But let us on to our list of works of general reading. Sifting the
treasure-stores of authorities named in Retana and others, I find
the following books of most value and service, whereof, though some
few among them, and for that matter the highest in their respective
classes, are no longer in print, yet these very masterpieces, if
not obtainable by purchase, like many another priceless blessing,
still are worth knowing by title to book-lover and scholar, who,
if perchance he cannot have these repertories of human lore on his
shelves, will know at least by what title to seek them on others.
Of the Philippines and their neighboring archipelagos these works
rank of the highest worth:
The history of Mindanao, Jolo, and their adjacent islands (Madrid,
1667), written by the Jesuit, Francisco Combes--the most ancient
detailed account of that region of Polynesia, known as the Archipelago
del Sur, and invaluable beyond other guides to the ethnologist
especially.
Then an account of the establishment of Christianity in the Marianas
Islands (Madrid, 1670?) similarly the oldest and at the same time most
reliable history of these Ladrones, or robber, islands, so styled by
early Spanish voyagers because of the thievish proclivities of the
natives, every one of them in theory and practice an annexationist and
protectionist to the back-bone, till the Jesuit missionary and scholar,
Diego Luis de Sanvitores, author of this history, rechristened them
Marianas, in honor (according to some chroniclers) of Dona Mariana
of Austria, Queen of Spain, in loving and tenderest-hearted homage
(according to others) of the Blessed Virgin, whose rosary that savant
was wont to recite every day. [7]
Then the story of the various religious missions in the Philippines
entrusted to members of his Society by another Jesuit, Pedro
Murillo Velarde (Manila, 1749), a rare and valuable work, whereof
an accompanying chart, drawn in 1734, should, strictly speaking, be
styled the earliest detailed topographical map of the Philippines. From
the pen of the same scholar issued, too, an historical geography
of that archipelago (Madrid, 1752), of much worth, the same as his
chart, for its scientific details--albeit little known, it seems,
to Philippinologists.
Then we have the rare and deeply interesting history (Madrid, 1756) of
some tribes in Luzon, hardest to convert--the Igorrotes, Tinguianes,
Apayaos and Adanes, four races of Indians in the hill-country of
Ilocos and Pangasinan, in spiritual charge of the Augustinians,
a member of which brotherhood, Manuel Carillo, is the author.
Another book, that because of its manifold literary merit, of
historical accuracy and statistical detail, is styled by Retana
"an historical work par excellence," is the general history of the
Philippines (Sampaloc, 1788-1792), by the Recoleto missionary, Juan
de la Concepcion, copious source of varied and valuable information,
wherein--albeit somewhat prolix in style, at times, too, rather
digressive--the author may fairly be said to be without rival.
Then comes the descriptive and historical account of the Marianas
Islands (Madrid, 1875), by Felipe La Corte y Ruano Calderon, the best
work on that little-known archipelago, and a rich source of general
information anent these Malaysian islands.
On the botany of the Philippines, a monumental work of the highest
character is the Philippine Flora (classified according to the sexual
system of Linnaeus), by the Augustinian, Manuel Blanco, printed at
Manila, first in 1837, again in 1845, and finally republished a
third time in 1877-1883, in superb style, in four folio volumes of
text in Spanish and Latin, embellished with two volumes of colored
lithographed plates descriptive of the plants, flowers and fruits
of those islands. One of the co-laborers on the third edition of
this Flora was Ignacio Mercado, a Philippine botanist himself, and
professed member of the Augustinian brotherhood.
The same Father Blanco also translated into Tagal the French physician
Tissot's work on medicine, enriched with his own life-long observations
on Philippine plant-lore.
Along with Blanco's Flora should be named the catalogue of fauna
of the Philippines (Manila, 1895-1896), by the Dominican zoologist,
Casto de Elera, an expert in that line of biological science,--a work
in folio (in three volumes) of two thousand three hundred pages and
upwards, termed by Retana not only a monumental work--easily to be
believed--but one unique of its character.
The geology of the islands (Madrid, 1840?), treated by Isidro
Sainz de Baranda, government inspector of mines, besides being well
worth reading, is the earliest study on this topic made on strictly
scientific lines.
Two works, sole representatives of their kind, are named by Retana
as of singular value to the physician not only, but to ethnologist
and scholar especially,--one the Embriologia Sagrada (Manila, 1856),
by the Recoleto missionary Gregorio Sanz, written in aid of his fellow
caretakers of souls, whose services in behalf of suffering humanity in
out-of-the-way districts were often called upon by the natives, whose
practice of the curing art, based on their own traditional formulas,
especially in cases of child-bearing, was, despite the efforts of the
missionary to uproot their unnatural and utterly heathen disregard for
human life, attended too often with destruction of progeny and mother.
The other repository of singular and very curious information is a
treatise in Visaya-Cebuano and Spanish by another Recoleto evangelist,
Manuel Vilches (Manila, 1877), written similarly in benefit of
Indian sick, the Manual, that is, of the Visaya Physician, or native
doctor--mediquillo, as in the Philippines these votaries of Hippocrates
are styled, a work praised by Retana as replete with Indian plant-lore.
The richest and most valuable collection of statistics relating to
the Philippines, so at least acknowledged by experts, more reliable
too than the Spanish government's own work, is the Estado general
of all the pueblos--Christianized settlements--in the islands, drawn
up by the Dominican archbishop of Manila, Pedro Payo (Manila, 1886),
whereof the data were gathered by his vicars-forane and parochial-cures
throughout the archipelago. While the most artistic map of Luzon,
so styled by Retana, is the chart of that island (Madrid, 1883),
published in four sheets by Enrique D'Almonte y Muriel.
With mention of two other authors I close this section of
Philippina,--one the history of the islands, or rather a detailed
account of his travels therein, by the Augustinian scholar and
voyager Joaquin Martinez de Zuniga (Sampaloc, 1803), a work known by
its Spanish title as Estadismo de las Filipinas o mis viajes, which,
translated into English by John Maver, was published in London in 1814;
and lately edited by Retana himself at Madrid in 1893.
As will be easily apparent to even the most cursory reader, Zuniga's
travels, critical throughout in spirit, display on well nigh every
page the results of keen observation of affairs during his wanderings,
combined moreover with sober reflections on the character and condition
of the various races of people of the chief Philippine islands.
In acknowledgment of its scientific worth, Retana has enriched Zuniga's
history (in the edition just noted) with twelve scholarly appendices
replete with copious erudition, among other topics on the ethnography
and geography of the islands; on animals, plants, and minerals. In
these appendices, too, will be found copious bibliographies on special
topics, as trade, commerce, the nao de Acapulco, taxation, finance,
and the like.
And,--I feel that attention shall be called thereto, first because
the subject itself is deeply interesting to lovers especially of
folk-lore, then again, because commonly much misunderstood,--in one
of his appendices to Zuniga (ii *66-*83), Retana has reproduced some
twenty-five pages of a Pangasinan Charm Book, covered with strange
words--jumbles, most of them, of mutilated Church Latin, with crosses
and queer-looking symbols. This charm-book in MS. (as are all its
fellows), whereof copies without count are circulated among the lowest,
most superstitious classes of islanders--Indians and meztizos, that is,
Spaniard, or Chinese, mixed with native,--is wont to be worn around
the neck, in the disguise of a Catholic scapular, as safeguard to
the wearer against perils of any kind, chiefly the knife, or bullet,
of his enemy. Again,--I am quoting Retana, who gives his own personal
experiences in Luzon,--so jealously and closely (he says) do these
Indian charm-bearers guard their secret heathenish practice from their
missionaries, who, for ages, albeit not always with good result, have
been striving to detach their wards from such superstitious usages,
that the same scholar and curio-hunter, despite his keenest research
in Luzon, has never been able to catch even a glimpse but of three
of these pagan scapularies, the ones shown to him by a Dominican
missionary, Father Casimiro Lafuente, for many years cure at the
pueblo of Santa Barbara, in Pangasinan, now (1893) a member of the
house of his brotherhood at Avila, in Spain. Moreover, it appears,
from the same Retana, that Father Lafuente, so many years resident
in the islands, had never succeeded in unearthing other scapularies
than these self-same three.
Many other forms of heathenism, some of them not even yet wholly banned
from the Philippines, the reader will find described in another of
Retana's works--de Aniterias (Madrid, 1894).
Zuniga also tells all worth knowing of the abominable rites practised
among Luzonians,--of their Nonos, Duendes, the Pag-Papasipin, Tigbalag,
Patianac, Bongsol, and Bilao. Much of what he says regarding the
attachment of these peoples to unclean and impious ceremonies he
has gathered from that rarest of books--one copy only believed to
be extant, at the colonial museum of the Augustinians at Valladolid
(in Spain), the Practica (Manila, 1731), of Father Tomas Ortiz,
one-time missionary of that brotherhood in China, then for thirty
years resident in Luzon, where he died in 1742.
Better, however, consult Zuniga himself, [8] and the notes thereon by
Retana, who singularly has failed to insert Ortiz' Practica in his
Biblioteca, and you will find much of interest;--among other things
about tattooing, common practice at one time among all Polynesians,
the same as among our own aborigines, until taught more refined ways
by Christian missionaries; and about wakes too,--solemn ceremonials
of grief, with banquetting and chants--on the occasion of the death
of kindred. [9]
Anent these and similar breaches of the Divine commands against
Satanism, it is surprising (I would observe) to reflect how many
forms of spirit and idol-worship [10] are (to their degradation
be it said) common with Malaysian and Caucasian. (See in our own
periodicals, published presumably by bright-minded, clean-souled
Christian philosophers, yes, see in these oracles of our fireside,
advertisements of magicians, diviners, fortune-tellers, charm-workers,
not to speak of other law breakers, whose mere self-interest seems
to have dulled all true intellective sense.)
The last authority on general topics I name here as invaluable as
well as deeply interesting to the scholar is the Encyclopedia (in
two volumes) of the Augustinian travelers, Manuel Buzeta and Felipe
Bravo (Madrid, 1851)--a work replete with most varied information
along with statistics, now, of course, out of date, on the ethnology,
geography, topography, dialects, customs and rites of the aborigines
in the Philippine archipelago.
Barring, as is only fair, any eulogy on the antiquated features of
this Encyclopedia, which yet will be recognized of much service to
the historian, the writer himself, who herein is supported among
others by Retana, would style this monument of varied scholarship
and research a masterpiece of all-round learning; within its lines
an indispensable guide to every Philippinologist.
Such, then, are the books most trustworthy and serviceable in their
respective fields of history, antiquities, ethnology, and other
sciences relating to Philippina.
Before leaving this subject to dwell on Philippinian linguistics,
I venture a brief digression on a class of works of general historic
character--repertories of all ethnic science, little known, however,
albeit to their serious disadvantage, to most students, and prized only
by your true-hearted book-lover, who has sense to value what he reads
for its own worth mainly, not because stamped with popular approval.
These are annals of the religious brotherhoods in the East, to
be recognized in Retana and other catalogues under the various
titles of chronicles--sometimes as Conquistas, a by no means
unfamiliar term--stories, that is, of the conquest of heathendom,
woven oftentimes, no doubt, as recreation by the missionary amid
his cares; sometimes as relief from thoughts of his far-away native
land--journals, as it were, drawn up by the wanderer, who, besides
being traveler, usually was a more or less keen-eyed observer, at home
wherever Providence sent him; where, too, he studied (for self-interest
was also at stake) whatever regarded the natives in his care--the
lands they dwelt in, the skies above them, the waters around them.
Scholars such as these on life-long service in their foreign homes
were wont to make themselves conversant with every characteristic
of the natives--with the language first of all, then the legends,
poetry, chants; with the traditions and customs of the people, the
industries and sports of their dusky-hued friends and brothers.
As a rule, these plain, simply-told recitals of matters of fact,
chronicle among other curios of literature, all kinds of even the
most out-of-the-way learning anent the races of men; of plants and
animals, of the various oftentimes most singular phenomena of air,
earth, and water--subjects, all of them, of eagerest quest on the
part of scientist, ethnologist, linguist, philosopher, naturalist.
These stories, albeit at times verbose, at others digressive,
will be acknowledged by the honest-minded critic as rich, indeed,
in many-sided lore, enough to repay amply whatever time or trouble
you have spent in their reading.
With the exception of one collection of missionary annals--the
Relations of the Jesuits in North America; now being edited by
Reuben Gold Thwaites, Secretary of the State Historical Society of
Wisconsin--I know of no exact counterpart in the field of English
literature to these delightful narratives of old-time missionary
travelers, Maver's translation of Zuniga's Estadismo, in 1814, being
not only out of print, but I suppose unpurchasable.
With the aid of such monuments as these--all original records of
old-time conquistadores and their fellow-missionaries in the Americas,
it has resulted (to the delight and blessing of students) that the
cyclopedias of Americana (thirty nine volumes of them), wherein you
will find enshrined whatever is worthy of preservation in the various
chequered cycles of aboriginal and Spanish polity and art, massed
together by the Western historian Bancroft, are veritably invaluable to
the antiquarian, besides being wholesome and refreshing food for men of
intellective genius, as therein, along with abundant matter for romance
and epic, you will see unraveled and laid bare many a drama of life.