An Englishwoman in the Philippines

by Mrs. Campbell Dauncey

The Butuan (by-the-bye, she has taken that name from a town in the big southern island of Mindanao) anchored off the mouth of the Pasig at three o’clock this morning, and deck-washing began at four. So at about five I opened my door a little bit and roared for the muchacho, till someone else in another cabin got tired of hearing me, and took up the cry, and it spread through the ship like the cock-crowing in the dawn. By-the-bye, I got away from the shrill of the crickets for a few hours, but did not, as I had hoped, escape the eternal cock-crowing, for those fowls on board the Butuan which had escaped death began to crow at four o’clock for all they were worth, poor things. Well, at last the muchacho came along and brought me a perilous candle and some hot water, and I dressed and packed up the few things I had out, and went up on deck at about six.

At sunrise—a thick, pink, hazy sunrise—we steamed up the river, but I was blasé about everything but food, so I stayed in the saloon and managed to get some biscuits and coffee, and to avoid a plate full of deadly-looking ham and eggs.

There was no room to anchor at the quay, which was fringed with a close line of steamers berthed stern-first, so she anchored in the stream; and until I was “fetched,” I amused myself watching the blue-green water-plants go trailing past, and trying to observe life on board the big, covered, brown lighters. No life was to be seen, however, except the natives wielding immense punt-poles, who walked along the sides of the barges on a platform one plank wide.

At about seven the company’s launch came for me, and she made quite a long trip, down the Pasig and all along outside the breakwater, as the shorter way through was blocked by a dredger. A tremendous new harbour is being built, which bids fair to be a very fine concern, and the Americans think a great deal of it, and say it will enable Manila to compete with and eclipse the shipping of Hong Kong. This is a difficult piece of reasoning to follow, for a glance at a map shows how out of the stream of the world’s traffic Manila lies; and then, besides that, there are the tariffs and customs, and all the vexations of the American system of government, which will make it impossible to compete with the traffic of a free port like Hong Kong. Moreover, it will never pay anyone to shift cargoes in a port where the coolies are so lazy and labour so expensive as in Manila.

It is the American go-ahead, run-before-you-walk way, too, to build great docks and harbours costing millions before they have spent the necessary thousands in constructing roads to bring the merchandise from inland, or sacrificed the hundreds required to encourage trade.

The same thing is being done down in Iloilo, where two millions are being spent on a harbour, when there is not one tolerable road across the island, and all the revenues that choke agriculture go to pay the officials and the school-teachers, conditions which prevail throughout the Archipelago. The Americans mean well by the Philippines, that no one can doubt for an instant, which makes it all the more sad to see them wasting magnificent energy, and earning nothing but failure and unpopularity, by going dead against everything that has ever been discovered about the successful government of Asiatics. But then, is this real government? It is very difficult to know what to call it, as at one time the venture is referred to as a “Colony,” at another as “The youngest of the United States,” and yet again as “A Sacred Trust.” I mean they use these terms indiscriminately and officially, which is very puzzling.

But I am wandering away from the trip in the launch, which went all round these same harbour works till it came right in front of our friends’ house, where a boat came off and took me through the shallow water to the steps at the end of the garden.

It was then nearly eight o’clock, so the day was getting very hot, and the cool house seemed delicious. Breakfast—nice, clean, ungreasy breakfast!—and the joys of a bath. There was a “bathroom” on the Butuan, but in a state of dirt that would have made bathing impossible, even if the bath itself had not been full of old lamps, boots, tin cans, and dirty clothes.

I have spent all the day resting in the house, to save up my energies for an entertainment which I should be very sorry to miss. This is a public reception to be held by the Governor, Mr Luke E. Wright, at his palace on the river, where one will see, as a compatriot informed me, “all Manila at a glance.” I don’t think a glance will satisfy me though, for I want to go and have a good long look. I feel better already for the change of air and scene, and am sure I shall be quite equal to the reception, besides, I would rather be ill than miss such a party!