[Unidentified with country.] “The magistrates, being allowed to remain only a year or two in the same province, lived there like strangers, without acquainting themselves with the wants of the people they governed; there was no tie between them.  The only care of the mandarins was to amass as much wealth as possible before they quitted their posts; and they then began the same game in a fresh locality, until finally they returned home in possession of a handsome fortune gradually collected in their different appointments.  They were only birds of passage.  What did it matter?  The morrow would find them at the other end of the kingdom, where the cries of their plundered victims would be unable to reach them.  In this manner the governmental policy rendered the mandarins selfish and indifferent.  The basis of the monarchy is destroyed, for the magistrate is no longer a paternal ruler residing amongst and mildly swaying his children, but a marauder, who arrives no man knows whence, and who departs no one knows whither.  The consequence is universal stagnation; no great undertakings are accomplished; and the works and labors of former dynasties are allowed to fall into decay.  The mandarins say to themselves:  ’Why should we undertake what we can never accomplish?  Why should we sow that others may reap?’...  They take no interest in the affairs of the district; as a rule, they are suddenly transplanted into the midst of a population whose dialect even they do not understand. [Dependence on interpreters.] When they arrive in their mandarinates they usually find interpreters, who, being permanent officieals and interested in the affairs of the place, know how to make their services indispensable; and these in reality are the absolute rulers of the district.”

[Importance of interpreters in Philippines.] Interpreters are especially indispensable in the Philippines, where the alcaldes never by any chance understand any of the local dialects.  In important matters the native writers have generally to deal with the priest, who in many cases becomes the virtual administrator of authority.  He is familiar with the characters of the inhabitants and all their affairs, in the settlement of which his intimate acquaintance with the female sex stands him in good stead.  An eminent official in Madrid told me in 1867 that the then minister was considering a proposal to abolish the restriction of office in the colonies to three years. [93]

[Fear of officials’ popularity.] The dread which caused this restriction, viz., that an official might become too powerful in some distant province, and that his influence might prove a source of danger to the mother country, is no longer entertained.  Increased traffic and easier means of communication have destroyed the former isolation of the more distant provinces.  The customs laws, the increasing demand for colonial produce, and the right conceded to foreigners of settling in the country, will give a great stimulus