the coco and
nipa wine is, nevertheless, considerable, for it is used in all their
festivities, cock-fights, games, marriages, etc. Accordingly if it is
desired to augment the annual sale of these liquors, no way could be
more efficient than to increase the number of their festive meetings,
and seek pretexts to encourage public diversions, so long as these do
not go contrary to the well-regulated order of society, and conflict
with the duties of those who are intrusted with its superintendence.

[Extension of monopoly urged.] I am still of opinion, however, that,
without resting the prosperity of this branch of the public revenue on
principles possessed of so immoral a tendency, it might be rendered
more productive to the treasury, if the monopoly could be introduced
into the other districts adapted to its establishment. By this I
mean to say that, as hitherto the monopoly has been partial, and
enforced more in the way of a trial than in a general and permanent
manner, much remains to be done, and consequently great scope is
left for improvement in this department of the public revenue. This
most assuredly may be attained, if all the local circumstances and
impediments, more or less superable, which the matter itself presents,
are only taken into due account, and proper exertions made to study
and discover the various indirect means of increasing the total mass
of contributions, by applying a system more productive and analogous
to the nature of the Philippine Islands. With regard to the revenue of
the two particular articles above treated on, I merely wish to make
it understood that, far from introducing by means of the monopoly,
a new vice into the provinces in which I recommend its establishment,
it would rather act, in a certain degree at least, as a corrective
to pre-existing evils, and the government would derive advantages
from an article of luxury, by subjecting its consumption to the
same shackles under which it stands in the northern provinces, where
its administration is established and carried on for account of the
royal treasury.

[Former customs usage.] In former times, when only vessels belonging to
the Asiatic nations visited the port of Manila, with effects from the
coast of Coromandel, or the China junks, and now and then a Spanish
vessel coming from or going to the Island of Java, with spices for
account of Philippine merchants, the receipt of duties was left in
charge of a single royal officer, and