ilian
owners, the Yankee invaders wandered at will, brimful of curiosity and
good nature, eager to gather in acquaintance, information, and
bric-a-brac, making themselves perfectly at home, filling the souls of
the late lords of the soil with disdain, and those of the natives with
wonderment through their lavish, jovial, free and easy ways. Within a
month from the time Merritt's little division had marched into the city,
Manila was as well known to most of those far-Western volunteers as the
streets of their own home villages, and, when once the paymaster had
distributed his funds among them and, at the rate of ten cents off on
every dollar, they had swapped their sound American coin for "soft"
Mexican or Spanish _pesos_, the prodigality with which they scattered
their wealth among their dusky friends and admirers evoked the blessings
of the church (which was not slow to levy on the beneficiaries), the
curses of the sons of Spain, who had generally robbed and never given,
and, at first, the almost superstitious awe of the Tagals, who, having
never heard of such a thing before, dreaded some deep-laid scheme for
their despoilment. But this species of dread lived but a few short
weeks, and, before next payday, was as far gone as the money of the
Americanos.

Those were blithe days in Manila as the autumn came on and the
insurrection was still in the far future. There were fine bands among
the Yankee regiments that played afternoon and evening in the kiosk on
the Luneta, and every household possessed of an open carriage, or the
means of hiring one, appeared regularly each day as the sun sank to the
westward sea, and after making swift yet solemn circuit of the Anda
monument at the Pasig end of the Paseo de Santa Lucia, returned to the
Luneta proper, and wedged in among the closely packed vehicles that
covered the broad, smooth driveways on both sides of the esplanade and
for some hundred yards each way north and south of the band-stand. Along
the shaded and gravelled walks that bordered the Paseo, within short
pistol-shot of the grim bastions beyond the green _glacis_ and even
greener moat, many dark-haired, dark-eyed daughters of Spain, leaving
their carriages and, guarded by faithful duenna, strolled slowly up and
down, exchanging furtive signal of hand or kerchief with some gallant
among the throngs of captive soldiery that swarmed towards sunset on the
parapet. Swarthy, black-browed Spanish officers in cool summer unifo