rrive at a correct estimate of their condition. If here and there
a single Filipino educated in Europe should dazzle society with novels
or plays or happy speeches, most of his countrymen would be satisfied
with his vindication of Filipino capacity.

There are two things which are absolutely necessary to the future
development of the Philippines, whether they remain under our flag
or become independent. One is a new aristocracy to be a new type of
incentive to the laborer; the other is an increase in the laborer's
wants which will keep him toiling long after he has discovered the
futility of the hopes which urged him in the beginning. At present,
the American Government is trying to remodel a social system which
consists of a land-holding aristocracy and an ignorant peasantry,
the latter not exactly willing to work for a pittance, but utterly
helpless to extricate themselves from the necessity of doing so. To
the aristocrat the Government says, "Come and aid us to help thy
brother, that he may some day rob thee of thy prerogatives"; and
to the peasant, "O thou cock-fighting, fiesta-harboring son of
idleness and good-nature, wake up, struggle, toil, take thy share
of what lies buried in thy soil and waves upon thy mountainsides,
and be as thy brother, yonder." Nor is my picture complete if I do
not add that, under his breath, both peasant and aristocrat reply,
"Fool I for what? That I may pick _thy_ chestnuts out of the fire."

There is a story which illustrates the Filipino's sensitiveness to
picking somebody else's chestnuts out of the fire, not inappropriate to
be told here. The agent of the Kelly Road Roller Company had made an
agreement with a number of Filipinos in the Maraquina Valley to take
up a rice thresher and to thresh their crops for one-twelfth of the
output. As this was cheaper than the usual cost of rice-threshing,
they accepted the offer, but they were anxious to compare the new
machine with their own system. One way of threshing rice is to have a
kind of stone table like an armchair, in which the seat is a bowl for
the grain which drops down as the thresher strikes the laden stalks
against the stone back. On the appointed day the American appeared
with his thresher, and the Filipinos were on hand with their stone
table and a confident expert who was reputed the best rice-thresher
in the district. The American began to feed his machine, and the
Filipino made his bundles cut the air. In a few seconds th