Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines
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Robert Mac Micking >> Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines
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Besides clay, some portions of the stem of the plantain-tree are
said to have the power of extracting the impurities from sugar, and
in some districts are said to be preferred to clay for that purpose,
being chopped up in small pieces, and spread over it.
The unclayed descriptions of sugar are generally procurable at
Manilla by the end of February, when the new crop commences to come
in; and clayed, or the new crop, is seldom ready for delivery before
the middle of March.
The entire crop is all ready for export by the end of April, although
the market is seldom cleared of it till the January of the ensuing
year, when the sugar clayers being anxious to close their accounts
of the past crop, and wind up all that remains in their camarines,
in order to be ready for the new season's operations, are sometimes
willing to make a reduction in the nominal price of the day, in order
to effect that purpose. But as the grain of sugar does not improve
by keeping, especially when it has to stand the moistness of the
atmosphere during the preceding wet season, such sugar, if bought at
that time, is seldom equal in grain to the produce of the new crop,
although its colour may be preferable.
Pangasinan sugar is of a beautiful white colour, but with a very
inferior grain: it loses much in the sun-dryings, and is generally,
I believe, mixed with the clayed Pampanga sugar, to give the latter
a colour, although all the dealers deny doing it themselves, but are
ready enough to believe, if told that their neighbours are in the
habit of mixing both Cebu and it, in their pilones,--the first for
the sake of cheapness, and the other for a colour. Pampanga sugar is
of a brownish tinge, and when of good quality, of a strong grain. It
possesses a very much greater quantity of saccharine matter than any
other description of sugar I am acquainted with, and is consequently
a favourite of the refiners at home and in Sweden. Taal and Cebu
descriptions are never clayed separately, although, as before
mentioned, the latter, on account of its cheapness, is occasionally
mixed with Pampanga for claying.
They are principally in demand for the Australian colonies, where Taal
is generally preferred to Cebu (or Zebu), from its possessing more
saccharine matter than the latter. Taal is generally so moist that
it always loses considerably in weight, sometimes to the extent of
about 10 per cent., and even more;--it is a strong sweet sugar. Cebu
seldom loses so much as Taal, generally not more than 3 per cent. on
a voyage of about two months' duration.
All sugar is sold to the export merchants by the pecul of 140
lbs. English, and it is either paid for at the time of its delivery,
or if a contract is made for a large quantity with a clayer, or other
dealer, it is often necessary to advance a portion of the price to
enable him to execute the order, and the merchants often do this long
before a pecul of sugar is received from him, or any security given
in return. This system prevails not only in sugar, but in all other
articles of the agricultural produce of the islands, in the sale of
which no credit is given to the purchaser.
Sugar pays an export duty of 3 per cent. It should never be weighed
except upon a hot dry day, as if there is the least moisture in the
air it absorbs it, and adds considerably to its weight.
In connection with sugar, it may be stated, that some very good rum is
made at Manilla, although very little is exported. It is a monopoly
of the Government, who farm it out to one of the sugar clayers at
Manilla. Molasses are never shipped, but are used in Manilla for
mixing with the water given to the horses to drink, most of them
refusing to taste it unless so sweetened.
Hemp is produced from the bark of a species of the plantain-tree,
forests of which are found growing wild in some provinces of the
Philippines. The operation of making it is simple enough, the most
important of the process apparently being the separation of the
fibres from each other by an iron instrument, resembling a comb
for the hair. After drying in the sun, and undergoing several other
processes, with the minutiae of which I am unacquainted, it is made
up into bales, weighing 280 lbs. each, and in that state is shipped
for Manilla, where, after being picked more or less white, which is
dependent entirely upon the purposes it is intended to serve, and the
markets it has to be sent to, it is again pressed into bales of the
same weight as before, although of much less bulk, and is exported,
the greater quantity of it going to the United States of America,
as the export tables will show.
The best hemp is of a long and fine white fibre, very well dried, and
of a silky gloss. The dark coloured is not so well liked, and if too
bad for exportation, is generally made up into ropes for the colonial
shipping, or sent down to Singapore for transhipment to Calcutta,
where it is employed for the same purpose.
The best hemp comes from Sorsogon and Leyte, and some of the Cebu
is also very good. Albay, Camarines, Samar, Bisayas, and some other
districts, are those from which it principally comes.
The freight on hemp shipped by American vessels to the United States,
is reckoned at the rate of 40 cubic feet, or four bales of 10 feet
each, to the ton; but when shipped to Great Britain, the freight is
generally calculated at the ton of 20 cwt., or 2,240 lbs. avoirdupois.
Annexed is a table of calculations of what it will cost if put on board
a ship in Manilla Bay, including all charges, and 5 per cent. paid
to an agent there for purchasing it, &c.
--------------+-----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+-------------
| If bought | | | | | | |
| at $5 per | | | | | | |
| pecul | | | | | | |
At the |would cost,| At | At | At | At | At | At | At
exchange | free on | $5-1/4 | $5-1/2 | $5-3/4 | $6 | $6-1/4 | $6-1/2 | $7
of | board | | | | | | |
--------------+-----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+-------------
s. d. | L s. d. |L s. d.|L s. d.|L s. d.|L s. d.|L s. d.|L s. d.|L s. d.
4 1 per $| 19 0 6 |19 17 8|20 11 5|21 12 1|22 10 5|23 6 3|24 5 4|26 0 3}
4 1-1/2 " | 19 4 5 |20 1 9|20 19 8|21 16 5|22 15 0|23 11 0|24 10 5|25 5 6}Per
4 2 " | 19 8 3 |20 5 10|21 3 11|22 0 9|22 19 6|23 15 9|24 15 3|26 10 0}
4 2-1/2 " | 19 12 2 |20 9 11|21 8 2|22 5 2|23 4 2|24 0 6|25 0 2|26 16 2}ton
4 3 " | 19 16 0 |20 13 11|21 12 4|22 9 7|23 8 9|24 5 4|25 5 1|27 1 6}
4 3-1/2 " | 19 19 11 |20 18 0|21 16 8|22 14 0|23 13 4|24 10 1|25 10 1|27 6 9}of
4 4 " | 20 3 10 |21 2 1|22 0 10|22 18 5|23 18 0|24 14 10|25 15 0|27 12 1}
4 4-1/2 " | 20 7 8 |21 6 1|22 5 1|23 2 10|24 2 6|24 19 7|26 0 0|27 17 5}20
4 5 " | 20 11 7 |21 10 2|22 9 4|23 7 3|24 7 2|25 4 4|26 5 0|28 2 9}
4 5-1/2 " | 20 15 6 |21 14 3|22 13 7|23 11 8|24 11 9|25 9 1|26 9 11|28 8 0}cwt.
4 6 " | 20 19 4 |21 18 3|22 17 10|23 16 0|24 16 4|25 13 10|26 14 10|28 13 4}
--------------+-----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+-------------
To understand this table, suppose an agent in Manilla purchases a
quantity of hemp for a merchant in London, at 5 dollars per pecul, the
cost of packing, shipping, and the 5 per cent. commission for buying,
&c., will make it cost, when put on board ship in Manilla Bay, 20_l._
19_s._ 4_d._ per ton, if drawn for at the exchange of 4_s._ 6_d._
to the dollar. On its arrival at London, the freight, insurance, &c.,
added to this, will be its actual cost laid down there.
_Tobacco._--The best tobacco produced in the Philippines is grown
in the Island of Luzon or Luconia, where it is monopolized by the
Government, to whom it furnishes an important revenue. From the
province of Cagayan, where the greater part of it is grown, the
best quality comes, and that leaf, being much stronger than any
grown elsewhere, is generally used as the envelope to wrap round
the inferior descriptions of tobacco employed in the manufacture of
cheroots. Most of the other descriptions used for them come from the
district of Gapan, in Pampanga province, and the two sorts combined
are said to produce pleasanter cigars than either separately could
do,--the Cagayan leaf being too strong to be used alone, and the
Gapan leaf too mild for the ordinary taste.
In the mountains of Ylocos and Pangasinan, some of the native Indians
inhabiting them grow quantities of tobacco, which they sell to the
traders of the neighbourhood. In these mountains the Indians are still
free, and retain their old pagan religion, unsubdued either by the
Spanish soldiery, or by the more salutary and effective warfare waged
against them by the priests, who labour assiduously to convert them
to Christianity. Being mountaineers, and leading the unsettled and
roving life of huntsmen, subsisting by the produce of the chase and
the plaintain-tree, very little is known about them at Manilla beyond
the fact of their existence, although the well-directed energies
of several enthusiastic missionaries, who have as yet only found
an entrance among them, are likely to civilize and ameliorate their
condition somewhat, and to supply this information. Notwithstanding
that the mounted police force, scattered over the country, are
particularly attentive to hunt out all illicit growth of tobacco,
and to put a stop to it by the severest punishments when it is
discovered; they have not as yet been, nor in fact are likely to be,
at all successful in doing so efficiently, so long as the Government
continue to make the enormous profit they at present do from its sale,
after it has been made by them into cheroots, or brought to Manilla
and sold in the leaf for export. In Bisayas the quality of the leaf
is so inferior in strength and appearance to that produced in Luzon,
that the Government have not thought it worth while to appropriate
the produce of the islands to themselves by a monopoly.
There are several extensive manufactories of cigars carried on by
the Government at and near Manilla, the most extensive being in the
capital, although those at Malabone and Cavite also employ a great
number of people in rolling them up.
In making cheroots women only are employed, the number of those so
engaged in the factory at Manilla being generally about 4000. Besides
these, a large body of men are employed at another place in the
composition of cigarillos, or small cigars, kept together by
an envelope of white paper in place of tobacco; these being the
description most smoked by the Indians.
The flavour of Manilla cheroots is peculiar to themselves, being quite
different from that made of any other sort of tobacco; the greatest
characteristic probably being its slightly soporific tendency, which
has caused many persons, in the habit of using it, to imagine that
opium is employed in the preparatory treatment of the tobacco, which,
however, is not the case.
The cigars are made up by the hands of women in large rooms of the
factory, each of them containing from 800 to 1000 souls. These are all
seated, or squatted, Indian-like, on their haunches, upon the floor,
round tables, at each of which there is an old woman presiding to keep
the young ones in order, about a dozen of them being the complement of
a table. All of them are supplied with a certain weight of tobacco,
of the first, second, or third qualities used in composing a cigar,
and are obliged to account for a proportionate number of cheroots,
the weight and size of which are by these means kept equal.
As they use stones for beating out the leaf on the wooden tables,
before which they are seated, the noise produced by them while making
them up is deafening, and generally sufficient to make no one desirous
of protracting a visit to the place. The workers are well recompensed
by the Government, as very many of them earn from six to ten dollars
a month for their labour, and as that amount is amply sufficient to
provide them with all their comforts, and to leave a large balance for
their expenses in dress, &c., they are seldom very constant labourers,
and never enter the factory on Sundays, or, at least, on as great an
annual number of feast-days as there are Sundays in a year.
During the years of 1848 and 49, the Government were not in the habit
of selling leaf-tobacco for export, but they have again resumed the
practice of 1847, which, however, is likely to be stopped soon again;
how soon, it is impossible to say--probably just when the caprice of
the director of tobacco inclines him, as he is an influential person,
generally, in his own department.
The denominations of cheroots were changed in January, 1848; when the
description formerly known as Thirds was and still is called Seconds,
and the manufacture of a new sort known as Firsts was begun.
The weights of new cigars when sent out of the factory are as
follow:--Firsts 1500, Seconds 3000, Thirds 4000 to the arroba; the
weight of the arroba when issued by Government from the factory being
actually 1 pound 9 ounces over the current weight,--this allowance
being made to meet the loss of weight which cigars always experience
during a long sea-voyage, which, although it diminishes their bulk,
is said materially to improve their flavour. All cigars for the use
of the country-people are made in the Havana shape, and are prohibited
being exported, probably from their desire to keep the name of Manilla
cheroots up to its proper status, as the Havana-shaped cigars are
seldom equal in flavour to those made for exportation.
A large quantity of the Havana-shaped are made and used in the
country by smugglers, who sell them at one-half the price charged by
the Government, and some of these are occasionally sent from Manilla
by stealth. But they are seldom so good as those of the Government
make, although that occasionally deteriorates to an alarming degree,
so that every now and then very bad cheroots are exported. Of course,
when they are smoked and disliked no one uses them, and they become
unsaleable, so that when Government finds that there are few or no
purchasers, and that their stock is accumulating, they are obliged to
use a better class tobacco in their manufacture, upon which people
begin to buy from them again. However, this uncertainty as to their
_at all times_ producing good cigars, has a most detrimental effect
upon themselves, and this alone prevents their consumption from being
very much greater than it now is, if one uniformly good quality of
tobacco were always used and the bad descriptions sold.
The rates at which Government sell cigars are fixed, being 14 dollars
per 1000 for Firsts, 8 dollars for Seconds, and 6 3/4 dollars for
Thirds; although, if the purchasers will take off more than the
stocks existing in their warehouses, the prices may be regulated by
the eagerness of the buyers, from the cigars being sold at public
auction, which, however, very seldom happens. Purchasers have no
power to secure the good quality of the cigars they buy, as on an
application being made to the director of the renta for a quantity,
he merely fills up a printed order for their delivery, and after the
money has been paid for them, but not till then, they are delivered
by the warehouse-keepers at random, as it is not allowed to select for
delivery any of the cigars under their charge, which are consequently
never seen by the purchaser until after the completion of the bargain,
when if the quality is bad he has no remedy for it, as they will not be
received back again by the Government or the money for them returned.
_Indigo._--The quantity produced is very small; that exported to the
United States being the bulk of the crop, although large quantities
of liquid indigo are also annually sent to China in casks; but I have
not been able to ascertain its amount with any degree of precision. It
is of an inferior quality to the solid dye, and sells for considerably
less money.
The dye coming from the provinces of Laguna and Pangasinan is generally
of superior quality to that produced in Ylocos and elsewhere, their
relative prices being about forty-five dollars per quintal for the
first two descriptions, and twenty-eight dollars for the other sorts
of first, second, and third qualities in proportions.
The cultivation of the plant is very precarious, as it is liable
to damage from a variety of causes; it will die if too much water
collects round it, or if too little is given to it. It generally
is grown on a dry soil, having a slight decline, to carry off the
rain. To extract the dye from the plant, the usual process is to
place it in large vessels containing lime and water, and then to
bruise it with a wooden pestle; after which, when the water becomes
still, the colouring matter will sink to the bottom of the vessel,
when the water and the plants are drained off, and the matter, which
by that time has acquired the consistency of paste, is exposed to the
air to dry upon mats: as it becomes more dry it is divided by lines
into small quadrangular pieces, and is broken up.
To secure a good quality of indigo, great attention must be paid to
the clearness of the water, and the proper mixture and quantity of
the lime, as too much or too little is equally pernicious; also the
time during which the bruising takes place, which, it appears, is a
matter of very nice judgment, as it is usual to explain or account
for the cause of the bad quality of a lot by saying that the planter
has beat it for too long or too short a time, and that he did not
know exactly when to stop.
This article is very liable to adulteration, at which both native and
Chinese dealers are so peculiarly expert, that purchasers trusting
solely to their own knowledge are very liable to be deceived by them.
The blues of the country are much brighter than any of the British or
continental dyes, and are in consequence much preferred by the natives.
_Cotton_.--Cotton is only grown in a very small quantity, principally
in Ylocos and Batangas provinces. Some of it is sent to China, but
the major part of the crop is used in the country. It is seldom or
never well cleaned, the rude machines employed for doing so being
usually worked by the hand or foot, very imperfectly and slowly,
cleaning only a small quantity of the wool in a day.
_Cocoa-nut oil_.--Cocoa-nut oil is made in the province of Laguna
and in Bisayas. That coming from the Laguna is of the best quality,
and generally sells for a good deal more than the Bisayas oil,
which does not give so good a light, and has a worse smell than the
other. The manufacturing processes employed in producing it are very
rude in both of these districts, although that followed in Laguna
is the better of the two; but both are bad. It has been proposed,
however, to remedy this by establishing proper machinery at Manilla
for carrying on its production on a large scale, as is done in Ceylon.
The chief difficulty of exporting the article appears to be the want
of knowledge of the proper means of seasoning the tanks in which
it is shipped. These have not as yet been well made at Manilla; and
some merchants have been in the habit of getting their empty tanks
from Batavia, as they are usually better made there than they are
procurable in Manilla. The best mode of seasoning them appears to be,
to fill them all with oil, and to place them in the sun, after being
well coopered, above a large vat or other receptacle to catch all the
oil which may leak out of them; and after they have stood for some
time in this way, the pores of the wood get filled up by the oil,
which prevents further leakage.
When filled with water, as has been the practice for some time past
at Manilla, on the oil being shipped, the effect, as has been found,
is to increase its leakage over what the casks lose when they have not
been filled with water, but left altogether alone, as water expands the
wood, while oil causes it to shrink. By attention to the preparation of
the casks at Colombo in Ceylon in this manner, they are able to send
home oil in old beer casks, &c., which, of course, enables them to
avoid a great deal of unnecessary expense. Perhaps a small quantity
of boiling hot oil poured into a cask, which should then be rolled
about so that the oil might wet every part of it, would cause it to
shrink more speedily than by exposing it to the sun for about six
weeks. I am not aware, however, of this having ever been tried.
Cocoa is grown among plaintain-trees, which afford it some shade,
and protect it from the excessive slow heat, which kills it.
Although the growth of cocoa is at present very small, did any one take
the trouble to bestow the necessary care and attention it demands, the
crop might be very greatly augmented. The best is now grown in Cebu,
although, from Samar, Misamis, and Batangas, the Manilla market is
also supplied, but it is only saleable at about twenty-three dollars
per pecul, while the Cebu grown fetches about twenty-seven dollars
per pecul.
Very little is exported, and the chocolate made in Manilla is nearly
all consumed there. Supplies occasionally come from Guayaquil of a
quality very similar to that of Cebu.
All the efforts hitherto made to send cocoa to Spain, without
its deteriorating in quality, by getting spotted, &c., have been
unsuccessful.
_Coffee._--Although there have been efforts made at various times to
promote this valuable branch of agricultural industry, by holding out
to the natives rewards in money for a certain number of plants in a
state of bearing, it has not as yet had the effect of greatly promoting
its growth. Tayabas and Laguna are provinces from which most of it
comes to Manilla, but this it does by very small lots at a time, and
generally uncleaned, which the provincial traders have to do here. The
quality of most of that grown at these places is fully equal to that
of Java, from which, however, it differs a good deal in flavour. The
French, who take off the bulk of the crop, are fonder of its peculiar
taste than most other people, and prefer it to other descriptions.
Pepper is grown to a very limited extent in Tayabas, and is all
consumed in the country, although in former years some has been
exported from that province.
Opium could be grown in the greatest perfection in several places
of the Philippines, where the white poppy abounds in the utmost
luxuriance; but Government do not choose to permit its growth and
manufacture, except in the immediate vicinity of Manilla, although I
believe there is a permission to do so there, where, however, there
is no soil suitable for the growth of the plant. There are many
places, also, which would subject the planters of it to the nearly
unlimited control of the police, whose interference alone would be
so vexatious and unpleasant as to deter any one from attempting its
growth, even did the stringent regulations laid down with reference
to it not do so; such as exactly counting the number of plants, and
being forced to deposit all the drug in the custom-house for export,
for the permission to do which twenty-five per cent. would have to be
paid to the Government. These regulations are a virtual prohibition
to engage in its cultivation, as no prudent man is at all likely to
embark his capital in such an enterprise while they exist.
In consequence of the heavy duty imposed upon opium, to discourage its
importation, the greater portion of the drug consumed in the country
is smuggled into it by the masters of the Spanish trading-vessels
from China or Singapore.
Government farm out the privilege of supplying the market with opium
to the highest bidder, who seldom, however, imports many chests for
its consumption; but what he does sell is usually at a very large
advance on the prices paid for it in another market.
How much better were it for the Government to attempt to regulate the
trade of this article instead of doing all in their power to suppress
it, in which they can never be successful, so long as Chinamen and
their descendants remain with the tastes that now belong to them. Can
there be any prohibition against the introduction of opium more strong
than that of the Chinese Government? and are there any more useless,
or any laws more openly evaded? It is impossible to extirpate the
taste, but it would be easy to regulate and in some degree control it;
and these are the proper and legitimate aims of a Government.
Under proper management and increased facilities for the planter to
rear opium, the Philippines, merely from their situation, would rule
the China market for the drug, which would employ multitudes of people
in its growth and manufacture, and be a source of immense wealth to
the country.
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