Two things still greatly complicate the administration of justice in the Philippines.

The first is the dense ignorance of the people of the working class who for the most part have failed to learn of their new rights, and even if they know them are afraid to attempt to assert them in opposition to the will of the caciques, whose power for evil they know only too well.

The other is the unreliability of many witnesses and their shocking readiness to perjure themselves.  It is always possible to manufacture testimony at small expense.  While the criminal libel suit brought against certain members of the staff of the newspaper El Renacimiento, which libelled me, was in progress the judge showed me the opinion of the two Filipino assessors [497] in one of the cases and told me that it was written by an attorney for the defence.  I could not believe this, but a few days later an assessor in another of the cases called at my house, bringing a draft of the opinion of himself and his associate which he sought to submit to me for criticism or modification, saying that I knew much more about the case than they did!  He was nonplussed at my refusal to read the document, and left saying “acqui tiene V. nuevo servidor.” [498] Had I redrafted the opinion, as I might have done, my “new servant” would have called later for a quid pro quo.

Some of the Filipino judges of first instance have proved weak in matters affecting the integrity of public domain and the protection of the public forests, but on the whole these officers have done rather surprisingly well.  It must be remembered that the best men in the islands have now been appointed, and that another generation must come on before there will be available any considerable number of new candidates who are up to the standard of the present appointees.

CHAPTER XVI

Health Conditions

I had abundant opportunity to observe health conditions in the Philippines during the Spanish regime and they were shocking in the extreme.  There were no provisions for the sanitary disposal of human waste even in Manila.  If one had occasion to be out on foot at night, it was wise to keep in the middle of the street and still wiser to carry a raised umbrella.

Immediately after the American occupation some five hundred barrels of caked excrement were taken from a single tower in one of the old Manila monasteries.  The moat around the city wall, and the esteros, or tidal creeks, reeked with filth, and the smells which assailed one’s nostrils, especially, at night, were disgusting.

Distilled water was not to be had for drinking purposes.  The city water supply came from the Mariquina River, and some fifteen thousand Filipinos lived on or near the banks of that stream above the intake.  The water was often so thick with sediment that one could not see through a glass of it, and it was out of the question to attempt to get it boiled unless one had facilities of one’s own.