entation, freedom of the Press, toleration of all religious
sects, laws common with hers, and administrative and economic
autonomy.

(3) Equality in treatment and pay between Peninsular and Insular
civil servants.

(4) Restitution of all lands appropriated by the friars to the
townships, or to the original owners, or in default of finding
such owners, the State is to put them up to public auction in
small lots of a value within the reach of all and payable within
four years, the same as the present State lands.

(5) Abolition of the Government authorities' power to banish
citizens, as well as all unjust measures against Filipinos;
legal equality for all persons, whether Peninsular or Insular,
under the Civil as well as the Penal Code.

The war must be prolonged to give the greatest signs of vitality
possible, so that Spain may be compelled to grant our demands,
otherwise she will consider us an effete race and curtail, rather
than extend, our rights.

_Malabar_.

Shortly after this Emilio Aguinaldo, the recognized leader of the
rebels, issued a _Manifiesto_ in somewhat ambiguous terms which might
imply a demand for independence. In this document he says:--

We aspire to the glory of obtaining the liberty, _independence_,
and honour of the country.... We aspire to a Government
representing all the live forces of the country, in which the most
able, the most worthy in virtue and talent, may take part without
distinction of birth, fortune, or race. We desire that no monk,
or friar, shall sully the soil of any part of the Archipelago,
nor that there shall exist any convent, etc., etc.

Every month brought to light fresh public exhortations, edicts, and
proclamations from one side or the other, of which I have numerous
printed copies before me now. About this time the famous Philippine
painter, Juan Luna (_vide_ p. 195), was released after six months'
imprisonment as a suspect. He left Manila _en route_ for Madrid in
the Spanish mail-steamer _Covadonga_ in the first week of July and
returned to Manila the next year (November 1898).

In the field there were no great victories to record, for the rebels
confined themselves exclusively to harassing the Spanish forces
and then retreating to the mountains. To all appearances trade in
Manila and throughout the Islands was little affected by the war,
and as a matte