years of our occupation.
Immense caravan trains go out from here to the various army posts to carry food and other supplies, while ships, like farm yards adrift, ply on the same errand between port and port. Cebu and Negros are the largest receiving stations.
In the center of the town is the plaza or park. Here, after getting things in order, a pole was set, and the stars and stripes unfurled to the breeze. The quarters of our soldiers were near the park and so our boys had a pleasant place to lounge when off duty in the early morning or evening. When our troops first landed here in 1898 there was quite a battle, but I am not able to give its details. The results are obvious enough. The native army set fire to the city before fleeing across the river to the town of Jaro (Hár-ro). The frame work of the upper part of the buildings was burned but the walls or lower part remains.
After the battle at Jaro, I went out to live for awhile in the quarters of Captain Walter H. Gordon, Lieutenant J. Barnes, and Lieutenant A. L. Conger, 18th U. S. A. I soon realized that the war was still on, for every day and night, the rattle of musketry told that somewhere there was trouble.
One day I went out to see the fortifications deserted by the Filipinos. They were curious indeed; built as an officer suggested, to be run away from, not to be defended. One fortification was ingeniously made of sacks of sugar. Everywhere was devastation and waste and burned buildings. The natives had fled to distant towns or mountains.
All this sounds bad and looked worse, and yet it takes but a little while to restore all. The houses are quickly rebuilt; a bamboo roof is made, it is lifted to the desired height on poles set in or upon the ground. The walls are weavings of bamboo or are plaited nepa. The nepa is a variety of bamboo grown near shallow sea water. When one of these rude dwellings is completed, it is ready for an ordinary family. They do not use a single article that we consider essential to housekeeping. Some of the better class have a kind of stove; its top is covered with a layer of sand or small pebbles, four or five inches thick; on this stand bricks or small tripods to hold the little pots used in cooking. Under each pot is a tiny fire. The skillful cook plays upon his several fires as a musician upon his keys, adding a morsel of fuel to one, drawing a coal from another; stirring all the concoctions with the same spoon. The baking differs only in there being an upper story of coals on the lid.
Town of Molo, Island of Panay.