But at last we were to see the Santo Niño for ourselves, and as we left the reception-room and passed down a long corridor, hung with atrocious native paintings of Christian martyrs in every degree of discomfort and uneasiness, through a wide refectory with three great dining tables, the top of each being a solid piece of wood, and finally into the chapel itself, I plead guilty to a distinct thrill of interest in every Protestant pulse.
The chapel was a large, rather bare room, with an altar to the Virgin on one side, and directly opposite it a small shrine painted white and picked out with gold. This shrine was locked, and as one of the little altar boys unfastened the double doors, we noticed the pictures on either side. To the left was Saint Joseph with the child Jesus in his arms; on the right, Mary, sweet and sad-eyed, the premonition of Gethsemane in her tender smile.
When the white doors had been unlocked and lifted off their hinges, a door of silver was discovered. On being opened, it revealed an interior so rich as to surprise a simultaneous exclamation of delight from us all. Gold and silver predominated in the decorations, and in the midst of this splendour stood a little figure about twelve or fourteen inches high, its back turned toward us as it faced the dark interior of the church so far below. A pale blue curtain was drawn over the front of the shrine, but we fortunate ones in the little chapel were looking at the Holy Child more intimately; from the back, to be sure, but so close that we could have touched him with our hands.
On the day of our visit the little figure was attired in a flowing coronation robe of crimson velvet, richly encrusted with elaborate gold embroidery, and while we were admiring this work of art, the priest slowly and very reverently turned the Holy Child around on his pedestal until he faced us squarely.
He is not beautiful—the Santo Niño—nor does he even faintly resemble our conception of the Christ-child. His face is flat and lifeless, carved very roughly out of some dark wood, which, when contrasted with his rich vestments and ornamentation, seems strangely incongruous. From out of this brown face, eyes painted a vivid blue stare straight into one’s own. Around his cheeks fall golden curls. This is not a figure of speech, but a reality, for the curls are of solid metal, the locks of hair being pressed into it like the china hair on the dolls of our childhood.
These golden locks were surmounted by a golden crown. In one wooden hand he held a golden globe with the cross of Catholicism above it, and in the other a golden staff, both of his hands being covered by long golden gauntlets. Right under his feet, which I have no doubt were booted in that precious metal, although they were hidden by the coronation robe, was a gold encrusted medallion containing the tiny bone relics of eight Christian martyrs. Never have I seen anything so barbarically splendid as that little Santo Niño, with his brown wooden face and bright blue eyes, for all the shining metal surrounding him was real, and not a specious tinsel masquerading as something of value.
Legend has it that originally, when the Santo Niño was a Visayan idol, it, too, was made of gold, and not of wood as it is to-day. It seems that after its conversion to Catholicism, on Magellan’s arrival in Cebu, it was sent to Spain at the request of that pious king, Charles the Fifth, where many extraordinary performances were accredited to it, perhaps the most miraculous and unaccountable thing of all being that on its return to Cebu, the people found it had changed itself en route from gold to wood, a reversal of alchemy strangely defective in wisdom on the part of the Santo Niño. Though, indeed, the transmutation may have been entirely without his volition, in which case it is small wonder that the Holy Child objected so strongly to a subsequent visit on the Continent.
At one side of this very elaborate shrine of gold and silver stood a small tin box in which one was expected to place his contribution to the Santo Niño. We paid handsomely for our glimpse of it, saw the little figure turned slowly around on its pedestal so that it again faced the church below, saw the silver door locked and the two white removable outside doors placed in position, and then somewhat reluctantly left.
Once down the broad stairway of the convento, whose massive hand-rail of carved ebony would make the heart of a collector leap for joy, we stepped into the church where many natives knelt in prayer, glancing up reverently now and then at the tiny shrine so far above their heads. In front of it the blue silk curtains were fast drawn, for except on holy days, it takes at least a peso to see the Santo Niño face to face.
On the following morning two of the padres from the convento returned our call, and evinced the most satisfying interest in all that was shown them aboard ship. Everything delighted them, and they even gathered up the long skirts of their cassocks, and grasped their birettas firmly in one hand, preparatory to descending into the noisome cable-tanks, should it be demanded of them. When the ship had been inspected, we all returned to the quarter-deck, where refreshments were served, the while we showed our guests some photographs of America.