ths, but not
for long at a time, as the intense cold made their teeth ache; while
still others piously crossed themselves and refused to have aught to
do with so manifest an invention of the Evil One.

Meanwhile, despite the fact of its being Christmas, the Signal
Corps officers, men, and natives were hard at work establishing an
office in the town, digging a trench for the shore end of the cable,
and setting up the cable hut, packed in sections for convenience in
transportation. Thirty Dumaguete natives were employed at twenty-five
cents a day to help dig the trench and put up the hut, and they seemed
very willing in their work and thought the remuneration princely.

So heavy was the surf in the early morning that the officers and
soldiers going ashore had to be carried from the rowboats to the
beach on the backs of natives, but it fortunately calmed down enough
before we women went over in the afternoon to allow of our entering
Dumaguete in a more conventional manner.

Being a _fiesta_, the town was full of natives from the provinces,
all smartly dressed and all beaming with good-natured curiosity at
the advent of two and a half American women,--the only _Americanas_
most of them had ever seen,--and quite an escort gathered around
us as, accompanied by the officers of the post and those from the
ship not otherwise engaged, we walked down the dusty streets toward
the cockpits, where in honour of the day there was to be a contest
of unusual interest. At every corner came new recruits to swell the
ranks of our followers. "Merry Christmas," cried everyone in Spanish or
Visayan, and "Merry Christmas" we responded, though June skies bending
down toward tropical palms and soft winds just rustling the tops of
tall bamboos, so that they cast flickering fern-like shadows over
thatched nipa roofs, but ill suggested Christmas to an American mind.

The cockpit reached, we found it to be a rudely built circular shack
of nipa, fairly crowded with natives in gala attire, and a sprinkling
of khaki-clad soldiers from the post. Native policemen, in uniforms
that strongly reminded one of the _insurrecto_ insignia, showed us to
our seats, and a few moments after our arrival two fine cocks, matched
as nearly as possible in strength and weight, were brought into the
ring by their respective owners, while the onlookers discussed the
birds' relative points. The two cocks, still held by their masters,
were then allowed to peck at each othe