country begins to get hilly in the
neighborhood of Tobog, a small place with no church of its own, and
dependent for its services upon the priest of the next parish. The
gentle slopes of the hills are, as in Java, cut into terraces and
used for the cultivation of rice. Except at Lucban I have never
observed similar sawas anywhere else in the Philippines. Several small
sugar-fields, which, however, the people do not as yet understand
how to manage properly, show that the rudiments of agricultural
prosperity are already in existence. The roads are partly covered
with awnings, beneath which benches are placed affording repose to
the weary traveller. I never saw these out of this province. One
might fancy oneself in one of the most fertile and thickly-populated
districts of Java.

[A convento and the parish priest.] I passed the night in a convento,
as the dwelling of the parish priest is called in the Philippines. It
was extremely dirty, and the priest, an Augustinian, was full of
proselytish ardor. I had to undergo a long geographical examination
about the difference between Prussia and Russia; was asked whether
the great city of Nuremberg was the capital of the grand-duchy or of
the empire of Russia; learnt that the English were on the point of
returning to the bosom of the Catholic Church, and that the "others"
would soon follow, and was, in short, in spite of the particular
recommendation of Father Llanos, very badly received. Some little time
afterwards I fell into the hands of two young Capuchins, who tried to
convert me, but who, with the exception of this little impertinence,
treated me capitally. They gave me pates de foie gras boiled in water,
which I quickly recognized by the truffles swimming about in the
grease. To punish them for their importunity I refrained from telling
my hosts the right way to cook the pates, which I had the pleasure of
afterwards eating in the forest, as I easily persuaded them to sell
me the tins they had left. These are the only two occasions on which
I was subjected to this kind of annoyance during my eighteen months'
residence in the Philippines.

[Arrangements for travellers.] The traveller who is provided
with a passport is, however, by no means obliged to rely upon
priestly hospitality, as he needs must do in many isolated parts of
Europe. Every village, every hamlet, has its commonhouse, called casa
real or tribunal, in which he can take up his quarters and be supplied
with p