in
a population of over seven-and-a-half millions.

Since the American advent (1898) the _Death-rate_ is believed to have
notably decreased. The Report of the Commissioner of Public Health
for 1904 states the death-rate per thousand in Manila to have been as
follows, viz.:--Natives 53.72; Europeans other than Spaniards 16.11;
Spaniards 15.42; and Americans 9.34. The Commissioner remarks that
"over 50 per cent. of the children born in the city of Manila never
live to see the first anniversary of their birthday." The Board of
Health is very active in the sanitation of Manila. Inspectors make
frequent domiciliary visits. The extermination of rats in the month
of December, 1903, amounted to 24,638. House-refuse bins are put into
the streets at night, and an inspector goes round with a lamp about
midnight to examine them. Dead animals, market-rubbish, house-refuse,
rotten hemp, sweepings, etc., are all cremated at Palomar, Santa Cruz,
and Paco, and in July, 1904, this enterprising department started
the extermination of mosquitoes! In the suburbs of Manila there are
now twelve cemeteries and one crematorium.

CHAPTER XII

The Religious Orders

History attests that at least during the first two centuries of Spanish
rule, the subjugation of the natives and their acquiescence in the
new order of things were obtained more by the subtle influence of the
missionaries than by the sword. As the soldiers of Castile carried war
into the interior and forced its inhabitants to recognize their King,
so the friars were drafted off from the mother country to mitigate
the memory of bloodshed and to mould Spain's new subjects to social
equanimity. In many cases, in fact, the whole task of gaining their
submission to the Spanish Crown and obedience to the dictates of
Western civilization was confided solely to the pacific medium of
persuasion. The difficult mission of holding in check the natural
passions and instincts of a race which knew no law but individual
will, was left to the successors of Urdaneta. Indeed, it was but the
general policy of Philip II. to aggrandize his vast realm under the
pretence of rescuing benighted souls. The efficacy of conversion was
never doubted for a moment, however suddenly it might come to pass,
and the Spanish cavalier conscientiously felt that he had a high
mission to fulfil under the Banner of the Cross. In every natural
event which coincided with their interests, in the prosecution of
the