Don
Lorenzo Rocha and Don Agustin Saez, I can attest to their enthusiasm
for the progress of their pupils.

In the General Post and Telegraph Office in Manila I was shown an
excellent specimen of wood-carving--a bust portrait of Mr. Morse
(the celebrated inventor of the Morse system of telegraphy)--the work
of a native sculptor. Another promising native, Vicente Francisco,
exhibited some good sculpture work in the Philippine Exhibition, held
in Madrid in 1887: the jury recommended him for a State pension, to
study in Madrid and Rome. The beautiful design of the present insular
coinage (Philippine peso) is the work of a Filipino. The biography
of the patriot martyr Dr. Jose Rizal (q.v.), the most brilliant of
all Filipinos, is related in another chapter.

The native of cultivated intellect, on returning from Europe, found a
very limited circle of friends of his own new training. If he returned
a lawyer or a doctor, he was one too many, for the capital swarmed
with them; if he had learnt a trade, his knowledge was useless outside
Manila, and in his native village his technical acquirements were
generally profitless. Usually the native's sojourn in Europe made
him too self-opinionated to become a useful member of society. It
remains to be seen how American training will affect them.

The (American) Insular Government has taken up the matter of Philippine
education very earnestly, and at considerable outlay: the subject is
referred to in Chapter xxx.

The intellectual and spiritual life, as we have it in Europe, does
not exist in the Philippines. If ever a Filipino studied any subject,
purely for the love of study, without the hope of material or social
advantage being derived therefrom, he would be a _rara avis_.

The _Disease_ most prevalent among the Filipinos is fever--especially
in the spring: and although, in general, they may be considered a
robust, enduring race, they are less capable than the European of
withstanding acute disease. I should say that quite 50 per cent. of
the native population are affected by cutaneous disease, said to be
caused by eating fish daily, and especially shell-fish. It is locally
known as _Sarnas_: natives say that monkey flesh cures it.

In 1882 _Cholera morbus_ in epidemic form ravaged the native
population, carrying off thousands of victims, the exact number of
which has never been published. The preventive recommended by the
priests on this occasion, viz., prayer to Saint R