A Woman's Impression of the Philippines. Mary H. Fee

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СКАЧАТЬ him on the back seat of an army ambulance in the clutches of the perennially youthful lady, starting for the Pali.

      We left Honolulu with the modified regret which always must be entertained when other lands are beckoning. The native custom of adorning departing friends with wreaths of flowers was followed, and some of our army belles were almost weighed down with circlets of blossoms cast over their heads by admiring officers of Honolulu. Once clear of the dock and out of eye range, they shamelessly cast these tokens away, and the deck stewards gathered up the perfumed heaps and threw them overboard. The favorite flowers used in these ley, or wreaths, were the creamy white blossoms with the golden centre from which the perfume frangipani is extracted. This flower is known in the Philippines as calachuchi. There were also some of the yellow, bell-shaped flowers called “campanilo,” and a variety of the hibiscus which we learned to call “coral hibiscus,” but which in the Philippines is known as arana, or spider.

      The flowers of Honolulu and Manila seem very much alike. In neither place is there a wide variety of garden flowers, but there is an abundance of flowering shrubs and trees.

      One quite common plant is the bougainvillaea, which climbs over trellises or trees, and covers them with its mass of magenta blossoms. The scarlet hibiscus, either single or double, and the so-called coral hibiscus grow profusely and attain the size of a large lilac bush. There is another bush which produces clusters of tiny, star-like flowers in either white or pink. It is called in the Philippines “santan,” but I do not know its name in Honolulu.

      Catholic missionaries were instrumental in introducing into the Hawaiian Islands a tree of hardy and beautiful foliage which has thrived and now covers a great part of the mountain slopes. This is the algoroda tree, the drooping foliage of which is suggestive of a weeping willow. Then there is the beautiful West Indian rain-tree, which the Honolulu people call the monkey-pod tree, and which in the Philippines is miscalled acacia. Its broad branches extend outward in graceful curves, the foliage is thick but not crowded, and it is an ideal shade tree, apart from the charm of its blossoms of purplish pink.

      The fire-tree and the mango are two others which are a joy to all true lovers of trees. The fire-tree is deciduous, and loses its leaves in December, In April or May, before the leaves come back, it bursts into bloom in great bunches of scarlet about the size of the flower mass of the catalpa tree. The bark is white, and as the tree attains the size of a large maple, the sight of this enormous bouquet is something to be remembered. When the leaves come back, the foliage is thick, and the general appearance of the tree is like that of a locust.

      Among tropical trees, however, the most beautiful is the mango. Its shape is that of a sharply domed bowl. The leaves are glossy and thickly clustered. It is distinguishable at a long distance by its dignity and grace. But the mass of its foliage is a drawback, inasmuch as few trunks can sustain the weight; and one sees everywhere the great trunk prostrate, the roots clinging to the soil, and the upper branches doing their best to overcome the disadvantages of a recumbent position.

      We ate our first mangoes in Honolulu, and were highly disgusted with them, assenting without murmur to the statement that the liking of mangoes is an acquired taste. I had a doubt, to which I did not give utterance, of ever acquiring the taste, but may as well admit that I did acquire it in time. The only American fruit resembling a mango in appearance is the western pawpaw. The mango is considerably larger than the pawpaw, and not identical in shape, though very like it in smooth, golden outer covering. When the mango is ripe, its meat is yellow and pulpy and quite fibrous near the stone, to which it adheres as does a clingstone peach. It tastes like a combination of apple, peach, pear, and apricot with a final merger of turpentine. At first the turpentine flavor so far dominates all others that the consumer is moved to throw his fruit into the nearest ditch; but in time it diminishes, and one comes to agree with the tropical races in the opinion that the mango is the king of all fruits.

      From Honolulu to Manila

       Table of Contents

      Voyaging over the Tropical Seas—We Touch at Guam, or Guahan, One of the Ladrone Islands—Our First Sight of the Philippines—Manila, “A Mass of Towers, Domes, and White-painted Iron Roofs Peeping Out of Green”—Dispersion of the Passengers.

      From Honolulu to Guam we crept straight across in the equatorial current, blistering hot by day, a white heat haze dimming the horizon, and an oily sea, not blue, but purple, running in swells so long and gentle that one could perceive them only by watching the rail change its angle. Once we saw a whale spout; several times sharks followed us, attracted by the morning’s output of garbage; and at intervals flying fish sallied out in sprays of silver. Once or twice we passed through schools of skate, which, when they came under our lee, had a curiously dazzling and phosphorescent appearance. One of the civil engineers aboard called them phosphorescent skate, but I had my doubts, for I noticed that bits of paper cast overboard would assume the same opalescent tints when three or four feet down in the water.

      We had also the full moon, leaving a great shining pathway in our wake at night, and flooding us with unreal splendor. The pale stars swung up and down as the Buford slipped over each wave, and little ripples of breeze cooled the weather side of the ship. By this time we were a thoroughly assorted company. The afterdeck was yielded to flirtatious married ladies whose husbands were awaiting them in Manila, while we sobersides and the family groups gathered under the awnings. We sang no more; but the indefatigable cornetist on the troop deck still entertained his fellows, while occasionally a second steward stole out with a mandolin, and struggled with the intermezzo from “Cavalleria.” We did not run out of talk, however, and the days went by all too swiftly.

      Of Guam I can only say that it struck me as the most desolate spot I had ever seen. It stays in my memory as a long peninsula, or spit of land, running out into the sea, with a ten or twelve-foot bank above, fringed with ragged cocoanut trees. Back of this the land rose gradually into low hills. There was a road leading to the town some eight miles inland, and four-mule ambulances dashed up and down this. We had to anchor three miles off shore on account of coral reefs. We had commissary stores to land, and our navigator captain lost his temper, because the only available lighter in Guam was smashed by a falling bundle of pig iron the first thing. For a while the outlook for fresh provisions in Guam was a sorry one, for our captain vowed by all his saints that he would up anchor and away at four o’clock. The glass indicated a change of weather, and he was unwilling to risk his ship in the labyrinth of coral reefs that encircles the island. Fortunately a German tramp whaler dropped into harbor at this point for water, and some boats were obtained from her—though I could never see why, for we had plenty of our own. The unloading process went on briskly, and toward noon the U.S. gunboat Yorktown came in to pay a call; thus there were actually three vessels at one time in the harbor of Guam.

      The Volcano of Mayón

      Said to be the only perfect cone in the world.

      Such a repletion of visitors had never been known there. The four-mule wagons seemed crazed with excitement. The enthusiasm even spread to the natives, who hung about in dug-outs, offering to sell us cocoanuts, pineapples, and green corn. Our captain kept his word, for at four o’clock we swung about and left Guam behind us. Our passenger list was richer by several political prisoners who had been in exile and were returning to their native land—whether for trial or for freedom, I have no knowledge.

      Some five or six days later, it was rumored that we should pick up the light on the southeast coast of Luzon about midnight, and most of us stayed up to see it. We also indulged in the celebration without which few passenger ships can complete a long voyage. We СКАЧАТЬ