OUR PEG IN ASIA
1
Venturing round the Pacific is like reincarnation. One lives as an
Hawaiian for a spell, enters a state of non-existence and turns up as a
Fijian; then another period of selflessness, and so on from one isle to
another. From such a period of transmigration I woke one morning to the
sight of Zamboanga, and knew myself for a moment as a dual
personality,--a Filipino and an American in one. All day long we hugged
the coast of the islands of the group--Mindanao, Negros, Panay, Mindoro,
Luzon--the cool blue surface of the choppy sea between us and reality.
After so many days' journey along the coast of Australia, through sea
after sea, it seemed unreasonable to require a turn of the sun in which
to outstrip a few Oriental islands. Then we swung to the right. Ahead of
us, we were told, lay Manila, but even the short run to that city seemed
interminable. At last the unknown became the known. A red trolley-car
emerged from behind the Manila Hotel. Life became real again.
Our ship had hardly more than buoyed when a fleet of lighters surrounded
her,--flat, blunt, ordinary skiffs; long, narrow, peculiar ones. The
former I thought represented American efficiency; the latter, Filipino
whimsicality. The Filipino craft were decorated in black, with
flourishes and letters in red and white. Over their holds low hoods of
matting formed an arch upon which swarmed the native owners. How
business-like, yet withal attractive. And business became the order of
the night.
From beneath the matted hoods of the lighters flickered glimmers of
faint firelight. Life there was alert, though quiet. It hid in the
shadows of night; confined in the holds, dim candles and lanterns
quivered: peace reigned before performance. A quiet harbor; moon and
stars and mast-lights above; a cool, refreshing breeze. That was my
first night in Manila Harbor.
Morning. Not really having stretched my legs in nearly three weeks,
since sailing from Sydney, Australia, I naturally felt in high spirits
upon landing. The mists which hung over Manila quickened my pace, for I
knew that before I could see much of that ancient town they would be
gone, dissipated by the intense heat of the tropical sun. I was eager to
put on my seven-leagued boots to see all that I had selected years
before as the things I wanted to stride the seas to see. But I soon
discovered that I was only a clumsy iron-weighted deep-sea diver. All
round the Pacific I had traveled alone. I wanted no mate but freedom.
But the three weeks _en route_ from the Antipodes, on board a small
liner whose major passenger list was made up of monosyllabic Oriental
names drove me, willy-nilly, into the companionship of the
septuagenarian English captain.
2
On account of the keying down of my reactions to the tempo of
seventy-three plus British sedateness, I wrote many things in my book of
vistas that seem to me now mere aberrations. Just to indicate what the
effect was I shall confess that as I approached the Walled City I
conceived of myself as almost a full-fledged Don Quixote storming the
citadel of ancient aggression. But my elderly Sancho Panza held me back
lest the shafts of burning sunlight strike me down.
Standing before the gates of antiquity, even the most haughty of human
beings moves by instinct back along the line of the ages, like a spider
pulling himself up to his nest on his web. Round the black stone wall
which encircles the old Spanish city, that which was once a moat is now
a pleasant grass-grown lawn. The wall itself, still well preserved, has
been overreached by two-story stone houses with heavy balconies which
seem to mock the pretenses of their "protector." Outwardly, things look
old; within change has kept things new. Mixed with surprised curiosity
at two Antipodes so close together comes a feeling of contact with
eternity, the present of yesterday linking itself with the antiquity
which is to be.
A long, narrow street stretched across the city. Spanish buildings
tinted pink and delicately ornamented, lined the sides. White stone
buildings, chipped and seamed with use and age, lined the way. Broad
entrances permitted glimpses of sumptuous patios, refreshed by tropical
plants; low stone steps leading up to dark vault-like chambers; windows
barred but without glass,--spacious retreats built by caballeros who
thought they knew the value of life. Indeed, they knew how to build
against invasion of the sun and the Oriental pirate, but not against the
invasion of time. Perhaps they live better as Spaniards to-day than they
lived as conquerors yesterday.
Here, within the walled city, everything looks as though change were not
the order of eternity. Everything is as it was, yet nothing is so.
Trolley-cars clank, motor-cars of the latest models throb quietly,
pony-traps and bullock-carts stir the ancient quiet. One wonders how so
much new life can find room to move about in such narrow streets with
their still narrower sidewalks that permit men to pass in single file
only, and angular corners and low buildings. But there they are, and
there they bid fair to remain. Even the unused cathedrals, whose doors
are here and there nailed shut, stand their ground. Some of them even
close the street with their imposing fronts, the courage of fervent
human passion in their crumbling façades.
[Illustration: FILIPINO LIGHTERS DROWSING IN THE EVENING SHADOWS]
[Illustration: THE DOCILE WATER BUFFALO IS USED TO WALKING IN MUD]
[Illustration: ONE CAN THROW A BRICK AND HIT SEVEN CATHEDRALS IN
MANILA]
[Illustration: COOL AND SILENT ARE THE MOSSY STREETS OF THE WALLED
CITY OF MANILA]
At that early hour there was little sign of human life. Into some of the
cathedrals native women crept for prayer. Here and there a confined
human being passed across the glassless windows; here and there a
tourist flitted by in search of sights. And I soon realized that within
the walls, intramuros, there was nothing. Across the park, across the
Pasig River, there one finds life.
Yet within that ancient crust there is new life. Some old buildings have
been turned into government offices, high schools, a public library
fully equipped, an agricultural institute, everything standing as in
days of old, but new flowers and plants growing in those crude
pots,--old surroundings with a new spirit. Something mechanical in that
spirit,--typewriters clicking everywhere under native fingers; still,
typewriters don't click without thoughts.
Here, then, is the conflict in growth between the ends of time, heredity
struggling with environment, the fountains of youth washing the bones of
old ambitions. They may not become young bones, but may we not hope they
will at least be clean? May not time and patience remold antiquity,
absorb its bad blood and rejuvenate it? Typewriters clicking everywhere;
tongues born to Filipino, then turned to Spanish, now twisting
themselves with English. The trough has been brought to the horse. Will
he drink? The library was full of intelligent-looking young Filipinos,
the cut of their clothes as obviously American as the typewriters
clicking behind doors. Both typewriters and garments indicated
efficiency, but I could no more say what was the impulse in the being
within those clothes than what thoughts were being fixed in permanence
to the sound of an American typewriter.
The most symbolical thing of all was the aquarium built beneath one wing
of the great wall round this little village. If in the hard shell of
American possession arrangement can still be made for the freedom,
natural and unconfining, of the native Filipinos, we shall not lay
ourselves open to censure. The natives may not be satisfied, they may
prefer the open sea; but that is up to them to achieve. As long as we
keep the water fresh and the food supplies free, they can complain only
of their own crustaceous natures and nothing else.
3
All Manila does not live within the walls, however,--not even a goodly
portion of it,--and the exits are numerous. Passing through the eastern
gate, one comes into a park which lies between the walled city and the
Pasig River. Beyond the river and on its very banks is Manila proper. As
I got my first glimpse of the crowded, dirty waterway, I could not say
much in reply to my companion, whose patriotic fervor found expression
in criticism of American colonization. It was like looking into a
neglected back yard. The Englishman did not seem to see, however, that
to have done better in so short a time would have been to inflict
hardships on the natives which no amount of progress ever justifies.
Still, with memories of Honolulu as a basis for judgment I was not a
little disappointed. How to change people without destroying their
souls,--that is the problem for future social workers for world
betterment to solve.
Meanwhile I had succeeded in eluding my burden of seventy-three years
and opened my eyes to the life round about me. There was still a bridge
to cross. It was narrow, wooden and crowded. It was only a temporary
structure, built to replace the magnificent Bridge of Spain which was
washed away in the great flood of September, 1914. During the few
minutes it took me to saunter across it, the traffic was twice blocked.
Perhaps to show me how full the traffic was, for in that moment there
lined up as many vehicles and people and of sufficient variety to
illustrate the stepping-stones in transportation progress. There were
traps, motor-cars, carts drawn by carabao, or water-buffalo, bicycles,
and trolley-cars. Everybody seems to ride in some fashion.
Yet everybody seems to walk, and in single file at that. Gauze-winged
Filipino women,--tawdry, small and ill-shod, or, rather, dragging
slippers along the pavement--insist on keeping to the middle of the
narrow walks. Frequently they are balancing great burdens on their
heads, with or without which they are not over-graceful or comely. Their
stiff, transparent gauze sleeves stand away from them like airy wings.
One hasn't the heart to brush against them lest these angelic extensions
be demolished, and so one keeps behind them all the way.
The men also shuffle along. They wear embroidered gauze coats which veil
their shirts and belts and trousers. There is something in this
lace-curtain-like costume that seems the acme of laziness. Neither stark
nakedness nor the durability of heavy fabrics seem so prohibitive of
labor as does this thin garment. No inquiry into the problem of the
Philippines would seem to me complete without full consideration of the
origin of this costume.
But one is swept along over the bridge, and is dropped down into Manila
proper by way of a set of steps, through a short alley. The main street
opens to the right and to the left. It is brought to a sudden turn one
block to the left and then runs on into the farther reaches of the city;
to the right it winds its way along till it encompasses the market-place
and confusion. This chiseling out of streets in such abrupt fashion is
puzzling to the person with notions of how tropical people behave. Why
such timidity in the pursuance of direction and desire? The obstruction
of the bridge promenade by the main street and of the main street by a
side street have a tendency to shoot the seer of sights about in a
fashion comparable to one of those games in which a ball is shot through
criss-cross sections so that the players never know in what little
groove it will fall or whether the number will be a lucky one or not.
I first fell into a bank, and the amount of money one can lose in
exchanging Australian silver notes into American dollars is sufficient
to dishearten one. The shops were too damp and insignificant to attract
me much, however, so I ventured on into the outer by-ways of the city.
There the dungeon-like stores and homes and Chinese combinations had at
least the virtue of ordinary Oriental manner in contrast to our own. The
Chinese cupboard-like stores, that seem to hang on the outside of the
buildings like Italian fruit-stands, held few attractions. There was an
obvious utilitarianism about them which, strange as it may seem, is the
last thing the man with no fortune to spend enjoys. Shops and museums
afford the unpossessing compensation for his penury.
As I made my way ahead to a small open square, my attention was arrested
by a performance the full significance of which did not at first appear
to me. At the gateway of a large cigar-factory from which came strolling
male and female workers, sat two individuals--two women at the women's
gate, two men at the men's--and each worker was examined before leaving.
As a woman came along, the inspector passed her hands down the side of
the skirts, up the thighs, over the bosom,--then slapped her genially
and off she went. Through it all, the girls assumed a most dignified
manner, absolutely without self-consciousness and oblivious of the gaze
of the passers-by. What is more certain to break down a man's or a
woman's self-respect than becoming indifferent to the opinion of the
public as to the method of being searched? A Freudian complex formed to
the point of one's believing oneself capable of theft, the next thing
is to live out that unconscious thought of theft and to care nothing for
the censure of the world.
When at work, these girls possessed a sort of sixth sense. The
cigarettes are handed over to them at their benches to be wrapped in
bundles of thirty. They never stop to count them--just place the
required number in their left hands encircling them with thumb and
fingers, reject an odd one if it creeps in, and tie the bundle. I
counted a dozen packets, but did not find one either short or over, and
the overseers are so certain of this accuracy that they never count them
either.
But what a different world is found at the public school not very far
from the factory! The building was not much of a building,--just an
old-fashioned wooden structure with a court. Its sole purpose seemed to
be to furnish four thousand children with training in the use of a new
tongue. "Speak English," stared every one in the face from sign-boards
nailed to pillars. I listened. The command was honored more in the
breach than in the observance, yet where it was respected strange
English sounds tripped along tongues that were doubtless more accustomed
to Tagalog and Spanish. There was nothing shy in the behavior of these
boys and girls. They moved about with a certain monastic self-assurance,
less gay than our children, more free than most Oriental youngsters. In
a few years they will be advocating Filipino independence, in no
mistaken terms,--if they have not been caught by the factory process.
I went straight ahead and found myself on my way back into the
city,--but from a side opposite that from which I had left it. The
squalor and the dungeon-like atmosphere were indeed nothing for American
efficiency to be proud of. Slums in the tropics fester rapidly. One
cannot say these places were slums; but they certainly were not native
villages. One felt that here in Manila America's heart was not in her
work. Why build up something that would in the end revert to the
natives, to be laid open to possible aggression and conquest! One felt
further that the Filipinos did not exactly rejoice in being Americans.
What they actually are they have long since forgotten. Once
foster-children of Philip of Spain. To-day the adopted sons of America.
To-morrow? How much more fortunate their Siamese cousins or relatives by
an ancient marriage! Yet all who know Manila as it was ten years ago
agree that there have been vast improvements in a decade. One does not
include in this generalization the residences and hotels of the
foreigners, for obvious reasons; still, the welfare of a community is
raised by good example.
That afternoon I stretched in the shade of one of the walls of the old
walled citadel with its fine gateways. I pondered the significance of
those stones against which I was resting. One gains strength from such
structures as one does from the sea,--not only in the actual contact,
but in the thought that that which human effort accomplished human
effort can do again. My septuagenarian had returned to the ship for
rest. I thought of his criticisms of the American occupation of Manila,
of his suggestions that England would have made of it a fine city. I
wondered what drove the Spanish to build this wall. To protect
themselves against Chinese pirates? There is not a country in the world
that has not tried to safeguard itself against invasion by the process
of invasion. Yet any attempt to do otherwise is decried as impractical.
All the while, decay weakens the arm of the conqueror.
But more luring scenes distracted my thoughts. The sinking sun stretched
the lengthening shadows of the wall as a fisherman, at sunset, spreads
his serviceable nets. Filipinos passed quietly to and fro; cars,
motor-cars, and electric cars cut a St. Andrew's cross before me. The
scent of mellow summer weighted the air. Slowly everything drew closer
in the net of night.
Two days later I was in Hong-Kong, where the Oriental dominates the
scene. I was at the third angle of the triangle, and hereafter the
subject is Asia.