Читать книгу The Friar's Daughter - Charles Lincoln Phifer - Страница 4

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“A beautiful city, Admiral Rainey—from a distance. Strongly fortified—for the fifteenth century. But you can sweep away the fortifications as easily as you sank the Spanish war vessels. What is a walled city with a moat to guns that will carry for miles?”

“I do not doubt, General Saguanaldo,” returned the American admiral as he sat on deck of his flag ship in the harbor of Manila, faultlessly garbed as though for a party, talking to the Filipino insurgent after the battle that had spread his name around the globe, “I do not doubt my ability to reduce the Spanish works, but I was looking to the future. Should I destroy so much private property as would be involved in bombarding Manila I would make enemies of the owners, who would give us trouble in days to come. I dare not take such a serious step until I am instructed from America.”

“But consider, admiral,” plead the insurgent, “Manila sits there, fair to see, but she has drawn the very life from the people of the interior for centuries. The private property of which you speak was gotten from labor by the sorrow of others.”

“You are doubtless right, general, and I would not blame you if you should seek revenge from them, for your people have suffered greatly. But with me it is a different proposition. I am not acting for myself alone.”

“Nor am I. It may be you do not know the sorrows of Luzon, Señor Admiral!”

“It may be I do not, General Saguanaldo.”

“May I tell you of them, Admiral Rainey?”

“I shall be pleased to know more of this land that I have just come to command until my country tells me what to do, or ends the unhappy war.”

“When Spaniards from Mexico first landed in Maynila, centuries ago,” continued General Saguanaldo, “the simple-minded natives bowed to the white people as to gods; and they have been on their knees rendering tribute of Luzon’s products ever since. It did not take the natives long to learn the nature of the Spaniards, who were inflamed by the lust of gold, both by their experience with the Incas and Aztecs in America and by the hard terms of the Spanish rulers, for we have had to pay tribute to Rome, to Spain and to Mexico—all.”

“I am told the people of the interior are primitive—half naked Igorrotes, or Negritos, wearing only breech clouts.”

“Those live chiefly in the Southern islands. The body of the people of the Northern islands are of the Malayan stock, loving liberty, but kept poor by tributes exacted. They were a people of simple ways and homely virtues. Because of being of Malayan descent they wore called Moros by the Spaniards. The two tribes of Moros, the Tagals of Northern Luzon, and the Viscayans of Southern Luzon and North Mindoro, yielded to Legaspi, to whom the king of Spain gave all the land he might conquer. He was not a hard master, leaving the olden, native chiefs in charge; but when, after this, the friars came from Spain, they began the work of oppression. When the great earthquake destroyed Maynila in 1645, and over 600 perished in the catastrophe, the natives were forced to work without pay on the arsenal at Ca Vite, and when, because of harsh treatment, they rebelled, burning towns and churches, the friars dispatched soldiers for the head of Sumoroy, the rebel. His followers sent in the head of a pig instead. The enraged friars and soldiers tortured to death the mother of Sumoroy, and afterward, when the rebel was betrayed to them, struck off his head and mounted it on a pole for the people to look upon.”

“Brutal, doubtless. But such things were common in those days,” returned the admiral.

“God pity us, they are too common in Manila in these days. The reputation of the friars was such in those days that when some of them went to Japan it was reported in that land that they were advance guards of the Spanish army, getting a foothold, and that after them would come the army to protect them. The Mikado ordered the friars out, but they defied him. Then the Japanese emperor adopted heroic measures. He gathered together 150 lepers and sent them to Maynila, saying that Japan did not allow Roman friars in that country, but, since these friars were fond of this kind of people, he sent them a ship load.”

“That, too, seems to have been inhuman. How were the lepers received?”

“Oh, the friars built the hospital of St. Lazarus for their reception. You can see it beyond those palms.”

“That was rather a Christian act.”

“The friars have done some good. But they insist on foreign friars ruling instead of native priests, and to maintain their supremacy keep the people uneducated. Then they claim ownership of large tracts of the best land, and exact high rentals. The people have rebelled against their exactions over and over again. Long ago the king of Tagals killed the alcade of Tayabas province, and made the people believe that the earth would swallow the Spaniards when they were attacked, but his rebellion was put down with great slaughter.”

“No wonder, General. This confirms my information that the inhabitants are not free from superstition.”

“Eso fue en los dias antiguos1, Admiral. The people were crude then. Perhaps they were like your American Indians. But they were oppressed, and they began even then the rebellion against Spain and the friars which they have maintained for over 300 years, from the days when Soliman, the native king, set fire to Maynila and fought them from the forests, to the last rebellion of Rizal and the religious deflection of Aglipay.”

“It seems to me a man of ability, like you, General, ought to be able to win.”

“We will win. But we have hoped so that the great North American nation that pitied Cuba and that is fighting for her independence will so pity us and give us independence. I assure you, Admiral, we have endured longer and more than Cuba has done. The oppression had been admitted by our masters. The Augustinians and Jesuits accused each other of cruelty and the Jesuits were banished. It was not till 1859 that they were permitted to return. I told you about the destruction of Manila by earthquake in the olden days. That was not the last or worst seismic disturbance.”

“I had heard as much.”

“In 1863 the city was again destroyed by earthquake, which killed thousands of people and left much destitution. The grafting that followed was scandalous and caused much dissatisfaction. It was in 1872 that the great insurrection occurred. But for an error in signals which started the trouble before the people were ready to support it, it would have succeeded. As it was, many were executed and shot. At another time the people were promised amnesty if they would lay down their arms, but when they did so thousands were massacred. Then came a period of organizing secret societies to work against the friars, who were also rulers.”

“But these are only incidents that come in the history of every land.”

“Por Dios, Donde se hallaria otro pais que has sufrido tanto.2 Think of it! Up to 1811 the Philippine islands dared not trade with any country but Mexico, not excepting their neighbor, China. Then the picturesque, half-moon-shaped galleons of Mexico did all the carrying of the Philippines and charged prices such as would enrich them in spite of the pirates they frequently met. For this trade Mexican promoters and the Spanish crown received their tribute, and the Spanish friars, too, had their share. The people were abjectly poor. Even the soldiers were often unpaid, and begged their support from the people whom they subjected. The friars charged exorbitant rentals on the lands they claimed. They encouraged the people to build cathedrals, monasteries and churches, but the cathedrals, monasteries and churches did not belong to the people after they had built them. They charged the people rental on graves in consecrated ground, and when the rent was not paid they evicted the dead. They made the price of marriage so high that many of the people lived together out of wedlock. The friars selected the women of the people they fancied and openly consorted with them, and the children of friars are common throughout the islands. The people are poor, living for the most part in grass houses, while the friars are rich and live in luxury; and this has been going on for centuries.”

“Bad, very bad; the morals of the tropics and the Orient.”

“This is not all. The friars exercised the power of secret investigation, and one never knew when he was safe. A friar might report a man as a conspirator against Spain, and, while meeting him and showing friendship for him in public, secretly secure his banishment. There have been cases which I could name, where friars, coveting the wife or sister of a man, have procured his banishment or even secured for him an appointment at a distance, so that they might have the way open to accomplish their purposes. There was a fear which beset every man, even those who through fear were nearest to the friars, that if his eyes should light upon his wife or daughter in an envious way, if he did not give them up he was lost.”

“Surely, General, this is exaggerated.”

“The half has not been told. In Lenten time, which was the period when the country folk came to confess, the parish friar would give strict orders to the scribes of the church that in the distribution or giving out of the certificates to the penitents among himself and his coadjutors they should give him the young unmarried women and servant penitents, whom he obscenely solicited through words and manipulations in the confessional.”

“Why, this is horrible.”

“It is, indeed. Some reverend friars arrogated to themselves rights which in feudal times were called rights of pernada, or the right to enter the bed of a new bride before the husband. The parish friar converted himself up to a certain point into an absolute lord, master of lives and property, and, if he so willed, made and unmade everything according to his fancy. Master of the will of the people more through fear than out of love for him, he nominated town authorities that pleased him, which nomination elevated almost always the greatest flatterer of all his parishioners, and it is plain that all weighty determinations dictated by the municipal authorities were not proper initiatives, but those of his amours.”

“It does not seem possible. Why, that is worse than Cuba.”

“Imagine paying rental on a grave for the bones of a dear one, until your money was exhausted, and then seeing the remains dumped into a pile of bones along with scores of other victims. Imagine being required to produce a certain crop each year to be turned over to the friars, and if you failed, becoming indebted to them so that there was no hope of your ever paying out. Imagine being compelled to sell your rice to the friar at the price he might offer, and being forbidden to take it to an open market where the price was higher. Would you rebel against such conditions?”

“The American would not tolerate it even for a moment.”

“That is not all. They were cruel, not only in the treatment of their servants by beating them, but they also took great delight in being eye witnesses to tortures and beatings of men and in prisons and jails by the civil authorities. They were always, when witnessing these acts, accompanied by some of the higher Spanish civil authorities, and these acts were usually carried out at the instigation of the friars.”

“I did not know of all these things.”

“Would to God that you knew, Admiral. Listen! In 1781 the growing of tobacco on Luzon was made a government monopoly. If farmers refused to plant a certain amount of tobacco the land was taken from them. Law required the natives to ’tend the tobacco that when raised belonged to the government; that is, to the friars. If the crop was less than the amount estimated for each farmer, he was heavily fined and became responsible for that much more the year following. If the crop was above the estimate, the government seized it all and destroyed what it could not sell to advantage.”

“No doubt you have suffered much.”

“Cuba does not know suffering, Admiral. Yet you liberty-loving Americans are warring to give Cuba her freedom. Give us freedom, too. Promise me, Admiral.”

The insurgent general, with the impetuosity of the tropics, fell on his knees before Admiral Rainey and seized his hands.

“America will see you have your rights. Arise,” the admiral said, flipping a speck from his coat as he spoke. The insurgent leader reverently kissed the hand of the admiral, and, crying, “You will be hailed as the great emancipator,” signaled to his attendants, and prepared to leave the flagship. Under Rainey’s guns the company made its way to shore, not far from the old moat outside the city’s walls, now overgrown with grasses and vegetation, which served for draining the outlying country.

1 Eso fue en los dias antiguos—That was in the old days. ↑

2 Por Dios Donde se hallaria otro pas que has sufrido tanto—For heaven’s sake, there is not another country found that has suffered so much.

For evidence as to the condition of the islands see Senate Document No. 190 of the 56th Congress, sworn testimony of Ambrosia Flores, Señor Constantine, Jose Tempto, Don Jose C. Mijares, Pedro Surano Laktaw, Jose Roderigues Infante and others. ↑