The bath is a great luxury among the natives, and of all country-born people, who appear to be fully as fond of the water as ducks are, and never look so well pleased as when they are paddling about in it, for nearly all the women can swim.
It used to be a very favourite sport to make up a bathing party of ladies, who, dressed in their long gowns, bathed with their male friends equipped in parjamas, or in short bathing trousers, without hesitation, swimming about in a retired part of the river for a long time, generally stopping at least an hour in the water, on leaving which, and dressing, all reunited to breakfast, or amuse themselves in some way, with dancing or music. These parties, however, are now seldom heard of, as the late arrivals from Spain have been so many as to be able to take the lead, and give a tone to the society of Manilla, and are now in the midst of revolutionizing the old habits and customs of the place, certainly not at all for the better, as they have yet to learn that what is suitable in Europe is not so in the tropics.
Fondness for gay dress is universal, and the ninas take considerable pains to understand the subject, and to adorn their natural good looks to the most advantage by the selection of the most appropriate colours.
Their hair is one of the most remarkable beauties in the native and Mestiza women, being very much longer, and of a finer gloss, than that of any Europeans.
The staple and most favourite food of the people is rice seasoned by sun-dried or salted fish, if they should be unable to procure it fresh, which is, however, seldom the case, as the rivers in the country abound with many different sorts, and all of them appear to be very good and well tasted.
And not only do the rivers abound with fish, but great numbers of dalag are found in the flooded paddy fields during and subsequent to the rainy season, when they are soaked with water. How this fish, which is not very good to eat, being tasteless and insipid, comes there, is a curious problem, as it is often killed in paddy grounds at a great distance from any stream, out of which it could come during an overflow. I am not quite certain whether this fish is ever killed in a stream or not, or whether it is only found in the paddy fields.
I do not recollect of its once being caught in a river, although the natives kill the fish in the ditches and paddy fields in large quantities, either by shooting them with shot, as they flounder in the fields, or by pursuing and capturing them, and knocking them down with a stick.
In fact, I suspect the dalag to be an intermediary between the reptile and the fish, although not naturalist enough to investigate the subject in a proper manner.
CHAPTER XXII.
Many of my readers may chance to be aware that the whole group of Philippine islands was mortgaged to Great Britain for payment of the ransom agreed upon at the time of our conquest of them nearly a century ago; and as up till this time neither the money nor the interest on it has been obtainable, as it probably never will be, they are, at this, or any other time, virtually our property, should the British Government foreclose the mortgage and demand payment. This, even at present, when the kingdom is groaning under extreme pressure for the necessary funds annually squeezed out of it, would not be thought a prudent course, even by the ultra-economical politicians who are so lavish of displaying their crude projects of retrenchment on neatly ruled-off paper.