The inhabitants resort in the evening to the Pier, which is a solid structure extending a sixteenth of a mile into the bay, a sea-view on all sides; and once a week there is music by the bands, which draws crowds. Much of this Spanish music is more sentimental than we are accustomed to hear addressed to the populace, exciting a thoughtful attention.
CLIMATE OF MANILA.
Manila is the capital of Luzon, one of the Philippine Islands. The climate in December and January was intensely hot. After nine o’clock in the morning, it was not agreeable to be out of doors, even to drive; but at five in the afternoon, and in the evening, the cool sea-breezes made it pleasant to be abroad.
RELIGIOUS SERVICE.
Religious services are sustained on Sabbath evenings by a few christian friends at the house of one of their number, but there is no public place of Protestant worship there. It was instructive to go from China, from the depths of heathen idolatry, into the depths of formalism under the name of Christianity. You question whether you have advanced at all into the light of truth; for though it is a relief to be where the Scriptures and the names and forms of christianity are heard and seen, you are impressed with the bias of the human heart to idolatry. To come from heathenism in China, and Roman Catholic superstition in Manila, into christian temples here at home, makes you wonder that only a certain number of leagues of salt water separate between us and such places as Canton or Manila.
TROPICAL FRUITS.
Of all the fruits which I have tasted in any part of the world, nothing has seemed to me preferable to the East Indian Mango. It is about the length of a full grown cucumber, as large as the largest specimens of that vegetable, smaller at one end that at the other. It has a flat stone extending from end to end. The skin is about the thickness of that of the banana. You stand the mango on one end in your plate and slice it on either side of the stone. Two slices then lay before you. With a dessert spoon you take out piece after piece of the tender fruit, and when you have eaten both halves to the skin, there yet remains the stone, which has a great deal on it. You take it up in both hands and pass your mouth around it. By this time your hands and face are a spectacle which you can judge of by the predicament which you see your neighbor to be in. You are ready to agree with the East Indian maxim that a mango never should be eaten except in a tub of water. You cannot help beginning with another; but let it be small, or you will be likely to inquire if you may not divide your second with a friend. The fruit is of about the same color inside as the muskmelon, but it is harder, though not tough, not disagreeably sweet; juicy, nutritious. We began to receive them at Hong Kong in May, from Manila, where they are in perfection. We were surprised on seeing them upon the table at Christmas in Manila, a forcing process being used there to bring them forward.
Another valuable fruit in the East Indies is the Mangastene. It is of the size of the tomato and looks like it in shape; it is of the deep purple color of the purple grape. The outside shell, which is easily broken by the hand, being removed, a snow white fruit appears, divided like the tomato into as many sections. Its juice is slightly acid,—more correctly, acidulated,—a pleasant sour. There being little or nothing solid in it, the saying is that one may eat of the fruit indefinitely. There are few fruits better adapted to a warm climate.
At Shanghai the Watermelon attains a degree of perfection which I have never known exceeded.
The Pumelo, though a coarse fruit, is valuable. It resembles the West India shadduck; it is a large, fleshy orange, not so juicy as that fruit.