be cut a
shred."

It is easily seen how precarious and nominal has been Spanish rule on most
of the islands of this vast archipelago. In the interior of the great
island of Mindanao there is no system of control, no pretence even of
maintaining order. It is a land of terror, the realm of anarchy and
cruelty. There murder is a regular institution. A _bagani_, or man of
might, is a gallant warrior who has cut off sixty heads. The number is
carefully verified by the tribal authorities, and the _bagani_ alone
possesses the right to wear a scarlet turban. All the batos, or chiefs,
are _baganis_. It is carnage organised, honoured, and consecrated; and so
the depopulation is frightful, the wretchedness unspeakable.

The Mandayas are forced to seek a refuge from would-be _baganis_ by
perching on the tops of trees like birds, but their aerial abodes do not
always shelter them from their enemies. They build a hut on a trunk from
forty to fifty feet in height, and huddle together in it to pass the
night, and to be in sufficient numbers to repulse their assailants. The
_baganis_ generally try to take their victims by surprise, and begin their
attack with burning arrows, with which they endeavour to set on fire the
bamboo roof. Sometimes the besiegers form a _testudo_, like the ancient
Romans, with their locked shields, and advance under cover up to the
posts, which they attack with their axes, while the besieged hurl down
showers of stones upon their heads. But, once their ammunition is
exhausted, the hapless Mandayas have nothing to do but witness, as
impotent spectators, the work of destruction, until the moment comes when
their habitation topples over and falls. Then the captives are divided
among the assailants. The heads of the old men and of the wounded are cut
off, and the women and children are led away as slaves.

The genius of destructiveness seems incarnate in this Malay race. The
missionaries alone venture to travel among these ferocious tribes. They,
too, have made the sacrifice of their lives, and, holding life worth
nothing, they have succeeded in winning the respect of these savages in
evangelising and converting them. They work for God and for their country,
and the poorest and most wretched among the natives are not unwilling to
accept the faith and to submit to Spain; but the missionaries insist on
their leaving their homes and going to another district, to which, for
many reasons, the neophytes gladly consent