of past and present; of romance and commercialism; of oriental ease and
occidental hustle.
Enter through one of the beautiful old city gates, say the Santa Lucia,
which bears the date 1781, and one finds himself in the old or walled
city, Intramuros, still very Spanish in its appearance, though the
government offices and other public buildings are here located. The
massive gray stone wall, started in the early part of the seventeenth
century, was originally surrounded by a moat, with drawbridges. It is
said that a very efficient American official once suggested the
desirability of having the wall whitewashed; fortunately his idea was
not carried out.
In contrast to the comparative quiet of the narrow streets of the
Intramuros the docks along the Pasig River, that flows through the heart
of the town, present a scene of bustle and confusion worthy of a city of
its size, some 300,000 inhabitants. Here may be seen vessels of all
sorts, from all parts of the world: steamships, junks, tugs, rowboats,
and _cascos_, the last being the name given the native barge for
carrying freight. The casco is covered by a roof of matting, made in
sliding sections, with a cabin in the stern where the family of the
owner lives.
While there is an excellent electric street railway system and plenty of
automobiles to be had, the common method of getting about is to 'phone
for, or to hail, a passing one-horse vehicle, of which there are three
distinct types charging different fares for the same service; the more
expensive vehicles are, however, more comfortable and have better
horses. Like the taxi-driver of New York or the rickisha-man of
Singapore the driver of the _caratella_ or _caramata_ will charge all
the traffic will bear, and it is well for the newcomer to inquire of an
old resident what the proper fare for a given distance is before
starting.
[Illustration: SANTA LUCIA GATE.
One of the entrances to the Walled City. Erected 1781.]
The typical vehicle for hauling freight is the low, two-wheeled cart,
drawn by the slow-moving, long-horned _carabao_ or water buffalo, one of
the most characteristic animals of the islands. This beast is
well-named, since it delights to lie buried in a muddy pool of water,
with just its head above the surface. It may be seen in the larger
lakes, swimming or wading in the deeper waters at a distance from the
shore. In the cities it is a quiet, peaceful brute that one brushes
against without a thought, but in the country, where is browses in the
open fields, it behooves the white man to be very circumspect as he
passes in its neighborhood, for it seems to have an aversion to the
Caucasian race and will frequently charge in a very unpleasant, not to
say dangerous, way. It is said that the carabao never shows this
hostility toward the natives. A peculiarity of the law is such that
should a man shoot a dangerous carabao to protect his own life he would
have to pay for the animal he killed.
[Illustration: PART OF THE WALL OF THE WALLED CITY.
Seen from the outside.]
Of course for small amounts of freight, in Manila as in all places in
the Orient, the ubiquitous Chinese coolie is the usual means of
transportation, and with a huge load at each end of a bamboo pole across
his shoulder he shambles along with a curious gait, between a walk and a
run, that he seems capable of sustaining for an almost indefinite time.
[Illustration: PASIG RIVER, PART OF THE HARBOR OF MANILA.
Casco in right foreground, with matting roof.]
The "Chino" of course is the merchant of Manila as of all the cities of
this part of the world. The main shopping street, the Escolta, is fairly
lined with Chinese stores of all sorts, some of them quite extensive;
and some of the narrower side streets, in the same neighborhood, have
practically no other stores than those kept by the Chinese. It is
wonderfully interesting to wander about these narrow, winding streets,
and into the dark, sometimes ill-smelling stores, but one should early
learn the gentle art of "jewing down" the prices that are first asked
for goods that are offered for sale. The Oriental always asks much more
than he is willing or even eager to accept. You ask the price of a
garment, say, and are told "Two pesos": you shake your head and say "Too
much": "Peso and half" will then be tried: you again say "Too much" and
perhaps turn as though to leave the shop; "How much you give?" says the
crafty merchant; "One peso," perhaps you suggest; "Take it," says the
eager merchant as he hands you an article that should probably sell for
half the amount paid. You leave the store feeling good over having
gotten ahead of the crafty Oriental, and he probably chuckles to himself
over having cheated the rich American.
[Illustration: A CARAMATA.
The taxi of the lower classes in Manila.]
[Illustration: A CARABAO AND CART.]
Most of the shopping is done in the morning or late in the afternoon.
For several hours, during the heat of the day, many of the stores are
closed while the proprietors enjoy a midday lunch and siesta.
[Illustration: PLAZA DE SANTO TOMAS.]
When tired of shopping or sight-seeing one may wander into a nearby
church or rest in some public park or square, such as the Plaza de Santo
Tomas. Many of these old squares are exceedingly picturesque and
attractive.
The different sections of the city are given distinct names, as though
they were separate towns, but they are separated by imaginary lines
only. In one of the more residential of these sections is the great
Manila General Hospital, an up-to-date, modern plant; nearby is the main
part of the University of the Philippines, whose students, it is said,
compare quite favorably with the average college students of America. In
this same neighborhood is also the main part of the Philippine Bureau of
Science, where trained chemists, geologists, botanists, zoologists,
bacteriologists, engineers, and other scientific experts are engaged in
numerous lines of investigation of importance to the welfare of the
islands. Most of these experts have, in the past, been drawn from the
United States, as have the professors in the University. Just what will
be the condition of affairs in these high-grade institutions when the
islands are entirely under native control is somewhat problematic.
[Illustration: MAIN BUILDING OF THE UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES.]
While the hotels are not numerous in Manila one may secure the best of
modern service by going to the Manila Hotel, down on the water-front,
just off the great promenade and playground known as the Lunetta, where
everybody goes at night to see everybody else and to listen to the band.
Or one may see more of the native, especially the Spanish, life of the
town by stopping at the Hotel de Spain, in the heart of the town, just
off the Escolta. Here one may be quite, if not luxuriously, comfortable
at a much more reasonable rate, and may enjoy watching the Spanish and
other foreign guests of the hotel instead of the usual crowd of military
and other well-dressed Americans that frequent the Manila Hotel.
[Illustration: MAIN BUILDING OF THE PHILIPPINE BUREAU OF SCIENCE.]
Although the population of Manila largely adheres to the Roman Catholic
Church, many of the Protestant denominations have churches of their own,
and a flourishing Y. M. C. A., with a fine, modern building, is
available for the men of the city.
Life in such a town is certainly very attractive, and there is a charm
about the place that makes one wish to return; but it is a long, long
way from home and from many of the things that may be had only in the
greater countries of Europe and America.
IX. A PACIFIC PARADISE, HONOLULU.
The long voyage to or from the Orient is delightfully interrupted by the
stop at Honolulu, capital of the Hawaiian Islands, about 2,100 miles
southwest of San "Francisco. This interesting group of volcanic islands
named in 1778 by their discoverer, Jas. Cook, the Sandwich Islands after
the Earl of Sandwich, then Lord of the British Admiralty, is said to be
the most isolated group of inhabited islands in the world. It is
possible that the real discoverer of the islands was not Jas. Cook, but
a Spanish seaman named Juan Gaetano, who sighted them in 1555. Cook and
his men were treated as supernatural beings and worshiped by the
superstitious natives as gods, until the death of one of the sailors
showed that they were mere mortals; and in 1779, by their overbearing
conduct, the Englishmen came into conflict with the irate natives and
Jas. Cook was killed. "His body was taken to a _heiau_ or temple; the
flesh was removed from the bones and burned, and the bones were tied up
with red feathers and deified. Parts of the body were recovered,
however, and committed to the deep with military honors, and a part of
the bones were kept in the temple of Lono and worshiped until 1819, when
they were concealed in some secret place. A monument erected by his
fellow countrymen now marks the place where he fell on the shores of
Kealakekua."
In 1893 the queen was deposed and a provisional government was
established, to be succeeded, in 1894, by the Republic of Hawaii. In
1900, by an act of Congress, the Hawaiian Islands became a territory of
the United States. Of the one hundred and ninety and odd thousands of
inhabitants of the islands, in 1910, nearly eighty thousand were
Japanese. The native Hawaiians come next in point of numbers and are the
most interesting people to the average tourist. Though dark-skinned,
they are quite different in appearance from the negro, and many of the
young men and women are decidedly good-looking.
As the vessel enters the beautiful harbor, with the city of Honolulu
spread out along the shore and the mountains rising abruptly in the
immediate background, the well-formed young men and boys are seen
alongside in the water or in native boats, ready to dive for the coins
that the passengers seem always ready to throw to them. These amphibious
people, like most of those in the tropics, are perfectly at home in the
water and seem never to tire, no matter how far they may go to meet the
incoming vessels, as they slowly wind their way through the tortuous
channels among the treacherous coral reefs.
[Illustration: DIAMOND HEAD, A FORTIFIED EXTINCT VOLCANO.
At the entrance to the harbor of Honolulu.]
To the south of the entrance to the harbor, which it guards with
batteries of concealed cannon and mortars, is the extinct volcanic
mountain known as Diamond Head, shown from the land side in the picture.
A grass-covered, bowl-shaped crater of perhaps half a mile diameter may
be entered through a tunnel on the land side, where Fort Ruger is
situated. The rim of the crater, which is only a few hundred feet high,
may be easily scaled and in most places affords easy walking and a fine
view of the harbor. In the higher portion of the rim, seen in the right
of the photograph, is a heavy battery of big guns, concealed in
passages in the solid rock, that could probably protect the entrance of
the harbor below from any ordinary fleet. Visitors are not allowed to
see these rock-hidden batteries, whose existence would never be
suspected from the smooth, apparently unbroken surface of the rock as
seen from the harbor.
Like many other beautiful places, Hawaii is said to have the "most
perfect climate in the world." Add to this wonderful climate and
beautiful scenery, of sea and mountains combined, the fact that there is
supposed to be not a snake nor a poisonous plant nor an insect worse
than bees in all the islands, it would seem that this is truly a
paradise, without even the serpent to cause trouble.
For the tourist there are excellent hotels and all the conveniences of a
continental city, and amusements of sufficient variety to suit the most
blase. For those who are merely stopping off for a day on the way to or
from more distant ports it is hard to decide which of the many
interesting places to visit. If it be his first visit, the mere city
streets with the royal palms and other magnificent trees, the stores,
the cosmopolitan crowds and other strange sights and sounds will be
fascinating. A drive to the Punchbowl, the Poli, or more distant points,
may be taken in a few hours, while if interested in natural history the
gorgeous fishes and other marine forms to be seen at the Aquarium will
be a revelation to one accustomed only to the life of the temperate
zone.
At the Bishop Museum the natural history, ethnology, etc., of the
islands may be studied in a synoptic form. It is here that the famous
war-cloak of Kamehameha I is on exhibition. It is a truly wonderful
garment, four feet long, with a spread of ten feet or more at the
bottom. It is made of the yellow feathers of the mama bird, and when it
is realized that each bird furnishes but two small tufts of feathers,
one under each wing, it will be imagined how many thousands of these
small birds were sacrificed to make this one robe. It is valued at
$150,000. It is carefully protected from dust and light but is exhibited
to visitors to the museum.
In the cool of the evening, when tired from a day of sight-seeing, the
traveler may listen to the Honolulu Band, on some public square. It is
composed of native musicians, but the instruments are those of the
ordinary American brass band, and but for the cosmopolitan character of
the audience one might imagine himself in a city of southern California
or some other subtropical part of the United States.
Besides having the most equable climate in the world Honolulu claims the
most perfect bathing-resort on earth, Waikiki Beach. The water is
certainly all that could be desired, but the not infrequent sharp masses
of coral that project up through the white sand of the otherwise perfect
beach are decidedly objectionable, and the writer cut a gash in his
foot, by stepping on one of these pieces of coral, that was many days in
healing.
[Illustration: ROYAL PALMS, HONOLULU.]
Another of the points of interest in the city is the Royal Mausoleum,
where are the bodies of many of the royalty of the Hawaiian dynasties.
The Hawaiian alphabet consists of but twelve letters, and the
preponderance of vowels in many words seems remarkable to an
English-speaking person. For example one of the bodies in the Royal
Mausoleum is that of "Kaiminaauao, sister of Queen Kalakaua"; it will be
noticed that eight of the eleven letters in this name are vowels. In
this Mausoleum doubtless now rest the remains of Liliuokalani, the last
queen of Hawaii, who was deposed in 1893 for attempting to force a less
liberal constitution upon the people. She married an American and twice
visited the United States, after his death.
If time permit, and the pocketbook too, most interesting side trips to
the other islands of the group may be made, especially to the active
volcano, Mauna Loa, 13,760 feet high, with Kilauea on its eastern slope,
situated on the Island of Hawaii.
While the Hawaiian Islands may not be as perfect as they are advertised,
they nevertheless give a very fair imitation of Paradise, and a better
place in which to rest and enjoy nature in her kindest moods would be
hard to find.
Transcriber's Notes:
Inconsistencies in the hyphenation of words retained. (nearby, near-by)
Pg. 45, unusual spelling of word "variagated" retained. (and large and
variagated smells)
End of Project Gutenberg's Wanderings in the Orient, by Albert M. Reese