uthor should be benevolent in his judgement of men and manners
and guarded against mistaking isolated cases for rules. In matters
of history he should neither hide the truth nor twist it to support
a private view, remembering how easy it is to criticize an act when
its sequel is developed: such will be my aim in the fullest measure
consistent.

By certain classes I may be thought to have taken a hypercritical view
of things; I may even offend their susceptibilities--if I adulated
them I should fail to chronicle the truth, and my work would be a
deliberate imposture.

I would desire it to be understood, with regard to the classes and
races in their collectedness, that my remarks apply only to the large
majority; exceptions undoubtedly there are--these form the small
minority. Moreover, I need hardly point out that the native population
of the capital of the Philippines by no means represents the true
native character, to comprehend which, so far as its complicacy can
be fathomed, one must penetrate into and reside for years in the
interior of the Colony, as I have done, in places where extraneous
influences have, as yet, produced no effect.

There may appear to be some incongruity in the plan of a work which
combines objects so dissimilar as those enumerated in the Contents
pages, but this is not exclusively a History, or a Geography, or an
Account of Travels--it is a concise review of all that may interest
the reader who seeks for a general idea of the condition of affairs
in this Colony in the past and in the present.

J. F.

Preface to the Third Edition

The success which has attended the publication of the Second Edition
of this work has induced me to revise it carefully throughout, adding
the latest facts of public interest up to the present period.

Long years of personal acquaintance with many of the prime movers in
the Revolutionary Party enabled me to estimate their aspirations. My
associations with Spain and Spaniards since my boyhood helped me,
as an eye-witness of the outbreak of the Rebellion, to judge of the
opponents of that movement. My connection with the American Peace
Commission in Paris afforded me an opportunity of appreciating the
noble desire of a free people to aid the lawful aspirations of millions
of their fellow-creatures.

My criticism of the regular clergy applies only to the four religious
confraternities in their lay capacity of government agents in these
Islands and not