The American Army in Manila.
Why the Boys Had a Spell of Home Sickness--Disadvantages of the
Tropics--Admiral Dewey and his Happy Men--How Our Soldiers Passed
the Time on the Ships--General Merritt's Headquarters--What Is Public
Property--The Manila Water Supply--England Our Friend--Major-General
Otis, General Merritt's Successor.
The American soldiers in the Philippines were most devoted and
cheerful, patient under hardship and pleasantly satisfied that they
were as far to the front as anybody and seeing all there was to see
during the siege of Manila. They were out in tropical rains, and the
ditches they waded were deep with mud unless filled with water. They
were harassed by the Spanish with the long-range Mausers at night and
insufficiently provided a part of the time with rations. At best they
had a very rough experience, but kept their health and wanted to go
into the city with a rush. They would rather have taken chances in
storming the place than sleep in the mud, as they did for twenty days.
When the defenders of Manila concluded that the honor of Spain would
be preserved by the shedding of only a little blood in a hopeless
struggle and fell back from very strong positions before the advance
of skirmish lines, and the American columns entered the city, keeping
two armies--the Spaniards and the insurgents--apart, and, taking
possession, restored order and were sheltered in houses, it soon
began to occur to the boys, who came out of the wet campaign looking
like veterans and feeling that they had gained much by experience,
that they were doing garrison duty and that it was objectionable. The
soldiers who arrived on the Peru, City of Pueblo and Pennsylvania
were shocked that they had missed the fight and disgusted with the
news of peace. They had made an immense journey to go actively into
war, and emerged from the ocean solitude to police a city in time of
peace. It was their notion that they lacked occupation; that their
adventure had proved an enterprise that could not become glorious.
The romance of war faded. Unquiet sensations were produced by the
stories that there was nothing to do but go home, and they would
soon be placed aboard the transports and homeward bound. Besides,
the climate was depressing. The days were hot and the nights were not
refreshing. The rations were better and there were dry places to sleep,
but there was no inspiring excitement, and it was not a life worth
living. War--"the front"--instead of offering incomparable varieties,
became tedious--it was a bore, in fact. How could a crowded city and
thronged streets be attractive in a military sense, or the scene of
patriotic sacrifice, when the most arduous duty was that of police? Was
it for this they had left homes in Oregon, Montana, Pennsylvania,
Wisconsin, Tennessee, Nebraska, Utah, California and Colorado?
There came an episode of homesickness. It was about time in a soldier's
life to contrast it with the farms and the villages, the shops,
mines and manufactories. They were kept busy on guard and in caring
for themselves, in activities as the masters of a strange community,
but the novelties of the tropics lost their flavor. What did a man
want with oranges when there were apples? What was a rice swamp
compared with a corn field? Think of the immeasurable superiority,
as a steady thing, of an Irish potato to a banana, or a peach to a
pineapple! What was a Chinese pony alongside a Kentucky horse, or a
water buffalo with the belly of a hippopotamus and horns crooked as
a saber and long as your arm to one who had seen old-fashioned cows,
and bulls whose bellowing was as the roaring of lions? The miserable
but mighty buffaloes were slower than oxen and, horns and all, tame
as sheep--the slaves of serfs!
As for the Chinese, if there were no other objection, they should
be condemned because too numerous--faithful, perhaps, in a way, but
appearing with too much frequency in the swarming streets. And the
women, with hair hanging down their backs, one shoulder only sticking
out of their dresses, the skin shining like a scoured copper kettle; a
skirt tight around the hips and divided to show a petticoat of another
tint, a jacket offering further contrasts in colors, slippers flapping
under naked heels, faces solemn as masks of death heads--oh, for the
rosy and jolly girls we left behind us in tears! How beautiful were
the dear golden-haired and blue-eyed blondes of other days! The boys
wanted at least tobacco and aerated waters to soothe themselves with,
and if there was not to be any more fighting, what was the matter
with going home?
They also serve, however, who only stand and wait--there are no
soldiers or sailors in the world who are in a position of greater
interest and usefulness than those of the American army and navy who
hold fast with arms the capital city of the Philippines. The army,
though much exposed, has not suffered severely from sickness. There
has been an intense and protracted strain upon the men of the ships,
but they have recovered from the amiable weakness for home, and they
are not merely well; they are more than plain healthy--they are hearty
and happy! There is the light of good times in their faces. One thing
in their favor is they have not been allowed to eat unwholesome food,
and the floors of the warboats and every piece of metal or wood that
is in sight is polished and glistening with cleanliness. The soldiers
will feel better when the postoffice is in working order and they
will do better by their organs of digestion when they are not deluged
with fizz--that is, pop, and beer made without malt, and the strange,
sweetish fruits that at first were irresistible temptations.
"Come with me and see the men of the Olympia," said Admiral Dewey,
"and see how happy they are, though they have been shut up here
four months." And the men did look jolly and bright, and proud of
the Admiral as he of them, and they were pleased when he noticed,
kindly, the hostile little monkey, who is the mascot, and the other
day bit the Captain.
The health of the boys was preserved at sea by systematic exercise. Not
a transport crossed the Pacific that was not converted into a military
school, and each floating schoolhouse had about 1,000 pupils. They
were put through gymnastics and calisthenics when, as a rule,
they were barefooted and wore no clothes but their undershirts and
trousers. There was even a scarcity of suspenders. The drill-masters
were in dead earnest, and their voices rang out until the manifestation
of vocal capacity excited admiration. The boys had to reach suddenly
for heaven with both hands and then bring their arms to their sides
with swinging energy. Then they had to strike out right and left to
the order "Right!" "Left!" until the sergeant was satisfied. Next each
foot had to be lifted and put down quickly at the word of command;
then it was needful that the legs should he widely separated in a jump
and closed up with vigor; then the spinal columns swayed forward and
back and all the joints and muscles had something to do. This was
no laughing matter to any one, though it was funny enough from the
ordinary standpoint of civil life. This medicine was taken day after
day, and seemed to vindicate itself.
It was esteemed a good thing for the boys to perspire from
exercise. There was no trouble, though, when south and west of
Honolulu, in having substantially Turkish baths in the bunks at
night, and there were queer scenes on deck--men by hundreds scantily
clothed and sleeping in attitudes that artists might have chosen to
advantage for life studies. It was necessary for those who walked
about, during the hours thus given to repose, where the enlisted
men took their rest with their undershirts and drawers around them,
to be careful not to tramp on the extended limbs. Once I feared I had
hit a soldier's nose with my heavy foot when stepping over him in a
low light, and was gratified that my heel had merely collided with
a big boy's thumb. He had gone to sleep with his head protected by
his hand. I paused long enough to note that the sheltering hand if
clinched would have been a mighty and smiting fist; and I was doubly
pleased that I had not tramped on his big nose.
Not infrequently, when we were steaming along the 20th parallel of
north latitude--that is to say, well in the torrid zone--and were
wafted by the trade winds that were after us at about our own speed,
heavy showers came up in the night and spoiled the luxurious content of
those who were spread on the decks. The boys got in good form through
the longest journey an army ever made--for the distance is greater from
the United States to the Philippines than from Spain--and every week
the skill of a soldier in acquiring the lessons of the climate and the
best methods of taking care of himself will become more useful, and the
tendency will be to settle down to the business of soldiering, make the
best of it and accept it as educational--an experience having in it the
elements of enduring enjoyments. "The days when I was in Manila, away
down in the south seas, but a little way from the island from which
came the wild man of Borneo," will be pleasant in remembrance, and
there will be perpetually an honorable distinction in identification
with an ambitious yet generous enterprise, one of the most remarkable
a nation can undertake--not excepting the Roman conquests all around
the Mediterranean, and that touched the northern sea, invading England.
In the later days of August there were in the prisons of Manila,
which answer to the penitentiary and jail in the American States,
2,200 prisoners, one of whom was a Spaniard! The prisons are divided
only by a high wall and contain many compartments to assist in
classification. There are considerable spaces devoted to airing the
prisoners, and one in which the privileged are permitted to amuse
themselves with games. The guard consisted, when I visited the place,
of sixty-three soldiers from Pennsylvania. There were many women
imprisoned. One who had been shut up for more than a year was taken
into custody because she had attempted rather informally to retake
possession of a house of which she had been proprietor and out of
which she had been fraudulently thrown. Her crime was a hysterical
assertion of her rights and her uninvited tenants were Spaniards.
One of the buildings contained the criminals alleged to be desperate,
and as they stood at the windows the chains on their right legs were
in sight. It was plainly seen in several cases that the links of the
chains used were about three inches long and that three or four turns
were taken around the right ankle. In a group of prisoners waiting
for supper to be handed them in pans in the open air a large number
wore chains. Many of the prisoners were incarcerated as insurgents,
having offended by refusing to espouse the Spanish cause or by some
other capital criminality in that line of misconduct! A commission was
investigating their cases and the Filipinos who had not satisfied the
Spanish requirements were represented by an able lawyer who was well
informed and disposed to do justice. Sixty-two of the inmates of the
penitentiary held for discontent with the Spanish system of government
were to be discharged as soon as the papers could be made out.
Many most interesting questions arise in connection with the
capitulation of the Spanish army. It was agreed that the Spaniards,
upon surrendering and giving up the public property, should be entitled
to the honors of war. It was expressly understood that the arms the
troops gave up were to be retained. In case the Americans abandoned
the islands or the Spaniards departed the rifles should be given them,
and usage would seem to determine that this return of weapons must
include the Mausers in the hands of the troops now prisoners of war
and the cartridges they would carry if they took the field.
Then arises a difficulty as to the precise meaning of the words
"public property." There were laid down by the Spaniards about 12,000
Mausers and Remingtons, and there were 10,000 in the arsenals--22,000
in all. It is admitted that 12,000 personally surrendered rifles go
back to the Spaniards, whether they or we go away from the islands--as
one or the other is sure to do--but the 10,000 stand of arms in the
arsenals come under the head of "public property," and so should be
retained permanently by the Americans. The number of ball cartridges
a soldier starting out to make a march carries is 100. There were
surrendered more than 500 rounds to the man. The public money was
public property, of course, and General Greene demanded the keys to
the vault containing it. The Spanish authorities objected, but yielded
after presenting a written protest. The money consisted of Spanish
and Mexican dollars, a lot of silver bars and change fused into one
mass, and some gold in the same state, also $247,000 in copper coin,
which was regarded, under the old dispensation, good stuff to pay
poor wages to poor men and women.
There are some fine points about customs. The American flag floats
over the city, and the importers and exporters want to know what the
charges are and how much the private concessions must be. Some of
these people ran around for several days with the object of placing
a few hundred Mexican dollars in the hands of officials, where they
would do the most good, and could not find anybody ready to confer
special favors for hard cash. These pushing business men had been
accustomed to meet calls for perquisites, and did not feel safe for a
moment without complying with that kind of formality. They turned away
embarrassed and disappointed, and were surprised to learn that they
were on a ground floor that was wide enough to accommodate everybody.
It should be mentioned in this connection, also, a Mexican dollar
passes in Manila for 50 cents American. The price of Mexican dollars
in the banks of San Francisco and Honolulu is 46 and 47 cents. The way
it works is illustrated in paying in a restaurant for a lunch--say
for two. If the account is $2 you put down a $5 United States gold
piece and receive in change eight Mexican dollars. If you buy cigars
at $40 per 1,000 a $20 American gold piece pays the $40 bill. There is
now pretty free coinage of Mexican dollars and they answer admirably
as 50-cent coins. That is one of the ways in which free coinage of
silver removes prejudices against the white metal; no one thinks of
objecting to a Mexican dollar as a half-dollar, and our boys, paid
in American gold, have a feeling that their wages are raised because
all over the city one of their dollars counts two in the settlement
of debts. These useful American dollars are admitted free of duty.
The headquarters of the American administration in Manila are in the
city hall, situated in the walled city, with a park in front that
plainly has been neglected for some time. It also fronts upon the same
open square as the cathedral, while beyond are the Jesuit College and
the Archbishop's palace. Just around the corner is a colossal church,
and a triangular open space that has a few neglected trees and ought
to be beautiful but is not. A street railroad passes between the
church and the triangle, and the mule power is sufficient to carry at
a reasonable rate a dozen Spanish officers and as many Chinamen. The
fare is 1 cent American--that is, 2 cents Philippine--and the other
side of the river you are entitled to a transfer, but the road is short
and drivers cheap. There is a system of return coupons that I do not
perfectly understand. The truth about the street railway system is
that there is very little of it in proportion to the size of the city,
but the average ride costs about 1 cent. If the Americans stay there
is an opening for a trolley on a long line.
There is no matter of business that does not depend upon the question:
Will the Americans stay? If they do all is well; if they do not all
is ill, and enterprise not to be talked of.
The most important bridge across the Pasig is the bridge of Spain. The
street railway crosses it. The carriages and the coolies, too, must
keep to the left. It is the thoroughfare between the new and old
cities, and at all hours of the day is thronged. It is a place favored
by the native gig drivers to whip heavily laden coolies out of the
way. A big Chinaman with powerful limbs, carrying a great burden,
hastens to give the road to a puny creature driving a puny pony,
lashing it with a big whip, and scrambles furiously away from a
two-wheeler whirling along a man able to pay a 10-cent fare.
In other days when one passed this bridge he faced the botanical
gardens, which had a world-wide reputation, an attraction being
a wonderful display of orchids. There were also beautiful trees;
now there are only stumps, disfigurements and desolation--some of
the horrors of war. The gardens were laid waste by the Spaniards as
a military precaution. As they seem to have known that they could
not or would not put up a big fight for the city, what was the use
of the destructiveness displayed in the gardens, parks and along the
boulevards? The fashion of taking a garden and making a desert of it
and calling it one of the military necessities of war is, however,
not peculiar to the chieftains of Spain.
Crossing the bridge of Spain to the walled city and turning to the
right there are well-paved streets bordered with strips of park
beside the river, that is rushing the same way if you are going to
headquarters; and the object that tells where to turn off to find
the old gateway through the wall, with a drawbridge over the grassy
moat, is a Monument to Alphonse, whose memory it is the habit of
these people to celebrate. Approaching the city hall (headquarters)
there is a white-walled hospital to note; then comes a heavy mass of
buildings on a narrow street, and the small square already styled
in this article a park, and we arrive at the grand entrance of the
official edifice. The room devoted to ceremony is so spacious that one
must consent that magnitude is akin to grandeur. There is the usual
double stairway and a few stone steps to overcome. On the right and
left under the second lift of stairs were corded the Spanish Mausers
and Remingtons and many boxes of cartridges. I have several times
noticed soldiers tramping on loose cartridges as though they had no
objection at all to an explosion. You can tell the Mauser ammunition,
because the cartridges are in clips of five, and the little bullets
famous for their long flight are covered with nickel. The Remington
bullets are bigger and coated with brass. Something has been said to
the effect that the Remington balls used by the Spaniards are poisonous
and that it is uncivilized to manufacture them. The object of the
Mauser and Remington system in covering the bullets, the one with
nickel and the other with brass, is not to poison, but to prevent the
lead from fouling the rifles. The point is almost reached in modern
guns of 2,000 and 3,000 yards range where the friction of the gun
barrel and the speed of the missile at the muzzle are sufficient to
fuse unprotected lead, and at any rate so much of the soft material
would soon he left in the grooves as to impair accuracy and endanger
the structure of the arm.
Right ahead when the first stairs are cleared is a splendid hall,
with a pair of gilded lions on a dais, and some of the boys had
adorned these beasts with crowns of theatrical splendor. The arms
of Spain are conspicuous, and in superb medallions illustrious
warriors, statesmen, authors, artists and navigators, look down
from the walls upon desks now occupied by American officers. Above
this floor the stairs are blocks of hardwood, the full width of the
stairway and the height of the step, and this earthquake precaution
does not detract from the dignity of the building, for the woodwork is
massive and handsome. A marvelous effect might be produced in some of
the marble palaces of private citizens in our American cities by the
construction of stairways with the iron-hard and marble-brilliant wood
that is abundant in Puerto Rico, Cuba and Luzon. The hall in which
the city council met, now the place of the provost-marshal's court,
is furnished in a style that puts to shame the frugality displayed
in the council chambers of our expensively governed American cities,
where men of power pose as municipal economists.
In the elevated chair of the President, faced by the array of chairs
of the Spanish councilmen, or aldermen, sits the provost-marshal
judge, and before him come the soldiers who have forgotten themselves
and the culprits arrested by the patrol. On the wall above him is a
full-length likeness of the Queen Regent--a beautiful, womanly figure,
with a tender and anxious mother's solicitous face. She looks down with
sad benignity upon the American military government. There is also
a portrait of the boy king, who becomes slender as he gains height,
and rather sickly than strong. It may be that too much care is taken
of him.
In the corner room at the end of the corridor Major-General Otis
received at his desk the news that Generals Merritt and Greene
were ordered home, and that he was the major-general commanding and
the chief of the civil, as well as the military department of the
government. He had already found much to do and tackled the greater
task with imperturbable spirit and a habit of hard work with, his
friends say, no fault but a habit that is almost impracticable of
seeing for himself almost everything he is himself held responsible
for. If he has a weakness of that sort he has a rare opportunity to
indulge it to the full extent of his personal resources. He certainly
dispatches business rapidly, decides the controverted points quickly
and has a clear eye for the field before him. His record is a good
one. When the war of the States came on he was a New York lawyer--his
home is at Rochester. Near the close of the war he was wounded on the
Weldon road, along which Grant was extending his left wing to envelop
Petersburg. He was struck by a musket ball almost an inch from the
end of the nose, and the course of it was through the bones of the
face under the right eye, passing out under the right ear. He was
"shot through the head," and suffered intensely for a long time,
but maintained his physical vitality and mental energy. His face
is but slightly marked by this dreadful wound. He has been a hard
student all his life, and is an accomplished soldier, as well as
an experienced lawyer. His judicial services in court-martials have
been highly estimated. Altogether he is well equipped for executing
the various duties of his position. He will "hold the fort in good
shape." In an adjacent room, Assistant Adjutant-General Strong, son
of the ex-mayor of New York, a young man of much experience in the
national guard and a sharp shooter, sticks to business with zeal and
knowledge, and in a very few days established a reputation as a helper.
So much has been said in disparagement of the "sons of somebodies"
that it is a pleasure to put in evidence the cleverness and intelligent
industry of Captain Strong, late of the 69th New York, and of Captain
Coudert, of New York.
General Merritt took possession of the palace of the governor-general,
overlooking the river, a commodious establishment, with a pretentious
gate on the street, a front yard full of shrubbery and rustling with
trees, a drive for carriages and doors for their occupants at the side
and a porte cochere, as the general said with a twinkle of his eye, for
the steam launch which was a perquisite of the Governor. The commanding
general of the Philippine expedition enjoyed the life on the river,
along which boats were constantly passing, carrying country supplies
to the city and returning. The capacity of canoes to convey fruit
and vegetables and all that the market called for was an unexpected
disclosure. There were unfailing resources up the river or a multitude
of indications were inaccurate. The General's palace is more spacious
than convenient; the dining room designed for stately banquets, but
the furniture of the table was not after the manner of feasts, though
the best the country afforded, and the supply of meat improved daily,
while the fruit told of the kindly opulence of the tropics.
There was a work of art in the palatial headquarters that the
commanding general highly appreciated--a splendid but somber painting
of the queen regent in her widow's weeds, holding the boy king as a
baby on her right shoulder, her back turned to the spectator, gloomy
drapery flowing upon the carpet, her profile and pale brow and dark
and lustrous hair shown, her gaze upon the child and his young eyes
fixed upon the spectator. This picture has attracted more attention
than any other in Manila, and the city is rich in likenesses of the
queen mother and the royal boy, who, without fault have upon them
the heavy sorrows of Spain in an era of misfortune and humiliation;
and it will take some time for the Spanish people, highly or lowly
placed, to realize that the loss of colonies, as they have held them,
is a blessing to the nation and offers the only chance of recuperation
and betterment in Spain's reputation and relations with the world.
The governor-general's palace, with General Merritt for General, was
a workshop, and the highly decorated apartments, lofty and elaborate,
were put to uses that had an appearance of being incongruous. The
cot of the soldier, shrouded in a mosquito bar, stood in the midst of
sumptuous furniture, before towering mirrors in showy frames, and from
niches looked down marble statues that would have been more at home
in the festal scenes of pompous life in the sleepy cities of dreamy
lands. There was no more striking combination than a typewriting
machine mounted on a magnificent table, so thick and resplendent
with gold that it seemed one mass of the precious metal--not gilt,
but solid bullion--and the marble top had the iridescent glow of a sea
shell. This was in the residence of the General, his dining and smoking
rooms and bedrooms for himself and staff, the actual headquarters
being next door in the residence of the secretary-general. Here was
a brilliant exhibition of mirrors, upon some of which were paintings
of dainty design and delicate execution, queerly effective. The
tall glasses stood as if upon mantles. There were other glasses that
duplicated their splendors; through the open doors down the street,
which was the one for the contemplation of the gorgeous--and down the
street means into the modern end of the city--was the residence of the
Spanish Admiral of the annihilated fleet, Montijo. It had been the
property of and was the creation of a German, who got rich and got
away in good time with $1,000,000 or more, selling his house to one
of the rich Chinese, who had the fortune, good, bad or indifferent,
to become the landlord of the Admiral whose ships disappeared in a
vast volume of white vapor on the May morning when the Americans came
and introduced themselves.
General Greene's headquarters were in the house the German merchant
built, the Chinese millionaire bought, and the Admiral, without a
fleet since the 1st of May, rented. The furnishing was rich; there were
frescoes that were aglow with the tropic birds and window curtains that
were dreams. The vast mansions of the ex-officials were not, however,
such as would have been sought as accommodations for the management of
the military and other affairs, and there was much lacking to comfort;
but as the hotels after the siege were not tolerable, the officers
had to discover houses in which they could develop resources, and
the public property was that of those who conquered to the extent to
which it had belonged to those displaced.
The Americans got out of the chaotic hotels soon as possible, for there
were some things in them simply not endurable. They rent houses and
employ servants and set up housekeeping. The newspaper correspondents
have been driven to this, and they are comparatively happy. They have
found ponies almost a necessary of life, and food that is fair is
attainable, while the flowing hydrants remove a good deal of privation
and apprehension. The water is from an uncontaminated stream, and
though slightly soiled after heavy rainfalls, it is not poisonous,
and that is what many American and European cities cannot truthfully
say of their water supplies. The demand for houses by the Americans
has raised the views of the proprietors. The street on which the
official Spaniards meant to flourish, as Weyler, Blanco and others
had done before them, and had not time to reap a harvest of plunder
before the days of doom came, would be called by the citizens of
Cleveland, O., the Euclid avenue of the town. It runs out to the old
fort where the Spaniards made their stand "for the honor of the arms
of Spain." The English and German and Chinese successful men reside
in this quarter. The majority of those who have provided themselves
with houses by the river and fronting on the street most approved,
looking out through groves and gardens, are Chinese half-castes,
claiming Chinese fathers and Philippine mothers. These are the most
rapacious and successful accumulators, and they would all be glad
to see the Americans stay, now that they are there, and have shown
themselves so competent to appreciate desirable opportunities and
understand the ways and means, the acquirements and the dispensations
of prosperity as our troops entered the city by the principal residence
street, it was noticed that guards were left at all the houses that
displayed the British flag--a reward for English courtesy, and the
feeling of the troops that the British are our friends.