Santa Fe new Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1898-1951, 1898-06-01

pox flourishes In the crowded houses of
the lower classes, Malays, half-caste
natives and Chinese unnoticed. Mala-
rial fever chooses the careless foreign
resident for its attentions. The black
plague has never reached the Philip
pines. The city of Manila has a good
water supply system. The mortality
rate in that center OF 200, 900 Malays,
half-castes, Chinese and Europeans does
not exceed 3 per cent per annum.
In largest proportion of the city's
population come the Malay half-caste
types, whose faces of swarthy color, high
cheek bones, almond eyes, straight
show mixtures of Chinese, Malay and
Spanish blood. The Chinese in Manila
number $4,000, and although hated by
the natives, are"the mainstay of the
business community. Europeans, aside
from Spanish troops, number 5000, but
England's sons would scarcely reach
three figures, and those of Americas
two.
The land in and around Manila for
ten miles, scarcely lifts it's surface "a
yard above the bay. In the rainy sea
son, the Pasig river, which flows through
the city, dividing it, oyerfows it's banks
and makes Manila what it is often called
the Venice of the Far East.
December, January and February are
months of little rain, warn days, cool
afternoons and cold nights. March,
April and May are hot, dry and dusty.
A poet has written of Manila during
these months:
Where the latitude's mean and the longi-
tude's low,
Whore the hot winds of summer perenially
blow,
Where the mercury chokes the thermomet-
And the dust il as thick as the hair on a goat,
Where ones throat is as dry as a " mummy ac-
cursed.
There lieth the land of perpetual thirst
Each day at noon, during these
months the mercury climbs to SO de-
grees but the nights are not uncOmfort-
able. The warm spell ends In May and
the rainy season sets in, lasting until
October.
The old walled town of Manila is very
interesting, The river bounds it on the
north and the bay and promenade on
the west. A long line of b%oulevards
range along the southeast. This leaves
an irregular triangle, the sides of which
are about a mile long. The walls are
moss grown, and rise out of moats that
are choked with weeds. At the three
corners of the triangle are the batteries,
and down at the apex, which is formed
by the meeting of the west wall with the
river, is the old fort known as the Black
Hole, in which three score of prisoners
We're advertently or inadvertently smoth-
cred to death during the early days of
the present revolution. In front of the
Notifications, facing west towards the
bay, run the Malecon promenade, a
mile of smooth road which just tops the
beach This was u favorite promenade
of General Blanco during his term as
governor general. At the south end of
the Malecon is a broad plaza, which is
%patronized by the fashionable element
and whore the band plays each pleasant
day. Within the city the streets are
narrow and the bnttressed houses stuffy.
Ponderons churches squeeze themselves
in and ruined arches show the
effects of earthquakes. During the hot
days and nights of the dry season no
breath of air seems to reach the pave
ments of Old Manila. The weedy moats.
heavy walls, drawbridges and creaking
gates now serve to restrain 10000 in
surgents from m~assacreing the Spaniards
and priests who have so long ruled the
region. The guns of the American fleet
can knock the walls into splinters and
fill the meats with battered fragments at
any time, but the few marines of the
American ships can not stop suburban
massacre when once the natives taste
blood. If the American nation holds the
Philippines s,o0o,o 900 of people located
on 900 islands will add to her territory
and population.
Corrcgidor island has all elevation
from 500 to 600 feet and contains the
light house first sighted by steamers
coming up the Malacca straights. 1t is
thirty miles from the island to the an
chorage in Manila bay. The shore
sweeps away right and left from Manila,
in the lines of a great hoop whose rim
isa sandy beach and low palm trees. Fiji
teen miles along the beech, TO the right,
the hoop breaks and q low sand spit
protrudes into tho bay which holds Ca
vite with it's docks, marine railway, ar
senal and low Notifications. The arm
formed by the hook makes good shelter
for vessels when the fierce winds of the
southwest monsoon kick up too much OF
a sea for them to load and discharge al
the main anchorage.
Five leagues inland, mountains rise tC
1000 feet high. All in all, the climatic
conditions of the Philippines are supe'
rior to Cuba, but the inhabitants will
furnish a fertile field for American mis-
s~ionarips for n long time to come,