Up till midnight Manila was at play. In mediæval Luzon they had not then lost the sportive instinct of the healthy animal or been lost in the chase of the dollar. The shops were closed, but the places of amusement were open. The Lunita, outside the city wall, was thronged with carriages, and at each end of the Plaza de Gotta a band was playing. Spanish grandees and beautiful donnas were driving or promenading there. Inside the wall churches and theatres were open, the churches being first visited and then the play houses. In the amphitheater, built up of bamboo, a crowd of the poorer people were gathered, and while the braver battles were not in progress at this time, cock fighting was attracting the attention of many. Under the walls of the old city, the city that best represented the ancient order, the city of this story, in cloisters arched over where stock was being housed, groups of men were throwing dice or playing cards. It was like a picture of the middle ages projected into the closing days of April, 1898.

What an anomaly it was! Walls of the middle ages, surrounded by a great moat, and within a cosmopolitan group, including Spaniards, Chinese and natives of the Northern islands; yet adjoining it to the east lay a modern city; and Cavite, eight miles to the west, was a fort manned by modern guns. Yellow clay houses of one and two stories roofed with red tile, some with courts in the center, here in old [8]Manila, and to the east modern places of business and houses well plumbed, lighted with electricity. Churches and cathedrals, conventos and nunneries everywhere here, and beyond the Passig river modern amusement places and Protestant churches.

In the magnificent harbor that lay north of Manila, small crafts of many kinds were grouped at the piers, and in the distance the modern fleet of Spain lay at anchor. It was the one portion of the old order that yet remained; and the world was pressing upon it, and change was near.

Ambrosia Lonzello, the Friar’s Daughter, stood at the gate in front of her mother’s home, gazing down the street, dreaming the dreams of oriental maidenhood. She had inherited the symmetry of proportion that belonged to her mother’s tribe in Cebu, and from her father, Bishop Lonzello, had the Spaniard’s dark eyes and charming vivacity. It had been twenty years since Friar Lonzello, a young priest then located in Cebu, had met the young native woman who became Ambrosia’s mother; and though it was forbidden priests to marry, Lonzello yet supported the woman he had then loved and the daughter that had been born to them. If it was a strange thing to a European, it was rather the rule than the exception in that oriental, mediaeval country, and as the daughter of the Bishop, Ambrosia was one of the prominent young women of the walled city. She stood, gazing down the street and up at the stars, dreaming her own dreams, a girl without experience in the ways of the world, when she heard a voice at her side:

“Ambrosia! Buenos dias!”1

Ambrosia started. She knew the voice. But she supposed the possessor, Camillo Saguanaldo, was across the bay in China. A few months before he had been banished because of leading an insurrection against the friars, who were [9]practically the rulers of the Philippines, and his return involved great danger for him. So Ambrosia said:

“I thought you were in China, Camillo. Do you not know it is dangerous for you to be in Luzon?”

“My duty calls me here, Ambrosia, and here I must be,” replied the youth. “It is not so dangerous now as it has been in the past. At last our prayers are to be answered and America, the great land that loves liberty, is to give us a chance to secure our freedom. If we do our part we shall be free. When I was in China I talked with Admiral Rainey, of the American fleet that was anchored there, and he told me that the United States was about to go to war with Spain solely to secure liberty for the Cubans; and when I told him how it was in the Philippines, that we had been struggling for liberty for three hundred years, he said that it might be that Uncle Sam would do for us what he meant to do for the reconcentrados of Cuba. So I came over in advance to help when the only chance the Filipinos ever had shall come to them.”

“I wish it might be, Camillo,” replied the girl. “But if my father hears you have returned, he will kill you, and nothing can appease his wrath now.”

It might be mentioned that when the insurrection led by Saguanaldo had failed and his banishment was decreed, Bishop Lonzello, at the intercession of Ambrosia, had procured for him an allowance of $20,000 on which to live in China. Ambrosia had intended it as a kindness to him, and the bishop regarded it as a bribe, but now that he had returned there was no doubt that Lonzello would prosecute him and if possible secure his death.

“I shall be safe.” replied the youth. “I used that $20,000 in buying guns and ammunition, and have already a stronger force than I ever had. My troops are near at hand even now, [10]and Manila is not so peaceful as she seems.”

“You do not know. The heavy guns of the battleships have been mounted at Corregidor and Caney, and the 160,000 Spanish troops in the city laugh at the idea of America ever being able to take it.”

“Yet America will take it. The American fleet will be here and will win, and then they will give us freedom. Within a few months the Filipinos will be free, and then Ambrosia Lonzello will become Ambrosia de Saguanaldo.”

The young girl flushed with combined embarrassment and pleasure.

“It can not be,” she said. “I am not worthy of you. I shall seek with you the freedom of the Filipinos and then I shall die and leave you free to marry a woman who has a name.”

“Fie, Ambrosia. I will give you my name, and there will be none in Luzon more honored than that. Many have tried for the good that now we shall attain. It must come. The very fact that we have waited for it so long proves that it must be near. Luz de mi vida2, it is so.”

“I wish,” the girl began wistfully, then stopped abruptly. “Father is so bitter against you. I always wish you with me, yet you never come but I am anxious you should go, lest staying mean your death.”

“Fear not, Ambrosia,” said the youth. “They call me the Fox of Luzon, and I find my way where they do not suspect. I was with your father yesterday and he never knew.”

“Oh, take no risk,” plead the girl, throwing herself in his arms. “Te amo con todo el corazon.3 You must, you must be careful. Oh, it is sad, so sad. If they would only let us have a chance the people might be so happy. Luzon is a beautiful island. It seems to me like Paradise, the garden of the Lord; and yet for us it is purgatory.” [11]

“Some day we shall be released from purgatory, chuleta4. The prayers of our forefathers will prevail.”

“Camillo, come inside, or they will see you.”

She drew the young man into the shadows, and into the house. There the lovers talked undisturbed. They talked of things that to them were the most momentous—their own loves and their individual plans, the hope and future of the island which had been their home all their lives. Little did they know that time was working for them and through them more momentous changes that should affect continents and end completely the feudal in the capitalistic.

On the following morning Manila was awakened by the roar of artillery. It was still dark save for the star light, yet quickly the streets were in turmoil. Some grasped the things they most valued and rushed to most ridiculous places for safety. One man took to the woods with a fighting cock under his arm. A few of the bravest mounted to the roofs of the dwellings and the towers of the churches in order to view the fight that had been anticipated, but which had come sooner than expected. From these vantage points they looked on a scene such as falls to the lot of man to observe only once in a thousand lives.

In answer to the challenge of Cavite the American fleet was forming in battle array. In single file, as if in gala parade, they came, like actors entering from the wings of a great stage or circus performers from the dressing room, crawling over the white bay like living things. The dawn had come, suddenly as in the tropics, come with the roar of artillery. For once it had literally realized Kipling’s line—

At last the fleet, the tool of the new order of capitalism, was ready. The command had gone forth from Admiral [12]Rainey: “You may fire when you are ready.” The American flag ship shot a line of fire, and from the smoke that arose a great roar resounded. Boom, boom! Fire and shell and smoke and action swept from consciousness the peace of nature and thought of the world of life. Now and then the white veil of smoke would lift, and the watcher on the towers could see in those intervals splintered masts and laboring vessels, specks that were men struggling in the waves, and wrecks that lined the shore. It did not seem possible that all those specks were men, with hopes and plans and families, and hearts and bodies that suffered; the watchers on the towers could not know that decks of vessels were slippery from blood, and that nerves were racked with pain and hearts were sore from loss. The American vessels, crawling like water mites over the white mirror spread below them, circled together about first one and then another of the Spanish ships; and ever as they moved flashes like fiery legs stretched from their sides. This red venom of death touched the Spanish ships that appeared to wither and consume before it. Here a Spanish ship ran to shore, as though a living, wounded thing, seeking a place to die, and, trembling, sank beneath the waves. There a vessel lay under the pitiless pelting of fire, till there was a heavy explosion, and the ship was torn to shreds that sprinkled the water, while dots that represented men struggled in the waves. Yonder a vessel was on fire, and as it bore to shore specks that were men dived into the water to save themselves, and the red flames licked life from the redder decks.

With what precision the stranger ships came on, circling, and pouring death into the helpless vessels whose wooden hulks graft had left exposed to shell! How aimlessly and helplessly the Spanish vessels floundered, unable to fight, and finding no escape! It was war, glorious and terrible. [13]In Spain a thousand widows and orphans would weep and miss forever that which had been taken from them in a quarrel in which the fighters had no interest. In America a million would scream for joy and tingle with the glory of slaughter and the thought of being splendid fighters. Within half an hour nearly four hundred able-bodied men perished and twenty million dollars’ worth of property that should have been used to make life happier and better was destroyed. It was a great drama, in a splendid amphitheatre, with the lifting curtains of night to show it forth, enacted for the few in the towers. Ambrosia had seen and understood and was silenced by the grandeur and horror of it. She felt for the dying, and could hardly restrain herself from crying out in agony when the American fleet ceased firing and calmly moved away to prepare, within sight of the wrecks and the sacrifice, breakfast for the living, after their hour’s toil.

“Oh, God, but this is horrible,” she muttered, faint with her feelings. As she spoke, once again she was startled with a voice at her side. She turned to behold an old man with a long beard, but she knew the voice, the voice of Saguanaldo, and it said:

“Ambrosia, chuleta, it is the dawn, not only of a new day, but also of a new era.” [14]

“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!” [15]

“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 [16]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.” [17]

“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 [18]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, [19]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.” [20]

“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, [21]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. [22]

As General Saguanaldo and his men drew to shore, a small English woman approached him from a clump of bamboos that grew near the shore, hiding the new city from sight.

“What do you here, Madam Rizal?” asked Saguanaldo, bowing low. “You always bear important news.”

“I have a circular which Bishop Lonzello has been distributing throughout Luzon. Did you win a promise from the admiral to aid us in our struggle?”

“He told me to go ahead and do the best I could against the Spaniards.”

“But no promise definitely to help us gain our independence?”

“N-o, I can’t say that he did.”

“Grant me permission, then, to lay this document before him. I am of his own race, and believe I can induce him to aid our cause.”

“Let me see the paper.”

Mrs. Rizal handed the paper to the insurgent general, and as he read stood gazing abstractedly over the water. She was yet a young woman, but her face revealed both sorrow and determination. She was the widow of the late insurgent, Dr. Rizal, who was the best educated and probably the most manly of all who had opposed the exactions of the friars in the interest of the native population. He had accomplished but very little, and only a short time before had been shot by the Spanish soldiery, at the instigation of Lonzello [23]and others. The widow, after that event, seemed to have no object in life but to carry on the work her husband had begun, and became an invaluable aid to Saguanaldo. She grasped situations he could not understand. She advised with the good sense of a veteran. She went from place to place, singing, talking and encouraging. She was always active in the cause of Philippine independence, and no task, no privation, was so great as to deter her. But perhaps the service that most appealed to the Filipino leader came through her friendship with Ambrosia Lonzello. She managed that the aling1 might meet her lover, and at the same time protected them from the friar, her father, so that he never suspected that his enemy was the lover of his daughter.

“Go, and God bless you,” said the insurgent, after he had finished reading the friar’s address.

Again the boat pushed from shore, this time bearing, not Saguanaldo, but Mrs. Rizal. When they arrived at the American flagship the woman introduced herself to Admiral Rainey and gave a history of her husband’s struggle and his fate. There was more feeling in her recital than there had been in Saguanaldo’s and the admiral was clearly touched by it. When she had finished the story she said:

“And, Admiral, our enemies are your enemies. The men who are fighting us are warring you also. I do not ask you to take my word for it, but I bring you a circular which is being distributed over the island by Friar Lonzello, which I ask permission to read to you.”

The admiral gave his consent and the woman read, translating from the Spanish as she proceeded:

Shortly afterward two boats put forth from the battleship for the shore bearing, not only Mrs. Rizal, but also a quantity of guns and ammunition, as well as other equipments for campaigning. They were met at the shore by Saguanaldo and his men with demonstrations of joy and Mrs. Rizal delivered her message from the admiral with the feeling of triumph:

“Tell General Saguanaldo,” the message went, “to take and hold the city of Manila. The American battleships will see that the Spanish forts do not interfere. But destroy as little property as possible, and maintain order and discipline.” [25]

It was a dark night. The sports that had characterized the early evening, and the throng of gay promenaders that had ranged the streets devoted at night to the business of pleasure instead of the pleasure of business, had given place to rest and quiet. The city was asleep—soundly asleep. It was the sleep of exhaustion that comes after play that is the hardest of work. Gambling houses were closed. The cock-pit, where a few hours before so many had gathered to participate in the great Spanish amusement, was deserted. Even at the arsenal of Cavite, eight miles away, all was silent except for the tread of sleepy sentinels.

New Manila, a modern city of more than a hundred thousand mixed people, lay on the east of Passig river, a place of merchandising and cosmopolitan in its sport and games of chance. But, though it was the more important of the two towns that were yet one, it was within the walled city that the public buildings and the great cathedral were located. Several stone bridges spanned the Passig river, each opening to a gate in the wall, which was often 150 feet through, but hollow, with rooms inside for the storage of forage, the stabling of animals, etc. In olden days the wall was a formidable defense, and was supplemented, where the river did not flow, with a moat. But now the moat was neglected and covered with a green scum, and snakes infested it while disease was breeded from it. And the wall was no longer a defense. The soldiers were careless now. In truth, they were poorly paid and none too loyal to Spain. It may have [26]been for this reason that at one of the gates, this night, there was an opening that would admit a man, yet that was not observable from a distance. For some strange reason no one seemed to be watching. Dark figures filed into this gate, and crept under the walls to the true gate, entering the city. A squad here, a few there, but, all told, hundreds. Again, for some mysterious reason, no soldiers were on guard. The city was safe anyhow; it had not been invaded for many years, and the proud Castilian felt that no one would dare to challenge him.

Up unfrequented streets a few figures stole silently, unobserved. It was so dark that, even had they been seen, few would have known that they were armed. It was so silent that the city seemed a place of the dead instead of the living, and the superstitious natives who were thus stealing into the city were more apprehensive of apparitions than of the Spanish soldiery. As the men entered from many streets they converged to one place. They then moved in small squads silently on the sentries, capturing and silencing them. They moved to the public buildings and took possession of them. They ran down the Spanish flag and in its place hoisted the insurgent flag. It was the crowning work of Saguanaldo.

Before this time, under his leadership, the insurgents had taken possession of Malalos, and even now they were active all over the island of Luzon. An election was under consideration, and Saguanaldo’s candidacy for president was uncontested. It was a peculiar situation, due to a lull before the storm. The American fleet, after having sunk the Spanish vessels, hesitated about taking possession of the islands lest complications might ensue; yet it was such a menace to the Spanish forts that they realized their helplessness. With both the Spaniards and Americans doing nothing, the insurgents [27]were able to accomplish more than they had ever done before. Their success filled Saguanaldo with delight. He arranged his troops to the best advantage and was soon in possession of the city.

Then suddenly the stars winked out and over the wooded uplands to the east the sun arose.

“It is the sun of Filipino independence,” said Saguanaldo, pointing to the orb of day. “How quickly has the darkness passed and how bright the new era of the Philippines is.” And then the soldiers cheered.

When morning come and the people understood the changed situation Mrs. Rizal called on Ambrosia Lonzello that she might felicitate with her. “Ambrosia, the city has been taken and is in the hands of the insurgents,” began the older woman. “It means Filipino freedom. Even if we are not able to maintain our own independence, then America will be our protector. And the night is past. Oh, thank God, thank God!”

“Dr. Rizal has won, in his wife,” replied the younger woman. “I think he must rejoice, together with all the thousands who through the centuries have given their lives for Filipino freedom. It must be a happy day in heaven as well as earth. Even the sun seems glad and all nature rejoices this morning.”

“For the first time since my husband suffered so cruelly and unjustly I am happy,” responded the older woman. “You will wed Saguanaldo and you will be happy with him. You will not have to see him shot in disgrace, Ambrosia, but instead will be hailed as the wife of the liberator. But think not that I envy you or grumble at my fate. It is enough for me that I have realized the dream my husband dreamed and helped to do his work.” [28]

“Where is Ambrosia?”

Bishop Lonzello addressed the woman who had borne a daughter to him in the home he had provided for her. He was deeply agitated with passion. The insurgents, who had elected a president and assembly, had already nationalized the friars’ lands, and the heresy of Aglipay was waxing formidable, having possession of most of the churches throughout Luzon. Lonzello had heard that his daughter Ambrosia had been receiving attentions from Saguanaldo, the leader of the insurgents, and the thought of it made him furious. It showed in his face as he stood before the woman he had once loved and whom now he supported.

She was deeply religious. To her, submission to the embrace of Friar Lonzello had been obedience to God’s messenger, and to this day she regarded him as a sinless representative of Deity rather than as husband. It had been many weeks since Bishop Lonzello had deigned to visit her. There were other and younger women whom he met now; still, he made no attempt to conceal the parentage of the girl, and the general knowledge that he was her father had no bearing on his standing either as a citizen or a priest.

“I do not know, Holy Father,” replied the Filipino woman meekly.

“You ought to know. What do you suppose will become of your daughter if you let her wander about apart from your knowledge?”

“Nothing bad, I hope. I have great faith in Ambrosia.” [29]

“Nothing bad! Diablo!1 Something has happened to her. Ambrosia has disgraced us and blasphemed the God of her fathers.”

“Holy Father, what do you mean?”

“I mean that the girl has gone astray, and you have not prevented her.”

It apparently did not occur to him that both father and mother had aforetime gone astray, and that it hardly behooved them to talk of lapses of their daughter while making religious professions themselves. But the mother only turned pale and gasped.

“I do not see how it can be. Tell me what you mean, Holy Father.”

“Ambrosia has been meeting Saguanaldo, the enemy of his country and of religion—meeting him in secret and at night. I will not say that she has fallen from virtue, for that is not so bad as lapsing from her God and her duty. Fornication might be forgiven, but the sin against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness. Woman, these meetings must cease. You hear me; they must cease.”

The woman trembled and mumbled. Her eyes fell as she replied:

“I will do my best, Holy Father.”

“Do your best! Damnation! Am I to be told that you will do your best? I tell you your daughter is the enemy of God, and you will only do your best to stop her. Do your best, Diablo! Forbid her leaving the house; keep her in prison; put her in a convent. This thing must stop. Woman, do you hear me?”

The mother faltered, and crossed herself. Apparently she was willing, but had not the strength of character to enforce her will.

“You speak to her, Holy Father,” she spoke hardly above [30]a whisper. But the irate priest turned away with an imperious gesture. As he turned Ambrosia herself entered from a side door and now confronted him.

“Sin-verguenza!2” he hissed.

The girl straightened in dignity. “I do not permit even my father to say that to me,” she said.

“And I do not permit a daughter of mine to consort with a heretic and rebel.”

The priest faced her with a sneer, and anger that shook his frame, while his fingers clasped and unclasped themselves. He looked ready to clutch her by the throat.

“I owe you nothing as a father,” the young girl replied quietly but bravely, “since you did not give me even a name when you gave me life. I owe you nothing as a mediator between God and man, because your life and words have not convinced me that you have the ear of God. But I am as much above your accusations as I am above your habits.”

The bishop lifted his hand and struck at her. She was young and lithe, and avoided the blow. He picked up a stone and threw at her, yet again she slipped away. Then he remembered himself, and, raising his hand, began the formal curse of the church. The girl listened with form erect and with a smile of defiance on her lips; but the mother fell on her knees and as the anathemas poured in anger from the lips of the father upon the child, she who believed they would come to pass, fell on the ground, and, writhing in agony before him, begged him to desist. But it was all in vain.

“The eye that mocketh at her father, and despiseth to obey her mother, the ravens of the valley shall pluck it out, and the young vultures shall eat it,” the priest hissed; the mother groaned.

The priest straightened, and, pointing his finger at his daughter, continued: [31]

“Cursed shall thou be in the city and cursed shall thou be in the field. Cursed shall be thy basket and thy store. Cursed shall be the fruit of thy body and the fruit of thy land, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep. Cursed shall thou be when thou comest in and cursed shall thou be when thou goest out. The Lord shall send upon thee cursing, vexation and rebuke in all that thou settest thy hand for to do, until thou be destroyed and until thou perish quickly, because of the wickedness of thy doing whereby thou hast forsaken me.”

The mother lay with her face on the ground in a swoon as he concluded. The priest walked away, and the eyes of the girl, his daughter, followed him with fearless look.

“You have cursed me with life,” she said. “You have cursed me before this, so that I can not even love as others do. That is the end of your power.” [32]

“Foolish, foolish, foolish!” Mrs. Rizal was expressing her opinion of General Saguanaldo’s action to the insurgent general himself.

“Caspita! Why is it foolish?” asked the general.

“Because you may offend America, without the friendship of which you can not win. It will be natural for the United States, after having captured the Philippines in the prosecution of a foreign war, to want to hold on to them. And if America chooses to hold the islands and make them part of the United States in declaring the independence of the Philippines you will only turn America from your side to oppose you.”

“Do you suppose I want to fight side by side with America for freedom from Spain and then be subjected to that country? Did you not tell me that Admiral Rainey promised us independence?”

“No. He could not promise us independence, because he is not the sovereign of America. The most he did, the most he could do, was to promise to aid us in our fight with the Spaniards, and he could do that only because his country, too, is at war with Spain.”

“Then what advantage will it be to us to win, seeing that, though we may win from Spain, we will lose to America? Por Dios, Señora! what do you expect of us?”

“You may not win independence, but you may win freedom and justice. You can not win independence, anyhow. It is doubtful if foreign countries would recognize the [33]Filipino republic, even if America should depart and leave us to work out our own salvation. It is also doubtful if we could win without America’s help. Our hope is in securing the aid of the republic that is giving Cuba her liberty, and repay the freedom that is possible of attainment at this time and at no other.”

“Independence is all that will suit me. I have not such a low conception of good for the Filipinos as you seem to have.”

The Filipino impatiently and angrily entered his headquarters.

Mrs. Rizal went away, sad at heart.

After Saguanaldo had secured the city of Manila he had occupied the public buildings, and a provisional government had been organized. The Filipino assembly at Malalos had adopted a constitution for the Filipino republic fondly hoping that the Americans would ratify it. Admiral Rainey had offered no objection; but it can not be said that he had advised the move. Indeed, he was merely awaiting instruction from America; and yet the presence of his fleet was the wholesome reminder that gave the provisional government power to maintain itself. Saguanaldo had been elected president and duly installed in office. The provisional government, among its first acts, had declared the friar lands confiscated and nationalized; and, while nothing had been done to enforce the new law, yet it was a fact that native priests, representing the schismatic Filipino Catholic church, had secured possession of the larger number of the churches and religious buildings throughout Luzon. This was not to be wondered at, because there were nearly three million who were in rebellion against the foreign priests, and less than half that number who were yet loyal to them. It was in Manila alone that the friars were in undisputed control. [34]

Perhaps power may have turned the head of Saguanaldo. Mrs. Rizal had told him that desire for honors had tempted him beyond the pale of discretion. It might have been better had he organized a provisional government and made it subject to the United States, since, then, it might have been recognized and maintained by the new invading power. But Saguanaldo denied personal ambition, and with some truth. He had planned to make the day of the declaration of national independence, which he had proclaimed, as the occasion of his marriage with Ambrosia Lonzello, and had craved, as a young bridegroom, to show her the honor, on that occasion, of having her hailed as the president’s wife, so that it was for her sake more than his own he sought the honor. So often this is true. Men seek wealth and place, not so much for themselves as that they may please and impress a woman.

But things did not seem to be going right. Not only was Mrs. Rizal offended at his action, but when he, with a lover’s ardor and enthusiasm, had laid the matter before Ambrosia Lonzello, she had responded with tears.

“You do not love me,” he began.

“Better than life, Camillo,” responded the girl. “But my heart tells me that all is not well. You may declare independence, but you will not have it until you first fight for it. I understand you are eager to give me honors, and I appreciate the motive, but I can not marry you and become a burden to you until the bitter battle and hard struggle are past.”

“That proves you do not love me,” iterated the youth, sulkily.

“I shall prove to you I do love you by waiting for you [35]until your work is done, and then I shall marry you just as freely and just as proudly, though you are defeated and without honor, as if you are successful and undisputedly president of the Filipino republic. It is the desire to do great and right things, the effort to do them, that makes the soul great, whether the deeds be really done or not.”

“But what pleasure will there be for me in the ceremonies of inauguration if you be not by my side?”

“If it was merely to give you pleasure, Camillo, if it was merely to gratify my pride or my selfish desire, I would become your bride on the day set for the celebration of Filipino independence. But I must decline to marry you now for your sake and for the sake of Filipino independence. You shall need to be free from ties of home and responsibility to me. Unless you are free I do not think you can win. Therefore, I refuse to hang around your neck in the battle, lest in doing so I cause you to be defeated.”

The insurgent general plead, but in vain. Then he left, hurt and blaming her.

The day for inauguration and celebration approached, and where he had expected the triumph of his life he faced defeat; where he had expected exultation and bliss he was filled with disappointment and bitterness. Still, preparations for the ceremonial proceeded. The day dawned at last. General Saguanaldo was present as the central figure, and was received with cheers as the savior of his country. But neither Mrs. Rizal or Ambrosia Lonzello were present. The people were merry with feasting and noise, and the enemies did not show themselves. The ceremonies of inauguration of the first Filipino president proceeded without interruption, and Saguanaldo made an inaugural address that was favorably received. Yet to him it was a disappointment, because [36]the One was not there amid the thousands. It is always the One we care for. The applause we crave is as nothing except the One applaud. The attainment we secure is mediocrity unless the One see us advanced and glories in our deed. And when, instead of the applause of the One, the approval and sympathy of the One, the One turns away with disapproval, then we feel the deed were better not done, and the applause is a mockery. So the day was not a triumph to Saguanaldo. Even when the shades of evening fell, and the people brought forth the fireworks, when Manila was noisy with explosives and when she was gay with rejoicing and sportive people, Saguanaldo’s heart was like lead, and he was bitter against the two who were the most loyal to him of all others.

Yet there seemed to be no reason for the heaviness of his heart. Perfect weather, a program without a hitch, expressions of good will only, without a word or act of disapproval from the enemies of the republic, it seemed that Saguanaldo ought to have been happy. He was making history as his friends told him. He would hereafter be hailed as the liberator of the Filipinos. The day would be celebrated for years as the day of rejoicing, the greatest in Filipino history. Why could he not shake off the dread apprehension that lay like lead on his heart? Is there such a thing as premonition, which tells one things to come, when he is too hard of hearing to receive the message?

But Saguanaldo got through the day. As night came he was wearied, exhausted from sorrow. But with the weariness peace came to him. It is the ease that comes when nature would heal a wound. Saguanaldo thought it meant success for him. He would triumph anyhow, and then they would believe in him. It was the fate of the great to be [37]misunderstood and derided by their friends, and he must greatly bear if he would triumph greatly.

At last the last fireworks had been exploded, the last hurrahs expressed, and in the deep silence and serenity of the night Saguanaldo lay to rest, feeling that, after all, it was not a failure; and, being tired, he slept. [38]

It was late when Saguanaldo awakened the following morning. He had no more than opened the casement blinds and stepped out on the veranda than he saw that the city was unusually stirred. He went into the streets to make inquiry.

“The American army has arrived and is disembarking,” was the word he received.

He walked into the heart of the city, and saw regiments of soldiers wearing the new khaki uniform, marching through the streets. His heart sank within him at the sight, and the warning Mrs. Rizal had given him recurred to his mind. Against these soldiers he knew he could do nothing, and if he should seek to maintain the Filipino independence that had been proclaimed the day previous, with hostile Spaniards on the one side and hostile Americans on the other, he saw at once that the case was hopeless. Yet, to give up his ambition, to forego independence for the Filipinos, to abandon the hope of making Ambrosia Lonzello his wife and the first lady of Luzon, to yield his new title and new honors without at least a show of resistance, was more than he felt like doing. He was perturbed, his mind flying from one resolve to another and his heart filled with one emotion after another. “And while he mused the fire burned.”

“Camillo, the people are depending on their president to do something for them in this crisis. Do you feel you can gather your troops together and successfully resist the Americans?”

It was Mrs. Rizal speaking. She was standing by his [39]side. There was no trace of exultation in her voice, but she spoke in deeply sympathetic tones.

“What would you advise?” asked the insurgent general, meekly.

“Go as the accredited leader of the Filipino people and welcome at the landing the general who comes from America. It will put America on your side, and that means against the Spaniards.”

Saguanaldo considered. “I will do it,” he said.

Indecision had left him. A few moments afterward, accompanied by his staff, and wearing his smartest uniform and accoutrement, he was driven to the pier, where he asked to be conveyed to the American general. His rank was at once recognized and he was taken to the commander in charge, being received by him with marked civility, and consulted relative to the placing of the American troops. Cordial relations seemed to be established between the two leaders at once; and Saguanaldo was very much gratified, after the noon hour, to receive from Judge Benjamin Daft, the man who had been sent from America to serve as civil governor of the Philippines, an invitation to visit him on shipboard.

Judge Daft was found to be a large man with a happy smile, who was very cordial in his manner. Within a very few minutes after they met Saguanaldo was smoking with him and felt at perfect ease.

“I understand,” said Judge Daft, “that it is somewhat embarrassing for you, as well as for me, that I come with orders to supercede you as governor of the Philippines. But you understand that the war is not yet over, and the final termination of things is not yet determined on. I want to assure you, however, that the United States desires only the welfare of the Filipinos. I believe it would be better for us [40]to co-operate and make sure of victory than to quarrel and possibly defeat the good that both desire.”

“Vd. disponza! All I want,” said Saguanaldo meekly, “is not to be humiliated.”

“I feel that as a representative of the American republic I can guarantee you that. You can be of invaluable service in the field in quelling disorder and bringing opportunity to your people.”

“I am not insensible to the fact that you, as representative of a great republic with standing already before the world, can command greater respect than I could do as president of the untried Filipino republic.”

“A very sensible view to take of it. I am very much pleased to find so liberal and disinterested a man as you at the head of affairs. It speaks well both for the Filipino people and for the cause you represent. The American republic will remember such unselfish sentiments, and I am sure you will not lose by it.”

General Saguanaldo was flattered by these remarks. They made him desire to appear oven more disinterested. He began:

“My chief concern is for the Filipinos. You can scarcely be ignorant of the injustice we have borne for centuries. We want freedom and opportunity. I ask these things for the Filipinos.”

“The request does you honor, and it will do America honor to grant them. Between us all we shall be invincible. With the prestige of the American republic behind us we can command the good will of the nations. Rainey’s fleet will be able to keep Cavite in subjection. The American general is an old campaigner who has with him a seasoned army and the best of equipment, so that he will be able to stand before any army that Spain can muster against him. Lastly, and most important of all, you, General, are familiar with the [41]islands of the Philippines, and can render service as a guide and leader such as no other man on the earth can give; and in serving us you will be serving yourself and the cause of Filipino liberty. I have heard much of the Fox of Luzon, and have felt that if I could formulate a plan that would enable us all to work together harmoniously, it would be a victory second only to the great victory that Admiral Rainey won in this beautiful bay of yours.”

“I will do all I can, Judge Daft. As you have said, together we shall be invincible.”

“In that case I shall feel no hesitancy about landing. I did think that perhaps it was not a courteous thing to do, to come from across the great ocean to your shores and then ask you to take me in as something more than guest. But in war we can not stand on ceremony. Your disinterestedness and your courtesy have been so great that you have made it much easier for me to do my duty.”

The two men wandered over the ship, Judge Daft showing Saguanaldo all the wonders of the modern man of war. They discussed various matters apart from the questions most in their minds, and always Judge Daft was courteous and apparently keenly appreciative of Saguanaldo. Following the visit of Saguanaldo to the battleship, Judge Daft visited him in the public building of Manila, and, with his permission, the American flag was run up over the town in place of the flag of the new republic. Within two days Saguanaldo went into the interior as the guide rather than the commander of an expedition which the American general sent against some Spanish troops that had, under the direction of Bishop Lonzello, been preparing to attack Saguanaldo in Manila, but that, after the Americans landed, had retired into the interior.

It was only after they had gotten into the interior that [42]Saguanaldo began to realize his position. It came to him that, though he had been hailed as president of the Filipino republic, another occupied his capital, and the Filipino republic was at an end; though he had been the leader of an insurrection, the insurrection was inoperative; and he was fighting under another power; though he had celebrated the independence of the Filipinos, Filipino independence was gone, and he was seeking to subject the people to another foreign nation. While he was under the spell of Judge Daft’s influence, he had not noticed it, but now it came to him with all its meaning and bearing all its bitterness. He felt that he had lost. He felt that he was not only unable to cope against the arms and warships of this strange republic from across the seas, but he was also unable to meet their wiles—diplomacy, they called it. He had heard the word used and now he was beginning to understand what it really meant.

“I am a fool,” he said to himself. “Ambrosia knows it, and so she despises me. But if I must be beaten I will show her that at least I am no coward.” It was heroism surviving folly.

So ever it is the one who influences human actions, whether they be good or bad, public or private, in nature. [43]

The day following the departure of the allied troops from Manila an English ship steamed into Manila bay, and among those who landed was a Jesuit, who came as papal nuncio, a special envoy of the pope, the astute Leo XIII. He at once hunted up Bishop Lonzello and was soon closeted with him over wine and cigars, discussing the situation.

“You see yourself the Spaniards cannot stand before the Americans. They represent the old order, the Americans the new; the old must pass. It is more than useless, it is folly, to stay with the passing policy.”

“But the Spaniards are friends of the church and the Americans are its enemies.”

“I fear you are short-sighted, Brother Lonzello. The Americans are to be Catholics, while the Spaniards have only been Catholics. A live dog is better than a dead lion. But the Americans are not to be despised. The republic is entering on world politics, and if the Holy Father could control that nation he would as good as control the world through it.”

“But he can never control that nation; it is given to heresy.”

“I do not agree with you. Neither does the Holy Father at Rome. Remember, I am speaking for him. Already we have two million voters in America. United, that means the balance of power. It is something that any candidate may well covet. But that is not all. As a result of this war America will add the Philippines to her territory, [44]with possibly Cuba and Porto Rico besides. In time, states will be formed of these territories, and they, being almost wholly Catholic, will give America to the true religion. It is something worth working for, and the prospect makes the Holy Father eager that you should fall in with his plans.”

“I can’t believe it possible to make America Catholic.”

The apostolic nuncio puffed his cigar in silence a moment. Then he leaned forward and said:

“Suppose we induce the capitalists of America to import a million Italians to be naturalized. Suppose we secure jobs for a million Mexicans in America and see that they are naturalized. Suppose that finally Central America and Mexico are annexed to the United States.”

“Why, that is treason to the Latin and the Spanish races.”

“No. It is taking advantage of new conditions. America is developed to the point where it is necessary that she should expand. If she should dig the Panama canal, it will be natural for her to close in on territory that divides her, and excuses are more easily found than grapes in a vineyard. It will aid rather than hinder the Catholic. American capitalists can pay higher wages than either the Italians or Mexicans receive and still obtain them cheaper than they get labor today. Catholic workmen will merely supercede heretics. If Mexico is taken there will be a leveling up as well as a leveling down, and the peon will gain immensely by the change.”

“But it means an entire change of policy.”

“The old policy has been worked to the end, and a new one is necessary. We are living in an age of machinery. Peon and slave can no longer yield the returns that the hireling can do by the aid of machinery. The returns from the [45]Philippines can be quadrupled; and we were foolish to forego the rich harvest because it involves a change of tenants.”

The friar was flushed and angry. He almost shouted.

“But that means that the Spanish friars are to lose power in the Philippines. Do you realize what you are asking us to forego?”

“Perfectly. You have had your opportunity and have made a failure of it. The natives have been rebelling against you for three hundred years. Now, Aglipay has stirred a schism that has taken from Rome a majority of our churches. So long as the Spanish friars remain in power the dissatisfaction will increase rather than diminish. It seems providential that America should come at this time, for it gives the supreme pontiff an opportunity to transfer you and by diplomacy save the work you have done for the church.”

The friar sank back in his chair and thought. Then he mildly said:

“It is a hard thing you ask.”

“Yes, but your order asked the same thing once of the Jesuits, and, on order of the Pope, we were expelled from the Philippines for many years. Now the supreme pontiff is merely exercising his right of transfer relative to the three orders of friars in the Philippines. It is his voice, and you will not dare disobey it.”

“I suppose, of course, we shall have to submit. But it is hard. Shall we have to lose our property, our lands?”

“I come with a mission to the Americans relative to them. I have not talked with the Americans yet, but I can assure you justice. As for the churches and convents, you have lost them to the church, and it is part of my mission to regain them for the church.”

“I shall have to submit. But I can not overcome my hatred of the Americans and I will not remain to knuckle [46]to the natives. I wish I might strike them one hard blow.” He brought his fist down on the table with a thump. The Jesuit was silent a moment. Then he said: “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. You know the response.”

“The lands which the supreme pontiff gave to Legaspi he may take again from the heirs of Legaspi.”

“I can not for the life of me see where the holy church will profit from the change, seeing that Spain is a Catholic country and America is heretic.”

“Spain will remain true to the church even if she loses. But if America wins, then we may not only win back into the fold the schismatics of the islands, but stand also a chance of winning America, and with it the world. It is the greatest, opportunity the church has had for years.”

“I do not yet see how you expect to win America.”

“We have been working for the conquest of America for centuries, ever since Columbus gave it to the world and dedicated it to Christ and his viceregent. After the heretics had taken possession of it, we have labored without cessation to win it back. We brought believing emigrants to the cities until we control many of them. We now have ten million population and two million voters, controlling several states and holding the balance of political power. Already the politicians are taking cognizance of us, But, more important than this, the statesmen are looking for a power that can withstand the tide of Socialism that is sweeping over the land and are ready to make concessions to us for our influence.

“The most far-seeing of American politicians recently remarked that some day Socialism would become a menace to the world and that the strongest influence to combat it would be the Roman Catholic church. Acting on this belief he has already been negotiating for our support. It was the Catholic [47]vote that saved America from the domination of the middle class when threatened by the mob in 1896. It was members of my order who fanned the flame that led to the present war, so that America might enter on world politics. The end is not yet. The Pope sees the importance of our plans, and you must submit. We intend that in the future it shall be known that he who would succeed at the polls must have our favor. We have the power now, and we shall use it. The Brotherhood of Jesus has been banished from almost every country on the face of the globe, but in spite of this we have remained loyal to our extreme oath, and have not for a moment faltered in our purpose to make America Catholic. We are now at the point of success, and the supreme pontiff sends me to command you to yield. Is your loyalty sufficient for that? Remember, we have been driven from land after land, and show yourself as true as the Jesuits have been.”

Bishop Lonzello did not reply. But he filled the two glasses, and as he raised his glass to his lips he proposed the toast:

“Leo, the greatest of Popes. When he speaks it is time for the rest of the world to be silent.”

After the toast had been drunk the Jesuit father referred no more to the topic about which he had been talking. They were sitting by the window looking out on the street where quite a few people were promenading. As one woman after another passed they discussed the good points of each and waxed merry over the wine, rehearsing many salacious stories. Finally Ambrosia Lonzello passed. The Jesuit, looking on her, remarked:

“That is the woman for me. She has the woman’s ten perfect points. Do you know her, Brother?” [48]

The bishop’s lips were dry and his heart was enraged as he answered, feebly, “Yes.”

“Can’t you give me opportunity to hear her confession?”

The bishop knew what was implied by the request, and his heart was fired with the heat of his passion. He made a motion once to kick the Jesuit down stairs. But the knowledge that he was a special envoy of the Pope, and, more than that, the counter-fire of anger at Ambrosia, and the fierce flame of his hatred of Saguanaldo, caused him to desist. Indeed, the first flames had eaten so deeply into his heart that there was little left for the flame caused by the insult to touch. He merely answered, quietly, after swallowing a little:

“That is the sweetheart of the insurgent general, Saguanaldo.”

“Ah, that is good,” responded the Jesuit. “You hate him and would like to wound him to the death before you go. Behold, the Lord hath delivered him into your hands. Promise me that the girl shall confess to me.”

He seized the bishop’s arm and leered lewdly at him. “You really must, for I am mad from continence while on the water. Some day I will do as much for you. Won’t you, good Bishop?”

Bishop Lonzello clenched his fist and hissed through his teeth, “Yes; and may God damn your soul to hell.” [49]

“I am very glad to meet you as a citizen, but of course it is against the policy of my country to receive you as an envoy from the Pope.”

“Very well, Judge Daft, we shall not quarrel over a little thing like that.”

It was the Jesuit talking to the new American governor. He had no intention of abandoning his purpose, but he meant to approach it by indirection. He knew something of diplomacy himself, and so devoted a few minutes to casual conversation. He was by nature and practice an expert in the recounting of stories, having found that an art which won where no other art was honored, and the two passed a pleasant half hour together. Finally, as Rodriguez Violeta, the Jesuit father, arose to take his departure, he said:

“If I speak purely as an individual, I presume you will not object to my asking that you treat us fairly relative to churches and church lands.”

“By no means. I have no objection to telling you that I desire to treat you fairly in these and all other matters.”

“Perhaps you would not object, then, to issuing an order that, until the matter can be settled in the courts, the possession of churches is to be secured to the party in possession, whether that party be the Roman Catholic church or the Filipino Catholic church. This seems to me to be fair, and I believe is in accordance with American jurisprudence.”

“I shall be glad to issue an order of that nature to the soldiers in the Philippines. Anything that is mutually just [50]will be granted you; and, while I can not receive you as envoy of the Pope, I shall take pleasure in hearing your recommendations as an individual of experience who is capable of understanding your people and presenting your side of the controversy in a fair and liberal way.”

“If I can be of any service to you, it will afford me pleasure to be commanded by you. I do believe, however, that the holy father, the Pope, has a plan which would save you very much trouble. I wish you would permit me to present it—as an individual.”

“You are at perfect liberty to do that. Be seated and I will hear you.”

The Jesuit re-seated himself. The camel’s nose had found entrance, and the rest of the body was about to follow.

“The Spanish friars are at the bottom of all the trouble in the Philippines. The Aglipayan schism came because of them, and the many revolts that have disturbed the islands for the past three centuries have been because the people wanted native rather than Spanish priests. Now Leo, who has always been friendly to America and Americans, is desirous of removing the Spanish friars from the Philippines.”

Judge Daft leaned forward, evidently interested. “This concerns me greatly,” he said. “Outline to me the plan more fully.”

The Jesuit ignored the request. Instead of answering him directly, he observed: “This would greatly simplify matters and make your problem sensibly easier of solution.”

“I am conscious of that,” asserted the Judge, betraying eagerness, a weakness which revealed that he was being beaten in diplomacy.

“America can easily handle the Spanish army. Your [51]future problems will lie with pacifying the natives and adjudicating the conflicting claim of the two churches.”

“You understand the situation just as it presents itself to me.”

“You have splendid opportunities here.”

“You mean, to make a fool of myself?” laughed Judge Daft.

“That is an opportunity that knocks often at every man’s door. But I was not thinking of that. I was merely musing—speaking aloud the thing I thought—and a man never ought to do that.”

“Sometimes I think he never ought to speak aloud anything else than his undisguised thoughts. I shall insist on hearing this novel thing, the undisguised thought of a Jesuit.”

“I meant, opportunity to make yourself a reputation that shall lead to future political power. Who knows but that the presidency of the United States lies along this path?”

“I am not ambitious.”

“I understand that; indeed, I was not thinking so much of you as an individual as of you in your position. I was musing, you know. We Jesuits naturally look into the political possibilities of things, and I am astonished at the possibilities I see before you.”

“War generally brings a warrior to the front. The people take pleasure in preferring their military heroes.”

“That is very true. I perceive you are an astute politician. Because you are so far-sighted, you cannot fail to realize that if you are enabled to satisfactorily settle a dispute that has been raging for three centuries, and give America the Philippines to exploit, you will have distinguished yourself in a way that is sure to bring reward. Perhaps not at once. The military hero may come first, while your reputation [52]is in process of building; but if you succeed, your time will come.”

“The people are very forgetful.”

“But men of affairs are not, and they are the folks who count. The substantial business men, who see the advantages that accrue to them because of these things, will remember; and the holy church never forgets. We alone poll two million votes in America now. But, remember, I am only musing. I am asking nothing. I shall report, however, the kindness you have shown me, which will, I feel sure, help to make your task easier.”

“For your suggestions I thank you. You shall be welcome whenever you choose to call—in your individual capacity.”

“You are a sly dog, Judge. I confess myself completely out-generaled in diplomacy, and have dropped it. Hereafter I wish to be known only as your friend. In the language of the Spaniards, buenas noches, amizo mio.”

Never more of a diplomat than when he was claiming to have abandoned diplomacy, the priest took his departure, knowing that he had left thoughts that would cling and bear fruit. He understood that, though the Judge might have been able to handle the simple-minded Saguanaldo by his diplomacy, every good has its better and he had been bested without realizing it. It is the true test of wit that cuts so smoothly one does not know of his wound at the time it is given.

The Jesuit sought Bishop Lonzello and spoke imperiously and exultantly:

“I am to have an order from the American governor that the soldiers are to protect in possession either side of the controversy that may have possession of churches and convents. You want to summon all you can command and seize at night [53]on all these buildings that you can. You haven’t half of them now, and by this means you may secure practically all of them. And the American army is pledged to maintain you in possession of them, once you are in charge. There is no time for delay.”

Lonzello was not a man who needed to have explained to him the advantage this gave the friars. He sprang up, before the Jesuit was through speaking, and began preparing to go on the street and set his machinery in motion.

“You will not find me sleeping,” he said.

The Jesuit leered: “Am I to confess that young woman as my reward?”

Lonzello opened the door and showed him from the room, kicking at him as he passed. Once the Jesuit was outside, however, he said:

“I will send the girl to the cathedral at ten o’clock tomorrow.”

Then he closed the door. [54]

Ambrosia’s mother had again received a visit from Bishop Lonzello. This time he had insisted that his daughter confess in order that she might be forgiven and the curse pronounced against her rendered null. It is possible that the bishop himself believed that the curse held power. Certain it is that the woman feared it and had wept almost constantly since that day that it had been pronounced on Ambrosia. Now she fell in with the idea of Ambrosia confessing and securing release from the curse. She brought the matter before her daughter, who demurred. Then she urged it with such insistence, declaring that filial duty required some reparation on her part, that Ambrosia was touched, and, at the same time, being plagued by the importunity of her mother, consented to confess, and even to confess before the foreign friar, in the church against which she was in rebellion. Indeed, she preferred the foreigner to one of the priests who had long resided in the islands and fallen with its ways.

Behold, then, Ambrosia Lonzello at the cathedral before the confessional in which Violeta was seated. She did not know it, but the moment she entered the confessional the door had been locked behind her by an attendant, at the signal from the officiating priest.

Ambrosia knelt at the confessional, troubled in heart. She felt out of place in a church against which she was in rebellion; and, while feeling that she ought to atone for disrespect shown a father, still she knew not what to say. She [55]knelt in prayer, and as she prayed, the priest within the cell gazed upon her with lustful eyes, studying her points as a sportsman might study the creature he meant to kill and devour. As he looked, the appetite for sex, the fiercest passion that sways mankind, took possession of and began to rage within him. Finally he spoke:

“Daughter, have you been guilty of disloyalty to the holy church? Have you consorted with those who are the enemies of the religion and of their country?”

Naturally, the question, so unexpected, disconcerted the girl kneeling before the cell with her eyes so downcast that she did not see the priest within the cell. Various emotions surged within her. Her first impulse was to deny rebellion to true religion and rush from the church. But she concluded that it were best to remain and admit the thing that had caused her mother sorrow. So she confessed:

“I have met the general of the insurrectionists and am his friend. But I am not an enemy of the true religion.”

“Have you met him at night?”

The girl, although, knowing it compromised her, said softly, “Yes.”

“Late at night or early in the morning?”

Again she faltered as she replied, “Both.”

“Were you two alone?”

“Yes.”

“Did he employ embraces or kisses toward you?”

Still lower, hardly above a whisper, “Yes; but we are engaged.”

“Did he caress you, feeling over your person with his hands—like this?”

The priest’s hands were upon her, and he was taking liberties no other man had ever done. She tried to arise from the cushion where she knelt, but strong arms about [56]her prevented. Then the priest stepped from the confessional and held her in his arms.

“Did he kiss you—like this?” the priest asked. “Did he press you to his bosom—like this?” She was now in his embrace, struggling in vain to free herself. “Nay, do not struggle, little bird. If you grant such favors to enemies of religion, you ought not to refuse them to representatives of the Lord.”

“How can you call yourself a representative of the Lord when you do these things?” she managed to ask between his kisses.

“Why, Chuleta, did not the Holy Ghost overshadow even the blessed virgin? And is it not an honor to be embraced by one who stands, as it were, in the very person of Christ? If you have yielded to the enemy of the Master, ought you not yield to the true representative of the Master, and so make atonement to him?”

For answer, she managed to free one hand and slap his face.

“You do not know the manner of my country,” said the priest, thrusting his hand in her bosom. “The instructions for confession, issued by Saint Liguori, says: ‘Kisses, embraces, squeezing of the hands and similar things not indecent, if done only as marks of affability or benevolence, according to the custom of the country, in an honest way, are not sins.’ Again: ‘To speak, hear, read, write indecent things with a legitimate reason is no sin. Hence, in order to administer the sacrament of penance priests can lawfully hear and read all they wish.’ Tell me what this insurgent did to you.”

The girl wrenched herself away, and, flying to the door, tried to open it. The priest stood and smiled. [57]

“The case is hopeless,” he said. “You might as well confess.”

“Have you no regard for your sacred calling? Have you no regard for this sacred place?” she asked.

“Nothing is more sacred than love,” said he. “Saint Liguori says: ‘Concerning the locality, every external carnal action, although hidden in a sacred place, is a sacrilege. However, cells, a cloister, the vestry, the roof above the church, its door and vestibule, are excluded.’ You see we are excused.”

“Excused! Oh, the wickedness of your heart! I wonder not that Saguanaldo broke away from the church you represent.”

“Nay, child, you misunderstand. If it is given to Peter and his successors to forgive sins, then whatever they may do can be no sin, but is, as it were, the act of God himself. You who think your highest virtue is to love God ought to esteem it an honor that you have provoked the love of God’s representative on earth.”

“Fiend!” shrieked the girl. “Help, help!” The words echoed from the wall, but seemed to penetrate no further.

There was no response, and the priest smiled: “It is foolish to resist the Lord who loves you,” he said. “It is in my power to absolve you from sin, and even to grant you indulgence to commit that which might under other circumstances be sin. Don’t be foolish, child.”

He sought to grasp her in his arms again, but she eluded him. Then he began in a pleading voice:

“Is it my fault that I love you? Why are you not as kind to me as you were to that heretic? You are in the confessional, and I can not only absolve you from sin, but I am also pledged to secrecy. Be kind to me.”

“Oh, loathsome thing, I hate you.” [58]

“But I love you.”

“Love, indeed! You pollute the word, like you do the office you hold and the building here and all else that should be sacred.”

“You know not how I love you. Oh, how I long toward you! ‘Item ordinarie mortalia nabenda sunt escula in ore, seu lingua in ore introducta vel excepta.1’ Are you not, indeed, the bride of Christ?”

“Oh, devil that you are! It is you who have confessed to me, and though you live to be a century of age, confessing every day such villainy as this, I could but hate you worse with every morn, and never could forgive you. If there is hell, where he who burns in lust and anger, burns in flame, then there’s your place. If there is a heaven that hears the voice of innocence, sending the white angels down to give it succor, then will the heaven open now, and white-robed creatures will deliver me. Oh, thou divine Christ, come now and judge between us. Oh, God of purity, deliver me from this, thine enemy.”

“You do not understand. I wish you no wrong. Love is not wrong.”

“Love thinketh no evil.”

“Love is not expressed in words. It never can be told, but in embraces and fondlings. Christ, how I love you and long toward you! ‘Delectatio venerea autem seu carnalisest ca, quea oritur ex commotione spiritum genertioni inservientum et sentitur circa partes genitales.’ You can not comprehend how I am stirred.”

“You know not how you fright me. Oh, sir, I plead with you to let me go. Do not for a moment’s passion damn your own soul and ruin me forever. Show but the manhood that will set me free, and for that manhood’s sake I will say that, though tempted, you had the hardihood to overcome, [59]and I, for that hardihood that won, will be silent as to all you have done and said.”

“What do you think I am? Does the sportsman set the bird free when it chirps? I am not so foolish or so weak.”

“Then let me ask one thing: Did my father deliver me into your hands?”

“Is the Bishop Lonzello your father?”

“He is.”

“Oh, then I understand some things that have been dark. I also have full license now for anything I can do, and you can find no fault in the fault that marked both your parents. Come and give me a kiss, like a good girl, Chuleta!”

“God in heaven, send me protection,” gasped the girl in a faint voice.

A moment later the priest grasped her in his arms, and his lips seized hers in a long, hard, passionate kiss. [60]

Early the following morning Ambrosia Lonzello was released from the convento1 in which she had been detained the night long, and staggered into the street. Suffering physically, nervous almost to prostration, and mentally overwhelmed with horror, she walked, she scarcely knew where. She felt that she dare not go home—that father and mother had betrayed her, and that now she was an outcast, with no friend and with no place on earth. Even heaven had been deaf to her call, and she felt that the divine Father, too, and the Christ who had sympathized with Magdalene, cared nothing for her.

It is a wise provision of nature, apparently attesting her sympathy with suffering, that when sorrow and pain tug almost to the point of destruction at the heart or body, she provides her own opiate. In the article of death almost all creatures are at peace, and fear nothing. Gradually this numbness came over Ambrosia. She apparently could not realize all that had happened. She ceased to feel the full burden of her anguish, and became numb, as it were. She no longer planned, she followed her heart. Indeed, she became more conscious of the glory of the morning than of her own ruin, and in spite of her mind’s declaration that there was no place in the world for her, she saw nature beautiful and friendly about her and felt that not yet had God excluded her.

Her brain would not work, but her heart thought of Saguanaldo and those whom she had thought to be her friends. It was this thread invisible that led her to the [61]camp of the Americans. When she arrived she met first a minor officer and asked to be shown to the commander in charge.

“All right, Miss, just go into the tent and wait until I bring him,” was the reply to her request.

She entered the tent and seated herself. As she waited a feeling of drowsiness overpowered her. Finally, scarcely knowing what she did, she threw herself on the cot in the tent and slept. The soldier who occupied the tent peeped in and saw her.

“Gee,” said he to his messmate, “she don’t want the commander now. She has already made a night of it and needs nothing so bad as sleep.”

“Let’s wait till she awakens and then keep her to ourselves.”

“We ought to have some rent for our tent.”

“Sure.”

When Ambrosia awakened several hours later one of the soldiers was at her side and the tent was closed and darkened. She remained in the tent two days, during which time she was repeatedly assaulted by the two soldiers. Instead of finding a refuge, she had merely fallen into another trap. There really is no escape for a creature that is hunted, especially if that creature be a woman. [62]

When next Ambrosia Lonzello regained consciousness she was reposing in a room familiar to her, at the home of Mrs. Rizal. After her last bitter experience she had been cast into the street in a fever and delirium, and, happily for her, had soon been picked up by Mrs. Rizal, who had taken her to her home and nursed her through a siege of fever. Now, as Ambrosia opened her eyes with a rational look, Mrs. Rizal, smiling on her, said:

“You are better now.”

“How do I come to be here?” asked the girl in confusion.

“I found you wandering on the street in a fever and brought you here.”

“Oh, then it is true,” cried the girl in horror as memory came to her. “I must go, I am not fit to be in this room with you.”

“Nonsense,” responded the older woman, smoothing her pillow. “You have been having bad dreams, and you must forget about them.”

“Are you sure they were dreams?”

“Perfectly. You have been very sick.”

“Where is mother?”

“She has been to see you often, and will come again.”

“Did she say where I had been?”

“She said you had started to confessional, and I suppose the fever came upon you while you were on the way.”

The girl lay silent for a time. Finally tears gathered in her eyes. It was a good sign that the power of crying had [63]returned to her; tears are a mark of humanity, and only they who are dehumanized or rendered outcasts by persecution or sorrow are unable to weep. Mrs. Rizal stooped and kissed the girl. It was the one act of sympathy she needed to break up the fountains of her heart, for it showed that she was not entirely abandoned, and Ambrosia wept unrestrainedly.

“You will be better now,” said Mrs. Rizal when the flood of tears had passed.

“Does—General Saguanaldo know?” asked Ambrosia.

“If he did, he would have come.” Again it was the wisest word that could have been spoken, simple and unlearned though it may have been, for it intimated that her lover had not ceased to care, and this was of all things the most consoling. Yet a moment after it occurred to Ambrosia that if Saguanaldo had desired to come and not been able, he, too, had been burdened and in trouble. Then it was, with a woman’s abnegation, Ambrosia thought of the woe of her dear one rather than of her own sorrow, and this, too, was an advantage to her.

“Are they having trouble at the front?” she asked.

“Yes,” Mrs. Rizal replied. “The friars have seized on the churches, the hospitals and convents, and now the American troops are maintaining them in possession of the property they hold. It is the same as though the Americans, after Saguanaldo had turned the city of Manila over to them, had turned against him and were making war on him and in favor of the friars.”

“Someone is behind this change,” declared the girl after a moment’s thought.

“Yes, there is a Jesuit here, an envoy from the Pope.”

Ambrosia sat up in bed, her eyes distended in horror.

“Then it is true,” she said. “It was not a dream. It was good in you to care for me and not desert me in my [64]pollution, but I know now it is true, and you need not deny it.”

“But,”—began Mrs. Rizal.

“I will not talk about it,” interrupted the girl, “and God will reward you who are so different from other women in that you did not turn away from the victim as from a thing polluted. No, do not interrupt. I am strong now. There is only one thing I may do with the remnant of life left to me. I have no longer father or mother, God or redeemer. I have no place in society on earth. I have no lover, no chance for home or respectability. But I have hope and a purpose. It has just come to me. Do not deny me in the plan I have.”

“I will listen to your plan, but you are weak and not yet able to do anything.”

The girl leaped out of the bed, let down her hair and hunted a pair of shears. “Cut off my hair, closely,” she said.

“I fear you are not yet over the fever,” remonstrated Mrs. Rizal.

“I have had no fever,” said the girl, “and I am well. I shall be strong for vengeance and justice. Nay, do not fear, good Mother Rizal, I am sane.”

“You have not told me your plan.”

“Inasmuch as Ambrosia Lonzello has lost all place in society and on earth, she had the fever and is dead. She is merely another victim of the friars. I, who stand before you, am not Ambrosia Lonzello. I am a man, now and henceforth. I feel within me the vigor and courage of manhood, proving the transformation. Henceforth I shall live only for vengeance and to assist Saguanaldo, who had been Ambrosia’s friend. Cut off the hair that belies my sex, and then we all go to the field to give our lives for the cause.”

Mrs. Rizal expostulated, but in vain. She argued as [65]to the girl’s lack of strength, but was actually laughed out of the idea. At last she fell in with the plan, both as being in accord with her own desire and also as being perhaps the only course open to the girl after what had happened.

A few hours afterward, then, the transformation was completed. The girl, with her hair cropped close and wearing a suit that had belonged in days past to Dr. Rizal, looked very much like a vigorous young man, and Mrs. Rizal was gratified to find that she showed no sign of failing physical powers. Indeed, she was to all appearance well again.

“You see, I have merely been transformed into a new creature,” said the youth, smiling and showing two rows of perfect white teeth. “My name is Hilario Agonoy, at your service.” Bowing low.

“When shall we go to the seat of war?”

“Mañana1,” replied the youth, gaily. “Don’t you see that Ambrosia is dead?” [66]

The next day Mrs. Rizal and her companion, known as Hilario Agonoy, set out into the country to join Saguanaldo.

After they had proceeded a few miles beyond the city they walked along through the jungle over a trail that was rough, stumpy, stony, and at places almost overgrown and hidden by bamboo growths, trees, ferns, and tropical grasses. Occasionally they came to a grass hut in the midst of a little clearing, and here the friendly peasants, who for the most part, knew Mrs. Rizal, extended their hospitality in the form of invitations to remain with them. In places the women would be at work in the rice fields or cultivating tobacco or sugar cane. They were barefoot and bare armed, wearing only shifts that but partly enveloped them, meagerly concealing their fine physiques. Sometimes a man, barefoot and wearing only two garments, would be seen following the carabao, the native ox, as it dragged the wooden plow that scratched the soil.

There were fields of abace or native hemp, rice and indigo. Sometimes the pilgrims would pass through groves of mahogany or cashu and see men at work with bolos, felling trees for lumber, or with sierras1 slowly cutting boards from teque or mahogany. Sometimes they saw them grinding cane in the trapiche2. Sometimes at night they saw the zanita, the Philippine bee, working by moonlight and storing its honey on the underside of slanting branches; and one day, when the bees were asleep Agonoy climbed a tree while [67]the two laughed at his struggles, and the honey he obtained constituted their supper. They passed haciendas3 and pueblos4. Once they came upon a cemetery where a couple of corpses were hanging, because the friends of the dead could or would not put up enough money to pay for the continuous burial in consecrated ground. Occasionally they were “given a lift,” to use an American expression, on a carata, behind a carabao. They saw at times the timid galina del monte, the wild chickens that ranged the forests, and at other times were regaled with the anona or custard apple.

Now and then there were streams to cross. For the most part these were waded or passed over on logs felled to bridge them, though in a few cases there were rustic bridges made of bamboo curiously woven together.

Everywhere poverty was visible, poverty abject and pitiable.

Now and then they came to villages where there were fine brick churches and conventos; and a few other good buildings, beside many huts that under the operation of the Spanish law poor people were enabled to build. The churches were guarded by American soldiers, and in almost every village the inevitable convento was occupied by officers of the American army. Invariably the friar lands were better cultivated and of a better quality than elsewhere, and resembled the old plantations in the American southern states when they were kept in good condition by slave labor; for the peasants bore the marks of poverty and hard work.

The weather was enervating at all times, and often dismal from the drenching tropical rains, for it was the rainy season. Streams were up and the trails were muddy. During the heat of the day a choking malarial steam arose from the earth as the moisture evaporated. The people were kept [68]much indoors. It was too disagreeable even for a revolt against Spain.

They inquired in private for Saguanaldo, and were told that he had deserted the American army and gone into the interior. Others of the Filipinos had followed his lead in desertion, but it seemed that they had not yet come together into anything like an army. As to his exact location, nobody knew. The Americans were looking for him, too, and the natives were careful, even before Mrs. Rizal and Agonoy, to not say too much.

“The Americans are going to force us into fighting them,” a Filipino told them in one of the villages. “They are overbearing and insulting, calling us ‘niggers’ and treating us as inferiors.”

“I feared as much. The Philippines are too rich for them to give up. They want the islands for themselves.”

“Let me show you.”

The Filipino led them to a hut where a man lay on a mat within, evidently seriously injured.

“The Americans gave him the water cure. This punishment was first learned from the Filipinos themselves.” Said the Filipino: “They laid him on his back and pinioned his limbs. Then they put a funnel in his mouth and held his nose while they poured him so full of water that it ran out of his nose and eyes and ears. It was horrible torture.”

“Why did they do it?” asked Agonoy, with sinking heart.

“In order to force him to reveal the whereabouts of Saguanaldo. You see why I have to be careful as to what I say. All I can do is to direct you to go on still further.”

On they went passing into the primitive. They went even into the region of the head hunters, where the beautiful and symmetrical volcano, Mayon, lifted its green sides against [69]the blue sky beyond; and here they saw the warriors who adhered to the old ways, and, severing the heads of their enemies with the bolos which they used also for clearing the roads through the bamboo brakes, dried them and retained the gruesome relics, reduced to a few inches in diameter, as trophies of war.

But the savage tribes were kind to the pilgrims. They, too, were at enmity with Spain and all they regarded as foreigners, ready to take sides with Saguanaldo should he call them forth.

“It seems to me they are more civilized and gentle in their way than are the people from the West,” said Agonoy.

“No people are so destructive and wasteful as those who call themselves civilized,” returned Mrs. Rizal. “I am of them and understand them, and I tremble for the future of the Filipinos. The Americans will bring the foreigner and the natives will disappear before him. They will bring the machine, and such as remain will be chained to it, and compelled to render to them a tribute many times in excess of that which Spain has exacted from you. You have been poor, but you have not starved. Civilization brings the slum and abject hunger.”

Agonoy answered not. He was thinking about something that to him seemed to be a dream, yet which he knew to be true—of the awful experiences of a girl, to all intents and purposes dead, who had suffered at the hands of civilization, the apex of possible human suffering.

So the two walked on and on. Sometimes they heard of Saguanaldo, and again lost trace of him. They passed on into wilder regions, into places infested by mosquitoes, snakes and other loathsome things; to regions where mango birds were numerous and where the pigeon of the crucifixion with the red cross on its breast had its habitat. Often lost, they [70]could go but slowly; sometimes they slept alone in the great forests. But ever they pressed on.

Finally, after days out, the two travelers came upon Saguanaldo in a grass hut in a thicket near the southern end of the island. As they approached, piloted by a friendly Igorrote, Saguanaldo arose in evident surprise. After exchanging greetings Mrs. Rizal said:

“General Saguanaldo, we came to take with you the fortunes of war.”

“Señora Rizal, you are welcome. We shall need all the soldiers we can gather, and your advice will be valuable in this time of trouble. The name of the boy”—

“Hilario Agonoy,” said Mrs. Rizal, quickly.

“You are welcome. Señora Rizal and the boy; we shall want you both at the council of war which we are about to hold.”

“Private soldiers are not often taken into councils,” suggested Agonoy.

“Oh, yes, they are when there are only three present,” suggested Saguanaldo, with grim humor. But Agonoy did not join in the laugh that followed.

By Saguanaldo’s side sat Bishop Aglipay, Obispo Maximo, the leader of the revolt against the friars. Only these four were left, though others were ready to take up arms when Saguanaldo suggested. It was a pitiful remnant of the gay throng that had such a short time ago celebrated Philippine independence, hailing Saguanaldo as president. Saguanaldo began:

“We shall need to confer as to the best mode of procedure, because we are in desperate situation. We are in a much worse shape than before the American army came. Then we were in possession of more than half the churches in the Philippines, and besides that, held Manila. But now [71]I have been tricked away from the Philippine capital, and the American troops are protecting the churches for the friars.”

“How did they come to get the churches which you had?” Mrs. Rizal was addressing Aglipay. She knew, but wanted his version of it.

“We were fearing nothing,” the leader of the schism explained, “when in one night, just before the American troops arrived on the scene, Spanish soldiers seized on the churches while we slept. The next day the American troops came, and as, it appears, they had been ordered to protect in possession of their properties whoever they might find in possession of them, they at once became allies of the friars.”

“And here I, who was with them,” exclaimed Saguanaldo indignantly, “I, who had given them peaceable possession of Manila, was ordered to protect the friars in possession that they gained by trickery.”

“What did you do?” asked Mrs. Rizal.

“Do? I passed the word to as many of my followers as possible, and fled. Not one of them came, though.”

“That seems to have been the best thing you could have done—for the friars,” returned Mrs. Rizal. “In doing that you became rebellious against the United States, and now, I understand, have the American army on your trail.”

“That is true; but what else could I have done? Had I done nothing I would have been fighting for the Spaniards, and, as it were, against myself. I had the Americans against me, anyhow.”

“But now the case is hopeless. So long as the Spaniards were your enemies, without outside help, there was some hope that some day you might have beaten them. But, now that the Americans are allies of the Spaniards the case is hopeless. It is too great a nation for you to combat. Recall how the Spanish fleet melted away before the American fleet in the [72]bay of Manila and tell me what chance you will have before the giant foe from across the seas.”

“I don’t see why the Americans turned against us, when they came here to fight the Spaniards,” said Aglipay gloomily.

“The reason is very plain,” returned the woman.

“Was it that they were offended at me because I had been made president of the Filipino republic?” asked Saguanaldo.

“No.”

“Are the American people, then, not lovers of liberty, and are they merely waging a war of conquest in the name of liberty?” Aglipay asked.

“The answer is found in the fact that there is not a member of the Filipino Catholic church in all America, while there are ten million Roman Catholics there.”

“Ah, political reasons, then,” suggested the bishop. He as an olden friar understood something of how politics modified policies.

“Yes. Though your schism might have a greater power here than the friars have, it commands no influence in America. The American who favors the other side will have friends at home, while one who would favor you would find enemies there that might destroy his influence and his future. You are not only fighting the American army here, and the friars here, but also, as it were, all the people of America.”

The two men reflected moodily for a few minutes.

“There is nothing to do but to fight until we perish,” said Saguanaldo.

“One should not die for a cause unless there is good cause for the sacrifice. Do you find that the people rally to you?”

“No,” said the insurgent bitterly. “They sympathize [73]and see the danger, but it seems they have not the interest that dares to risk all and fight.”

“Even the men you can command are not disciplined or drilled or properly equipped.”

“No. The Americans have the equipment I had collected.”

“Nor would the various tribes be likely to cling together,” suggested the woman.

“This cursed race feeling! The only way the tribes will stay together is when they war with each other; then they are together in battling each other.” There was dogged bitterness in Saguanaldo’s words.

“I do not see how you can win by fighting. What does a grinning skull care for vengeance? But there is a way in which you may win, General Saguanaldo.”

“How,” asked the general, eagerly.

“By yielding. It is often the surest way of winning. You have an unexpected ally.”

“Who can it be?”

“None other than the Pope at Rome.”

“The Pope!” exclaimed both men in a breath.

“Yes. The Pope understands that the Spanish friars are at the bottom of the long trouble in the Philippines and is glad of the war that will give him an excuse for removing them. That will be a victory for him; and, as he has already managed to get possession of the churches, it means a victory for the church as well. If you can get the friendship of America, so that the country will treat you justly, it will also be a victory for the Filipino people.”

“And I am to lose all that I have struggled for?” protested Saguanaldo.

“And I to lose the organization which I have built up through the years?” added the Bishop. [74]

“Better to lose these things alone than to lose both them and your lives as well,” suggested Mrs. Rizal.

“If a common soldier might be permitted to speak”—faltered Hilario Agonoy.

“Say what you wish,” suggested the insurgent general. “We are all equal in our love for the cause.”

“I prefer to fight even though I know we must lose. There is some satisfaction in punishing those who have treated us so unjustly, and every blow we strike will cause them to have the greater respect for the Filipino people in the future. If we could punish that Jesuit”—

“And Bishop Lonzello,” added Aglipay.

“To my mind there is nothing left us to do but fight,” added General Saguanaldo, visibly pleased. “We in the interior can conduct a guerrilla warfare that will cause the enemy to respect us, and make the new masters more inclined to do us justice. I trust, Señora Rizal, you will not desert us if we take this action.”

Mrs. Rizal arose. “I am with, you to the last,” she said. “I am not afraid to die, either, just as my husband died before me. If I may be asked to designate the service I am to perform, I would ask that the youth here and I be permitted to go among the people and arouse them with our songs and speeches. We can rally you a force, General.”

“Go, and God bless you. There is one question I would ask you if I may speak to you in private.”

General Saguanaldo and Mrs. Rizal stepped a few paces away.

“Have you seen Ambrosia?” he asked. “Is she well, and does she remain true to me?”

“Ambrosia has the strength of a man,” returned Mrs. [75]Rizal, “in the cause of Filipino independence. She is true, and will ever be near you—in spirit.” [76]

Mrs. Rizal and Hilario Agonoy, after much effort, succeeded in rallying a force to Saguanaldo. It was a motley crowd, composed of representatives of several different tribes, armed with shot guns, bolos and whatever they could secure, and garbed all the way from a soldier’s uniform to breech clouts and feathers. There were perhaps five thousand of them, all told.

With this force, Saguanaldo began a careful march toward the north part of the island. Mrs. Rizal and Agonoy went ahead and discovered that a force of Americans were advancing inland to meet them. Consequently Saguanaldo stopped at the banks of the Rio Grande, and prepared rifle pits. He also removed from the bridge that crosses the stream the flooring, leaving only the sills, the girders, and cross pieces about every seven feet apart. The first night after these preparations had been made the American troops appeared and encamped on the bank opposite, some 300 feet away.

The Filipinos were not inclined to attack, but relied on the river, which was high and threatening, to keep the enemy from them. Yet the second night, about 11 p. m., the cackling and crowing of chickens at farm houses on the other side, and part way down stream, told them that some movement was in progress. It was immediately across the stream from where Agonoy had been stationed with some threescore natives. At the time the clatter began the moon came out, and it was revealed that a force of Americans was at work [77]on the margin of the river, evidently trying to launch some rafts with a view to crossing. Agonoy directed the men to fire, and a fusillade from the insurgents soon drove the Americans to cover. Hiding behind trees, stumps, rocks or anything that would afford protection, they remained silent until the fire of the insurgents ceased. Then, after a time, they again made endeavor to launch their rafts, until the forces under Agonoy once more drove them away.

This first victory, won by the insurgents, gave them great encouragement and Agonoy was publicly commended by the general. It is still remembered that when this occurred the young officer first blushed fiery red and then broke into tears.

The day following the Americans undertook by daylight the thing which they had before tried at night. But they began in a little different way. They were seen to dump some rafts into the river over a high bank, and then two men, stripped to the skin, dived into the stream and began to swim across. The insurgents peppered at them, while the Americans from the other shore shot at every head among the Filipinos that showed itself. Bullets splashed on all sides of the swimmers, but none took effect. As they drew to shore they were protected by the bank, the Filipinos being unable to fire at them because of thus exposing themselves. Then it was seen that they had borne a cable across the stream. It became apparent that the intention was to hitch it so some object on the Filipino side of the river and thus form a means of propelling the rafts across the stream. But the two naked, unarmed white men, alone on the Filipino side of the Rio Grande, were unable to find a place to which to hitch. Daubed with dirt and glistening with the water, they raced back and forth under protection of the bank, looking for stump or tree, but in vain. [78]

“There is a stump in the rifle pit, up there,” remarked one.

“We must hitch to that,” said the other. “Make you some mud balls.”

They scooped up mud from the river and hugged to their breasts the balls of filth as they started to climb the banks directly ahead of them. Meantime the American soldiers fired over their heads. As they arose over the bank and stood erect looking into the rifle pits, they began throwing the mud balls. The first one struck Agonoy full in the face, and the young commander, with eyes and mouth full of dirt, began clawing at the mud and retreating. The natives, seeing this, and not knowing the nature of the new weapon, broke into a run and retreated.

Meantime a raft had started across the stream, with two men and the clothing and guns of the men who were now tying the cable to the stump. When midstream the rope slipped and the raft upset, precipitating all in the water. The two men reached shore, but the clothing of the men who had swum the river was lost. Other rafts were on the way. Before Agonoy could rally the natives, a small force of Americans had crossed over.

Then began an opera bouffe charge; naked and begrimed Americans and men in khaki against naked and half-clothed representatives of a half a dozen races! And as the Americans came on a run they broke into a college yell:

There was a peculiar laughable twist on the “U.” that added to the grotesqueness of the incident. [79]

By this time they were reinforced by a small body of men who had crossed the bridge on the girders, and as these came up yelling other college yells and firing as rapidly as possible, at nothing, the Filipinos, in utter consternation, broke ranks and fled.

In the course of a few hours, however, Saguanaldo, who understood the lay of the country thoroughly, had again brought his forces into order and had forded the river a little lower down. He was now on the side of the stream nearest Manila, while the Americans, after all had crossed and they had leisurely partaken of dinner, were hunting him further in the interior. It had been a bloodless battle, with the victory apparently on one side and yet the advantage decidedly on the side of the defeated.

After the troops had been collected Saguanaldo called Agonoy to him and said:

“The honors of the first encounter belong to you. Name the reward you desire.”

“All I wish is to serve my country further,” replied the youth with another blush. “Permit me to go ahead to Manila and inform you how to take the city.”

“Another should accompany you, so that if something happens to one the other may escape.”

“Permit me to go to spy out the land,” asked Bishop Aglipay.

“You, Bishop?”

“Yes. Let each go in his own way and alone. Then we can report and will not be in collusion.”

“Does that suit you, Señor Agonoy?” [80]

“I shall be satisfied. If we can wreak vengeance on the bishop’s enemy, the Jesuit, I shall be repaid for all dangers and suffering that may ensue.”

“Then go, and success attend your efforts,” returned Saguanaldo. And he looked on the youth with searching eyes that for a third time caused Agonoy to blush. [81]

“I’m going to invite Judge Daft to occupy this convento,” suggested Violeta to Bishop Lonzello, a few days after he arrived.

“You will do nothing of the kind,” replied the bishop. “It is a little too much, you coming here and ordering us from the islands; but, as if this was not sufficient, now you want us to give up our dormitories. I may yield the land for the good of the church, but I am not going to stand this individual insult from a stranger.”

“Oh, be reasonable,” persuaded the Jesuit. “I am doing it solely for your good. You will get the rental for it, and a republic is never niggardly in such matters. The convento is really the only suitable building in Manila for the purpose, and we can use the tender of it in cementing a very valuable pact. Depend on it, you will lose nothing by it. Another thing”—

“Nombre de Dios! Is there anything else?”

“Of course there is. We must syndicate the friar lands.”

“I do not understand.”

“If the United States undertakes to deal with the friars as individuals, it will be able to handle them to its notion. But by combining the 1,500 owners in a syndicate where half a dozen have the full control of things, we can dictate terms. You can see the advantage of this. It is the modern way of doing business. You managed the seizure of the churches well; now you must organize the friars for purpose of selling their lands advantageously.” [82]

The two priests discussed the matter further, and though Lonzello was bitter against the Jesuit and in his heart resented the new order that was being installed, he saw the force of the arguments, and ere long started on a trip through Luzon for the purpose of organizing the syndicate. During his absence the Jesuit took occasion to tender the convento to Judge Daft and to point out its superiority for the private uses of the new officials. The argument was valid, because the convento was the best residence property in Manila. The Jesuit went further and offered not only the church property in Manila, but also in Malalos and throughout all the Philippines. Judge Daft argued with his conscience, against his inclination to have the use of the best, and ultimately accepted the offer. With the American governor housed in the convento where the Jesuit lived, meetings became informal and frequent. The two drove together in the evenings along the Plaza de Gotta. They played golf together of afternoons. They met and talked as friends; and the papal nuncio constantly and persistently employed the power of suggestion for developing his plan.

“I do not think we can elect you president short of eight to twelve years, but it will come some day,” he told Daft while at golf. Small business is transacted in the shops, larger in offices, and the greatest business of the world is forwarded at social gatherings and in games.

“I supposed I was to be elected next week,” suggested the governor, facetiously.

“No, the people of America will probably demand a military man first. There is such a one who begins to loom up as a possibility, and he understands the situation thoroughly. Besides, he is not so timid as the present president. The latter means well, but he will not act until he is pushed into action, while in adopting new policies, such as are coming [83]up now, we need a bold man. You want to keep your eye on Colonel Rosefield. We have had our eyes on him and he understands it. We mean to see that he has a military record manufactured for him, so he can run for president. After him comes Judge Daft.”

“You Jesuits are too deep politicians for me.”

“You will at least admit we are not dreamers, Judge. I am in earnest in what I say. No man in the service in Cuba has received the advertising so far that this Colonel Rosefield has had, and there is a reason for it. He will emerge from the war the central hero of it all, even if we have to make him the winner of a battle where he was not present. More history is made by well circulated reports than there is by deeds.”

The Judge laughed: “I wonder if you intend to circulate reports about me.”

“That depends. If you do justice by us, we will see to the advertising, all right.”

“What do you mean by justice?”

“Well, the Holy See is doing you inestimable service in withdrawing the Spanish friars from the Philippines, because it is thus removing the very source of the quarrel and enabling you to gain a world reputation by accomplishing within a few years that which the Spanish government failed to accomplish in three centuries. That is a good start toward the presidency.”

“It seems you have tricked me into payment for that service, which I freely acknowledge, because you have used the order that those in possession of church property shall be maintained in possession of that property to your advantage, by seizing on all the property before the American troops arrived on the scene.”

“A mere act of justice. That property belonged to the [84]holy church before the schism took it away, and we have merely done to the schism what it first did to us. This is, therefore, a mere act of reparation; but we are not ungrateful to you that you have made it possible.”

The judge was secretly troubled at the part he had played. It was not in accord with his conception of right. But he readily saw that it was good politics, played for him by a power he did not understand. He ventured to say:

“I wish to do exact justice by you, and no more.”

“We shall ask no more. In a sense the church in general has had reparation; but what about the friars?”

“I do not understand.”

“His holiness, the Pope, can not banish them and thus leave the field clear for you, unless they can be remunerated for the lands they hold—not the churches, which belong to Rome, but the lands, which belong to the friars. It is a matter of justice to pay them for their property, and it would be of inestimable benefit to the United States to get rid of this troublesome element.”

“I understand the ground on which these churches were built belonged to the Spanish government, and that the government contributed considerable cash besides toward their erection. This being the case, the churches will belong to the United States after we shall have acquired the Philippines, and you would owe the federal government for them.”

“If the Spanish government gave the lands and donations to the church they ceased to belong to Spain. You Americans would not claim again land that had been patented to settlers. The churches belong to Rome, where all titles to church property are vested. You will have to settle with Rome for them. The land belongs to the friars, who, as agents of Spain, developed the country and paid for the land. [85]You will have to settle with the friars for them if you would banish that troublesome element.”

“The Malalos convention declared them fortified to the Philippine republic.”

“Can you recognize that republic? You know you dare not do it.”

Daft understood that; after a pause he inquired.

“What are the lands worth?”

“They have not been appraised, but I would estimate their value at from twelve to fifteen millions of American money.”

“It seems to me pretty high.”

“On the contrary, it is reasonable, considering the cost it would be to America to settle the trouble with the friars still here.”

“It seems to me you are faring pretty well, considering that you have restored to you the churches that were in revolt.”

“You will win with the friars gone, but there are a number of things that will have to be settled by arbitration after the war is over. You must act as America’s representative to the Pope.”

Judge Daft started back in astonishment.

“It is impossible. It is against the policy of the United States to recognize the temporal power of the Pope by sending an ambassador to the Vatican.”

“Nonsense. This war will make it necessary. You may disguise him under the name of agent, if you will, but a representative will become a necessity. It would be a big thing for you to be that representative. You must have your picture taken with the Pope.”

The boldness of the declaration again startled Judge Daft. [86]

“You do not know the temper of the American people. They would not stand for it.”

“It would give you two million Catholic votes and make your election as president an assured thing. It is big politics we are playing these days, and you might as well be in on it as anyone.”

“But can you make good?”

“Didn’t your national chairman declare that the only power that could save America from Socialism was the Catholic church? Did not the Catholic vote go to your present national executive, for the first time in history that the republican party got that vote? You are asked only to follow the policy set by your party, and to reap the result in honors and power. Why do you suppose the head of the church deserted Spain in this war, when Spain is a Catholic country, and has been on the side of the Protestant United States, if he did not expect recognition of his services? Do you not suppose we understood from the time the Maine was blown up that the people might be aroused to start this war? The hierarchy is hereafter to be a dominating power in America, and you are to be president. It is a big thought, and you must think over it, Judge.”

The Judge did think over it and the apostolic nuncio kept from his presence several days in order to give him opportunity to ponder the subject. When next the two men met the chastened attitude of Judge Daft and his evident desire to be agreeable was to the discerning Jesuit ample proof that the leaven was working.

“I do not know,” he added to himself, “but that the fine, bold material we are getting on our side may necessitate the removal of the good-hearted old man who rules but fears to move. We dare not wait too long when plans are ripe and boldness is necessary.” [87]

A few mornings after this the apostolic nuncio was walking along the calzada by the coast, musing over his plans, when he chanced upon three American soldiers with a Filipino prisoner. He was inclined to pass on with only a cursory glance, but his ever-alert mind, always spurred to observation, prompted to closer scrutiny. Then he saw that the soldiers were drunk. This was not important in his eye, because, under the canteen system inaugurated by the American government, and the influence of the tropics working on the nerves of the boys so far from home, and of the Filipino beverage, vino, drinking was rather common with the soldiers. Indeed, the tropics were playing havoc with the morals of the youth in khaki.

Kipling has thus expressed the languorous feeling that gets into the bones in the tropics:

Vino, that decoction from the cocoanut which in time [88]crazes the drinker and makes him run amuck, had been getting in its work on the Americans, and they were more or less beside themselves even now. Besides, insidious fever, the mali-mali, which weakens the will, leaving the victim chiflado, ready to imitate the movements of any who pass; the almost constant vibration of the soil that tells so on American nerves; the absence from home and accountability to civilized restraints; the enervating tropics that seemed to tingle in their veins and vanish, make them devilish; and the daily sight of half-naked women, whose ideals of morality were tropical rather than American, were telling on the habits of many a homesick mother’s boy. The Philippines became a hot-bed in which erotic passions developed into national scandals. The nuncio himself, with grim desire to strike at the Americans when it profited his cause to do so, had procured the licensing and inspection of bawds, under sanction of the American governor, the fees for inspection going to church charities. So the sights of drunken American soldiers did not even interest him.

But there was something about the prisoner that was striking. His very bearing, his mannerism, his cut of tie and clothing proclaimed him to be a priest. If he was a Roman priest, the nuncio felt he must rescue him; if he was an Aglipayan priest, then he might gratify on him the cruel desire to torment which is born in some and which he had fostered by feeding. He determined to put the matter to an instant test by a bold stroke. So he approached the prisoner, crossing himself and saying:

“As I live, if this is not Dr. Maximo Voliva, born Aglipay.”

It was a venture, but it struck home.

“And you are that devil, Violeta, who has robbed us already [89]of our churches. I am not pleased to form your acquaintance.”

“Still reprobate and unregenerate, I see,” returned the Jesuit. “At one time we might have made terms with you, but that day is past. We have the whip hand now and you are in our power. Man (speaking to a soldier), run to the nearest house and borrow a couple of spades or shovels, and be quick about it. Follow us down the beach.”

The three men walked down the coast to a more secluded spot.

“What do you plan to do to me?” asked the erstwhile Maximo.

“It will be time to discuss that when we come to it. Do you wish to return to the true church and receive absolution?”

“I am in the true church,” replied Aglipay, hardly above a whisper. “You will not murder me?”

“We do not murder snakes and vermin when we destroy them. And to think, you used to be a priest in the one true church. You see now what your ambition brought you to.”

“Ambition!—I would talk about ambition if I were you. You, who have mastered the poor Filipinos; you, who are planning for control of America! Ambition—may God forgive you!”

“I am sorry I can not return the compliment of praying for your forgiveness, but you are so unrepentant. However, I will hear your confession if you wish.”

“I will confess to God and not the devil.”

“You might as well begin your confession then.”

Aglipay paled. But he faced the nuncio and spoke in a calm voice: “How can you profess religion, you who are so cruel, so ambitious, so licentious? Do you really believe, or is it an open mockery with you?”

Violeta laughed. [90]

“Yes,” answered he, “there is a God, and truth, too, in religion. But it is moral to rise to your full height, though you may trample others as you rise; and though it seem a pity to devour the weaker creatures, no one thinks about it. It is a part of feeding, and is right. We eat a woman’s flesh as ’twere a fowl’s, and take a poor man’s life as though a bird’s; that is, the great do, those with authority. It is doing this that makes them great. Repression is but failure. Life and success came from expression and experience. I am friendly with you because we must part. Good-bye; Bishop.”

He extended his hand, but the schismatist, pale and unable to more than move mechanically, stared at him without offering his hand. The nuncio laughed again, and carelessly said, “Oh, as you please.”

By this time they were in a shady place, secure from observation by a clump of trees, and the other soldier approached with a couple of shovels.

“Scoop out a grave there, fellows,” said the Jesuit. “You must not take your prisoners to headquarters if you would avoid trouble. We will have a bit of fun by and by.”

The soldiers were sufficiently drunk to be irresponsible, and of a temperament to receive suggestions. They obeyed the Jesuit without demurring, while he taunted the renegade Romish priest, and then they came to him to inform him that all was ready.

“Tie the prisoner,” said the Jesuit.

They proceeded to pinion his legs and arms, and when this was done the Jesuit continued:

“Now take him and throw him in the trench.”

“Dios Mio! You surely will not bury me alive,” plead the leader of the schism, as they lifted him and deposited him in the rude and shallow grave. For answer the Jesuit bade the soldiers seize the shovels and fill up the sand over [91]the body, leaving the head uncovered. Aglipay begged and prayed, as shovelful after shovelful of sand fell upon him, first rendering him powerless to move, and then bearing upon him with a weight intolerable. His face was blanched, his eyes stood out, bloodshot in horror. For answer to his pleading the Jesuit produced a prayer book and began to read in mockery the service of the dead:

“From the pains of death, good Lord, deliver me.” Aglipay gritted his teeth, but his soul responded in a sincerer prayer than the Jesuit uttered.

“From the pains of hell and the agony of the grave”—

“Good Lord, deliver me,” plead the man in the grave.

“Silence the disturber of our devotions,” commanded the Jesuit.

One of the soldiers lifted a shovelful of sand and threw it in the face of the man man in the grave. Some grains entered his eyes, but as he lay in agony, because gravel filled his mouth, he could only groan and sputter without speaking.

“His mouth shall be filled with gravel,” quoted the Jesuit, with unfeeling sarcasm. “Fill in the grave, men.”

The soldiers shoveled for a moment and the remains of Aglipay were buried from sight, literally buried alive. [92]

Of course, the death of Aglipay became noised abroad. Indeed, the Jesuit took no pains to keep it from being known, because he felt that the death of the leader would have an important effect in ending the schism. The death was a matter susceptible of proof from the fact that the body was found, but that he was buried alive could not be proven save from the participants in the tragedy, who were not required to testify against themselves. Rumors as to the horrors of the fate of Dr. Obispo Maximo spread through Manila and Luzon, and aroused the people to a high pitch of indignation. In a sense, it was for the time beneficial to the revolt, because hundreds now flocked to Saguanaldo, bringing their own weapons and ammunition, and every region through which he passed was eager to feed the soldiery, so that opposition to the friars gained strong headway again. It became impossible for the Americans to ignore the matter. In order to appease the inhabitants of Manila, the three soldiers were arrested and placed on trial, before a court martial, for killing a prisoner. They were found guilty and ordered shot.

It was then that Violeta appeared before Judge Daft.

“You must pardon these men,” he said.

“Must is a strong word,” returned the Judge, flushing.

“The reasons behind it are strong,” continued the Jesuit. “The deed they did, while irregular, has simplified matters amazingly, by removing the head and cause of the schism, so [93]that they did you an inestimable service. You can not afford to show ingratitude toward what they did.”

“But it was murder.”

“Manslaughter, perhaps. America is at war, not only with Spain, but also with this schisms, and all war is manslaughter. Rainey’s victory was manslaughter. Manslaughter among soldiers is not a crime.”

“It seems to me you assume a great deal in saying that we are at war with this schism.”

“You will be, which is the same thing. The Aglipayans over all the archipelago are in arms.”

“Yes, and this deed precipitated it.”

“Precipitated it, perhaps; that does not mean that was the cause of the revolt. It was bound to come anyhow, and the sooner it comes the cheaper it will be for America; the quicker you win, the greater your reputation will be. The United States could not occupy the archipelago and leave the Philippine republic intact, you know that.”

Judge Daft thought in silence, pacing the floor. Then, seating himself at his desk, he wrote:

News of this transaction did not set well with the people [94]of Manila. There was an old song sung in the island, and that night clumps of stragglers paraded the streets, noisily singing to that tune the improvised words:

[95]

When news of the death of Aglipay reached her, near Manila, Hilario Agonoy was awakened to sufficient interest to plan something for herself. She straightway thought that if she could appear before Judge Daft and plead against the Jesuit, even going so far as to sacrifice herself by telling the whole story of Ambrosia Lonzello, she might change the attitude of the United States and thus save the day for the insurrectionists.

Within a few days, therefore, Hilario Agonoy disappeared. Ambrosia Lonzello again appeared before her mother at the grass hut—her mother, who has mourned the mysterious disappearance of Ambrosia—and made herself known—telling the terrible story without concealment. The mother was stricken with horror, and convinced her daughter that she was in no way culpable. Woman’s garments were again donned and Ambrosia Lonzello prepared to appear, with her mother’s consent, before Governor Daft to tell her story.

It was somewhat discouraging to Ambrosia to find the Governor’s headquarters in the convento, and to be compelled to again visit the scene of her agony and ruin. But she nerved herself for the ordeal. It was her fortune to be admitted to Judge Daft’s office, to find the Jesuit with him. To her it was a surprise and shock. But perhaps it was as well. Had he been there, had he seen her before she reached the governor, she might have been locked up again, both to safeguard himself and satisfy anew his lust. And, after the first shock of it had passed, the sight of her despoiler revived all the [96]strength within her into anger and hatred, rendering her doubly powerful. Judge Daft kindly asked:

“What can I do for you, my child?”

“Hear me,” replied the girl, trembling from the intensity of her feeling. “I come to ask for justice. That man (pointing to the Jesuit) has wronged me. I came to the church to confess, and he by force took me to the convento, where he locked and kept me all night, using me as I can not tell, and making me, who trusted him as a man of God, an outcast by his devil-deeds. I come to call justice and God’s vengeance upon him. But this is not all. He it is who persuaded drunken soldiers to bury Bishop Aglipay alive—alive, mind you; and as the poor man stifled in the sand, this fiend who poses as a representative of God, mocked him by saying the burial service over him. I come to call God’s vengeance on him, and to ask for justice, from you toward this enemy of mankind.”

The girl was half hysterical, speaking in loud, impassioned tones. Judge Daft sought to quiet her.

“Be seated, my dear young lady,” he said. “These are grave charges you make, and I shall look into them. But be calm, I fear in your excitement you are exaggerating.”

“Exaggerating! I could not if I had a thousand tongues, all eloquent, tell half the wrongs I feel. I could not, even though educated as you are and as he is, reveal a tenth of what I have suffered at his hands. I beg of you, for humanity’s sake, for the sake of your daughter, if you have one, hear me and give me vengeance.”

She fell on her knees before Judge Daft, who gently lifted her and sat her in the chair. The Jesuit stood smiling and serene. The girl, scarce knowing what she did, arose and screamed:

“You will not aid me. It is because you are as wax in [97]the hands of that devil, who by the hope of power and position for yourself moulds you to his will. He induced you to pardon the murderers of Aglipay. He persuaded you to have the army seize on our churches. He has you in his house, directing you by flattery and making you a tyrant from your very kindness. My curses on you both! How hard and bitter this fierce world can be! It was my father, my own father, Judge Daft, who delivered his daughter to this fiend. And this man, my father, Bishop Lonzello, betrayed my mother when she was young, so that I came into the world foredoomed to ruin and disgrace. And you, you, Judge Daft, uphold this Jesuit in his villainy and plots and will not hear my prayer.”

The over-wrought girl sank in a heap on the floor, sobbing bitterly. The noise of her last speech had brought several servants on the scene. To them Judge Daft turned and compassionately said:

“Take her to a room, where she may rest.”

“What! A room in this convento?” screamed the girl arising. “Back to the scene of horror? I did not think this of you.”

She was now attacking the servants with nails and fists, pressing her way toward the door. She fought her way to the street, and then ran at her fullest speed, away, anywhere, but away from the convento.

“Poor creature!” cried the Jesuit in tones of the deepest commiseration. “I think there is nothing in all the world sadder than the hallucinations of the insane.” [98]

“It was a most fortunate turn of affairs that led her to the extremes she went,” said the Jesuit, in reporting Ambrosia’s visit to her father. “Had she stopped short of where she did, an investigation would have been ordered, I feel sure of that.”

“I wish it had been,” commented Lonzello. “You deserve punishment for the wrong you did her.”

“Don’t be unreasonable,” gently expostulated the Jesuit. “Her accusation was against you also, and the same drag net that caught me would have caught you, too.”

The passionate Lonzello walked the floor nervously, cursing under his breath.

“When do you think of leaving?” persisted the Jesuit, quietly.

“When you leave, beast,” hissed the priest.

“No, you will have to leave soon. The people demand it, and your successor is in the harbor. But I have other work to do.”

“The mob will have you, too,” returned the bishop.

“Oh, no. I am under the protection of my good humor, but you have no such guardian. Have you much money?”

“You know I haven’t anything.”

“Would you like to know how you can get away full-handed, feared and honored by all?”

“It wouldn’t be bad.”

“Well, I will tell you. That daughter of yours will tell her story through town and she will be believed by hundreds [99]there. The way to silence these rumors, and to turn the tide toward us is to perform a miracle.”

“A miracle?”

“Yes, think of the honor of being Saint Lonzello, the miracle worker, and having hundreds come to your shrine seeking the efficacy of your sanctimonious bones! You may go from the archipelago honored and rich and feared, or you may go from the end of a rope. Which shall it be?”

The two men drew chairs close together and talked earnestly in low tones. [100]

A throng of the devout were gathered in Manila cathedral. To a pillar near the pulpit Ambrosia Lonzello was chained. Neither she or the audience knew, but wires connecting with the chains ran under the floor to the pulpit, connecting them with a key on the floor. Underneath it all was a powerful battery. It had all been arranged secretly, at night, by the Jesuit, who was himself an expert electrician. Bishop Lonzello occupied the pulpit.

“We have come to the test by ordeal,” he told the people. “It grieves me that any one of the flock should have gone astray, but when the one who leaves the true fold is my own daughter I am doubly grieved. And, as though it were not enough that she should desert the true church and become a friend and companion of the enemy of the church and state, she brings accusation against the priests of the Lord, against her own father, and the apostolic nuncio. You have heard these charges, for the unbelievers in the city take pleasure in rolling the scandal under their tongues. It is beneath my dignity to deny, it is beneath the dignity of the Pope’s messenger to deny, such preposterous things. We will call on the Almighty to decide between us. But first, my daughter, let me beg of you, before we reach this supreme test, recant and save yourself.”

He turned toward the girl, who was chained to the stake. There were tears in his eyes, and feeling was in his voice. It was evident he sincerely hoped she would clear the situation by recanting. [101]

“Ambrosia, save your father,” he plead. “Say I did not do the awful thing you charge.”

“A father should not ask his daughter to perjure herself in the house of the Lord. This is nearly as wicked as to send me to confession in order I might in that holy place be made the victim of another’s lust. Priest—for you have been so unfatherly, I will not call you father—you are guilty, and you know it.”

As she spoke the people arose and stood, eager to catch each word. Now that she was through they caught their breaths with a gasp that was audible through all the edifice. The face of the man in the pulpit grew white as his own surplice. His nails dug into the wood of the pulpit.

“Apply the test,” said the Jesuit, arising and standing by the other. Lonzello assayed to speak, but he could not articulate.

“Shall we call on God to decide between us?” asked the Jesuit of the congregation.

“The test, the test,” came from over all the house. Lonzello’s face grew haggard. Many of the congregation were surprised to see the man before them was old, with face deeply wrinkled. But the Jesuit was placid, fully in command of himself and of the situation. He raised his hands toward heaven, and remained silent until the people grew tense, waiting for what might come.

“Thou who didst destroy the guilty Jannes and Jambres in the wilderness,” he began impressively, “thou who didst reveal of old the stealer of the golden wedge, judge now, oh, God, the truth between us here. If thy servants are guilty of the things charged against us”—

He paused, not only that he might the more impress the people, but also to place one arm about Lonzello that he might support him in case his nerve should fail him and his [102]limbs grow weak; then, with the other hand spread upward, he continued, impressively:

“Strike us dead, oh, God, cause us to die at once.”

Every person in the house was standing; every neck was craned; every sound, even to the rustle of breathing, was stilled. A moment passed in tense silence. Then the low voice of the Jesuit continued:

“The Almighty has spoken. We live.”

The people breathed again, audibly. Lonzello, his strength partly returned and his anxiety burning into his very bones, rushed from the pulpit to the post where his daughter was chained, and, falling on his knees, begged piteously:

“Confess, confess, Ambrosia, and end this horrible thing. The father is on his knees to the daughter, begging you to recant.”

“Confess!” cried the girl with scorn. “That is the word you used to send me to slaughter, to be devoured by that beast. Sweet father, you are, to ask a daughter to swear to a lie in order to shield the man who wronged her. I know not what foul plot you have framed here, but I do know in my soul of souls I am as white as dawn and that your soul is black as night from which the dawn is born. As for that creature in the robes of God, neighbors and friends, I say he is a devil. His place is hell—however, not to rule, but to find torment, now and everlasting.”

The Jesuit flushed slightly, but his voice was unruffled as he asked:

“Friends, shall we call the test of God on her?”

“No, no!” Lonzello plead, rushing back to the pulpit, “not on her.”

“A father may be pitied in pleading for a child,” the Jesuit said, quietly and without passion. “I would, if I [103]could, spare him, and her as well. Let me, for his sake, girl, ask you to speak the word that shall save both. Recant, recant.”

“Repent, repent,” returned Ambrosia, facing him fiercely. “The crime is on your head; the crime on me, the crime upon my father, the crime which now I feel you mean to do, are all upon your head. Repent, repent.”

“The girl is obdurate,” said the Jesuit, turning again to the people. “In spite of vindication heaven sent, she has reiterated accusations. Therefore, we shall be forced to call on heaven again to choose between us. Shall we do so?”

“The test, the test!” cried the people in one voice.

Again the right hand of the Jesuit was raised, again the left stole round Lonzello, gripping him as with a vice. His toe sought the hidden key under the pulpit as he intoned:

“Choose now between us, which of us is right. If we are guilty, send from heaven the fires and take our lives. If we have been maligned, then let the fiery vengeance seize on the woman who has said the word and prove to all the people that thou art a jealous God, watching above thine own.”

Even as he spoke, even as his hand was outstretched to heaven, Ambrosia Lonzello straightened, then lunged forward, her hands and limbs trembling and shaking; again and again, as the friar’s toe moved, the horrible contortions were repeated. As he completed his prayer the girl hung limp and heavy on her chains, lifeless.

An instant more the audience was in a turmoil.

“A miracle, a miracle!” it cried.

Men and women rushed to the altar, crowding and kneeling, fumbling their rosaries and praying. Lonzello sank into the chair at the side of the altar. The Jesuit alone was calm and commanding.

“Yes,” said he, “it is a miracle. The Lord has spoken. [104]Strip your fingers and ears and pockets of jewelry and money, and lay it before him who doeth wonders in your sight. Woe to the man or woman who refuses, woe upon the head of such!”

Men were groaning, women praying aloud. Money and jewelry were thrown before the altar in profusion, until hundreds of dollars in value were piled there. Then the audience was dismissed.

“Now,” said the Jesuit, turning to Lonzello, “take this stuff and get from the country at once. Your successor from America has arrived and is in the harbor even now.” [105]

When Saguanaldo heard of the fate that had befallen Ambrosia he was almost beside himself with rage and horror. He determined to be revenged on the Jesuit and Lonzello, and issued orders for the force to at once prepare for active service. Mrs. Rizal’s singing and speaking began to bear fruit. The story of Ambrosia spread rapidly through the island, rousing the people to something like frenzy. They came out in force. Not until now had that feeling which makes a religious war been stirred, but it was rampant at this time. Even some of the Spanish friars, who rebelled at being banished from the islands, joined the revolt. The war had turned, so that it was no longer Spaniard and native, but the native against both Spain and America.

They gathered in great numbers before Manila, coming in pairs and squads. Some were captured, but the United States troops, appalled at the demonstration that seemed to be even larger than it really was, fell back into the city, while the insurgents formed on the hills occupying the rifle pits without. It was raining and the mud was so deep that all movements were slow and disagreeable. But the forboding appearance of nature did not discourage the malcontents. Women and children were there. Some of them were unarmed, but they gathered stones for throwing and carried them. Others had nothing but clubs or bolos. But they were all mad for slaughter, ready to die.

Contrary to expectations of the Americans, they did not [106]attack by night. Neither did they make any demonstration against the Spanish fortress of Cavite. In the early morning women and children, ragged and showing the poverty that had provoked the war, drenched by rain, muddy and miserable, marched down the streets, in irregular lines, shrieking and singing. As they marched, others came from the houses of Manila and joined them. Again there was the song:

Instead of an army, it was a mob, something far harder to handle than an army, especially if it is composed of women and children. They broke into shops and took things to eat, munching and screaming as they marched.

Then, while the American troops were besieged with the mob, Saguanaldo attacked from the rear. As his troops charged on the American works, women from the rear threw stones at the American soldiers. The first line of defense was taken. Cavite was silent, having no part in this battle, and it was well for America it was so; for had the attack been more complicated, the issue might have been in doubt. Some said it had been arranged so in advance. As it was, the American army lay in the mud in its redoubts, with the rain drizzling on them, and the little pools of water that formed were stained with blood.

Somehow Saguanaldo and an aide penetrated to the convento and appeared unannounced before Judge Daft, dripping from the rain and sprinkled with mud.

“Have a seat, General,” said Judge Daft, affably. “You must be very cold. I will order hot coffee brought.”

“Thank you, but you need not,” Saguanaldo replied. “I am here on a mission of war, not of hospitality. You have wronged me, Governor, grievously wronged me.”

“War is not a pink tea affair,” returned the Judge. “It [107]can not be prosecuted without individual harm being done.”

“I do not refer to that,” said the insurgent. “I shall not whimper over hardships and private losses or wounds that come from war. But you have wounded me in peace, while I was ally to you.”

“I do not see that you are acting as an ally today.”

“No, but I was when I went with the American troops to spy out and defeat the Spaniards. And at the very hour when I was serving you, and after I had voluntarily given you my office and surrendered the Philippine republic that we might come under the protection of the American republic, you set your soldiers to protecting the Spanish friars, in possession of property which Spanish soldiers had seized from us. Was that right?”

“It was a general order. Had the insurgents been in possession of the property, they would have been protected in it. It is not my fault if you were not able to hold this property.”

“But you occupy the conventos, on invitation of the friars. It puts you under obligation to them.”

“I occupied the house you offered. Did that put me under obligation to you?”

“Yes. But you now war those who were your allies.”

“And you war those who were your allies. That makes us even.”

“The man whose guest you are, murdered the leader of the schism, cruelly, and you shield him. He betrayed the faith of the friar’s daughter”—

“After she had betrayed her faith”—

“On her father’s solicitation”—

“So she said. Poor girl, she was evidently insane.”

“And then horribly maltreated her. Later he burned her, as it were, at the stake.” [108]

“My friend,” said Judge Daft, amiably, “it is not a part of my duty to quarrel, and I refuse to jower longer with you. If you want to fight, go and join with those whose duty it is to fight. If you have a personal grievance, bring civil suit, and I will hear your cause. Before you go, I shall be pleased if you will permit me to serve you something warm.”

Saguanaldo was broken in spirit. He was again beaten in diplomacy. His mission had failed, and, with quivering lip and voice shaking with emotion, he said farewell, muffled himself in his great coat and took his departure with his aide.

As he stepped on the street he was met by a detachment of soldiers, sent out from the convento by the apostolic nuncio, and placed under arrest. At the same time Violeta stepped before him and extended his hand:

“General, I am glad to meet you.”

Saguanaldo struck at him, but missed, because the soldiers restrained him. The Jesuit very composedly said:

“Nothing is ever made, General, by being unpleasant. Take the prisoner to American headquarters, and spread the report that the leader is captured and the insurrection is over.” [109]