ared to be
thoroughly convinced of, and faithful to their religion in its purity;
and as a body, appear to be about as sincere and pious a class as
clergymen at home.

Occasionally, however, you meet with startling exceptions to this
rule, which astonish any one accustomed to see the high regard to
outward decency observed by the same cloth at home; for instance,
it would be considered most reprehensible at home, for any clergyman
to keep a mistress; and if the fact became known, would occasion his
instant dismissal from his cure, and his expulsion from the Church.

This is not so, however, in the Philippines, and may be seen at
any time, especially among the Mestizo and native Indian priests,
whose education is worse, and their ideas of religion much more
vague, incorrect, and superstitious than those of the Spaniards;
and sometimes, in the country parishes, an Indian or Mestizo _padre_
is found openly living in the _convento_ or parsonage-house with his
mistress and natural children. But frequently, in cases where a sense
of decency prevents them doing this openly, one occasionally meets
in their houses young half-caste children, who pass for the family
of some brother or sister, although these had never any existence,
and there is in reality little or no doubt as to the priest himself
being their father.

This state of things, however, is not the general state of the Church,
although it may but too frequently be met with; and is not considered
nearly so reprehensible as it would be, were they at liberty to marry,
as Protestant clergymen are. In many cases its existence can scarcely
fail to be known to their bishops, by whom however it appears to be
winked at; and is not considered by the laity as being particularly
scandalous, their notions on the subject being somewhat indefinite.

Within a very short distance of Manilla, I have been in a convento
where the priest, his mistress, and family all lived together, the
padre being a Mestizo. On the village feast-day, one of the party
with whom I was in the country, hired some jugglers who had come down
from Bengal to act their wonderful tricks in the theatre at Manilla,
and sent them out to Mariquina on the feast-day, there to amuse the
people, and to please the padre, as he knew it would do, he being an
old acquaintance of his. Accordingly, in the afternoon they exhibited
to an immense crowd of natives, just before the open church-door. A
platform had been quickly e