Page images
PDF
EPUB

villages, usually built by the side of a stream, in one, two, or three long streets joined by lines, were fortified. Lunettes covered the ends, stockades arranged in quincunx were erected to close all openings, and the solid stone churches built by the friars were barricaded and loopholed. In many cases these works were constructed by Filipinos who had been educated as civil engineers. The sections and profiles given by Colonel Monteverde do not look contemptible. Nor was it only round the villages that these works were to be found. Many were erected, and strengthened by abutting riflepits and trenches, to stop the roads through the forests. Finally, there was one resource to which the Tagalos might be driven. In order to keep water for irrigation in the dry months, many presas or weirs have been constructed on the upper reaches of the rivers in Cavite. It was seriously feared by the Spanish authorities that, if driven to desperation, their enemies would flood the country by opening the sluices.

Colonel Monteverde speaks with more rancour than generosity of the fighting quality of his foes. Their rebellion is to his mind explicable only by a double dose of original sin. Their courage is to his mind founded only on folly, ignorance, superstitions, and an unpardonable hatred of the Spaniard. As for the superstitions of the Tagalos, and all other Filipinos, there can be no question. Colonel Monteverde assures us that in several actions they

were led by a boy who wore wings, and who in their belief bore a charmed life by virtue of an extremely powerful Antinganting, and the protection of an archangel. Mr Worcester has much to say of the confidence the natives have in these charms, and how impossible it is to remove their belief. They will present you with one of them, and assert that it cannot be damaged by a bullet. When you destroy it with a welldirected shot, they only remark that your Anting - anting is stronger than theirs. Anything, apparently, will do, so long as it is credited with magic powers, a book, a button, a medal, a fragment of metal, a piece of paper with a few words of gibberish written on it, may all be Anting-antings. Colonel Monteverde gives specimens of this last kind. They are covered with rude drawings of a symbolical religious character, and words of dog Latin. Colonel Monteverde's contempt for these amulets does not sit very gracefully on a Spaniard. The bullfighters of his own country go into the ring protected by such things. Among the soldiers who served under Colonel Monteverde's orders there must have been many who carried round their necks little medals bearing the picture of the Virgin or some saint, blessed by the priest, and given to them by their mothers in the villages of Castile, of Aragon, and the hillsides of Navarre. And if these things are not Anting-antings, the reason is that this is not the name for them in Castilian.

We cannot follow the Spanish colonel in his minute account of the fighting in the early months of 1897. The general plan of the operations is sufficiently simple. Polavieja himself held the northern part of the province of Cavite, while his lieutenant-Lachambre-in command of the left division of the army, some 13,000 men with artillery, advanced in a succession of turning movements from the shores of the Laguna de Bay on the western side. The object was to drive the Filipinos from their fortified villages in the interior of Cavite and pin them up against the shores of the bay of Manila. It was carried out with a large measure of success. General Lachambre advanced southward from his headquarters at San Domingo with his three brigades, marching on parallel routes through a closely wooded country. They were often out of sight and hearing of one another. Communications had to be kept up by staff-officers, who rode across country by guesswork, or by the compass. An active enemy who could have attacked with reasonable hope of success might have punished the Spaniards severely for thus dividing their forces. But methods which would infallibly spell disaster if tried against a European enemy answer well when put in practice against Orientals. They did in this case. The Filipinos had no idea of what is meant by beating an enemy in detail, and little notion of aggressive movements of any kind. To judge by the telegrams which have come of late

[ocr errors]

from Manila, they are more bold against the Americans than Colonel Monteverde found them. The only forms of offensive movement they practised were occasional rushes at small outposts, and incessant "sniping' at the Spanish troops on the march and in bivouac. The colonel confesses that this form of worry proved at first a severe trial to the young soldiers who filled the ranks of Lachambre's division. But they soon grew hardened to it, on discovering how badly the Filipinos aimed. After making a large allowance for Colonel Monteverde's natural partiality for his countrymen, we come on the whole to the conclusion that the military quality of the troops engaged in this campaign was nowise inferior to that of the American soldiers who are now fighting in the same region. the very good-natured account which Major Younghusband gives of the American soldiers he saw at Manila leaves no very exalted impression of their military qualities. On the whole, it seems at least as fortunate for them as for the Spaniards that the Filipinos, like most Orientals, have an excessive reliance on rifle-pits, trenches, stockades, and loopholed walls, and that they seem incapable of learning the proper answer to a flank attack.

Indeed,

In this campaign of February and March 1897, the Filipinos certainly acted on a uniform plan. They held the stockades and abattis which they had made across the roads or round their villages till the Spaniards were able to turn their flanks,

and carry the positions by storm after preparing the way by artillery fire. Their local knowledge, and the thickly wooded nature of the country generally, enabled them to escape prolonged pursuit; but this kind of defensive policy can lead to only one result when the assailant is in sufficient numbers, and when his operations are conducted on a combined and intelligent plan. Little by little the Filipinos were driven into a corner. General Lachambre first forced his way south to the mountain of Mataas - na - lupa, and the town of Silang, which he stormed. Then he wheeled to the right, and, having got his enemy on the run, kept him on the run. Meanwhile General Polavieja took care that the Filipinos did not escape to the north -at least, not in an organised body. Many did, no doubt, slip away between the Spanish divisions; but as an army, in any serious sense of the word, the native force ceased to exist. As they were more and more driven to the wall, the resistance of the Filipinos grew fiercer, which is to their honour. At Salitran, one of the later actions of the campaign, where General Zabala was killed, the fighting was desperate. But the storm of Silang, which was one of the earlier actions, was typical of them all. This place is a large village, or small town, formed of three long streets with crosslanes. It contains a strongly built stone church and convent. The ground about it is much broken, and covered with bush. When the Spaniards, after a number of minor actions on the

way, reached the place, it was full of rebels, who had collected there in great numbers, relying on the natural strength of the position, and the fortifications they had erected all about it. Yet it was stormed with the loss of some seventy or eighty in all to the Spaniards, and of several hundreds to the rebels. The assailants broke in at one end, and took the defenders in flank. Like most Orientals-or indeed like most men till they are taught what to do in such cases the Filipinos cannot stand being attacked in that fashion, though they will stick stoutly to their barricades against an enemy who comes on in front. The difficulty of the Spaniards was not to beat the Filipinos, but to overcome the natural obstacles of a roadless country (for the want of roads they had of course to thank themselves), the want of water in the dry season, the heat, the bush, and their insufficient local knowledge. It never seems to have suggested itself to Colonel Monteverde that this last deficiency was discreditable to his countrymen. The new-comers from Spain could not be expected to know the paths through the bush and forest. But there was an almost total want of guides, whether Spanish residents or natives. Only one of these last volunteered to serve, and he made it a condition that he should be allowed to disguise himself in a false beard and moustache, and that his name should be concealed. If General Lachambre's division had not accidentally captured two babaes or native girls in a wood, they would have had

no local information whatever. As a rule, the inhabitants fled before the Spaniards. A Government must surely have been bad indeed when it has contrived to get itself hated to this extent.

Colonel Monteverde, in the course of his rather misnamed brief reflections, remarks that his countrymen have never failed at each successive stage of their history to display military capacity. A good deal might be said upon that point, but it may be allowed that the campaign of Cavite proves them still able to produce officers who can lead and men who can follow. The instructions of General Polavieja are thorough and workmanlike, including some very sensible remarks on the consequences of using a magazine rifle with indiscreet haste. General Lachambre carried out the orders of his commander-in-chief ably. But the end of this spasm of effectual activity was comically Spanish. General Polavieja was attacked by ophthalmia and compelled to resign, which, however, was an accident such as might have happened to anybody. But the conduct of General Lachambre was most truly Spanish. He came home to enjoy an ovation. As for the Government, it behaved like itself. It came to the conclusion that a few fine

words and a little money would complete the pacification of the Philippines. General Primo de Rivera was sent out with orders to make an arrangement on the model of the convention of Zanjon, which wound up the ten years' war in Cuba in 1878 -after a fashion. The rebel

leaders were discouraged by defeat, and not unwilling to be bought off. So the treaty of Biacnabató was made, Aguinaldo and some score and a half of others received a sum down, promises of more, and a safeconduct to Hong-kong. Then the Spanish Government came to the premature conclusion that all was over. It withdrew 7000 of its men, and prepared to settle down once more on its pillow. But all was not over. On the contrary, many minor patriots who had not shared in the benefits of the treaty of Biacnabató took up arms, and began a guerrillero warfare. They were persuaded, not absurdly, that rebellion was a quick and not too dangerous method of making a fortune. The wet season soon carried off more men than had been recalled to Spain, and in 1898 the garrison was again overtaxed everywhere. Meanwhile the troubles of the Spaniards had been increased by an untimely exhibition of the most odious side of their character. A blatant ruffian of the name of Comenge, who took upon himself to play the patriot at Manila, went about preaching "energetic measures." In plain words, this meant massacre, and under the stimulus of this ruffian's speeches a mob of volunteers attacked and murdered some Visaya sailors. The Visayas are inhabitants of the islands south of Luzon, which had hitherto remained quiet. It may be that they would have revolted sooner or later in any case; but it is very probable that the report of this massacre hastened the rising.

In any case it occurred, and was accompanied by atrocities of a shocking kind. As the native troops now began to go over to the rebels bodily, and usually after murdering their Spanish officers, the result was that the Spanish rule was soon in utter ruin. The fragments of these ruins were brought to the ground by Admiral Dewey's

cannon.

The last struggles of Spain in the Philippines may possess only a historic interest. Yet they do serve to explain the problem which the Americans have undertaken to solve. A good deal of obscurity rests on the transactions which took place between Admiral Dewey and Aguinaldo at Hong-kong. The Filipino case is that the Americans promised them help to secure their independence. The American case is that the Filipinos asked for their protection. It is possible that they did; but, then, what did Aguinaldo understand by "protection," and did Admiral Dewey exactly define the sense in which he used the term? There is a good deal of difference between the protection which England gave Spain during the Peninsular War and that which she affords the Nizam of Hyderabad, which again is different from that she gives the Ameer of Afghanistan. The Filipinos would no doubt accept the first freely, and they would probably have no invincible objection to the third. They are fighting because they are threatened by the second. If there be such things as rights and wrongs in the relations of peoples, they have something to say for

themselves. It is true that they had substantially won their independence when America intervened. It is hard that they should be despoiled by their friend.

Right and wrong are out of place in this discussion as completely as the honour of Lady Teazle in a certain famous conversation with Mr. Joseph Surface. The question is whether the Filipinos can vindicate their independence. General Polavieja's campaign, and the the operations of the Americans themselves round Manila, show that the work of breaking up and beating back a native army, though arduous from the nature of the country and the climate, is no impossible feat. But the success of the Spaniards in 1897 also shows that the mere breaking up of the native armies near Manila will not end the war. They had recourse to methods of bribery by which they secured a delusive show of peace, but they would not have secured even so much if they had not bought off Aguinaldo for a space. We cannot suppose that America will imitate the mere bribery of the convention of Biacnabató; but if she does not, and will not resign her attempt to master the islands, then she has assuredly a long series of operations before her on the other side of the coming rainy season. As yet she has touched only a small part of the island of Luzon. The whole has to be mastered. In the other islands there is a marked disinclination to accept her rule. The inhabitants of Panay, for instance, resented

« ՆախորդըՇարունակել »