“But we are all friends now under a new, friendly flag; and we preach and practice love, instead of fear and fighting,” I replied.
Filippa looked upon me with very happy eyes, when I said this; for a girl seems to know wiser ways of settling quarrels than do boys. A boy becomes excited; a girl thinks longer and acts more slowly. Certainly, Filippa’s gentle ways and the expression in her wonderfully deep eyes had more power with Fil and Moro than would strife and force.
“Every name seems to have a pretty meaning in your Edenlike Philippines,” I remarked to Filippa’s playmate, Favra.
“Yes,” she replied, “the Padre (pă′drāi), our pastor or cleric, who knows so much, tells me that my name means the friendly one who does favors.”
Chapter II
Climate, Typhoons, Volcano
Next day I met the Padre. He was seated on a cane chair under a clump of whispering bamboos, which are giant grasses as tall and as strong as trees.
We had hardly exchanged morning greetings, by saying “Buenos dias (boo āi′nos dē′as),” before we heard the children running along the white shell path, between the parklike tropical woods.