LITMIR.BIZ

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offering him assistance. Villa would not shake hands with him, as was natural, but the priest was able to see that he was confused when he saw the distinction and courtesy with which an American general had treated a helpless friar. What a narrow idea did the Americans form of the government of Aguinaldo, represented by men as savage and inhuman as Villa!

“The natives averred that the Americans referred to were spies who had come to explore those provinces and were making maps of the strategic points and principal roads, so that a very careful watch was kept upon them and Villa took measures to have them go down the river without landing at any place between Echague and Ilagan. At Ilagan they were given an entertainment and dance, Villa being a skilled hand in this sort of thing, and a few days later he accompanied them to Aparri18 without allowing them to set foot on land. The government of Aguinaldo no longer had everything its own way, and secret orders had been given to have every step of the explorers followed. The commanding and other leading officers of the Valley, supporting the orders of the government, circulated an order throughout the towns which read as follows:—

      “ ‘To All Local Officers:

      “ ‘You will not permit any maps to be made or notes to be taken of strategic points by Americans or foreigners; nor will you allow them to become acquainted with the points of defence; you will endeavour to report immediately to this Government any suspicious persons; you will make your investigations secretly, accompanying suspected persons and feigning that their investigations are approved, and finally when it shall seem to you that such suspected persons have finished their work, you will advise without loss of time, in order that their notes may be seized.’

      “Despite this order the Americans were able to inform themselves very thoroughly of the forces in the Valley and its state of defence, and Filipinos were not lacking who for a few pesos would put them abreast of all information regarding the plans and projects of Aguinaldo’s government.”

      Relative to this Wilcox-Sargent trip Taylor says:—

      “In October and November, 1898, Paymaster W. B. Wilcox, U.S.N., and Naval Cadet L. R. Sargent, U.S.N., travelled through Northern Luzon from which they returned with a favourable impression of the government which had been set up by Aguinaldo’s agents.

      “It was realized by the subtle men whom they met that it was highly expedient that they should make a favourable report and accordingly they were well received, and although constant obstacles were thrown in the way of their seeing what it was not considered well for them to see yet the real reasons for the delays in their journey were carefully kept from them. At least some of their letters to the fleet were taken, translated, and sent to Aguinaldo, who kept them, and constant reports upon them and their movements were made.”

Blount refers to the fact that Mr. Sargent tells a characteristic story of Villa,19 whose vengeful feeling toward the Spaniards showed on all occasions.

      It would doubtless have interested the travellers to know that the “robbery” consisted in taking the funds out of the province to save them from falling into Villa’s hands, and in paying them to soldiers in Nueva Vizcaya to whom money was due. It would further have interested them to know that this unfortunate Spaniard had been twice tortured within an inch of his life by Villa.

      But let us continue our interrupted narrative:—

      “The presence of the Americans in Ilagan soon freed us from certain forms of savagery and barbarous intentions on the part of Villa. There can be no doubt that the tyrant was constantly cudgelling his brains to invent new methods of showing his contempt for the friars; at the unlucky time we write of he conceived the infamous plan of ordering a circular enclosure of cane to be made, put a pig into it—we trust the reader will pardon the details—with a bell hung to his neck, blindfolded the priests and compelled them to enter the enclosure with sticks in their hands, and in this ridiculous attitude, obliged them to strike about when the sound of the bell appraised them of the animal’s proximity; it is obvious that the principal purpose of the fiendish Villa was to have the priests lay about them in such a way as to deal each other the blows instead of the pig. The tyrant also had the idea of making us and the other priests in Ilagan parade the streets of that town dancing and playing the band. The wish to consummate his plan was not lacking but he was deterred by the presence of the Americans and the arguments of Sr. Sabas Orros to whom we also owed the signal favour that Villa did not take us to our prisons at Tumauini and Gamut on foot and with our clothing in a bundle at our backs.”

      On October 2 a banquet was given in Villa’s honour at Ilagan and the pleasant idea occurred to him to have four of the friars dance at it for his amusement. The people of the town put their handkerchiefs before their faces to shut out the sight, and some wept. Father Campo, one of the priests who was obliged to dance, had great ulcers on his legs from the wounds caused by the cords with which he had been bound when he was tortured with water, and was at first unable to raise his feet from the floor; but Villa threatened him with a rattan until he finally did so. This caused the sores on his legs to burst open so that the bones showed.

      On the 3d of October a number of the friars were compelled to get up a band and go out and meet Leyba with music on his arrival. The people of the towns closed their windows in disgust at the sight. A great crowd had gathered to receive Leyba, and the priests were compelled to dance in the middle of the street, but this again only caused disgust. A couple of priests were then beaten in the usual fashion in a private house. This caused murmuring even among those of the soldiers who were natives of the Cagayan valley. At the same time two other priests were horribly whipped in the prison.

      This has been a long story, but the half has not been told. Those who escaped torture had their feelings harrowed by the sight of the sufferings of their fellows. They were constantly and grossly insulted; were often confined in the most unsanitary quarters; given poor and insufficient food and bad water, or none at all; robbed of their clothing; compelled to march long distances under a tropical sun when sick, wounded and suffering; obliged to do servants’ work publicly; forced to make a ridiculous spectacle of themselves in the public streets; ordered to recant, and heaven knows what not!

      The torments practised on them had two principal objects: to compel them to give up money, and to discredit them with the common people. They failed to accomplish this latter result. There is abundant evidence that the natives of the Cagayan valley clothed and fed them when they could, and wept over the painful humiliations and the dreadful sufferings which they were powerless to prevent or relieve.

      The tormentors were men from distant provinces, with no possible personal grievances against the priests whom they martyrized. Their action was the result, not of an “ebullition of revenge for three centuries of tyranny” as stated by Blount, but of insensate greed of gold and damnable viciousness. I believe the American people will hold that such cruelities brand those who practise them as unfit to govern their fellows, or themselves.

      Lest I be accused of basing my conclusions on ex parte statements I will now return to the Insurgent record of events in the Cagayan valley.

At the outset the Spanish officers of the Tabacalera Company20 fared comparatively well. In a letter dated September 27, 1898, and addressed to the secretary of war of the revolutionary government, Leyba says of the taking of Tuguegarao that the only terms of the surrender were to respect life. He therefore felt at liberty to seize all the money that the friars had hidden, “which was accomplished by applying the stick.” He adds that they did nothing to the agents of the great Tabacalera Company, then the most powerful commercial organization in the Islands, for the significant reason that they had found that its stock was largely held by Frenchmen and feared trouble.21

      On December 4, 1898, Leyba, concerning whose ideas as to public order we are already informed, wrote a most illuminating letter setting forth the conditions which had existed there. He does not claim that there had been Octavian peace!

      It

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