The trade between Spain and the Philippines was for a long time carried on by the way of Mexico. The intercourse between the Crown and her dependencies here was infrequent. The Mohammedans waged frequent wars against the Catholic missionaries, whom they sought to exterminate.
The friars became the real rulers of the civilized parts of the islands. The will of the Spanish priest was absolute. He was independent of State authority. The rule of the Church was so severe that it brought religion into disfavor, and when the power of Aguinaldo arose, that chief insisted upon the expulsion of certain monastic orders, as detrimental to liberty, and demanded the restoration of the estates of the Church to the people.
Such is, in brief, the simple history of the islands discovered by Magellan before the archipelago was ceded by the treaty of Paris to the United States.
MANILA.
Beautiful Manila, shining over the China Sea—so seductive to the white man when seen from a distance, so withering to all his energies when the same white man becomes a resident there!
A two days' voyage from Hong Kong brings the traveler to Luzon to the river Pasig, where the grim old fortresses of Manila, earthquake rent, like a haze of green vegetation, break the view. Palms lift their green cool shadows in the burning air.
Manila is a walled city. The entrance is by drawbridges, which are raised at night.
The mediæval atmosphere does not disappear when one finds one's self within the walls. Exhaustion and decay are everywhere. The large open bay lies in the splendors of the sunlight when the day is calm, and the visitor would never dream of its turbulent condition when it is lashed by the typhoon.
Admiral Dewey.