m Rome that the image was either lost or stolen, for although the
bishop had never let the sacred box out of his sight, yet when he
came to unlock it before a hushed throng at the Vatican, there was
no Santo Nino within. It was thought that in some mysterious way the
bishop had been robbed and that the Holy Child was forever lost. Great
was the grief and terror and excitement in Cebu. Masses were said,
and individual prayers offered up, novenas were held, and vows taken,
all to the effect that the Santo Nino should be restored to the island.

One day, months later, while the church was being repaired, the
partition of wood over the Holy Child's shrine was accidentally
knocked out of place by a workman, and what should he discover
there but the Santo Nino himself, gravely smiling, his little hands
outstretched in benediction. He had not wanted to go abroad, and so
had left the carefully locked boxes and returned to his old home. What
more natural? Of course there was a great _fiesta_, and the miracles
performed in that week of rejoicing will never be forgotten.

But even to this day the Santo Nino gives numerous evidences of
his supernatural power, and any native will tell you how he walks
abroad of a night, and visits the homes where his image is enshrined,
a tremendous undertaking, as hardly a nipa shack on the island but
boasts its picture or statue of Cebu's patron saint. On returning
from these nocturnal tramps, the Holy Child is wont to bring back
with him food and drink for his own consumption, the evidence of
these midnight feasts being found on many a morning in the shape of
crumbs scattered over the altar, a touch of nature which makes him
indeed kin to the natives, who, we were told, invariably save a bit
from their scanty suppers, putting it where the Santo Nino will be
sure to find it does he honour them with a visit.

But at last we were to see the Santo Nino for ourselves, and as we
left the reception-room and passed down a long corridor, hung with
atrocious native paintings of Christian martyrs in every degree
of discomfort and uneasiness, through a wide refectory with three
great dining tables, the top of each being a solid piece of wood,
and finally into the chapel itself, I plead guilty to a distinct
thrill of interest in every Protestant pulse.

The chapel was a large, rather bare room, with an altar to the Virgin
on one side, and directly opposite it a small shrine painted white
and picked out wi