that they had not the ability to perform the services for which they
were hired. While some individual members of both the religious orders
and of the Government were influenced by these inflaming attacks,
the interests concerned, as organizations, seem to have had a policy
of self-defense, and not of revenge.

The theory here advanced must wait for the judgment of the reader
till the later events have been submitted. However, Rizal himself
may be called in to prove that the record and policy is what has been
asserted, for otherwise he would hardly have disregarded, as he did,
the writings of Motley and Prescott, historians whom he could have
quoted with great advantage to support the attacks he would surely
have not failed to make had they seemed to him warranted, for he
never was wanting in knowledge, resourcefulness or courage where his
country was concerned.

No definite information is available as to what part Francisco
Mercado took during the disturbed two years when the English held
Manila and Judge Anda carried on a guerilla warfare. The Dominicans
were active in enlisting their tenants to fight against the invaders,
and probably he did his share toward the Spanish defense either with
contributions or personal service. The attitude of the region in
which he lived strengthens this surmise, for only after long-continued
wrongs and repeatedly broken promises of redress did Filipino loyalty
fail. This was a century too early for the country around Manila,
which had been better protected and less abused than the provinces
to the north where the Ilokanos revolted.

Binan, however, was within the sphere of English influence, for
Anda's campaign was not quite so formidable as the inscription on his
monument in Manila represents it to be, and he was far indeed from
being the great conqueror that the tablet on the Santa Cruz Church
describes him. Because of its nearness to Manila and Cavite and
its rich gardens, British soldiers and sailors often visited Binan,
but as the inhabitants never found occasion to abandon their homes,
they evidently suffered no serious inconvenience.

Commerce, a powerful factor, destroying the hermit character of
the Islands, gained by the short experience of freer trade under
England's rule, since the Filipinos obtained a taste for articles
before unused, which led them to be discontented and insistent, till
the Manila market finally came to be better supplied. The contrast
of the British judicial system with the Spanish tribunals was also a
revelation, for the foulest blot upon the colonial administration of
Spain was her iniquitous courts of justice, and this was especially
true of the Philippines.

Anda's triumphal entry into the capital was celebrated with a wholesale
hanging of Chinese, which must have made Francisco Mercado glad that
he was now so identified with the country as to escape the prejudice
against his race.

A few years later came the expulsion of the Jesuit fathers and the
confiscation of their property. It certainly weakened the government;
personal acquaintance counted largely with the Filipinos; whole
parishes knew Spain and the Church only through their parish priest,
and the parish priest was usually a Jesuit whose courtesy equalled that
of the most aristocratic officeholder or of any exiled "caja abierta."

Francisco Mercado did not live in a Jesuit parish but in the
neighboring hacienda of St. John the Baptist at Kalamba, where there
was a great dam and an extensive irrigation system which caused the
land to rival in fertility the rich soil of Binan. Everybody in his
neighborhood knew that the estate had been purchased with money left
in Mexico by pious Spaniards who wanted to see Christianity spread in
the Philippines, and it seemed to them sacrilege that the government
should take such property for its own secular uses.

The priests in Binan were Filipinos and were usually leaders among
the secular clergy, for the parish was desirable beyond most in the
archdiocese because of its nearness to Manila, its excellent climate,
its well-to-do parishioners and the great variety of its useful and
ornamental plants and trees. Many of the fruits and vegetables of
Binan were little known elsewhere, for they were of American origin,
brought by Dominicans on the voyages from Spain by way of Mexico. They
were introduced first into the great gardens at the hacienda house,
which was a comfortable and spacious building adjoining the church,
and the favorite resting place for members of the Order in Manila.

The attendance of the friars on Sundays and fete days gave to the
religious services on these occasions a dignity usually belonging to
city churches. Sometimes, too, some of the missionaries from China
and other Dominican notables would be seen in Binan. So the people
not only had more of the luxuries and the pomp of life than most
Filipinos, but they had a broader outlook upon it. Their opinion
of Spain was formed from acquaintance with many Spaniards and from
comparing them with people of other lands who often came to Manila and
investigated the region close to it, especially the show spots such
as Binan. Then they were on the road to the fashionable baths at Los
Banos, where the higher officials often resorted. Such opportunities
gave a sort of education, and Binan people were in this way more
cultured than the dwellers in remote places, whose only knowledge of
their sovereign state was derived from a single Spaniard, the friar
curate of their parish.

Monastic training consists in withdrawing from the world and living
isolated under strict rule, and this would scarcely seem to be
the best preparation for such responsibility as was placed upon the
Friars. Troubles were bound to come, and the people of Binan, knowing
the ways of the world, would soon be likely to complain and demand the