ves, who were armed, and ordered to carry their weapons
constantly. The armoury was overhauled. A war plan was discussed and
adopted, and places were singled out for each division of troops. The
natives openly avowed to the Chinese that whenever they saw the
first signs of the hostile fleet arriving they would murder them
all. The Chinese were accused of having arms secreted; they were
publicly insulted and maltreated; the cry was falsely raised that
the Spaniards had fixed the day for their extermination; they daily
saw weapons being cleaned and put in order, and they knew that there
could be no immediate enemy but themselves. There was, in short,
every circumstantial evidence that the fight for their existence
would ere long be forced upon them.

In this terrible position they were constrained to act on
the offensive, simply to ensure their own safety. They raised
fortifications in several places outside the city, and many an
unhappy Chinaman had to shoulder a weapon reluctantly with tears in
his eyes. They were traders. War and revolution were quite foreign to
their wishes. The Christian rulers compelled them to abandon their
adopted homes and their chattels, regardless of the future. What a
strange conception the Chinese must have formed of His Most Catholic
Majesty! In their despair many of them committed suicide. Finally,
on the eve of Saint Francis' Day, the Chinese openly declared
hostilities--beat their war-gongs, hoisted their flags, assaulted
the armed natives, and threatened the city. Houses were burnt, and
Binondo was besieged. They fortified Tondo; and the next morning
Luis Perez Dasmarinas, an ex-Gov.-General, led the troops against
them. He was joined by 100 picked Spanish soldiers under Tomas de
Acuna. The nephew of the Governor and the nephew of the Archbishop
rallied to the Spanish standard nearly all the flower of Castilian
soldiery--and hardly one was left to tell the tale! The bloodshed was
appalling. The Chinese, encouraged by this first victory, besieged
the city, but after a prolonged struggle they were obliged to yield,
as they could not provision themselves.

The retreating Chinese were pursued far from Manila along the Laguna
de Bay shore, thousands of them being overtaken and slaughtered or
disabled. Reinforcements met them on the way, and drove them as far
as Batangas Province and into the Morong district (now included in
Rizal Province). The natives were in high glee at this licence to s