Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines

R >> Robert Mac Micking >> Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines

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This place is generally a large house, constructed of _cana_, wattled
like a coarse basket, and surrounded by a high paling of the same
description, which forms a sort of court-yard, where the cocks are
kept waiting their turns to come upon the stage, should their owners
have succeeded in arranging a satisfactory match. Passing across
the yard, the door of the house, within which the matches come off,
stands open: after entering and ascending the steps, the arena is
before us, surrounded by seats sloping down from the wall towards it,
so that every one may be able distinctly to witness the event.

After the owners of the contending cocks have walked into the ring
and displayed them, each armed with a long and sharp steel spur, many
critical opinions are expressed by the Indians; and the judgments
of the old men, who are keen upon the sport, are worth hearing by
a visitor.

The spectators having viewed the birds carefully, the bets are
made, by calling one of the men who are constantly walking round
the outside of the arena, for the purpose of arranging the amounts
of bets ventured on either of the birds. Giving him the money with
which you back your opinion, he generally quickly finds, or may at
the moment hold in his hand, the money ventured by some one else on
the other cock, and apprises you of the arrangement. But should your
cock chance to be a favourite, and the broker be unable to arrange an
equal bet against the other, he tells you so before the set-to begins,
and returns your money if you are not disposed to give odds.

In general the conflict does not last long: in from about two to
five minutes after the set-to, one or other of the birds is pretty
sure to be either killed, or so badly wounded by the steel spur as
to show he has had enough of it, and to give in. Until this happens,
the utmost quietness is maintained by the people, and their intense
interest is only shown by their outstretched necks and eager looks,
as well as by their muttered exclamations at the various stages of the
fight; at the end of which, of course, the gainers are noisy, and in
high spirits at pocketing the money, which is heard clinking all round.

The amount of money staked on the issue is never very large; at least,
I have not seen more than eighty or a hundred dollars staked in any
cockpit, and the usual bet is an ounce of gold, or nearly four pounds.

Chance, in a great measure, appears to decide the event; as an early
blow with the sharp spur is quite sufficient to cripple the bird which
receives it so much as to determine the fate of the battle. Quickness
and game no doubt tell to some extent, but not very much. Of course,
the breeding of cocks engages a good deal of attention by those
interested in the amusement; but with the details of it I am not
acquainted.

Many of the Indians, however, appear to be more fond of a good cock,
and to display more anxiety about it, than would be shown by them
to their wives and children, who are not objects of nearly so much
attention.

Although extravagantly fond of all games of chance, none of them
appears to be so captivating as the cockpit, which ranks as their chief
passion. Of games at cards, the principal one is _monte_, the playing
of which is sometimes carried on to a great extent, which has caused
such distress that the law has wisely endeavoured to stop the evil,
by enacting severe fines and punishment against those caught playing
at it. Houses suspected of carrying it on, are at all times subject
to a visit from the alguacils, all the people found in them being
carried off to jail.

But notwithstanding these measures, it is found impossible to put
gambling down entirely, and some of the alcaldes, knowing the inutility
of attempting to do so, habitually give private instructions to their
policemen not to hunt for people playing _monte_, and not to molest
them if found doing so. Tresilla, tresiete, &c., are names of other
games at cards commonly played at Manilla.

Billiards is also a favourite game of the Indians, whose play differs
in some particulars from ours, and from the usual Spanish game, which
is also dissimilar to ours. Tables are scattered throughout the town,
entirely for the use of the native population, some of whom show
considerable dexterity.

Although bull-baiting used many years since to be an amusement here,
it is never heard of now, having quite gone out of fashion. Neither
are the bull-fights, as managed in Spain, practised here, probably
from the effects of the climate on the men, who would not much relish
a combat with one of the small, but spirited and powerfully shaped
bulls of the country.

The considerable number of officers of the troops, and other government
_empleados_, are acquisitions to the society of the place; for being
principally half occupied people, they are almost obliged to have
recourse to amusements to kill the time, which would otherwise hang
very heavy on their hands; and principally to their exertions must
we attribute the means of enjoyment, such as they are, which are now
available here.

There is a subscription ball-room, where assemblies are held three
times a-month; at one of which there is only dancing; at another,
performances by the amateurs of vocal and instrumental music. Some
of them, having a taste that way, do wonders for amateurs; and after
the concert, there is dancing.

At the third monthly assembly, there is a farce or play of some sort
acted by amateurs; and as the Spanish genius inclines to the buskin
and the sock, they acquit themselves very well.

To this _sociedad de recreo_, or casino, there are many subscribers,
including the Governor and his family, if he has any, and all the
considerable people of the place, who for many years kept out those
of lower caste than themselves by the ballot, which is the mode of
electing candidates, who must be introduced by two members. However,
at last the funds of the society got so low, that the admission
of many new members was requisite to bolster up the concern with
their entrance-money and monthly contributions, and, of course, a
much more indiscriminate set were admitted, than formerly used to go
there, which caused one or two people to absent themselves from the
assemblies for some time, as no one, of course, chooses to introduce
his daughters among people he does not wish to associate with. On
the whole, however, the place has benefited by the new people; that
is to say, it is more gay than before they came, which is the chief
consideration to one careless of the precise social degree of any
handsome and pleasant girl whom he may meet at the place.

All the ladies sit together; and the men, who dare not, apparently,
trust themselves so close to their brilliant and beautiful eyes,
as we fancy we can do with impunity in Britain, promenade up and
down the ball-room, or in one of the large ante-rooms contiguous to
it. No doubt their tindery and inflammable temperaments, whenever
love-making is concerned, has something to do with this arrangement;
as, if a young male acquaintance of any damsel took a seat beside her,
it would be certain to attract the papa or chaperon, to the spot, to
see what was going on, as their most likely subject of conversation
would have a strong leaning towards a flirtation, or downright
love-making, at which nearly all the Spaniards are great adepts;
the flowery expressions of their language being peculiarly suitable
for such sentimental recreations.

Besides the principal theatre, where Spaniards are the actors,
there are two native theatres, where plays are represented in the
Tagalog language, and written to suit their ideas of the drama; the
subjects represented being principally tragedies connected with their
historical traditions, and of their fathers' earliest connections
with their European conquerors.

But their mode of representing these subjects is scarcely suitable
to any one's taste but their own, as the amount of vociferation,
and drawling singing of the women who take a part in the pieces,
are very disagreeable, and the noise and quantity of fighting with
which they are always interlarded, is tiresome. Yet, strange to say,
they themselves are much interested while listening to these absurd
recitatives.

The Spanish theatre is generally opened twice a-week, and one or two
of the performers act very creditably. The national passion is for
dramatic amusements; and the house, which is a large one, is usually
well filled.

CHAPTER XXV.

A misconception appears to exist as to the state of society at Manilla,
people at a distance for the most part labouring under the erroneous
impression that it remains stationary, and is today as much behind
the rest of the world as it was thirty years ago; and that it can
support no newspaper or other publication. Now, during my residence
at Manilla, there have been various periodicals published daily,
bi-weekly, and weekly; but at the end of last year (1850), these had
all given place to one daily newspaper, called the _Diario de Manilla_,
which being more carefully conducted than any of its predecessors,
still continues to enjoy its popularity.

It is under the direction of an editor, who being in his youth trained
up to commercial pursuits, and having spent some years of his life in
Great Britain in order to conduct the business of his Spanish friends,
has insensibly acquired ideas during his residence there which are,
no doubt, more exact and unprejudiced than those of the bulk of his
countrymen, so that he understands the duties of a journalist, and
manages his paper better than these things were formerly done. Of
course, however, he must study not to trespass on the existing
regulations of the censor, if he would avoid the scissors of that
officer, whose duties are, to prevent any statement obnoxious to the
powers that be from seeing the light. This, of course, is a great check
to the spread of information, especially of a political character;
and articles written and printed, have frequently to be suppressed
in the succeeding impressions of the paper. The power is sometimes
exercised when there is very little occasion for the interference of
authority, and, of course, must very materially interfere with the
mode of conducting an efficient newspaper.

To give the censor time to examine its contents, the _Diario_ is
printed the afternoon preceding its publication, and is issued every
day except Monday, thus leaving the printers free from work and at
liberty on Sunday.

The _Diario_ has a large circulation in Manilla and the different
provinces of the islands, besides having agents at Madrid, Cadiz,
and Paris; it is also obtainable in the Havana, at Hongkong, and
at Singapore.

The subscription is one dollar a month, which is moderate enough;
and advertisements are inserted in its columns without charge.

Once a week it includes a list of the shipping in the harbour, and
also of the arrivals and departures, and reports every morning the
arrivals and cargoes of any vessels that have come in on the previous
day from the provinces. It also publishes a weekly price-current of
the produce of the country.

A well-conducted periodical of this nature is of great importance in a
commercial point of view, not only from the advertisements circulated
by its means throughout the Philippines, but from the variety of
facts and information which the country alcaldes address to the
Manilla Government, in which they are required to give a list of the
prices-current for the various articles of produce grown in their
different provinces; a regulation which, of course, tends to keep
the trade on a sound footing, and to prevent reckless speculation,
which the want of market information usually induces.

The _Diario_ is delivered at the houses of Manilla subscribers at about
daylight every morning, so that they may make themselves masters of
its contents while sipping their chocolate, before engaging in the
business of the day. This is no slight luxury, I assure the reader,
and it is not at all diminished by the place being so remote from
the sound of Bow-bells and the region of Cockaigne, although it is
true that the contents of the paper are not composed of exciting
parliamentary reports, or of leading articles equal in talent to
those of the _Times_ or _Morning Chronicle_.

The mail bags are carried to the provinces by mounted couriers, and
the north post, arriving at Manilla every Friday morning, brings
communications from the important provinces of Bulacan, Bataan,
Zambales, Pampanga, Nueva Eciga, Pangasinan, Ilocos (North and South),
Abra, and Cagayan; and is despatched from the capital to all these
districts every Monday at noon.

The south post, embracing the provinces of Laguna, Batangas, Mindoro,
the islands of Masbate and Ticao, Camarines (North and South), Albay,
Samars, and Leyte, reaches Manilla every Tuesday morning, and is
despatched from it in return every Wednesday at noon. To the arsenal of
Cavite there is a daily post, excepting on Sundays; and to the islands
of Visayas, the Marianas, and Batanes, the correspondence is forwarded
by the first ships bound for any of those places, as they are obliged
to give notice to the postmaster two days before starting for them.

It would be difficult to over-estimate the advantages of this line
of postal communication, which affords the native traders in remote
places the best facilities for the prosecution of their trade in the
various articles of commerce produced in the districts where they live.

There are, of course, several things which might be improved in the
administration of the post-office, as is the case in every country,
without bringing Spain and her colonies in question; but, no doubt,
these will be found out by-and-by, and an alteration for the better
will take place.

The press of Manilla is much more active than is commonly supposed,
as, besides the _Diario_, there are several other periodicals printed
in the place. Among them may be mentioned the _Guia de Forasteros_,
and an _Almanac_, which is printed at the College of Santo Tomas,
being entirely got up and sold by the priests of that institution,
the proceeds being devoted to charitable purposes.

Various religious and polemical works also emanate at different
times from the press, all of them neatly and well printed, nay,
highly creditable to the Indian compositors who execute them.

I have frequently seen it stated in books, the authors of which should
have been better informed, that no periodical publications exist at
Manilla. Certainly there is much less appetite there for such things,
than is exhibited among my own countrymen, whose birthright it is to
grumble at the conduct of authorities, and to show up delinquencies
with the most unsparing zeal, neither of which would be quite safe
to attempt at Manilla, although it is so in Great Britain, and all
her colonies and dependencies.

CHAPTER XXVI.

Through ignorance and a misconception of the nature of the country,
many people are in the habit of adducing the scantiness of manufactures
among the Indians, as an evidence of their backwardness in civilization
and the arts which it teaches.

But this is not so in reality, for if our readers reflect on the
subject a short time, it can scarcely fail to occur to them, that
the fertility of the soil, and the abundance of primary materials,
even of those made use of in the manufactories, is the true reason
why they neglect manufactures, and turn all their attention to growing
the raw produce, from which spring the materials for conducting them.

It is this cause which makes the Americans send their cotton-wool to
Manchester, to be there, at some thousands of miles from the place
of its growth, made into cloth--and the shepherds of Australia to
send their wool to Yorkshire for a like purpose.

This appears paradoxical, but it is true. A day's labour on a fertile
tropical soil is better recompensed when it is directed to grow cotton,
than it would be, were the same labour applied to weaving the wool
into cloth; for although this climate is suitable for the growth of
cotton in the fields, it does not at all follow that it is so for
weaving cloth, as has been proved to be the case in the United States.

In that country, where manufacturing industry has so much energy
of character in those carrying it on to back it up, and to secure a
satisfactory result, it appears very strange that we should be able
to beat them in the manufacture of their own produce.

But although many efforts have repeatedly been made by speculative
and sanguine men to weave all the descriptions of cotton cloth made
in Great Britain by the power-loom, they have never been able to
do so in the United States. Even when they have actually carried
machinery and men from Manchester to work it, across the Atlantic,
the produce of the looms has been of a different quality of cloth
to that which the same cotton yarn would have produced by the same
machinery in Great Britain. This can only be accounted for, I believe,
by estimating the effects of climate. The moisture of the atmosphere,
the difference of water, and other causes, have been assigned as
the cause of this very remarkable circumstance, and perhaps some,
or all of them, have their share in producing it.

In the Philippines, the natural shrewdness of the people, who show
considerable aptitude in the arts which experience has taught them
will pay them best, is demonstrated by the neatness of execution
which characterises many of their handiworks, demanding no small
portion of skill, care, and perseverance; the elaborate execution
of the gold ornaments worn by the women frequently exhibiting signs,
in a very high degree, of skilful and neat workmanship.

I have seen chains, &c., of native make, quite as beautifully and as
curiously worked as any I have seen in China, where those ornaments
are made in more perfection than the European gold or silversmiths
have as yet been able to attain.

But probably the pina cloth manufactured in the Philippines, is the
best known of all the native productions, and it is a very notable
instance of their advance in the manufacturing arts.

There is perhaps no more curious, beautiful, and delicate specimen of
manufactures produced in any country. It varies in price according to
texture and quality, ladies' dresses of it costing as low as twenty
dollars for a bastard sort of cloth, and as high as fifteen hundred
dollars for a finely-worked dress. The common coarse sort used by the
natives for making shirts costs them from four to ten dollars a shirt.

The colour of the coarser sorts is not, however, good; and the high
price of the finer descriptions prevents its becoming generally a
lady's dress; and the inferior sorts are not much prized, chiefly
because of the yellowish tinge of the white cloth. The fabric is
exceedingly strong, and, I have been informed, rather improves in
colour after every successive washing.

Pina handkerchiefs and scarfs are in very general use by the Manilla
ladies, although they are rather expensive; the price of the former,
when of good quality, being from about five to ten pounds sterling
each, while for a scarf of average quality and colour about thirty
pounds is paid. The coarser descriptions can be had for much less
money than the sums mentioned; and the finest qualities would cost
from three to four times more than the amounts I have set down.

Besides the pina there is also a sort of cloth made by the natives
called juse (pronounced huse), or siriamaio, which makes very beautiful
dresses for ladies. It is manufactured from a thread obtained from
the fibres of a particular sort of plantain tree, which is slightly
mixed with pine-apple thread; and the fabric produced from both of
these is very beautiful, being fine and transparent, and looking,
to the unaccustomed eye, finer than the ordinary sort of pina cloth.

It can be made of any pattern, and is generally striped or checked
with coloured threads of silk mingled with the other two descriptions.

The manufacture of both these articles is carried on to a small extent
in the immediate neighbourhood of Manilla; but in the provinces of
Yloylo and Camarines the best juse is produced, the price of which is
very much lower than pina, as a lady's dress of it may be got at from
seven to twenty dollars; and for the latter amount a very handsome
one would be obtained.

In addition to these manufactures, which the natives have appropriated
and made their own, from the greater facilities found in the
Philippines than in other places less adapted by nature for their
prosecution, the Government has been at some pains to force them
to engage in the manufacture of cotton yarn and cloth by imposing
high duties on those descriptions of foreign manufactured goods
most suitable for the native dress, either from their partiality to
particular colours, or from other causes.

And for this reason solely a number of kambayas of blue and white
checks are made in the country by the native hand-loom, these colours
being in general favourite ones of the Indians; the custom-house
duty on such goods, and on other favourite colours, being 15 and 25
per cent., according to the flag of the vessel importing them; the
Spaniards guarding their own shipping, and securing to it a monopoly
of the carrying trade by that difference of the import duty. Should
these goods come from Madras, which is their native country, the duty
charged on them is 20 and even 30 per cent.

Although these rates of duty may be considered high enough, they
are in reality very much more than that per-centage, because the
duty is charged by the authorities on a very high fixed valuation,
or on the _ad valorem_ principle, which actually is equivalent to
increasing the rates of duty, were that only charged upon the actual
market price. Since the beginning of this year (1851), however,
I understand some changes have been made in the tariff by altering
the valuations of goods.

Kambayas are used as sayas, or outer petticoats, by the native or
Mestiza girls, and are generally made of cotton cloth, although,
of late, juse and silk sayas appear to be more generally worn than
they used to be.

Tapiz of silk and cotton is also manufactured in the country. This
piece of dress is used as a sort of shawl, and is wrapped tightly
round the loins and waist, above the saya, being generally a black
or dark blue ground, with narrow white stripes upon it, which, when
the garment is worn, encircles the body.

The great advantage which the natives have over foreign manufacturers
of these coloured cloths consists not so much in the duty, although
that is an immense protection, as in the quickness with which they
are able to meet the changes of taste in the patterns and designs
of such fancy goods. For it is evident that before designs of new
styles can reach Great Britain, and the goods be manufactured there,
and shipped off to Manilla, many months must elapse, during which the
native manufacturers have been supplying the market with these new and
approved styles of goods, and of course reaping all the advantages of
an active demand, exceeding the supply, by the high prices obtainable
for the new designs. For the market of Manilla varies as much, and
the tastes of the people are as inconstant and capricious with regard
to their dress, as the natives of almost any country can be.

It will scarcely be believed, that in this remote quarter of Asia,
many of the natives of the country are as much _petits maitres_ in
their own way, as a gallant of the Tuileries or of St. James's. It
would astonish most people to see some of these poor-looking Indians,
or Mestizos, wearing a jewel of the value of four or five hundred
dollars in the breast of their shirts, or in a ring on their fingers.

No doubt some of them prefer keeping their money in this way, as it is
easily transportable, and is always about their persons, to leaving
their dollars or gold ounces concealed somewhere about their houses,
from which they may frequently be obliged to be absent. Though, as
it is a common custom for the natives to have a piece of bamboo in
which to deposit their ready-money, and as there is so much bamboo
work about the house, of course it is not very difficult for them
to select one piece, which from its being out of the way, and rather
unapproachable, renders it a secure deposit for their hoards.

Towels, napkins, and table-cloths, are also manufactured by them, from
the cotton of the country, and Governor Enrile taught some of their
weavers how to make canvas from cotton. It is now very extensively
used by the native shipping, and bears the name of the distinguished
and philanthropic individual who taught them how to make it, being
known by the name of _Lona de Enrile_, which name may it long bear,
and remain as the most honourable memento any governor could leave
behind him, of his beneficent and wise interest in the affairs and
administration of an important colony.

At several places in Luzon, and in Cebu, &c., the natives make
a species of cloth from the plantain-tree, known by the names of
_Medrinaque_ and _Guiara_ cloths. The former description is in the
greatest consumption, being stouter and more valuable than the other
sort, and is mostly all bought up by the natives themselves, although
a small portion of it is also exported.

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