t he is, to convince him that he is incompetent. What
good would it do, besides, to have him believe in something else that
would make him wretched? Believe me, it's an act of charity to hold
every creature in his place--that is order, harmony. That constitutes
the _science_ of government."

In referring to his policies, Don Custodio was not satisfied with the
word _art_, and upon pronouncing the word _government_, he would extend
his hand downwards to the height of a man bent over on his knees.

In regard to his religious ideas, he prided himself on being a
Catholic, very much a Catholic--ah, Catholic Spain, the land of
_Maria Santisima_! A liberal could be and ought to be a Catholic,
when the reactionaries were setting themselves up as gods or saints,
just as a mulatto passes for a white man in Kaffirland. But with all
that, he ate meat during Lent, except on Good Friday, never went to
confession, believed neither in miracles nor the infallibility of the
Pope, and when he attended mass, went to the one at ten o'clock, or
to the shortest, the military mass. Although in Madrid he had spoken
ill of the religious orders, so as not to be out of harmony with his
surroundings, considering them anachronisms, and had hurled curses
against the Inquisition, while relating this or that lurid or droll
story wherein the habits danced, or rather friars without habits,
yet in speaking of the Philippines, which should be ruled by special
laws, he would cough, look wise, and again extend his hand downwards
to that mysterious altitude.

"The friars are necessary, they're a necessary evil," he would declare.

But how he would rage when any Indian dared to doubt the miracles
or did not acknowledge the Pope! All the tortures of the Inquisition
were insufficient to punish such temerity.

When it was objected that to rule or to live at the expense of
ignorance has another and somewhat ugly name and is punished by law
when the culprit is a single person, he would justify his position
by referring to other colonies. "We," he would announce in his
official tone, "can speak out plainly! We're not like the British
and the Dutch who, in order to hold people in subjection, make use
of the lash. We avail ourselves of other means, milder and surer. The
salutary influence of the friars is superior to the British lash."

This last remark made his fortune. For a long time Ben-Zayb continued
to use adaptations of it, and with him all Manila. The th