The troubles in Albay ended with the surrender of Ola on September 25, 1903.  Blount gives the impression that he had a knowledge of them which was gained by personal observation.  He arrived in the province in the middle of November, seven weeks after normal conditions had been reestablished.

On October 5, 1903, General Bandholtz telegraphed with reference to the final surrender of Ola’s band:—­

“The towns are splitting themselves wide open celebrating pacification and Ramon Santos (later elected governor) is going to give a record-breaking fiesta at Ligao.  Everybody invited.  Scouts and Constabulary have done superb work.”

Blount makes much of disorders in Samar and Leyte.  Let us consider the facts.

In all countries feuds between highlanders and lowlanders have been common.  Although the inhabitants of the hills and those of the lowlands in the two islands under discussion are probably of identical blood and origin, they long since became separated in thought and feeling, and grew to be mutually antagonistic.  The ignorant people of the interior have always been oppressed by their supposedly more highly civilized brethren living on or near the coast.

The killing of Otoy by the constabulary in 1911 marked the passing of the last of a series of mountain chiefs who had exercised a very powerful influence over the hill people and had claimed for themselves supernatural powers.

Manila hemp is the principal product upon which these mountaineers depend in bartering for cloth and other supplies.  The cleaning of hemp involves very severe exertion, and when it is cleaned it must usually, in Samar, be carried to the seashore on the backs of the men who raise it.  Under the most favourable circumstances, it may be transported thither in small bancas [494] down the streams.

The lowland people of Samar and Leyte had long been holding up the hill people when they brought in their hemp for sale in precisely the way that Filipinos in other islands are accustomed to hold up members of the non-Christian tribes.  They played the part of middlemen, purchasing the hemp of the ignorant hill people at low prices and often reselling it, without giving it even a day’s storage, at a very much higher figure.  This system was carried so far that conditions became unbearable and finally resulted in so-called pulajanism which began in the year 1904.

The term pulajan is derived from a native word meaning “red” and was given to the mountain people because in their attacks upon the lowlanders they wore, as a distinguishing mark, red trousers or a dash of red colour elsewhere about their sparse clothing.  They raided coast towns and did immense damage before they were finally brought under control.  It should be remembered that these conditions were allowed to arise by a Filipino provincial governor, and by Filipino municipal officials.  It is altogether probable that a good American governor would have prevented them, but as it was, neither their cause nor their importance were understood at the outset.  The pulajan movement was directed primarily against Filipinos.