[12] The reference is to the novel Noli Me Tangere (The Social Cancer), the author’s first work, of which, the present is in a way a continuation.—­Tr.

[13] This legend is still current among the Tagalogs.  It circulates in various forms, the commonest being that the king was so confined for defying the lightning; and it takes no great stretch of the imagination to fancy in this idea a reference to the firearms used by the Spanish conquerors.  Quite recently (January 1909), when the nearly extinct volcano of Banahao shook itself and scattered a few tons of mud over the surrounding landscape, the people thereabout recalled this old legend, saying that it was their King Bernardo making another effort to get that right foot loose.—­Tr.

[14] The reference is to Noli Me Tangere, in which Sinang appears.

[15] The Dominican school of secondary instruction in Manila.—­Tr.

[16] “The studies of secondary instruction given in Santo Tomas, in the college of San Juan de Letran, and of San Jose, and in the private schools, had the defects inherent in the plan of instruction which the friars developed in the Philippines.  It suited their plans that scientific and literary knowledge should not become general nor very extensive, for which reason they took but little interest in the study of those subjects or in the quality of the instruction.  Their educational establishments were places of luxury for the children of wealthy and well-to-do families rather than establishments in which to perfect and develop the minds of the Filipino youth.  It is true they were careful to give them a religious education, tending to make them respect the omnipotent power (sic) of the monastic corporations.

“The intellectual powers were made dormant by devoting a greater part of the time to the study of Latin, to which they attached an extraordinary importance, for the purpose of discouraging pupils from studying the exact and experimental sciences and from gaining a knowledge of true literary studies.

“The philosophic system explained was naturally the scholastic one, with an exceedingly refined and subtile logic, and with deficient ideas upon physics.  By the study of Latin, and their philosophic systems, they converted their pupils into automatic machines rather than into practical men prepared to battle with life.”—­Census of the Philippine Islands (Washington, 1905), Volume III, pp. 601, 602.

[17] The nature of this booklet, in Tagalog, is made clear in several passages.  It was issued by the Franciscans, but proved too outspoken for even Latin refinement, and was suppressed by the Order itself.—­Tr.

[18] The rectory or parish house.

[19] Friends of the author, who suffered in Weyler’s expedition, mentioned below.—­Tr.

[20] The Dominican corporation, at whose instigation Captain-General Valeriano Weyler sent a battery of artillery to Kalamba to destroy the property of tenants who were contesting in the courts the friars’ titles to land there.  The author’s family were the largest sufferers.—­Tr.