CHAPTER VI FROM MANILA TO DAGUPAN A Experiences on a Railway-Goats, not Children, TRIP of four days was made along the route of the Manila and Dagupan Railway. The line is English, both in its construction and in the compartments into which the carriages are divided. One car suffices to take all the first and second class passengers, who are kept apart by a door. The rest of the train is made up of third-class coaches, in which people sit as long as sitting room is available, and then stand or squat, according to circumstance and inclination. A third-class Filipino coach is a circus, not simply because of the great variety of colors displayed in the dresses of the passengers, but because every coach has more or less of a menagerie in it. When the train stopsand it might stop almost anywhere, so gentle is its speed, an express train running fifteen miles an hour!-the sounds that greet the passengers are many and various. Three or four times on our trip we thought we heard children crying, but found that the feet of a goat having been tied together and the poor animal carried with his feet up, he was doing his best to let the world know of his humiliation. Sometimes a shote carried in the same way lifted up its voice, but no one ever thought a child was crying at such a time. Added to these cries, human and inhuman, were the shrill crows from the cocks traveling with their masters and seemingly having the time of their lives, grateful that it was neither Sunday nor feast day, and, therefore, they could not legally be made to fight. The company owning the only railroad in the Philippines has been under heavy expense in constructing and operating it, owing to the numerous rivers which it crosses, which frequently interrupt travel, as the bridges were formerly weakened or swept away. Under the present management, however, not only are the conditions. changed, but the company is able now to build a branch line which was begun with formal ceremonies while we were on our journey. It is a trifle humiliating to ride on an English road over American soil; but until American capital is ready to follow the flag in sufficient volume to construct and operate new railroads, we should be thankful that the English are able and willing to do so, and that they do it so successfully. If they could raise the speed of one express train to twenty or thirty miles an hour, a loud chorus of praise would rise from thankful hearts. When Aguinaldo was making his retreat before the American forces, he went north along the railroad. We stopped at two of the capitals of the insurgents, Malolos and Tarlac, and at two other towns. The first stop was at Barasoain; Malolos, the capital of the Philippine forces in 1899, is separated from this town by a narrow creek, so that one scarcely knows at any time which city he is in. Our host at Malolos was A DAY IN MALOLOS 79 Captain W. H. Warren, the senior inspector of the Constabulary in the province. We walked through the town, visiting the native market with its curious productions, mostly of an edible nature, although some cloth and hats and other articles were for sale, and then went to the school and met the American teacher having charge of a few classes and showing the native teachers how to instruct their little brown brothers and sisters. The walls of the great church, which was Aguinaldo's headquarters, still remain, but only the walls are standing. A more desolate place one would not care to visit, and yet this American woman is seemingly as happy as if she were living in New York or Boston. The same is true of the young Methodist missionary, and the officers of the Constabulary, one of whom is a nephew of Bishop Potter, of New York. Before luncheon the Governor of the Province, Pablo Tecson Ocampo, called to pay his respects to the visitors. One must not infer that the Governor is Mr. Ocampo; he is really Paul Tecson, Ocampo being his mother's name. The Governor was especially happy in talking about his province, in which, he says, there is not an American soldier. This does not imply indifference to the essentials of the Army or antipathy to its methods, but satisfaction that the Constabulary has done its work so well that the Military is not needed. There are two hundred and fifty men under Captain Warren, who see to it that the ladrones give the province a wide berth. If Captain Warren were unable at any time to cope with robber bands coming from an adjoining province, the Governor of the Province would call upon the Governor of the Philippines to send soldiers to aid the Constabulary in enforcing the law. But there is apparently no probability that such an order will be necessary. Governor Tecson said, in reply to questions from the writer regarding his province: "The friars were here until 1898, and were then driven out because they were not teaching the Filipinos the right way. It is true that the native priests are not so well educated as the Spanish were, but they really teach better than the more educated Spaniards, because their lives more nearly correspond with what they say. They do not have one standard for the people and another for themselves. About eighty per cent. of the people in my province are good Roman Catholics, and the rest are Protestants or Aglipayans. Aglipay was one of Aguinaldo's leading men, who was deposed by the Catholic Church, and has started an independent religious movement. He has only visited two towns in this province, but he has quite a following, his chief success lying in towns where the padre, or priest, and the people are not on good terms. Generally, I think, the personal feeling enters into the secession from the Catholic Church. Few of the better class follow Aglipay. "In regard to Protestantism, it is a matter I have not looked into very closely. In nearly every town there are some Protestants. The greater part is what we would call the common class of people, but occasionally the better class become Protestants, and more of this class become Protestants than Aglipayans. Personally, I believe that each man should be a member of the religious body with which his judgment best accords. The American school teachers are splendid people. Without exception they have shown themselves worthy of the country |