eft the bench and darting fire from his eyes,
fell in blind fury upon the defenceless priest; what harsh words he
uttered in Tagalog while he vented his fury on his victim, striking him
with his clenched fist, slapping him and kicking him, I do not know,
but the religious man fell at the feet of his furious executioner who,
being now the prey of the most stupendous rage, could scarcely get
his tongue to stutter and continued to kick the priest, without seeing
where he kicked him. Getting deeper and deeper in the abyss and perhaps
not knowing what he was about, this petty chief made straight for a
sabre lying on a table to continue his bloody work. In the meantime
the priest had risen to his feet and awaited with resignation new
torments which certainly were even worse than the first, for he gave
him so many and such hard blows with the sabre that the blade was
broken close to the hilt. This accident so infuriated Delfin that
he again threw himself upon the priest, kicking him furiously and
striking him repeatedly until he again threw him to the ground, and
not yet satisfied, his vengefulness led him to throw himself upon his
victim with the fury of a tiger after his prey, beating him on the head
with the hilt of the saber until the blood ran in streams and formed
pools upon the pavement. The priest, more dead than alive, shuddered
from head to foot, and appeared to be struggling in a tremendous
fight between life and death; he had hardly enough strength to get
his tongue to ask for God's mercy. At this most critical juncture,
and when it seemed as if death were inevitable, the martyr received
absolution from Father Diez, who witnessed the blood-curdling picture
with his heart pierced with grief at the sight of the sufferings of
his innocent brother, feeling as must the condemned man preparing for
death who sees the hours fly by with vertiginous rapidity. The blood
flowing from the wounds on the priest's head appeared to infuriate
and blind the heart of Delfin who, rising from his victim's body,
sped away to the armory in the court house, seized a rifle, and came
back furious to brain him with the butt and finish killing the priest;
but God willed to free his servant from death at the hands of those
cannibals, so that generous Lieutenant Navarro interfered, took the
rifle away from him and caught Delfin by the arm, threatening him with
some words spoken in Tagalog. Then Navarro, to appease Delfin's anger,
turned the pries