first, the "head of a barangay" meant the leader or chief of a family or group of families. This office, quite analogous to the old Germanic or Anglo-Saxon "head of a hundred," was adopted and perpetuated by the Spaniards in their system of local administration.--TR.

[68]--The hermano mayor was a person appointed to direct the ceremonies during the fiesta, an appointment carrying with it great honor and importance, but also entailing considerable expense, as the appointee was supposed to furnish a large share of the entertainments. Hence, the greater the number of hermanos mayores the more splendid the fiesta,--TR.

[69]--Mt. Makiling is a volcanic cone at the southern end of the Lake of Bay. At its base is situated the town of Kalamba, the author's birthplace. About this mountain cluster a number of native legends having as their principal character a celebrated sorceress or enchantress, known as "Mariang Makiling."--TR.

[70]--With uncertain pace, in wandering flight, for an instant only --without rest.

[71]--The chinela, the Philippine slipper, is a soft leather sole, heelless, with only a vamp, usually of plush or velvet, to hold it on.--TR.

[72]--"All hope abandon, ye who enter here." The words inscribed over the gate of Hell: Dante's Inferno, III, 9.--TR.

[73]--"Listening Sister," the nun who acts as spy and monitor over the girls studying in a convent.--TR.

[74]--"Más sabe el loco en su casa que el cuerdo en la ajena." The fool knows more in his own house than a wise man does in another's.-- TR.

[75]--The College of Santo Tomas was established in 1619 through a legacy of books and money left for that purpose by Fray Miguel de Benavides, O. P., second archbishop of Manila. By royal decree and papal bull, it became in 1645 the Royal and Pontifical University of Santo Tomas, and never, during the Spanish régime, got beyond the Thomistic theology in its courses of instruction.--TR.

[76]--Take heed lest you fall!

[77]--Ferdinand and Isabella, the builders of Spain's greatness, are known in Spanish history as "Los Reyes Católicos."--TR.

[78]--These spectacular performances, known as "Moro-Moro," often continued for several days, consisting principally of noisy combats between Moros and Christians, in which the latter were, of course, invariably victorious. Typical sketches of them may be found in Foreman's The Philippine Islands, Chap. XXIII, and Stuntz's The Philippines and the Far East, Chap. III.--TR.

[79]--"The Willow."

[80]--The capital of Laguna Province, not to be confused with the Santa Cruz mentioned before, which is a populous and important district in the city of Manila. Tanawan, Lipa, and Batangas are towns in Batangas Province, the latter being its capital.--TR.

[81]--"If on your return you are met with a smile, beware! for it means that you have a secret enemy."--From the Florante, being the advice given to the hero by his old teacher when he set out to return to his home.

Francisco Baltazar was a Tagalog poet, native of the province of Bulacan, born about 1788, and died in 1862. The greater part of his life was spent in Manila,--in Tondo and in Pandakan, a quaint little village on the south bank of the Pasig, now included in the city, where he appears to have shared the fate largely of poets of other lands, from suffering "the pangs of disprized love" and persecution by the religious authorities, to seeing himself considered by the people about him as a crack-brained dreamer. He was educated in the Dominican school of San Juan de Letran, one of his teachers being Fray Mariano Pilapil, about whose services to humanity there may be some difference of opinion on the part of those who have ever resided in Philippine towns, since he was the author of the "Passion Song" which enlivens the Lenten evenings. This "Passion Song," however, seems to have furnished the model for Baltazar's Florante, with the pupil surpassing the master, for while it has the subject and characters of a medieval European romance, the spirit and settings are entirely Malay. It is written in the peculiar Tagalog verse, in the form of a corrido or metrical romance, and has been declared by Fray Toribio Menguella, Rizal himself, and others familiar with Tagalog, to be a work of no mean order, by far the finest and most characteristic composition in that, the richest of the Malay dialects.--TR.

[82]--Every one talks of the fiesta according to the way he fared at it.

[83]--A Spanish prelate, notable for his determined opposition in the Constituent Cortes of 1869 to the clause in the new Constitution providing for religious liberty.--TR.

[84]--"Camacho's wedding" is an episode in Don Quixote, wherein a wealthy man named Camacho is cheated out of his bride after he has prepared a magnificent wedding-feast.--TR.

[85]--The full dress of the Filipino women, consisting of the camisa, pañuelo, and saya suelta, the latter a heavy skirt with a long train. The name mestiza is not inappropriate, as well from its composition as its use, since the first two are distinctly native, antedating the conquest, while the saya suelta was no doubt introduced by the Spaniards.

[86]--The nunnery of St. Clara, situated on the Pasig River just east of Fort Santiago, was founded in 1621 by the Poor Clares, an order of nuns affiliated with the Franciscans, and was taken under the royal patronage as the "Real Monasterio de Santa Clara" in 1662. It is still in existence and is perhaps the most curious of all the curious relics of the Middle Ages in old Manila.--TR.

[87]--The principal character in Calderon de la Barca's La Vida es Sueño. There is also a Tagalog corrido, or metrical romance, with this title.--TR.

[88]--The Douay version.--TR.

[89]--"Errare humanum est": "To err is human."

[90]--To the Philippine Chinese "d" and "l" look and sound about the same.--TR.

[91]--"Brothers in Christ."

[92]--"Venerable patron saint."

[93]--Muy Reverendo Padre: Very Reverend Father.

[94]--Very rich landlord. The United States Philippine Commission, constituting the government of the Archipelago, paid to the religious orders "a lump sum of $7,239,000, more or less," for the bulk of the lands claimed by them. See the Annual Report of the Philippine Commission to the Secretary of War, December 23, 1903.--TR.

[95]--Cumare and cumpare are corruptions of the Spanish comadre and compadre, which have an origin analogous to the English "gossip" in its original meaning of "sponsor in baptism." In the Philippines these words are used among the simpler folk as familiar forms of address, "friend," "neighbor."--TR.

[96]--Dominus vobiscum.

[97]--The Spanish proverb equivalent to the English "Birds of a feather flock together."--TR.

[98]--For "filibustero."

[99]--Tarantado is a Spanish vulgarism meaning "blunderhead," "bungler." Saragate (or zaragate) is a Mexican provincialism meaning "disturber," "mischief-maker."--TR.

[100]--Vete á la porra is a vulgarism almost the same in meaning and use as the English slang, "Tell it to the policeman," porra being the Spanish term for the policeman's "billy."--TR.

[101]--For sospechoso, "a suspicious character."--TR.

[102]--Sanctus Deus and Requiem aeternam (so called from their first words) are prayers for the dead.--TR.

[103]--Spanish etiquette requires that the possessor of an object immediately offer it to any person who asks about it with the conventional phrase, "It is yours." Capitan Tiago is rather overdoing his Latin refinement.--TR.

[104]--A metrical discourse for a special occasion or in honor of some distinguished personage. Padre Zuñiga (Estadismo, Chap. III) thus describes one heard by him in Lipa, Batangas, in 1800, on the occasion of General Alava's visit to that place: "He who is to recite the loa is seen in the center of the stage dressed as a Spanish cavalier, reclining in a chair as if asleep, while behind the scenes musicians sing a lugubrious chant in the vernacular. The sleeper awakes and shows by signs that he thinks he has heard, or dreamed of hearing, some voice. He again disposes himself to sleep, and the chant is repeated in the same lugubrious tone. Again he awakes, rises, and shows that he has heard a voice. This scene is repeated several times, until at length he is persuaded that the voice is announcing the arrival of the hero who is to be eulogized. He then commences to recite his loa, carrying himself like a clown in a circus, while he sings the praises of the person in whose honor the fiesta has been arranged. This loa, which was in rhetorical verse in a diffuse style suited to the Asiatic taste, set forth the general's naval expeditions and the honors he had received from the King, concluding with thanks and acknowledgment of the favor that he had conferred in passing through their town and visiting such poor wretches as they. There were not lacking in it the wanderings of Ulysses, the journeys of Aristotle, the unfortunate death of Pliny, and other passages from ancient history, which they delight in introducing into their stories. All these passages are usually filled with fables touching upon the marvelous, such as the following, which merit special notice: of Aristotle it was said that being unable to learn the depth of the sea he threw himself into its waves and was drowned, and of Pliny that he leaped into Vesuvius to investigate the fire within the volcano. In the same way other historical accounts are confused. I believe that these loas were introduced by the priests in former times, although the fables with which they abound would seem to offer an objection to this opinion, as nothing is ever told in them that can be found in the writings of any European author; still they appear to me to have been suited