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AN EAGLE FLIGHT
I have in this rough work shaped out a man
Whom this beneath-world doth embrace and hug
With amplest entertainment: my free drift
Halts not particularly, but moves itself
In a wide sea of wax; no levell'd malice
Infects one comma in the course I hold;
But flies an eagle flight, bold and forth on,
Leaving no track behind.
Timon of Athens--Act 1, Scene 1.
An Eagle Flight
A Filipino Novel
Adapted from
"NOLI ME TANGERE"
By
DR. JOSE RIZAL
NEW YORK
McCLURE, PHILLIPS & CO.
MCMI
Copyright, 1900,
By McCLURE, PHILLIPS & CO.
CONTENTS.
Chapter Page
I.--The House on the Pasig 1
II.--Crisostomo Ibarra 7
III.--The Dinner 9
IV.--Heretic and Filibuster 12
V.--A Star in the Dark Night 15
VI.--Captain Tiago and Maria 17
VII.--Idylle 20
VIII.--Reminiscences 23
IX.--Affairs of the Country 25
X.--The Pueblo 30
XI.--The Sovereigns 32
XII.--All Saints' Day 35
XIII.--The Little Sacristans 40
XIV.--Sisa 44
XV.--Basilio 47
XVI.--At the Manse 50
XVII.--Story of a Schoolmaster 53
XVIII.--The Story of a Mother 57
XIX.--The Fishing Party 63
XX.--In the Woods 71
XXI.--With the Philosopher 79
XXII.--The Meeting at the Town Hall 87
XXIII.--The Eve of the Fete 94
XXIV.--In the Church 102
XXV.--The Sermon 105
XXVI.--The Crane 109
XXVII.--Free Thought 116
XXVIII.--The Banquet 119
XXIX.--Opinions 126
XXX.--The First Cloud 130
XXXI.--His Excellency 134
XXXII.--The Procession 142
XXXIII.--Dona Consolacion 145
XXXIV.--Right and Might 150
XXXV.--Husband and Wife 156
XXXVI.--Projects 163
XXXVII.--Scrutiny and Conscience 165
XXXVIII.--The Two Women 170
XXXIX.--The Outlawed 176
XL.--The Enigma 181
XLI.--The Voice of the Persecuted 183
XLII.--The Family of Elias 187
XLIII.--Il Buon di si Conosce da Mattina 193
XLIV.--La Gallera 196
XLV.--A Call 201
XLVI.--A Conspiracy 204
XLVII.--The Catastrophe 208
XLVIII.--Gossip 212
XLIX.--Vae Victis 217
L.--Accurst 221
LI.--Patriotism and Interest 224
LII.--Marie Clara Marries 232
LIII.--The Chase on the Lake 242
LIV.--Father Damaso Explains Himself 247
LV.--The Nochebuena 251
INTRODUCTION
JOSE RIZAL
In that horrible drama, the Philippine revolution, one man of
the purest and noblest character stands out pre-eminently--Jose
Rizal--poet, artist, philologue, novelist, above all, patriot; his
influence might have changed the whole course of events in the islands,
had not a blind and stupid policy brought about the crime of his death.
This man, of almost pure Tagalo race, was born in 1861, at Calamba,
in the island of Luzon, on the southern shore of the Laguna de Bay,
where he grew up in his father's home, under the tutorage of a wise
and learned native priest, Leontio.
The child's fine nature, expanding in the troublous latter days
of a long race bondage, was touched early with the fire of genuine
patriotism. He was eleven when the tragic consequences of the Cavite
insurrection destroyed any lingering illusions of his people, and
stirred in them a spirit that has not yet been allayed.
The rising at Cavite, like many others in the islands, was a protest
against the holding of benefices by friars--a thing forbidden by a
decree of the Council of Trent, but authorized in the Philippines, by
papal bulls, until such time as there should be a sufficiency of native
priests. This time never came. As the friars held the best agricultural
lands, and had a voice--and that the most authoritative--in civil
affairs, there developed in the rural districts a veritable feudal
system, bringing in its train the arrogance and tyranny that like
conditions develop. It became impossible for the civil authorities
to carry out measures in opposition to the friars. "The Government
is an arm, the head is the convent," says the old philosopher of
Rizal's story.
The rising at Cavite miscarried, and vengeance fell. Dr. Joseph Burgos,
a saintly old priest, was put to death, and three other native priests
with him, while many prominent native families were banished. Never
had the better class of Filipinos been so outraged and aroused, and
from this time on their purpose was fixed, not to free themselves
from Spain, not to secede from the church they loved, but to agitate
ceaselessly for reforms which none of them longer believed could be
realized without the expulsion of the friars. In the school of this
purpose, and with the belief on the part of his father and Leontio that
he was destined to use his life and talents in its behalf, Jose was
trained, until he left his home to study in Manila. At the College of
the Jesuits he carried off all the honors, with special distinction
in literary work. He wrote a number of odes; and a melodrama in
verse, the work of his thirteenth year, was successfully played at
Manila. But he had to wear his honors as an Indian among white men,
and they made life hard for him. He specially aroused the dislike of
his Spanish college mates by an ode in which he spoke of his patria. A
Tagalo had no native land, they contended--only a country.
At twenty Rizal finished his course at Manila, and a few months later
went to Madrid, where he speedily won the degrees of Ph.D. and M.D.;
then to Germany--taking here another degree, doing his work in the
new language, which he mastered as he went along; to Austria, where he
gained great skill as an oculist; to France, Italy, England--absorbing
the languages and literature of these countries, doing some fine
sculpture by way of diversion. But in all this he was single-minded;
he never lost the voice of his call; he felt more and more keenly
the contrast between the hard lot of his country and the freedom of
these lands, and he bore it ill that no one of them even knew about
her, and the cancer eating away her beauty and strength. At the end
of this period of study he settled in Berlin, and began his active
work for his country.
Four years of the socialism and license of the universities had not
distorted Rizal's political vision; he remained, as he had grown up,
an opportunist. Not then, nor at any time, did he think his country
ready for self-government. He saw as her best present good her
continued union to Spain, "through a stable policy based upon justice
and community of interests." He asked only for the reforms promised
again and again by the ministry, and as often frustrated. To plead for
the lifting of the hand of oppression from the necks of his people,
he now wrote his first novel, "Noli Me Tangere."
The next year he returned to the Philippines to find himself the
idol of the natives and a thorn in the flesh of friars and greedy
officials. The reading of his book was proscribed. He stayed long
enough to concern himself in a dispute of his townspeople with the
Dominicans over titles to lands; then finding his efforts vain and his
safety doubtful, he left for Japan. Here he pursued for some time his
usual studies; came thence to America, and then crossed to England,
where he made researches in the British Museum, and edited in Spanish,
"Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas," by Dr. Antonio de Morga, an important
work, neglected by the Spaniards, but already edited in English by
Dean Stanley.
After publishing this work, in Paris, Rizal returned to Spain, where,
in 1890, he began a series of brilliant pleas for the Philippines,
in the Solidaridad, a liberal journal published at Barcelona and
afterward at Madrid. But he roused little sympathy or interest in
Spain, and his articles, repeated in pamphlets in the Philippines,
served to make his position more dangerous at home.
Disheartened but steadfast, he retired to Belgium, to write his second
novel, "El Filibusterismo." "Noli Me Tangere" is a poet's story of his
people's loves, faults, aspirations, and wrongs; "El Filibusterismo"
is the work of a student of statecraft, pointing out the way to
political justice and the development of national life. Inspired,
it would seem, by his own creation of a future for his country, he
returned to the Solidaridad, where, in a series of remarkable articles,
he forecast the ultimate downfall of Spain in the Philippines and
the rise of his people. This was his crime against the Government:
for the spirit which in a Spanish boy would not permit a Tagalo to
have a patria, in a Spaniard grown could not brook the suggestion of
colonial independence, even in the far future.
And now having poured out these passionate pleas and splendid
forecasts, Rizal was homesick for this land of his. He went to
Hong-Kong. Calamba was in revolt. His many friends at the English port
did everything to keep him; but the call was too persistent. December
23d, 1891, he wrote to Despujols, then governor-general of the
Philippines: "If Your Excellency thinks my slight services could be
of use in pointing out the evils of my country and helping heal the
wounds reopened by the recent injustices, you need but to say so, and
trusting in your honor as a gentleman, I will immediately put myself
at your disposal. If you decline my offer, ... I shall at least be
conscious of having done all in my power, while seeking the good of
my country, to preserve her union to Spain through a stable policy
based upon justice and community of interests."
The governor expressed his gratitude, promised protection, and
Rizal sailed for Manila. But immediately after his landing he was
arrested on a charge of sedition, whose source made the governor's
promise impotent. Nothing could be proved against Rizal; but it was
not the purpose of his enemies to have him acquitted. A half-way
sentence was imposed, and he was banished to Dapidan, on the island
of Mindanao. Despujols was recalled to Spain.
In this exile Rizal spent four years, beloved by the natives, teaching
them agriculture, treating their sick (the poor without charge),
improving their schools, and visited from time to time by patients from
abroad, drawn here by his fame as an oculist. Among these last came
a Mr. Taufer, a resident of Hong-Kong, and with him his foster-child,
Josephine Bracken, the daughter of an Irish sergeant. The pretty and
adventurous girl and the banished patriot fell in love with each other.
These may well have been among the happiest years of Rizal's
life. He had always been an exile in fact: now that he was one in
name, strangely enough he was able for the first time to live in
peace among his brothers under the skies he loved. He sang, in his
pathetic content:
"Thou dear illusion with thy soothing cup!
I taste, and think I am a child again.
Oh! kindly tempest, favoring winds of heaven,
That knew the hour to check my shifting flight,
And beat me down upon my native soil,..."
Always about his philological studies, he began here a work that
should be of peculiar interest to us: a treatise on Tagalog verbs, in
the English language. Did his knowledge of America's growing feeling
toward Cuba lead him to foresee--as no one else seems to have done--her
appearance in the Philippines, or was he thinking of England?
At Hong-Kong, and in his brief stays at Manila, Rizal had established
the Liga Filipina, a society of educated and progressive islanders,
whose ideas of needed reforms and methods of attaining them were at
one with his own. His banishment was a warning of danger and checked
the society's activity.
The Liga was succeeded, in the sense only of followed, by the
Katipunan,--a native word also meaning league. The makers of this
"league," though avowing the same purpose as the members of the other,
were men of very different stamp. Their initiation was a blood-rite:
they sought immediate independence; they preached a campaign of force,
if not of violence. That a recent reviewer should have connected
Dr. Rizal's name with the Katipunan is difficult to understand. Not
alone are his writings, acts, and character against such a possibility,
but so also is the testimony of the Spanish archives: for not only
was it admitted at his final trial that he was not suspected of any
connection with the Katipunan, but his well-known disapproval of that
society's premature and violent action was even made a point against
him. He was so much the more dangerous to the state because he had the
sagacity to know that the times were not yet ripe for independence,
and the honesty and purity of purpose to make only demands which the
state herself well knew to be just.
When the rebellion of 1896 broke out, Rizal, still at Dapidan,
knew that his life would not long be worth a breath of his beloved
Philippine air. He asked, therefore, of the Government permission to
go to Cuba as an army surgeon. It was granted, and he was taken to
Manila--ovations all along his route--and embarked on the Isla de
Panay for Barcelona. He carried with him the following letter from
General Blanco, then governor-general of the Philippines, to the
Minister of War at Madrid:
Manila, August 30th, 1896.
Esteemed General and Distinguished Friend:
I recommend to you with genuine interest, Dr. Jose Rizal,
who is leaving for the Peninsula, to place himself at the
disposal of the Government as volunteer army surgeon to
Cuba. During the four years of his exile at Dapidan, he has
conducted himself in the most exemplary manner, and he is in
my opinion the more worthy of pardon and consideration, in
that he is in no way connected with the extravagant attempts
we are now deploring, neither those of conspirators nor of
the secret societies that have been formed.
I have the pleasure to reassure you of my high esteem,
and remain,
Your affectionate friend and comrade,
Ramon Blanco.
But as soon as the Isla was on the seas, despatches began to pass
between Manila and Madrid, and before she reached her port the
promises, acceptances, and recommendations of the Government officials
were void. Upon landing, Rizal was immediately arrested and confined
in the infamous Montjuich prison. Despujols was now military governor
of Barcelona. The interview of hours which he is said to have had
with his Filipino prisoner must have been dramatic. Rizal was at
once re-embarked, on the Colon, and returned to Manila, a state
prisoner. Blanco was recalled, and Poliavieja, a sworn friend of the
clericals, was sent out.
Rizal was tried by court-martial, on a charge of sedition and
rebellion. His guilt was manifestly impossible. Except as a prisoner
of the state, he had spent only a few weeks in the Philippines since
his boyhood. His life abroad had been perfectly open, as were all his
writings. The facts stated in General Blanco's letter to the Minister
of War were well known to all Rizal's accusers. The best they could
do was to aver that he had written "depreciative words" against the
Government and the Church. Some testimony was given against him by men
who, since the American occupation, have made affidavit that it was
false and forced from them by torture. Rizal made a splendid defence,
but he was condemned, and sentenced to the death of a traitor. On that
day Jose Rizal y Mercado and Josephine Bracken were married. Then
the sweetness and strength of his character and his singleness of
purpose made a beautiful showing. In the night, which his bride spent
on her knees outside his prison, he wrote a long poem of farewell
to his patria adorado, fine in its abnegation and exquisite in the
wanderings of its fancy. He received the ministrations of a Jesuit
priest. He was perfectly calm. "What is death to me?" he said;
"I have sown, others are left to reap." At dawn he was shot.
The poem in which he left a record of his last thoughts was the
following:
MY LAST THOUGHT.
Land I adore, farewell! thou land of the southern sun's
choosing!
Pearl of the Orient seas! our forfeited Garden of Eden!
Joyous I yield up for thee my sad life, and were it far
brighter,
Young, rose-strewn, for thee and thy happiness still would
I give it.
Far afield, in the din and rush of maddening battle,
Others have laid down their lives, nor wavered nor paused in
the giving.
What matters way or place--the cyprus, the lily, the laurel,
Gibbet or open field, the sword or inglorious torture,
When 'tis the hearth and the country that call for the life's
immolation?
Dawn's faint lights bar the east, she smiles through the cowl
of the darkness,
Just as I die. Hast thou need of purple to garnish her pathway?
Here is my blood, on the hour! pour it out, and the sun in
his rising
Mayhap will touch it with gold, will lend it the sheen of
his glory.
Dreams of my childhood and youth, and dreams of my strong
young manhood,
What were they all but to see, thou gem of the Orient ocean!
Tearless thine eyes so deep, unbent, unmarred thy sweet
forehead.
Vision I followed from far, desire that spurred on and
consumed me!
Greeting! my parting soul cries, and greeting again!... O
my country!
Beautiful is it to fall, that the vision may rise to
fulfilment,
Giving my life for thy life, and breathing thine air in
the death-throe;
Sweet to eternally sleep in thy lap, O land of enchantment!
If in the deep, rich grass that covers my rest in thy bosom,
Some day thou seest upspring a lowly, tremulous blossom,
Lay there thy lips, 'tis my soul; may I feel on my forehead
descending,
Deep in the chilly tomb, the soft, warm breath of thy kisses.
Let the calm light of the moon fall around me, and dawn's
fleeting splendor;
Let the winds murmur and sigh, on my cross let some bird tell
its message;
Loosed from the rain by the brazen sun, let clouds of soft
vapor
Bear to the skies, as they mount again, the chant of my spirit.
There may some friendly heart lament my parting untimely,
And if at eventide a soul for my tranquil sleep prayeth,
Pray thou too, O my fatherland! for my peaceful reposing.
Pray for those who go down to death through unspeakable
torments;
Pray for those who remain to suffer such torture in prisons;
Pray for the bitter grief of our mothers, our widows,
our orphans;
Oh, pray too for thyself, on the way to thy final redemption.
When our still dwelling-place wraps night's dusky mantle
about her,
Leaving the dead alone with the dead, to watch till the
morning,
Break not our rest, and seek not to lay death's mystery open.
If now and then thou shouldst hear the string of a lute or
a zithern,
Mine is the hand, dear country, and mine is the voice that
is singing.
When my tomb, that all have forgot, no cross nor stone marketh,
There let the laborer guide his plough, there cleave the
earth open.
So shall my ashes at last be one with thy hills and thy
valleys.
Little 'twill matter then, my country, that thou shouldst
forget me!
I shall be air in thy streets, and I shall be space in thy
meadows.
I shall be vibrant speech in thine ears, shall be fragrance
and color,
Light and shout, and loved song forever repeating my message.
Rizal's own explanation of the lofty purpose of his searching story
of his Tagalog fatherland was in these words of his dedicatory preface:
TO MY COUNTRY
The records of human suffering make known to us the existence of
ailments of such nature that the slightest touch irritates and causes
tormenting pains. Whenever, in the midst of modern civilizations,
I have tried to call up thy dear image, O my country! either for the
comradeship of remembrance or to compare thy life with that about
me, I have seen thy fair face disfigured and distorted by a hideous
social cancer.
Eager for thy health, which is our happiness, and seeking the best
remedy for thy pain, I am about to do with thee what the ancients did
with their sick: they exposed them on the steps of their temples, that
every one who came to adore the divinity within might offer a remedy.
So I shall strive to describe faithfully thy state without extenuation;
to lift a corner of the covering that hides thy sore; sacrificing
everything to truth, even the love of thy glory, while loving, as
thy son, even thy frailties and sins.
Jose Rizal.
AN EAGLE FLIGHT
I.
THE HOUSE ON THE PASIG.
It was toward the end of October. Don Santiago de los Santos, better
known as Captain Tiago, was giving a dinner; and though, contrary to
custom, he had not announced it until that very afternoon, it had
become before evening the sole topic of conversation, not only at
Binondo, but in the other suburbs of Manila, and even in the city
itself. Captain Tiago passed for the most lavish of entertainers,
and it was well known that the doors of his home, like those of his
country, were closed to nobody and nothing save commerce and all
new or audacious ideas. The news spread, therefore, with lightning
rapidity in the world of the sycophants, the unemployed and idle,
whom heaven has multiplied so generously at Manila.
The dinner was given in a house of the Calle de Anloague, which
may yet be recognized, if an earthquake has not demolished it. This
house, rather large and of a style common to the country, stood near
an arm of the Pasig, called the Boco de Binondo, a rio which, like
all others of Manila, washing along the multiple output of baths,
sewers, and fishing grounds serves as a means of transport, and even
furnishes drinking-water, if such be the humor of the Chinese carrier.
Scarcely at intervals of a half-mile is this powerful artery of the
quarter where the traffic is most important, the movement most active,
dotted with bridges; and these, in ruins at one end six months of
the year and inapproachable the remaining six at the other, give
horses a pretext for plunging into the water, to the great surprise of
preoccupied mortals in carriages dozing tranquilly or philosophizing
on the progress of the century.
The house of Captain Tiago was rather low and on lines sufficiently
incorrect. A grand staircase with green balustrades, carpeted at
intervals, led from the vestibule, with its squares of colored faience,
to the main floor, between Chinese pedestals ornamented with fantastic
designs, supporting vases and jardinieres of flowers.
At the top of the staircase was a large apartment, called here caida,
which for this night served at once as dining- and music-room. In the
centre, a long table, luxuriously set, seemed to promise to diners-out
the most soothing satisfaction, at the same time threatening the
timid girl--the dalaga--who for six mortal hours must submit to the
companionship of strange and diverse people.
In contrast to these mundane preparations, richly colored pictures
of religious subjects hung about the walls, and at the end of the
apartment, imprisoned in ornate and splendid Renaissance carving,
was a curious canvas of vast dimensions, bearing the inscription,
"Our Lady of Peace and of Safe Journeys, Venerated at Antipolo." The
ceiling was prettily decorated with jewelled Chinese lamps, cages
without birds, spheres of crystal faced with colored foil, faded air
plants, botetes, etc. On the river side, through fantastic arches, half
Chinese, half European, were glimpses of a terrace, with trellises and
arbors, illuminated by little colored lanterns. Brilliant chandeliers,
reflected in great mirrors, lighted the apartment. On a platform of
pine was a superb grand piano. In a panel of the wall, a large portrait
in oil represented a man of agreeable face, in frock coat, robust,
straight, symmetrical as the gavel between his jewelled fingers.
The crowd of guests almost filled the room; the men separated from
the women, as in Catholic churches and synagogues. An old cousin
of Captain Tiago's was receiving alone. Her appearance was kindly,
but her tongue not very flexible to the Castilian. She filled her
role by offering to the Spaniards trays of cigarettes and buyos, and
giving the Filipinos her hand to kiss. The poor old lady, wearied at
last, profited by the sound of breaking china to go out hurriedly,
grumbling at maladroits. She did not reappear.
Whether the pictures roused a spirit of devotion, whether the women
of the Philippines are exceptional, the feminine part of the assembly
remained silent. Scarcely was heard even a yawn, stifled behind a
fan. The men made more stir. The most interesting and animated group
was formed by two monks, two Spanish provincials, and an officer,
seated round a little table, on which were wine and English biscuits.
The officer, an old lieutenant, tall and morose, looked a Duke of Alba,
retired into the Municipal Guard. He spoke little and dryly. One of the
monks was a young Dominican, handsome, brilliant, precociously grave;
it was the curate of Binondo. Consummate dialectician, he could escape
from a distinguo like an eel from a fisherman's nets. He spoke seldom,
and seemed to weigh his words.
The other monk talked much and gestured more. Though his hair was
turning gray, he seemed to have preserved all his vigor. His carriage,
his glance, his large jaws, his herculean frame, gave him the air of a
Roman patrician in disguise. Yet he seemed genial, and if the timbre
of his voice was autocratic, his frank and merry laugh removed any
disagreeable impression, so far even that one pardoned his appearing
in the salon with unshod feet.
One of the provincials, a little man with a black beard, had nothing
remarkable about him but his nose, which, to judge from its size,
ought not to have belonged to him entire. The other, young and blond,
seemed newly arrived in the country. The Franciscan was conversing
with him somewhat warmly.
"You will see," said he, "when you have been here several months;
you will be convinced that to legislate at Madrid and to execute in
the Philippines is not one and the same thing."
"But----"
"I, for example," continued Brother Damaso, raising his voice to
cut off the words of his objector, "I, who count twenty-three years
of plane and palm, can speak with authority. I spent twenty years
in one pueblo. In twenty years one gets acquainted with a town. San
Diego had six thousand souls. I knew each inhabitant as if I'd borne
and reared him--with which foot this one limped, how that one's pot
boiled--and I tell you the reforms proposed by the Ministers are
absurd. The Indian is too indolent!"
"Ah, pardon me," said the young man, speaking low and drawing nearer;
"that word rouses all my interest. Does it really exist from birth,
this indolence of the native, or is it, as some travellers say, only an
excuse of our own for the lack of advancement in our colonial policy?"
"Bah! ask Senor Laruja, who also knows the country well; ask him if
the ignorance and idleness of the Indians are not unparalleled?"
"In truth!" the little dark man made haste to affirm; "nowhere will
you find men more careless."
"Nor more corrupt, nor more ungrateful."
"Nor more ill-bred."
The young man looked about uneasily. "Gentlemen," said he, still
speaking low, "it seems to me we are the guests of Indians, and that
these young ladies----"
"Bah, you are too timid: Santiago does not consider himself an Indian,
besides, he isn't here. These are the scruples of a newcomer. Wait a
little. When you have slept in our strapped beds, eaten the tinola,
and seen our balls and fetes, you'll change your tone. And more, you
will find that the country is going to ruin; she is ruined already!"
"What does your reverence mean?" cried the lieutenant and Dominican
together.
"The evil all comes from the fact that the Government sustains
wrong-doers in the face of the ministers of God," continued the
Franciscan, raising his voice and facing about. "When a curate rids
his cemetery of a malefactor, no one, not even the king, has the right
to interfere; and a wretched general, a petty general from nowhere----"
"Father, His Excellency is viceroy," said the officer, rising. "His
Excellency represents His Majesty the king."
"What Excellency?" retorted the Franciscan, rising in turn. "Who is
this king? For us there is but one King, the legitimate----"
"If you do not retract that, Father, I shall make it known to the
governor-general," cried the lieutenant.
"Go to him now, go!" retorted Father Damaso; "I'll loan you my
carriage."
The Dominican interposed.
"Senores," said he in a tone of authority, "you should not confuse
things, nor seek offence where there is none intended. We must
distinguish in the words of Father Damaso those of the man from those
of the priest. The latter per se can never offend, because they are
infallible. In the words of the man, a sub-distinction must be made,
into those said ab irato, those said ex ore, but not in corde, and
those said in corde. It is these last only that can offend, and even
then everything depends. If they were not premeditated in mente,
but simply arose per accidens in the heat of the conversation----"
At this interesting point there joined the group an old Spaniard,
gentle and inoffensive of aspect. He was lame, and leaned on
the arm of an old native woman, smothered in curls and frizzes,
preposterously powdered, and in European dress. With relief every
one turned to salute them. It was Doctor de Espadana and his wife,
the Doctora Dona Victorina. The atmosphere cleared.
"Which, Senor Laruja, is the master of the house?" asked the young
provincial. "I haven't been presented."
"They say he has gone out."
"No presentations are necessary here," said Brother Damaso; "Santiago
is a good fellow."
Er hat das Pulfer nicht erfunden. "He didn't invent gunpowder,"
added Laruja.
"What, you too, Senor de Laruja?" said Dona Victorina over her
fan. "How could the poor man have invented gunpowder when, if what
they say is true, the Chinese made it centuries ago?"
"The Chinese? 'Twas a Franciscan who invented it," said Brother Damaso.
"A Franciscan, no doubt; he must have been a missionary to China,"
said the Senora, not disposed to abandon her idea.
"Who is this with Santiago?" asked the lieutenant. Every one looked
toward the door, where two men had just entered. They came up to the
group around the table.
II.
CRISOSTOMO IBARRA.
One was the original of the portrait in oil, and he led by the hand
a young man in deep black. "Good evening, senores; good evening,
fathers," said Captain Tiago, kissing the hands of the priests,
"I have the honor of presenting to you Don Crisostomo Ibarra."
At the name of Ibarra there were smothered exclamations. The
lieutenant, forgetting to salute the master of the house, surveyed
the young man from head to foot. Brother Damaso seemed petrified. The
arrival was evidently unexpected. Senor Ibarra exchanged the usual
phrases with members of the group. Nothing marked him from other guests
save his black attire. His fine height, his manner, his movements,
denoted sane and vigorous youth. His face, frank and engaging, of a
rich brown, and lightly furrowed--trace of Spanish blood--was rosy
from a sojourn in the north.
"Ah!" he cried, surprised and delighted, "my father's old friend,
Brother Damaso!"
All eyes turned toward the Franciscan, who did not stir.
"Pardon," said Ibarra, puzzled. "I am mistaken."
"You are not mistaken," said the priest at last, in an odd voice;
"but your father was not my friend."
Ibarra, astonished, drew slowly back the hand he had offered, and
turned to find himself facing the lieutenant, whose eyes had never
left him.
"Young man, are you the son of Don Rafael Ibarra?"
Crisostomo bowed.
"Then welcome to your country! I knew your father well, one of the
most honorable men of the Philippines."
"Senor," replied Ibarra, "what you say dispels my doubts as to his
fate, of which as yet I know nothing."
The old man's eyes filled with tears. He turned away to hide them,
and moved off into the crowd.
The master of the house had disappeared. Ibarra was left alone in the
middle of the room. No one presented him to the ladies. He hesitated
a moment, then went up to them and said:
"Permit me to forget formalities, and salute the first of my
countrywomen I have seen for years."
No one spoke, though many eyes regarded him with interest. Ibarra
turned away, and a jovial man, in native dress, with studs of
brilliants down his shirt-front, almost ran up to say:
"Senor Ibarra, I wish to know you. I am Captain Tinong, and live near
you at Tondo. Will you honor us at dinner to-morrow?"
"Thank you," said Ibarra, pleased with the kindness, "but to-morrow
I must leave for San Diego."
"What a pity! Well then, on your return----"
"Dinner is served," announced a waiter of the Cafe La Campana.
The guests began to move toward the table, not without much ceremony
on the part of the ladies, especially the natives, who required a
great deal of polite urging.
III.
THE DINNER.
The two monks finding themselves near the head of the table, like
two candidates for a vacant office, began politely resigning in each
other's favor.
"This is your place, Brother Damaso."
"No, yours, Brother Sibyla."
"You are so much the older friend of the family."
"But you are the curate of the quarter."
This polite contention settled, the guests sat down, no one but Ibarra
seeming to think of the master of the house.
"What," said he, "you're not to be with us, Don Santiago?"
But there was no place: Lucullus was not dining with Lucullus.
"Don't trouble yourself," said Captain Tiago, laying his hand on the
young man's shoulder. "This feast is a thank-offering for your safe
return. Ho, there! bring the tinola! I've ordered the tinola expressly
for you, Crisostomo."
"When did you leave the country?" Laruja asked Ibarra.
"Seven years ago."
"Then you must have almost forgotten it."
"On the contrary, it has been always in my thoughts; but my country
seems to have forgotten me."
"Why do you say that?" asked the old lieutenant.
"Because for several months I have had no news, so that I do not even
know how and when my father died."
The lieutenant could not repress a groan.
"And where were you that they couldn't telegraph you?" asked Dona
Victorina. "When we were married, we sent despatches to the peninsula."
"Senora, I was in the far north," said Ibarra.
"You have travelled much," said the blond provincial; "which of the
European countries pleased you most?"
"After Spain, my second country, the nations that are free."
"And what struck you as most interesting, most surprising, in the
general life of nations--the genius of each, so to put it?" asked
Laruja.
Ibarra reflected.
"Before visiting a country I carefully studied its history, and,
except the different motives for national pride, there seems to
me nothing surprisingly characteristic in any nation. Given its
history, everything appears natural; each people's wealth and misery
seem in direct proportion to its freedom and its prejudices, and in
consequence, in proportion to the self-sacrifice or selfishness of
its progenitors."
"Did you discover nothing more startling than that?" demanded
the Franciscan, with a mocking laugh. "It was hardly worth while
squandering money for so slight returns. Not a schoolboy but knows
as much."
The guests eyed one another, fearful of what might follow. Ibarra,
astonished, remained silent a moment, then said quietly:
"Senores, do not wonder at these words of Brother Damaso. He was my
curate when I was a little boy, and with his reverence the years don't
count. I thank him for thus recalling the time when he was often an
honored guest at my father's table."
Brother Sibyla furtively observed the Franciscan, who was trembling
slightly. At the first possible opportunity Ibarra rose.
"You will pardon me if I excuse myself," he said. "I arrived only
a few hours ago, and have matters of importance to attend to. The
dinner is over. I drink little wine, and scarcely taste liquors." And
raising a glass as yet untouched, "Senores," he said, "Spain and the
Philippines forever!"
"You're not going!" said Santiago in amazement. "Maria Clara and her
friends will be with us in a moment. What shall I say to her?"
"That I was obliged to go," said Ibarra, "and that I'm coming early
in the morning." And he went out.
The Franciscan unburdened himself.
"You saw his arrogance," he said to the blond provincial. "These young
fellows won't take reproof from a priest. That comes of sending them
to Europe. The Government ought to prohibit it."
That night the young provincial added to his "Colonial Studies,"
this paragraph: "In the Philippines, the least important person at a
feast is he who gives it. You begin by showing your host to the door,
and all goes merrily.... In the present state of affairs, it would
be almost a kindness to prohibit young Filipinos from leaving their
country, if not even from learning to read."
IV.
HERETIC AND FILIBUSTER.
Ibarra stood outside the house of Captain Tiago. The night wind,
which at this season brings a bit of freshness to Manila, seemed to
blow away the cloud that had darkened his face. Carriages passed
him like streaks of light, hired calashes rolled slowly by, and
foot-passengers of all nationalities jostled one another. With the
rambling gait of the preoccupied or the idle, he took his way toward
the Plaza de Binondo. Nothing was changed. It was the same street,
with the same blue and white houses, the same white walls with their
slate-colored fresco, poor imitations of granite. The church tower
showed the same clock with transparent face. The Chinese shop had
the same soiled curtains, the same iron triangles. One day, long ago,
imitating the street urchins of Manila, he had twisted one of these
triangles: nobody had ever straightened it. "How little progress!" he
murmured; and he followed the Calle de la Sacristia, pursued by the
cry of sherbet venders.
"Marvellous!" he thought; "one would say my voyage was a dream. Santo
Dios! the street is as bad as when I went away."
While he contemplated this marvel of urban stability in an unstable
country, a hand fell lightly on his shoulder. He looked up and
recognized the old lieutenant. His face had put off its expression
of sternness, and he smiled kindly at Crisostomo.
"Young man," he said, "I was your father's friend: I wish you to
consider me yours."
"You seem to have known my father well," said Crisostomo; "perhaps
you can tell me something of his death."
"You do not know about it?"
"Nothing at all, and Don Santiago would not talk with me till
to-morrow."
"You know, of course, where he died."
"Not even that."
Lieutenant Guevara hesitated.
"I am an old soldier," he said at last, in a voice full of compassion,
"and only know how to say bluntly what I have to tell. Your father
died in prison."
Ibarra sprang back, his eyes fixed on the lieutenant's.
"Died in prison? Who died in prison?"
"Your father," said the lieutenant, his voice still gentler.
"My father--in prison? What are you saying? Do you know who my father
was?" and he seized the old man's arm.
"I think I'm not mistaken: Don Rafael Ibarra."
"Yes, Don Rafael Ibarra," Crisostomo repeated mechanically.
"You will soon learn that for an honest man to keep out of prison is
a difficult matter in the Philippines."
"You mock me! Why did he die in prison?"
"Come with me; we will talk on the way."
They walked along in silence, the officer stroking his beard in search
of inspiration.
"As you know," he began, "your father was the richest man of the
province, and if he had many friends he had also enemies. We Spaniards
who come to the Philippines are seldom what we should be. I say this
as truthfully of some of your ancestors as of others. Most of us come
to make a fortune without regard to the means. Well, your father was a
man to make enemies among these adventurers, and he made enemies among
the monks. I never knew exactly the ground of the trouble with Brother
Damaso, but it came to a point where the priest almost denounced him
from the pulpit.
"You remember the old ex-artilleryman who collected taxes? He became
the laughing-stock of the pueblo, and grew brutal and churlish
accordingly. One day he chased some boys who were annoying him, and
struck one down. Unfortunately your father interfered. There was a
struggle and the man fell. He died within a few hours.
"Naturally your father was arrested, and then his enemies unmasked. He
was called heretic, filibustero, his papers were seized, everything
was made to accuse him. Any one else in his place would have been
set at liberty, the physicians finding that the man died of apoplexy;
but your father's fortune, his honesty, and his scorn of everything
illegal undid him. When his advocate, by the most brilliant pleading,
had exposed these calumnies, new accusations arose. He had taken
lands unjustly, owed men for imaginary wrongs, had relations with the
tulisanes, by which his plantations and herds were unmolested. The
affair became so complicated that no one could unravel it. Your father
gave way under the strain, and died suddenly--alone--in prison."
They had reached the quarters.
The lieutenant hesitated. Ibarra said nothing, but grasped the old
man's long, thin hand; then turned away, caught sight of a coach,
and signalled the driver.
"Fonda de Lala," he said, and his words were scarcely audible.
V.
A STAR IN THE DARK NIGHT.
Ibarra went up to his chamber, which faced the river, threw himself
down, and looked out through the open window. Across the river a
brilliantly lighted house was ringing with joyous music. Had the young
man been so minded, with the aid of a glass he might have seen, in that
radiant atmosphere, a vision. It was a young girl, of exceeding beauty,
wearing the picturesque costume of the Philippines. A semicircle
of courtiers was round her. Spaniards, Chinese, natives, soldiers,
curates, old and young, intoxicated with the light and music, were
talking, gesturing, disputing with animation. Even Brother Sibyla
deigned to address this queen, in whose splendid hair Dona Victorina
was wreathing a diadem of pearls and brilliants. She was white,
too white perhaps, and her deep eyes, often lowered, when she raised
them showed the purity of her soul. About her fair and rounded neck,
through the transparent tissue of the pina, winked, as say the Tagals,
the joyous eyes of a necklace of brilliants. One man alone seemed
unreached by all this light and loveliness; it was a young Franciscan,
slim, gaunt, pale, who watched all from a distance, still as a statue.
But Ibarra sees none of this. Another spectacle appears to his fancy,
commands his eyes. Four walls, bare and dank, enclose a narrow
cell, lighted by a single streak of day. On the moist and noisome
floor is a mat; on the mat an old man dying. Beaten down by fever,
he lies and looks about him, calling a name, in strangling voice,
with tears. No one--a clanking chain, an echoed groan somewhere;
that was all. And away off in the bright world, laughing, singing,
drenching flowers with wine, a young man.... One by one the lights
go out in the festal house: no more of noise, or song, or harp;
but in Ibarra's ears always the agonizing cry.
Silence has drawn her deep breath over Manila; all its life seems
gone out, save that a cock's crow alternates with the bells of clock
towers and the melancholy watch-cry of the guard. A quarter moon comes
up, flooding with its pale light the universal sleep. Even Ibarra,
wearied more perhaps with his sad thoughts than his long voyage, sleeps
too. Only the young Franciscan, silent and motionless just now at the
feast, awake still. His elbow on the window-place of his little cell,
his chin sunk in his palm, he watches a glittering star. The star
pales, goes out, the slender moon loses her gentle light, but the monk
stays on; motionless, he looks toward the horizon, lost now behind
the morning mists, over the field of Bagumbayan, over the sleeping sea.
VI.
CAPTAIN TIAGO AND MARIA.
While our friends are still asleep or breakfasting, we will sketch
the portrait of Captain Tiago. We have no reason to ignore him,
never having been among his guests. Short, less dark than most of
his compatriots, of full face and slightly corpulent, Captain Tiago
seemed younger than his age. His rounded cranium, very small and
elongated behind, was covered with hair black as ebony. His eyes,
small and straight set, kept always the same expression. His nose
was straight and finely cut, and if his mouth had not been deformed
by the use of tobacco and buyo, he had not been wrong in thinking
himself a handsome man.
He was reputed the richest resident of Binondo, and had large estates
in La Pampanga, on the Laguna de Bay, and at San Diego. From its
baths, its famous gallera, and his recollections of the place,
San Diego was his favorite pueblo, and here he passed two months
every year. He had also properties at Santo Cristo, in the Calle de
Anloague, and in the Calle Rosario; the exploitation of the opium
traffic was shared between him and a Chinese, and, needless to say,
brought him great gains. He was purveyor to the prisoners at Bilibid,
and furnished zacate to many Manila houses. On good terms with all
authority, shrewd, pliant, daring in speculation, he was the sole
rival of a certain Perez in the awards of divers contracts which
the Philippine Government always places in privileged hands. From
all of which it resulted that Captain Tiago was as happy as can be
a man whose small head announces his native origin. He was rich,
and at peace with God, with the Government, and with men.
That he was at peace with God could not be doubted. One has no
motive for being at enmity with Him when one is well in the land,
and has never had to ask Him for anything. From the grand salon
of the Manila home, a little door, hid behind a silken curtain,
led to a chapel--something obligatory in a Filipino house. There
were Santiago's Lares, and if we use this word, it is because the
master of the house was rather a poly- than a monotheist. Here, in
sculpture and oils, were saints, martyrdoms, and miracles; a chapter
could scarcely enumerate them all. Before these images Santiago burned
his candles and made his requests known.
That he was at peace with the Government, however difficult the
problem, could not be doubted either. Incapable of a new idea, and
contented with his lot, he was disposed to obey even to the lowest
functionary, and to offer him capons, hams, and Chinese fruits at all
seasons. If he heard the natives maligned, not considering himself one,
he chimed in and said worse: one criticised the Chinese merchants or
the Spaniards, he, who thought himself pure Iberian, did it too. He was
for two years gobernadorcillo of the rich association of half-breeds,
in the face of protestations from many who considered him a native. The
impious called him fool; the poor, pitiless and cruel; his inferiors,
a tyrant.
As to his past, he was the only son of a rich sugar merchant, who died
when Santiago was still at school. He had then to quit his studies
and give himself to business. He married a young girl of Santa Cruz,
who brought him social rank and helped his fortunes.
The absence of an heir in the first six years of marriage made Captain
Tiago's thirst for riches almost blameworthy. In vain all this time
did Dona Pia make novenas and pilgrimages and scatter alms. But at
length she was to become a mother. Alas! like Shakespeare's fisherman
who lost his songs when he found a treasure, she never smiled again,
and died, leaving a beautiful baby girl, whom Brother Damaso presented
at the font. The child was called Maria Clara.
Maria Clara grew, thanks to the care of good Aunt Isabel. Her
eyes, like her mother's, were large, black, and shaded by long
lashes; sparkling and mirthful when she laughed; when she did not,
thoughtful and profound, even sad. Her curly hair was almost blond,
her nose perfect; and her mouth, small and sweet like her mother's,
was flanked by charming dimples. The little thing, idol of every one,
lived amid smiles and love. The monks feted her. They dressed her
in white for their processions, mingled jasmine and lilies in her
hair, gave her little silver wings, and in her hands blue ribbons,
the reins of fluttering white doves. She was so joyous, had such a
candid baby speech, that Captain Tiago, enraptured with her, passed
his time in blessing the saints.
In the lands of the sun, at thirteen or fourteen, the child becomes a
woman. At this age full of mysteries, Maria Clara entered the convent
of Santa Catalina, to remain several years. With tears she parted from
the sole companion of her childish games, Crisostomo Ibarra, who in
turn was soon to leave his home. Some years after his departure, Don
Rafael and Captain Tiago, knowing the inclinations of their children,
agreed upon their marriage. This arrangement was received with eager
joy by two hearts beating at two extremities of the world.
VII.
IDYLLE.