[118] It was declared, however, in the press of Spain that Aguinaldo projected a residence in Europe and had started for Paris when Consul-General Pratt found him at Singapore in April, 1898. [↑]
[119] The change of Spanish administration in October, 1897, bringing the Liberals again into power, with Moret, who had proposed secularization of education in 1870, as Colonial Minister, was another reason for expecting liberal measures in the Philippines as well as in Cuba. It was this new ministry which urged Primo de Rivera to conclude the Biak-na-bató negotiation speedily. One of the indications that the Biak-na-bató documents in the War Department, above cited, were “doctored” in some particulars is the insertion in Paterno’s letter to Aguinaldo of Aug. 9, 1897, of a reference to Moret being Minister; the change of cabinet in Madrid occurred two months later. [↑]
[120] See the Memoria, pp. 159–176, on Reforms. In a temperate, judicial way his discussion of the friars, from experience as Governor-General from 1881–83 and during the insurrection, is perhaps the severest arraignment they could receive, above all since it came from a man appointed by a Conservative administration. [↑]
[121] See the Memoria, pp. 144–154. The incident is related in various tones by other writers. [↑]
[122] See the pamphlets, reprinting articles from two of these periodicals: Juan Caro y Mora, La situación del país (Manila, 1897), series in La Oceanía Española; and El gran problema de las reformas en Filipinas planteado por El Español, periódico diario de Manila (Manila, 1897). These articles appeared while the Biak-na-bató negotiation was pending, and with full official sanction; but they touched the religious question only very cautiously, and mostly to defend the friars. The articles of Caro y Mora especially merit consideration in connection with the study of Spanish administration in its last stage. [↑]
[123] See especially El Liberal, of Madrid. The writer has a copy of a broadside dated at Madrid Jan. 26, 1898, Exposición elevada á sa Majestad la Reina Regente sobre la insurrección en Filipinas, by Vital Fité, a Spanish journalist, once provincial governor in the Philippines. It represents friar-rule as the chief grievance, but recites also abuses and defects of administration. [↑]
[124] See J. Pellicena y Lopez, Los frailes y los filipinos (Manila, 1901). [↑]
[125] An earlier indication of the friars’ fear of coming reforms is the pamphlet, Filipinas. Estudios de algunos asuntos de actualidad (Madrid, 1897), by Eduardo Navarro, procurator of Augustinians, who advocates “reform” by means of “a step backward.” [↑]
[126] As, e.g., does Pellicena y Lopez, in Los frailes y los filipinos, to prove that separation was not the aim of the propagandists. The citation from Del Pilar’s Soberanía monacal (paragraph v), is almost identical with the paragraph of the 1888 petition to the Queen, quoted already. [↑]
[127] The author of the preliminary report of the Schurman Commission, Nov. 2, 1899, must simply have blindly followed Foreman and must have somewhat misunderstood his Filipino informants, in order to make these remarkable statements (Report, i, pp. 169, 172): “This movement [rebellion of 1896] was in no sense an attempt to win independence, but was merely an attempt to obtain relief from abuses which were rapidly growing intolerable.” “Now [June, 1898] for the first time arose the idea of independence [in Aguinaldo’s camp].” [↑]