THE PHILIPPINES AND THEIR TREATMENT.

Otago Witness, Issue 2286, 23 December 1897, Page 56

THE PHILIPPINES AND THEIR TREATMENT.

The population of the Philippines, estimated at about eight millions, is anything but homogeneous in its nature. The original inhabitants were a race of curly-headed dwarfish blacks, known as Aetas, or Negritos. At the time of the Spanish conquest the Negritos had been driven into the mountains by invading Malays belonging to, several different tribes. A few of the Negritos still exist in the highlands of some of the larger islands. They hunt a little with bows and poisoned arrows, bat for the most part live like the beaßts — on what they can pick from the forest trees or dig out of the ground. They are said often to eat animal food raw, Daring the dry season they build no huts, but wander from place to place, moving whenever the flies become troublesome. They are a puny, sickly race, and are rapidly becoming extinct. The Malays of the southern islands, however, belong to a warlike Mohammedan tribe, and the fierce ' struggle between the Spanish and Mohammedans, carried on for so many centuries in Spain, and only terminated there by the fall of Granada in 1492, was resumed in the Philippines, where it continues to this day.

The proper government of a population so miscellaneous would in any case be a matter of much difficulty. In the present instance it is giv.en into the ftands of a horde 7of poverty-stricken officials, who make no secret of tho factthat they are not in the colony for their health. Many, if not all, of them go to the Philippines because they are hn3ebt, if we may believe their, own very fratkly .reiterated statements. With few exceptions' their object i 3 to jjet money as rapidly as possible; and »tbey;are not overscrupulous as to ways and means. ' Theee men came out for terms which should vary from three to six; years, though as a matter of fact an official never knows -how soon he may lose his place through a change in the home Ministry, or from some other cause. It is not unheard -of for a man to receive an appointment to office in the PLilippines, take passage for the islands, and find on his arrival there that his " successor " has been appointed. In view of this uncartainty, then, time is precious. A few years ago it used to be said that the governor of a province who did not become wealthy in two years was indeed stupid. Times are not so good for the provincial official now. The success of General Weyler duriDg the three years of his reign as Governor general of ithe Philippines shows what "good management" will accomplish under favourable circumstances. His salary was 40,000iolper annum. His position, of course, demanded that he should entertain handsomely, give liberally to charities, and sb on. His personal expenses, therefore, cduW not have been small, but so rigid was bis economy that be was able to deposit in the banks of London and Paris a sum variously estimated by his own countrymen at from one to four million dollars. The means employed to obtain this sum were various. Some inference as to their character may be drawn from the fact that hardly had Despujol, Weyler's successor, arrived at the capital when one of the leading Chinese merchants of Manila called on him with a little gift of lO.OOOdoI in silver, which he wished to bestow merely as a slight mark of attention ! Deapujol was a man of different itamp from Weyler, and is reported to have given the Chinese a vigorous blow in the face. The system employed by the Government to obtain money is certainly ingenious. Each town or village ha's a " Gobernadorcillo " or petty governor, who is invariably a native or Mestizo, and also invariably one of the wealthier men of the place. The position is one of some dignity, and its occupant is vested with a certain amount of that authority which is so dear to tbe heart of the Philippine native. The place is often, therefore, much sought after. The gobernadorcillo has as his staff a number of "head men," called Cabezis de Birangay. Each cabeza is allowed to carry a cane. Hs is incidentally made responsible for the taxes of 40 to 60 families. If he can get the money from them, well and good ; if not, he must put his hand into his own pocket. The cabezas are responsible to their gobernadorcillo, who is, in turn, responsible to the governor of his province. Should any of his cabezaa prove delinquent, the gobernadorcillo must make the deficit good. An especially interesting feature of the system is that the exgobernadorcillos are liable, during the terms of their natural lives, for their full pro rata share in any deficit which may arise under the administration of a successor in office. No mercy is shown to delinquent native officials. Their property is confiscated and sold to pay the debt they do not owe. I£ the funds raised by this means prove insufficient, the unfortunates are imprisoned or deported. In Siqui jor we once saw a melancholy procession of 44 men who had lost houses, cattle, lands, and, in addition, were to be sent to Bohol because they still " owed " sums ranging from 2dol to 40doJ, which they could not pay. Their families were left to shift for themselves. Following the example of the Spaniards, the native officials are by no means always honest. The thieving doubtless begins, in many instances, with the gobernadorcillo?, and sometimes even with the cabezas ; but the sums involved are usually insignificant, as opportunities fox theft are not great or numerous. There is do hesitation as to ways and

! means of obtaining information from natives who are unwilling to give it, and torture is I more or less openly resorted to. One of our servants having stolen some powder from us at Bomblon, we applied to the Governor for instructions as to the best method of ascertaining its whereabouts. He at once suggested that a thumb-screw properly used would probably elicit tbe desired information. We are informed that other apparatus, formerly used in the Inquisition, and since preserved in the monasteries of old Manila against the time of need, is being brought into requisition during the present revolt, but it should not be supposed that the Spaniards had not improved upon these somewhat antiquated implements of torture. We learned during our stay in the islands that the application of a good strong interrupted current of electricity to certain sensitive portions of the body had been found quite effective ! And yet they say that Spain is not a progressive nation 1 The desert of official and ecclesiastical corruption is not without an occasional oasis, and one meets honest and humane Government officials who are truly interested in bettering the condition of things in their pr6vinces. The Philippine career of General Arolas affords a' shining example of what might be accomplished in the archipelago were there more men like him. Arolas was made GDvernor ef Sulu at a time when assignment to that post was a somewhat equivocal honour. His well-known republican views had made him decidedly persona non grata with the powers at home, and he was not the first undesirable character who had been " honoured " by an appointment to Sulu or Bilabac, where pestiferous fevers and knives and lances of the hostile Moros made life at once varied and uncertain. A less energetic man might have given up in despair, but Arolas promptly improved the defences of his fortified town, made soldiers of bis raw native troops, and by a vigorous application of modern hygienic laws, with w.hich he was familiar, changed the place from a pest hole to one of the healthiest cities in the East. He gave the Moros such a thrashing as was utterly foreign to, their experience, threw the priest, who attempted to interfere with him, into irons, and settled down to improve the condition of things around him at his leisure. So great were the services of Arolas that he was raised from the rank of colonel to that of a general of brigade, and what had been tantamount to a sentence of banishment against him was finally revoked. He availed himself of the opportunity to return to Spain, and had hardly turned his back on Salu when the Moros took advantage of the carelessness of his -successor and sacked the town. We must; however,- take conditions as we find them,- and in spite of individual exceptions, there can be no doubt that, taken as a whole, the ecclesiastical and secular authorities in the Philippine Islands are a blight and a curse npon the country which they misgovern. Small wonder, then, that the indolent ■ and peace-loving natives, led by more energetic and restive half-castes, have risen, repeatedly in impotent rebellion against the hand that oppresses them.