"when you have been in the country
a few months, and will be convinced that what I say is right. It is
one thing to govern in Madrid and another to rule in the Philippines."

"But----"

"I, for example," continued Father Damaso, raising his voice to prevent
the other from speaking, "I, who can point to my twenty-three years
of existence on bananas and rice, can speak with some authority on
this subject. Do not come to me with theories or arguments, for I
know the native. Remember, that when I came to this country, I was
sent to a parish, small and largely devoted to agriculture. I did not
understand Tagalog very well, but I received the confessions of the
women and we managed to understand each other. In fact, they came
to think so much of me that three years afterward, when I was sent
to another and larger town, where a vacancy had been created by the
death of the native parish priest, all the women were in tears. They
overwhelmed me with presents, they saw me off with bands of music----"

"But this only shows----"

"Wait, wait! Do not be in a hurry! My successor remained there a still
shorter time, but when he left there were more people to see him off,
more tears shed, and more music played, although he had treated the
people worse than I, and had raised the parish dues to a sum almost
double the amount I had exacted."

"But allow me----"

"Furthermore, I was twenty years in the town of San Diego and it was
only a few months ago--that--that I left. Twenty years! Surely any
one will admit that twenty years is time enough to get acquainted
with a town. There were six thousand people in San Diego, and I knew
every one of them as if he were my own child. I knew even the private
affairs of them all; I knew in what way this man was 'crooked,'
where the shoe pinched that one, what slips every girl had made and
with whom, and who was the true father of each child, for I received
all of their confessions and they always confessed scrupulously. I
can prove what I say by Santiago, our host, for he has considerable
property in that town, and it was there that we became friends. Well,
then! This will show you what sort of people the natives are: when I
went away, only a few old women and some lay brothers saw me off. And
that, after I had been there twenty years! Don't you see that this
proves beyond a doubt that all the reforms attempted by the Ministers
of the Government in Madrid are perfectly absurd?"

It was now th