The Kinsley graphic. [volume] (Kinsley, Kan.) 1890-1940, 1901-05-24
A Letter From the sulu Islands.

Dear GrdpnlC-AS lnere are very
few Kansas men down in this part of
the empire, 1 will infringe on your
space and your readers patience to
give you An idea of how things wag
along down here in the land of the
naughty NJ orc and the gaudy MOrOess.
When 1 returned to Manila from
Frisco in November five of us were
sent to Zamboango, headquarters of
the department of Mjndinoa and Jolo.
We came down on the transport Penn
land had delightful trip, stopping at
IliOlio.
After a stay of six weeks, waiting
to be assigned to duty, we came down
to JOlO. We stopped there three days
and / had intended to call on the Sui
tan, but "his majesty had just re-
turned from Singapore with u couple
of new wives and he was out at his
country place, and respecting his
troubles, did not intrude.
Jolo is quite small place to be the
metropolis of such a large empire. It
is strongly fortified by a wall that
would probably keep out sheep, ifthey
didn't want to get ;instoo bad.
All Moros are held up at the city
gate and have to deliver up their s'bO-
lOs'' and spears.
Bopgoa is 2OO miles south OF Jolo,
and is the most southern garrison in
the islands. There are very few Fill.
ipinos here, and a few Chinos, but the
great bulk of the population are Nor
| Os. They are rather larger than the
Filipiuos. The men are nearly all
we'll built, and they have a chest and
shoulder development that I have
never seen equaled by any class of
men. They would be a good looking
race if they would only get ship
| wrecked once in a while and get
bath. Then they all use beteI nut and
| their teeth are black as coal, and the
rest of their mouth is stained red, and
they certainly are CUTE But l sup
pose they think it is pretty for the
women all use the nut, and the girl
with the blacklist teeth and reddest
mouth has the most admirers. Truly
Robbie has said
1.-The world is wondrous large,
Seven seas, from marge to marge,
And it holds a vast amount of vari
Gus kinds of men.''
But l believe it would puzzle Bobbie
Burns to find beauty in these people.
The MOrOess is a "new woman" us
regards dress reform. Men and WON
en- wear trousers. The men wear
theirs skin tight below the knees and
loose above. The women incline to
| the bloOmer style. Both sexes run to
cOlOrS, and one costume would tax the
ingenuity of a landscape artist to re-
produce. I think it must have beeu
one of these "betel-chewing Moro
| bellies, in pants of emerald green"
who inspired the genius of the poster
girl.
The poster girl will, henceforth,
| bring to my recellections only tender
meme ries of twilight strolls beneath
i waving palms, and along the narrow
beach of Tawhi-Tawhi, listeni ng where
the little wavelets of the Sulu sea
| break and sob, and the still sweeter
voice of my Moro "bre-gi" charms
| away all memories of cold and
heartless North.
The younger hOpefuls aremore sim
pie in dress-in fact, their. simplicity
| at times verges on the painful. Their
wardrobe for the most part consists
|'of 3 skirt made of q COSTA Rico"
-four suck, and SO Abbreviated as to
leave the question OF sex no matter of
conjecture.
The principle industry here used to
be pearl fishing, but now it consists
of stealing ana begging iron from the
Americans, making it up into bolos
and selling them back to the Ameri-
cans.
The Moro, as you know, is Mo-
hammedan, but never see him with
his head toward Mecca, praying five
times per day; nor does he put in all
his time saying praised be Allah
aud ''By the beard of the Prophet,
as you always hear of the Moslem
saying. | am inclined to class these
sayings with the "Hoot mon' of the
Scot and the BE jabbers" of the
Irishman. l never heard either of
them outside of Puck, or Hicks AL
manac.
However, there is one article of the
creed that he does keep. That is pO-
lygamy. III g general understanding
is that he taxes as many wives as he
can support, but l find that they get
las many wives as they can fool into
supporting them.
Living is a very simple air down
here. The difference between riches
and poverty consists in having some
other "Gaygu" to catch your fish and