The head hunters of northern Luzon : from Ifugao to Kalinga, a ride through the mountains of northern Luzon, with an appendix on the independence of the Philippines.

Front matter

PRINCETON, N. J.

Division D.S..G 8 8 Section...>^.L.S I4/ G 9

An Igorot Warrior.

Chapter II

Annual inspection of the mountain tribes. — We set out from Baguio. — Pangasindn Province. — .^gno River. — Reception by the people.

Chapter III .to

Padre Juan \'illaverde. — His great trail. — The beginning of the mountain journey. — Nozo.

Chapter IV ,t7

Early start. — Pine forest. — Vegetation. — Rest at .Amugan — The g,a>i.sa — Bone.

Chapter V 4.S

Aritao. — Bubud. — Dijpa.x. — Start for Campote.

Chapter VI 50

The Ilongots and their country. — Efforts of our Government to reach these people — The forest trail. — Our first contact with the wild man.

Chapter \TI ,s6

School at Campote. — Our white pony, and the offer made for his tail.

Chapter \TII 62

.'\ppearance of the Ilongots. — Dress. — Issue of beads and cloth. — Warrior Dance. — School work — Absence of old women from meeting.

Chapter IX 7 ?

Return to civilization. — Reception at Bambang. — .A.glipayanos and Protestants.

Chapter X 78

Magat River. — Enthusiastic reception at Bayombong. — Speeches and reports. — Solano. — Ifugao “college yell.”

— Bagahag.

Chapter XI 88

We enter the Mountain Province. — Payawan. — Kiangan, its position. — Anitos. — Speech of welcome by Ifugao chief — Detachment of native Constabulary.— Visit of Ifugao chiefs to our quarters. — Dancing

The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon.

PAGE

Chapter XII 104

Day opens badly. — Ifugao houses. — The people assemble.

— Dancing. — Speeches. — White paper streamers. — Head-hunter Dance. — Canao.

Chapter XIII 1 17

Dress of the people. — Butchery of carabao. — Prisoner runs amok and is killed.

Chapter XIV 126

Barton’s account of a native funeral.

Chapter XV 139

Visit to the Silipan Ifugaos at Andaiigle. — The Ibilao River. — Athletic feat. — Rest-house and stable at Sabig.

Chapter XVI 148

Change in aspect of country. — Mount Amuyao and the native legend of the Flood. — Rice terraces. — Benawe. —

Mr. Worcester’s first visit to this region. — Sports. — Absence of weapons. — Native arts and crafts.

Chapter X\TI 162

We ride to Bontok. — Bat-nets. — Character of the country.

— Ambawan. — Difficulties of the trail. — Bird-scarers. — Talubin. — Bishop Carroll of Vigan. — We reach Bontok.— "The Star-spangled Banner.” — Appearance of the Bontok Igorot — Incidents.

Chapter XVIII 179

Importance of Bontok —Head-taking — Atonement for bloodshed . — Sports. — Slapping game .

Chapter XIX 190

The native village. — Houses— Pit-a-pit. — Native institutions.— Lumawig.

Chapter XX 199

We push on north. — Banana skirts. — Albino child. — Pine uplands. — Glorious view.

Chapter XXI 205

Deep Valley. — A poor rancheria. — Escort of boys. — Descent of Tinglayan Hill .- — Sullen reception at Tinglayan.

— Bangad. — First view of the Kalingas. — Arrival at Lubuagan.

Chapter XXII 221

Splendid appearance of the Kalingas. — Dancing. — Lubuagan.— Basi. — Councils. — Bustles and braids. — Jewels and weapons. — Excellent houses.

Chapter XXIII 2,34

We leave the mountains. — Nanong. — Passage of the Chico.— The Apayao. — Tabuk. — The party breaks up.

— Desolate plain — The Cagayan Valley. — Enrile.

Chapter XXIV 247

Tobacco industry. — Tuguegarao. — Caves. — The Cagaydn River. — Barangayans. — Aparri. — Island of Fuga. —

Sail for Manila. — Stop at Vigan. — Arrival at Manila.

Chapter XXV 262

Future of the Highlanders. — Origin of our effort to improve their condition. — Impolicy of any change in present administration. Transfer of control of wild tribes to Christianized Filipinos. — Comparison of our course with that of the Japanese in Formosa.

Appendix 281

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE

An Igorot Warrior 2

Hon. Dean C. Worcester 19

Views of the Benguet Road 20

Working on the Benguet Road 25, 26

Padre Juan Villaverde 35

Benguet Road, Zig-zag 36

Tree Fern, Province of Bontok 41

Ilongot Women 42

Native Policemen 47

Reception Committee of Ifugaos 48

Mountain Scene in the Ifugao Country 57

Mountain Scene between Benawe and Kiangan 58

Inaba, Ifugao Village 63

Ifugao Couple with Adornments of a Wedding Ceremony 64

Ifugao Children 69

Headless Body of Ifugao Warrior 70

Ifugao Warrior 79

Typical Ifugao House 80

Ifugao Making Rounds of Ciranary 85

Anitos, Kiangan 86

Ifugao Chief Making a Speech 91

Conference between Government Officers and the Headmen of

the District 92 lo The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon.

Ifugao Head-hunter, Full Dress loi

Head-hunter Dance, Kiangan 102, 107

Dancing at Kiangan 108

Ifugaos Dancing 1 1 3

Silipan Ifugao Earring 114

Ifugaos Dancing, Benawe 123

Crossing Ibilao River by Flying Trolley 124

Ifugao Head Dance 133

Rice Terraces at Benawe 134, 143

Body of Igorot Girl Prepared for Burial 144

Carabao Fight 153

Igorot Tribunal 154

A Bontok Igorot House 163

Igorot Rice Fields 164

On the Trail from Benguet to Cervantes 169

Bontok Igorot Woman 170

Elaborate Tattooing of the Head-hunter 175

Bontok Igorot Constabulary Soldiers 185

Bontok Igorot Slapping Game 186, 19 1

Gansas with Human Jaws as Handles 192

Women and Girls Wearing Banana-leaf Skirts 197

New vSehool -house, Bontok 198

Valley of the Rio Chico 207

Kalinga Girl 210

Looking Down the Rio Chico 211

Spiral Camote Patch 216

Madallam, Kalinga Headman 219

Two Headmen of Lubuagan 220

Kalinga Warriors 229

Typical Kalinga House 230

Conference at Lubuagan .239

View of Lubuagan, Capital of Kalin.ga 240

Kalinga Head-ax 249

Igorot Shield 230

Ifugao Carved Bowl 259

Ifugao Pipe, Carved Figure, and Wooden Spoon 260

Carved Wooden Figurines 269

Map of Northern Luzon 270 preface.

In 1910 the Secretary of the Interior of the Philippine Islands did me the honor to invite me to accompany him on his annual tour of inspection through the Mountain Province of Northern Luzon. In the following pages I have tried to describe what fell under my notice during the journey, with such comments, observations, and conclusions as seemed pertinent.

I should like here to thank Mr. Worcester for having invited me to join him, and Major-General Duvall, United States Army, for allowing me to accept. My thanks are also due the various officers and officials of the Insular Government who placed me under obligations by their hospitality and other courtesies and by the never-failing patience with which they received and answered my many questions. To my friend Colonel J. G. Harbord, United States Army, Assistant Director of Constabulary, I am beholden for instructions sent out in advance of the journey to the various Constabulary posts on the itinerary, directing them to offer me every opportunity to accomplish the purpose of my

Preface

trip. Except where otherwise indicated, the illustrations are from photographs taken either by Mr. Worcester himself, or else under his direction. Some of these, as shown, were lent to me by the National Geographic Magazine of Washington, and others by the Bureau of Insular Affairs of the War Department. My best thanks are due and given in each case. Dr. Heiser was kind enough to let me have a few photographs taken by him. To Lieutenant P. D. Glassford, 2d Regiment of Field Artillery, I am indebted for the map of Northern Luzon and for one or two other illustrations copied from Jenks’ “The Bontoc Igorot”; to Father Malumbres, of the Dominican Monastery in Manila, for information relating to Padre Villaverde and for the portrait of that missionary; it is to be regretted that this portrait should be so unsatisfactory, but it is the only one available. The frontispiece is by Mr. Julian Miller, who has lived in the Igorot country, and whose drawing is from life.

West Point, N. Y.,

January, 1912.

CHAPTER I.

Highlanders of Northern Luzon. — Meaning of the word "Igorot.” —

Trails. — The Mountain Province. — Nature of the country.

It is to be regretted that the people of the United States should in general show so little interest in the Philippine Islands. This lack of interest may be due to lack of knowledge; if this be so, then it is the duty of those better informed to do all that lies in their power to develop the interest now regrettably absent. Be this as it may, it is assumed here that most of our people do not know that a very large fraction of the inhabitants of the Philippines consists of the so-called wild men, and that of these the greatest group or collection is found in the mountains of Northern Luzon.

These mountaineers or highlanders constitute perhaps, all other things being equal, as interesting a body of uncivilized people as is to be found on the face of the earth to-day. The Spaniards, of course, soon discovered their existence, the first mention of them being made by De Morga, in his “ Sucesos de las Islas Pilipinas ” (1609). He speaks* of them as inhabiting the interior of a rough mountainous coun-

*See Retana’s edition, p. 183, Madrid, 1909.

14 The Head Hunters of Xnrtlieni Luzon.

try, where are “many natives who are not pacified, nor has anyone gone into their country, who call themselves Ygolotes.’’ Here we have the first form, the classic form according to Retana, of the word now universally written Igorrote, or in English Igorot. The word itself means “highlanders, ” go/oi being a Tagalog word for “mountain,” and / a prefix meaning “people of.” De Morga mentions the “Ygolotes” as owning rich mines of gold and silver, which “they work as there is need,” and he goes on to say that in spite of all the diligence made to know their mines, and how they work and improve them, the matter has come to naught, “because they are cautious with the Spaniards who go to them in search of gold, and say they keep it better guarded under ground than in their houses.”

The Spaniards at a very early date sent armed exploring parties through the highlands and maintained garrisons here and there down to our own time.* But they never really held the country.

The Church, too, early entered this territory, the field being given over to the Dominicans, f who

*It is interesting to note that as late as 1889 General Weyler, then Governor-General of the Archipelago, in establishing various comandancias, drew up regulations for the treatment of the natives, etc., as remarkable for lenity and good sense as his later measures in Cuba were, whether justly or not, distinguished for .severity.

tFor an account of the early missions of this order, see the Manila Libertas of May 23, 1910.

I'hc Head Hunters of Xortheni L,nzon. 15

furnished many devoted missionaries to the eause. But here, too, failure must be recorded in respect of permanency of results in the really wild parts of the Highlands. It has remained for our own Government to get a real hold of the people of these regions, to win their confidence, command their respect, and exact their obedience in all relations in which obedience is proper and just.

The indispensable material condition of success was to make the mountain country accessible. Only those who have had the fortune to travel through this country can realize how difficult this endeavor has been and must continue to be, chiefly because of the great local complexity of the mountain system, but also because of the severely destructive storms of this region, with consequent torrential violence of the streams affected. But little money, too, can be, or has been, spent for the necessary road-work. In spite of the difficulties involved, however, a system of road-making has been set on foot, the labor needed being furnished by the highlanders themselves in lieu of a road tax. Very briefly, the system is as follows:

(a) The first thing done is to open what is known as the “meter trail,” i. e., a trail one meter wide, at a grade not to exceed 6 per cent, and where possible to be kept at 4 per cent. At certain points where the absolute necessity exists, a lo per cent grade is admissible for very short distances, as at river crossings, but only where a gentler grade would involve a long detour at great expense.

This “meter trail” weathers for one year, and thus automatically develops its own weak spots. These are repaired as fast as discovered (which is practically at once, by reason of constant supervision), and the trail thus hardens, as it were, into something approaching permanency.

(6) The next step in the history of the trail is to widen it to two meters, the same general course being followed as outlined in (a). As a satisfactory state of permanency is reached we come to

(c) The final widening, draining, and metalling of the trail to accommodate wagon traffic. The trail now becomes a permanent road.

In many cases only wooden tools have been available, and the lack of money has compelled a sparing use of explosives. Nevertheless under this system there now exist in the Mountain Province 730 miles of excellent horse trail of easy grade,* and what is significant, the people of the highlands are using these trails, and so becoming peacefully acquainted with one another.

*Report of the Secretary of the Interior, Philippine Islands, 1910; Washington Government Printing Office, 1911.

The Mountain Province itself is the outcome of the difficulties encountered in governing the wild tribes so long as these were left in provinces where either their interests were not paramount, or else the difficulties of administration were unduly costly or difficult. Established in 1908, it has a Governor, and each of its seven sub-provinces a Lieutenant- Governor, the sub-province as far as possible including people of one and of only one tribe. The creation of this province was a great step forward in promoting the welfare of the highlanders.

A word must be said here in explanation of the nomenclature of the mountain tribes. Generically, having in mind the meaning of the word, they are all Igorots. But it is the practice to distinguish the various elements of this great family by different names, restricting the term “ Igorot” to special branches, as Benguet Igorot, Bontok Igorot, meaning those who live in Benguet or Bontok. The other members are known as Ifugao, Ilongot, Kalinga, and so on.* Lastly, the following extract from the “Census of the Philippine Islands ’’f gives some idea of the mountain system in which dwell the people whom we are about to visit.

*See “Census of the Philippine Islands,’’ Vol. I., p. 453 et seq., for a discussion of the non-Christian tribes.

fVol. I,, p, 60 et seq.

1 8 The Head H miters of Xorthern Luzon.

“West of this Valley [the Cagayan] and separating it from the China Sea, stands a broad and complex system of mountains, known as the Caraballos Occidentales. Its length is nearly 200 miles, and its breadth, including the great spurs and subordinate ranges and ridges on either side, is fully one-third its length. The central range of the system forms the divide between the waters flowing to Cagayan River on the east and those flowing to the China Sea on the west. Its northern part bears the name Cordillera Norte. Farther south it is called Cordillera Central, while the southern portion is called Cordillera vSur.” “At its south end the Cordillera Sur swings to the east, and, under the name of Caraballos Sur, joins the vSierra Madre, or East. Coast Range.”

This description, it must be understood, gives no adequate idea of the local intricacy of the system, while at the same time it is precisely this intricacy, both vertical and horizontal, that increases the cost and difficulty of making roads, and that has served in the past to keep the inhabitants of these regions apart.

The Honorable Dean C. Worcester.

Secretary of the Interior, Philippine Islands.

View on the Benguet Road.

At this point the line crosses hack to the right bank of the Bued River.

CHAPTER II.

Annua] inspection of the mountain tribes. — -We set out from Baguio.— Pangasinan Province. — Agno River. — Reception by the people.

Every year Mr. Worcester makes a formal tour of inspection through the Mountain Province to note the progress of the trails and roads, to listen to complaints, to hear reports, devise ways and means of betterment and in general to see how the hillmen are getting on. This tour is a very great affair to the highlanders, who are assembled in as great numbers as possible at the various points where stops are made; during the stay of the “ Commission” (as Mr. Worcester is universally called by the highlanders) at the points of assemblage, the wild people are subsisted by the Government.

The trip is long and hard, nor is it altogether free from danger. Preparations have to be made two months ahead to have forage for animals, and food for human beings, at the expected halts, while everything eaten by man or beast on the way must be carried by the cargadores (bearers) who accompany the column, since living off the country is in general impossible. Under these circumstances but

very few guests can be invited. I was so fortunate as to be one of these in 1910; how fortunate, I did not realize until the trip w^as over. For although an American may ride alone unmolested through the country we visited, still he would see only what might fall under his eye as he made his way; whereas, on this official trip, thousands of people are brought together at designated points, and one can thus do and see in a month what it would take a much longer time to do and see under one’s own efforts.

This year (1910) the party was made up of Mr. Cameron Forbes, the Governor-General of the Philippine Islands; Mr. Worcester, Secretary of the Interior ; Dr. Heiser, Director of Health ; Dr. Strong, Chief of the Biological Laboratory; Mr. Pack, Governor of the Mountain Province; and of two officers besides myself. Captain Cootes, 13th Cavalry, Aide de Camp to the Governor-General, and Captain Van Schaick, i6th Infantry, Governor of Mindoro. General Sir Harry Broadwood, commanding His Majesty’s forces at Hong Kong, had been invited, but at the last moment cabled that his duties would prevent his coming. Unless he reads this book he will never know what he missed ! As we passed through the various sub-provinces their respective governors and one or two officials would join us and ride to the boundary.

On account of the difficulties of supply and transportation, we were requested to bring no muchachos (boys — i. e., servants), so we had to shift for ourselves. Our baggage was very strictly limited; each man being allowed two parcels, one of bedding, and the other of clothes, neither to be more than could be easily carried on the back of a single cargador. Mr. Worcester took along for the whole party an ingenious apparatus of his own contrivance for boiling drinking-water, as all streams in the Philippines at a level lower than 6,000 feet have been found to contain amoebae,* the parasitic presence of which in the intestines produces that frightful disease, amoebic dysentery. We were especially desired to leav^e our revolvers at home, and had no escort.

Accordingly, our mounts and kit having been sent on a day or two in advance, we set out from Baguio in motor-cars, April 26, at eight a. m., of an extraordinarily fine day. The day before it had rained mercilessly; not only that, but clouds and mists had enveloped us so that one could not see

*Mr. A. H. Savage Landor, in his “Gems of the East,” protests against our practice of boiling water before drinking it, but the experience of others is against him. He was simply fortunate in not being made ill by the natural water.

twenty yards ahead. We were nearing the rainy season, and conditions were uncertain, but this morning the gods were on our side and we could not have asked for better weather. We went down the splendid Benguet Road, following the bed of the Bued River* to the railway, a drop of over 4,000 feet in thirteen miles. Strange to say, the stream had not risen at all, a fortunate circumstance, as one hundred and sixty bridges are crossed in the drop, and at times a rise will wash out not only the bridges, but all semblance of a road.f At the railway we turned south over the great plain of Pangasinan. This, in respect of roads, is the show province of the Archipelago and deserves its reputation, one hundred and twenty miles having been built. Those we passed over this day would have been called good in France even. Our passage was of the nature of a progress, thanks to the presence of the Governor-General. Simple bamboo arches crossing the road greeted us everywhere, Mr. Forbes punctiliously raising his hat under every one.

*An attempt has been made to stock this river with trout, but it has proved a failure. The fish grew and throve, but did not breed.

jThis happened on a large scale in the spring of this year (1912). Landslides having occurred on both banks of the caiion, and as luck would have it, at the same point, the waters rose behind the natural dam thus formed to a height of over one hundred feet, and breaking through, scoured the valley in their sweep, completely wiping out the road.

Working on the Benguet Road.

Working on the Benguet Road.

The Head Hunters of Northern Liicon. 27

All the villages had decorated their houses; handkerchiefs, petticoats, red table-cloths, anything and everything had been hung out of the windows by way of flags and banners. Across the front of the municipal building of one village was stretched a banner with this inscription, “ En honor de la venida del Gobernador General y de su Comitiva” (“ In honor of the arrival of the Governor-General and of his retinue”), and then below on the next band, “ Deseamos tener un pozo artesiano” (We should like to have an Artesian well”), which led Mr. Worcester to remark that four years before the banner would have demanded " independencia" (independence), and not an Artesian well.

Even in Pangasinan, good roads must come to an end, and ours did as we neared the Agno River. For this blessed river is a curse to its neighborhood, and rises in flood from a stream say seventy-five yards wide to a rushing lake, if the expression be permitted, half a mile and more across. Our car finally refused to move; its wheels simply turned in situ, so deep was the sand. There was nothing for it but to walk to the river bank, where we were met with many apologies. A bamboo bridge had been built across the stream a few days before so that our cars might cross, but yesterday’s rain had washed it down, and would we try to cross on rafts?

We looked at the rafts, bamboo platforms built over large bancas (canoes, double-enders cut out of a single log), the bamboos being lashed together with bejuco (rattan, the native substitute for nails), and decided that no self-respecting motor would stand such transportation, but would go to the bottom first by overturning. So we got our stuff aboard the rafts, were poled over, and made the rest of the journey to Tayug, our first considerable halt, in carromatas (the native two-wheeled, springless cart). Fortunately the distance was short, the carromata being an instrument of torture happily overlooked by the Spanish Inquisition.

At Tayug a great concourse of people welcomed us, with arches, flags, and decorations. The presidencia, or town hall, was filled with the notabilities, and Mr. Forbes was presented with an address by one of the seiioritas. Suitable answer having been made, we adjourned, the men first, the women following when we had done, according to native custom, to the side rooms, where a surprisingly good tiffin had been got ready for us, venison, chickens, French rolls, dulces (sweets), whiskey and soda. Heaven knows what else, to which, all unwitting of our doom, we did full justice. About two miles beyond Tayug lies San Francisco, the initial point of our real mounted journey. The people along this

The Head Hunters of Northern Liicon. 29

part of the road had simply outdone themselves in the matter of arches, there being one at every hundred yards almost. At San Francisco the crowd was greater than at Tayug; and here was set out for us another sumptuous tiffin, in a house built the day before for this very purpose, of bamboo and nipa palm. Access to it was had by a ladder and we sat down at a table, while the schoras of the place waited on us, every inch of standing-room being occupied by people who had crowded in to see the performance of the Governor-General and of his comitiva! And perform we did- we had to! Ducks, chickens, venison, camotes (sweet potatoes), peppers, beer, red wine no one would have thought that but three-quarters of an hour before we had just gone through the same thing. But it would have been the height of discourtesy to give way to our inclination by showing a lack of appetite; moreover, it is not often that a party is held in a house built to be used merely one hour. So we did honor to the occasion, but had to let out our belts before mounting immediately afterward.

CHAPTER III. Padre Juan Villaverde. — His great trail. — The beginning of the

mountain journey. — Nozo. ,

The point to which we had come, San Francisco, marks the beginning of the Juan Villaverde trail from the Central Valley of Luzon through the mountains before us, to the province of Nueva Vizcaya. All day the chain we were to pierce had been in sight, and I for one had been wondering where we were to find a practicable entrance, so forbiddingly vertical did the range appear to be.

Now the Spaniards in the Philippines at best were but poor road- or trail-makers. Indeed, in the matter of trails they were simply stupid, in some cases actually going straight up a hill and down the other side, when the way around was no longer, and of course far easier to maintain. But Padre Juan Villaverde of the Dominicans was a great and honorable exception. Quite apart from this aspect, we hear so much that is evil of the friars that it is a pleasure, when possible, to point out the good they did, a thing more frequently possible than people imagine it is. For Father Villaverde gave

The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon.

his life to missionary work among the hill-people, seeking in every way to better their condition materially as well as morally. Born in 1841, as early as 1868 we find him on duty at Bayombong, in Nueva Vizcaya, the province we were about to enter. From the first he seems to have been impressed by the possibilities of the country in which he was laboring; and, foreseeing that good communications would ultimately settle most of the questions relating to the highlanders, he built trails, trails that are still in use, whereas nearly all the others (but few in number) established by the Spaniards have been abandoned by us, where Nature has not indeed saved us the trouble by washing them out of existence. For thirty years Villaverde worked unceasingly, building roads and bridges and churches, and striving to civilize the people among whom he lived; but his chief work, that by which his memory is kept green to this day, is the great trail from the otherwise almost inaccessible province of Nueva Vizcaya, across the Caraballos to the Central Valley of Luzon, where access to the outer world by rail becomes possible. This trail is officially designated by his name, and is maintained by Government. This was the one we were about to enter upon.* Accordingly we thanked our kind hosts of San Francisco; and at last set out on our real trip. But, curious and eager as I felt to engage upon it, I could not help regretting that this part of our journey was over, that we had to turn our backs on the smiling plains of Pangasinan, its hospitable and courteous people. The day had been so cool and fresh, and our progress so easy; flat as was the country, it had its charm, the charm of cultivated plains, relieved by lanes of feathered bamboos, by clumps of nodding palms, by limpid streams. But we were off", nevertheless, the Governor - General on a cow-pony, nearly all the rest on Arabs and thoroughbreds, V^an vSchaick and I riding mountain ponies. We had fifteen miles to go to reach our first resting-place.

Crossing a stream, we began to climb at once, and as we rose the plain of Central Luzon began to unroll itself below us, with our road of the morning stretching out in a straight white line through the green rice-fields. Far to the west we now and then caught glimpses of Lingayen Gulf, with the Zambales Mountains in full view running south and bordering

*For a fuller account of Padre Villaverde’s labors, see the Manila Libertas of May 17, 1910. Villaverde remained at his post until his health broke completely; he set out for Spain, but never reached it, dying August 4, 1897, and being buried at sea a few hours only from Barcelona. The great trail he built reduced the cost of transportation by nine-tenths.

the plain, while still farther to the south Mount Arayat* rose abruptly from its surrounding levels. Now Arayat is plainly visible from Manila. Here and there solitary rocky hills, looking for all the world like ant-heaps, but in reality hundreds of feet high, broke the uniformity of the plains. Flooded as the whole landscape was with brilliant sunshine, the view was exquisite in respect both of form and of color. But as we moved on, turning and twisting and ever rising, we were soon confined to just the few yards the sinuosities of the trail would allow us to see at one time. For a part of the way the country was rocky, hills bare and fire-swept; not a tree or shrub suggested that we were in the tropics. Soon pines began to appear, and then thickened, till the trail led through a pine forest, pure and simple, the ground covered with green grass, and the whole fresh and moist from recent rains. It was up and down and around and around. Not a sign of animal life did we see, not a trace of human beings.