October 6. Mr. S——, being a member of the Board of Health, has been engaged in inspecting wells. The natives are now saying that he poisoned them. He is indignant, and we are all a little uneasy. We are a handful of Americans—fifteen at the most. We have little confidence in the native scouts, though their officers insist on their loyalty. We are twenty-four hours from Iloilo by steamer, and forty-eight from Manila, and are without a launch at this port. In case of violent animosity against us, the situation might become serious.
October 7. At dinner last night, Mr. S—— said there had been an anti-American demonstration in the market, and that a scout had cried, “Abajo los Americanos!” That settled me. I lost my nerve completely, and went up and asked Dr. and Mrs. S—— to let me spend the night at their house. They were lovely about it, and salved over my mortification by saying that they wondered how I had been able to stand it so long, alone in the native quarter. Slept badly in the strange house, and am afraid I gave much trouble.
October 8. Got some command of my nerves last night, and stayed at home, though I asked the officer commanding the constabulary for a guard. He was most accommodating and outwardly civil, though it was apparent he thought I was making a goose of myself. The guard came, in all the glory of khaki, red-shoulder-straps, 45-calibre revolver, and rifle—don’t know whether it was a Krag or a Springfield. At any rate, he was most imposing, and, as he unrolled his petate on the dining-room floor, assured me in broken Spanish that he would protect me to the last. I bolted my door and went to bed. Slept wretchedly, being, it must be confessed, about as much afraid of the guard as of the possible anti-Americanos.
October 9. Last night, decided that I had yielded to my nerves long enough. Stayed at home, and didn’t ask for a guard either. Being much exhausted by two nights of wakefulness, slept soundly all night. To-day the world looks bright and fresh, and my late terrors inexplicable.
October 12. Poor M—— has the cholera. His duties as a road overseer have taken him into the province, and he has been forced to eat native food. He got a bottle of chlorodyne and seemed to feel that it would save him.
But to-day he is down. Mr, S—— brought the news when he came by to take me for an afternoon walk. We met the inspector and the padre, coming from M——’s house. Extreme unction had been given him and all hope of recovery was gone, though both American physicians had been with him all day and were making every effort to save him. He asked for Mr. S——, so the latter left me to go to his bedside.
At seven o’clock Mr. S—— went by in the dusk, and called to me from the street to send his dinner up to his house. Poor M—— had just died. Mr. S—— held his hand to the last, and was on his way home to burn his shoes and clothing and to take a bath in bichloride.
Most of the American men went in to see M——. I am glad of it. It may not be sanitary, but it is revolting to think of an American dying alone in a Filipino hut.
M—— was buried to-night. I saw the funeral go by. First came the body in the native coffin, smeared with quicklime. The escort wagon loomed up behind in the starlight, full of American men, and then came the scout officer and his wife in the spring wagon. M—— was once a private in the Eighteenth Infantry.
Just after this mournful little procession went by with its queer muffled noises, the big church bell boomed ten, and the constabulary bugles from the other end of the town blew taps. The sound came faintly clear on the still night air, and the tall cocoanut tree that I love to watch from my window drooped its dim outline as if it mourned.