Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines Part 15

Good wood is stout, straight, well-coloured, and with no appearance or trace of water having been used to heighten it, which may be easily detected on a careful inspection, although the unwary have on several occasions been known to have purchased, and shipped home to Britain, quant.i.ties of the common firewood in place of it, as after being wetted, it acquires the colour of Sapan-wood, sufficiently to deceive an ignorant or careless purchaser.

Nearly all of the straight wood is sent to Europe, and the roots to China and Calcutta, where they are said to be quite as well liked as straight wood, and beyond a doubt they produce more dye than the latter.

The mountains of the Philippines are clothed with numberless varieties of woods of almost every description of Oriental timber; but the markets of Europe being so distant, and the cost of freight to them so enormous, very few are sent there, except, perhaps, ebony and molave, although several beautiful descriptions of wood are employed by the cabinet-makers of the country and those of China, some of which are of superior beauty to anything I have ever seen at home when made up into furniture.

The ebony princ.i.p.ally comes from Cagayan and Camarines, the wood from which is perfectly dark, and as good as any I know of. The Cagayan wood is very beautiful, being marked by broad black and white, or black and yellow stripes; it takes a polish very well, and forms a peculiarly fine timber for the cabinet-makers to exercise their skill upon, its rays producing magnificent tables, &c.

Molave is a wood of great solidity, and of incredibly lasting properties; and it resists, better than all others, exposure to the weather. It is said to become petrified when immersed for some time in water, and in fact it appears to be nearly as lasting and incorruptible as stone itself. It is employed for nearly all purposes, and large quant.i.ties of it are shipped to China.

Narra is a common description of red wood, somewhat resembling mahogany, which occasions it to be largely used in cabinet-making. From the lower parts of this tree I have seen a table exceeding two yards square, cut out, in one piece.

Tindal wood resembles narra, but has a higher colour than the latter, which, however, gets sobered, and becomes darker by age.

Alintatas is of a beautiful yellow colour.

Malatapay is also yellow, or rather coffee-coloured, and is well veined for ornament.

Lanete is a white wood, and is made use of for a variety of purposes.

All the preceding woods are capable of being made into furniture of a very handsome and valuable description, and were they better known in Europe, would be largely employed for that purpose, as people would be willing to purchase them for their beauty, even at the high prices which the distance and expense of transit would occasion.

Among the common useful woods for ship-building and other purposes, may be mentioned the banaba and mangachapuy: the latter does not stand water well, however.

Yacal, for beams and joists of houses, &c., and a tall, straight wood, called _Palo Maria_, is valuable for supplying spars, &c., to the shipping of the colony.

Baticulin, for cutting up into boards or deals.

Dungo unites strength and solidity to an immense size.

Teak is found in Zamboanga, and its value is too well known to require any remark upon it.

Ypil is brought to Manilla from Yloylo, and being a very lasting and hard timber, is of the greatest value, and is applied to a variety of uses.

These are some of the many species of woods abounding in the country, whose number and value are yearly increasing as they become better known to the foreign timber merchants of China and elsewhere. The China market alone would take off greatly increased supplies, were they allowed to ship the timber from the ports next to where the woodman's axe had felled the tree, in place of forcing it to bear all the heavy charges which its transport to Manilla in the first instance now subjects it to.

The investigations of Don Rafael Arenao have been of great service to me in forming a list of these; and for several other particulars scattered throughout the preceding pages I have to thank him.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

The money current in the Philippines consists of Spanish and South American dollar pieces princ.i.p.ally, although no two of them have precisely the same weight in silver. Thus the Chilian dollar of 1833 had 45624 grains of pure metal, while that of the Rio de la Plata has only 44124 grains of silver.

Nearly all the Mexican dollars differ in their quant.i.ty of pure silver; for example, that of the coinage of 1832 had only 44280, while that of 1833 had 45120 grains of pure metal. The old Spanish dollar has 44508 grains of pure silver, and the half dollar 22248 grains; while the Bolivian half dollar has only 16860 grains of pure silver; and the Bolivian quarter-dollar piece has only 8484 grains of pure silver; while the standard Spanish quarter-piece contains 11124 grains of unalloyed silver.

The golden doubloon, weighing an ounce, is worth sixteen dollars in Manilla, although it usually sells for considerably less in China.

Both of these coins are subdivided into halves and quarter-pieces, and the dollar is divided into eight reals, one of which is equal to two and a half reals of the vellon money current in the Peninsula; and the Manilla real is represented by a copper currency of seventeen cuartos. In calculations, however, the real is divided into twelve parts by an imaginary coin called grains; so that by $3. 2. 6. would be understood three dollars, two reals, and a half real, or three dollars and five-sixteenth parts of a dollar.

The copper money in circulation is so scanty, as to be perfectly inadequate for the purpose; and at the time of my leaving Manilla, the usual charge for exchanging a dollar for copper money was a quartillo, or the quarter of a real, worth about a penny halfpenny of English money.

In consequence of this scarcity, the natives are in the habit of employing cigars as money, to represent the smaller coins; and all over the Philippines a cigar is actually the most important circulating medium, each representing a cuarto.

At various times the scarcity of copper coins has given rise to extensive forgeries of them, and caused a considerable depreciation in their actual value, the false coinage being all of spurious metal.

The gold which is found at Pictas, in Misamis, and at Mambalao, Paracala, and Surigao, is consumed in the country in ornaments, &c., and some of it is sent also to China. The amount annually produced at these places is very uncertain; and the quant.i.ty exported to China is probably a good deal more than the amount set down in the tabular statement, it being a thing of so very easy export, that I should suppose at least an equal number of taels are sent there privately, to what appears in the table to have pa.s.sed the Custom-house.

Its value in Manilla varies, according to quality, at from twenty dollars a tael down to fourteen for the inferior sorts.

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

After travelling so far together, the reader will permit me to direct his attention to the geographical position and natural advantages of the Philippines, which are unequalled by any other islands in the whole eastern Archipelago. Their vicinity to the immensely populous empire of China is in itself enough to render them a most flourishing colony.

The Spanish and local governments are alive to the importance of this, and appear desirous to encourage trade to a limited extent, but are apparently anxious to hold the reins of it, and to regulate it as they deem best for themselves, or at any time to put a stop to it entirely.

The evils arising from the changeable elements given birth to by their interference it is difficult to over-estimate, as from the ignorance, which prevails through all cla.s.ses, of the first elements of a commonwealth, and from their capricious notions of government, and want of knowledge of the advantages of liberality and of the facilities given to the prosecution of commerce, few persons of prudence care to expose their capital very extensively to the chances of trade.

At present the Philippines want some infusion of foreign capital and energy into the veins and local arteries of the country, which, backed by the enlightened application of science, would cause these islands to emerge from the obscurity now surrounding them, and force them to a.s.sume the important position for which nature has apparently destined them.

This will not come to pa.s.s until the present opinions of the Government and people are considerably changed with reference to their commercial legislation, or until all government interference in affairs of that nature is left off, so far as the interests of the revenue will permit, when the people will be insensibly but wisely taught by experience to rely upon themselves alone.

The principles of commerce, and the wealth of nations, as laid down by Adam Smith in his great work, which is almost deserving of immortality for the truths it tells mankind, are as true and as sure in practice as they are in theory; and should the wisdom and truth of his investigations ever be applied to the commercial regulations of these islands, it is difficult to foretell the destiny that may ultimately await them.

It appears to me to be as unwise to attempt to restrain the course of nature and its fruits, aided by the energies of man to develop or to use them, as it would be to bind down the mind of a man of genius, or of a poet, in order to prevent their operation, or to hinder the great conceptions of their muse, or the scientific research which a bright genius renders serviceable to his fellow mortals, from ever seeing the light. No one will defend the justice or wisdom of the time which forbade Galileo to publish, or even himself to believe in, his great discoveries; but is that more unjust than the policy of rulers, who shut up from the beings whom G.o.d has created to use them, the fruits of our common mother, the earth?

It is equally absurd to prevent and to prohibit in either case; but notwithstanding this, the pa.s.sions and prejudices of mankind are violent enough to permit of the one, although they would by no means suffer the other. Wisdom and pa.s.sion can seldom or never accompany each other.

Philanthropy will ultimately banish from our codes all such regulations as tend to check the fruitfulness of the soil and its use by man, who has been endowed with reason in order that he may a.s.sist the operations of nature. The constant and unrestricted use of the bounties of nature does not lead to their abuse; the contrary is the fact, for it is only when our appet.i.tes are excited by the obstacles to their attainment that they become excessively indulged and depraved.

The illiberality of the Government places the existing position of foreigners in rather an equivocal position, for they are only there upon sufferance; and in the event of any disturbance, such as happened at Manilla in 1820, or of a war between the two nations, what would become of the foreigners or of their property?

It has already been shown to the world that our fellow-subjects at Manilla in 1820, might be murdered in the streets like dogs, and no retribution be demanded by their Government; and to this day their personal liberty and property can at any time be endangered by the caprice of the Governor or of his subordinates.

In 1848, an alcalde laid hold of a number of British subjects, and threw them suddenly into prison, because he happened one day to discover that the time for their permission to remain in the country had years ago expired, which all of them had been led to expect it was quite unnecessary to have renewed so long as they remained quiet and well-conducted members of the community. As the alcalde did not know very well what to do with them when he had got them into the jail, he kept them there for a few days till he had smoked a good deal, and thought a little about them, and then he told the jailor to let them out again.

Our trade with China would be materially improved by the attention of Her Majesty's Foreign Secretary being directed to the position of the Philippines in connection with our own interests with them, and with the great empire adjoining them. Besides, it is a shame to ourselves that such things should exist in the colony, not only of a friendly European power, but of one so much indebted, as Spain is, to the valour of our arms for her independence, and to our liberality for possessing this colony at all.

THE END.