would ever attempt landing.

In 1668 a mission was established. At this time the population numbered
about one hundred thousand. The country was so well cultivated that the
whole island seemed like a beautiful garden, for the people were pretty
good farmers. Rice and tropical fruits were cultivated in abundance.
The natives were also skilful in the making of pottery and they had a
well-regulated calendar.

For a time they were well disposed toward their intruders; but at
length, as they began to learn that conversion to the Christian faith
meant also slavery to the Spanish, they rebelled against a system which
was so one-sided, and their opposition led to constant strife and
bloodshed.

In the course of time the severe treatment of the Spaniards, together
with contagious diseases introduced, so completely wiped out the native
population that, at the end of seventy years, scarcely two thousand were
left. Perhaps no peoples in all the South Sea Islands have suffered more
keenly from contact with Europeans than these aborigines.

Frightened at the terrible mortality they had caused, the conquerors
turned to the Philippines to replenish the depopulated island. Tagals
were brought over to occupy the place of the fast-disappearing natives,
and with these many of the natives intermarried. The half-castes are
inferior to the original inhabitants, but they have increased in
population, and now number ten thousand.

Spain ceded Guam to the United States in 1898. Since the acquisition our
government has established both day and evening schools for the natives,
and they are making rapid progress in education.

It is a long journey to Guam--thirty-five hundred miles almost from
Honolulu and not quite half as far from Manila. And how to get there?
Well, it is not an easy matter. If you go to Apia, or to Manila, and
remain long enough--perhaps six weeks, maybe six months--a German
trading schooner will come along and take you aboard. You get there in
time; for the trading schooner is likely to make a very circuitous trip,
calling at a dozen islands to get copra in exchange for cloth, knives,
and cheap jewelry. But if one happens to have the right sort of "pull,"
one can get a pass on an army transport. That means a most delightful
trip from San Francisco to Honolulu, and thence to Guam. Uncle Sam does
the square thing by his soldiers, and the army transports that carry
them to the distant stations are fitted so as to be as comfo