s to the extent of ten or fifteen thousand dollars from one
person, nearly all of the goods being sold to them on credits of
three, four, or six months after the date of purchase and delivery
of the merchandise. Occasionally, however, some of them break down,
and those importers who have been trusting them for large amounts,
of course burn their fingers; Chinamen, as a general rule, being
honest and trustworthy only so long as it appears to be their own
interest to remain so. Most of them at Manilla are people who have
made everything for themselves, from nothing except their hands to
begin with, as no rich Chinamen, such as are met with in their native
country, and occasionally in Java and Singapore, are found at Manilla;
for nearly all those who come there have originally arrived as coolies,
earning their bread by manual labour, but very few of them indeed
having inherited anything from their fathers, except the arts of
reading and writing, which nearly the whole of them, however poor,
understand and are able to perform. Whenever they make money, they
invariably return to China, the Government holding out no inducements
for them to remain in the Philippines, as they do elsewhere in the
Archipelago, where greater freedom and protection are allowed them.

CHAPTER IV.

The streets of Manilla have at all times a dead and dull appearance,
with the exception of the two already mentioned as being in the
business part of the town. The basement-floor of the houses being
generally uninhabited, there are no windows opened in their walls,
which present a mass of whitewashed stone and lime, without an object
to divert the eye, except here and there, where small shops have
been opened in them, these being generally for selling rice, fruit,
oil, &c., and entirely deficient in the glare or glittering colours
of gay merchandise, nearly all of which is confined to the shops of
the Escolta, Rosario, and Santo Christo.

The houses here, as elsewhere in hot climates, are arranged with great
regard to ventilation and coolness, and are mostly large edifices;
but are seldom well laid out, and are deficient in many respects. The
entire white population, which amounts to upwards of 5,000, resides
either in the city, by which is meant that portion of it within the
walls, or in the principal part of the town outside the walls, and
on the other side of the river from the city within the walls; and
in this district is comprehended the g