At the tribunal is maintained a small force of cuadrilleros, who perform police duty, and are supposed to defend the town against bandits and the like. A man who has been elected teniente or gobernadorcillo, or who has served ten years as a cabeza de Barangay, is numbered among the "headmen" of the place. The headmen meet at the tribunal from time to time, and discuss public affairs with great gravity. They assemble every Sunday morning, and, headed by the gobernadorcillo, and frequently also by a band playing very lively airs, they march to the convento and escort the friar to the church, where they all attend mass. The state dress of the headmen is quite picturesque. Their white shirts dangle outside of their pantaloons after the Philippine fashion and over them they wear tight-fitting jackets without tails, which reach barely to their waists. When the jacket is buttoned, it causes the shirt to stand out in a frill, producing a most grotesque effect. HOSPITALITY OF THE A traveler, in speaking about the villagers of Ayala, in Mindanao, says: "We were rather touched by their never-failing hospitality. The Philippine native seems always ready to kill his last fowl for a stranger or share with him his last pot of rice. When we stopped at a hut and asked for a drink, its inmates were loth to offer us water in the cocoanut-shell cups which served their own purpose and hunted up and washed old tumblers or even sent to some neighbors to borrow them. With a glass of water they always gave us a lump of coarse brown sugar to stimulate thirst, an entirely unnecessary precaution." CHAPTER XIII. THE SULU ARCHIPELAGO. Geography of This Island Group-Source of the Sulu Mohammedans-Civil Warfare in the Archipelago-Two Centuries of Piracy-Unavailing Spanish Efforts to Control the Sulus-Zamboanga Fortified-Spanish Garrisons in the IslandsAuthority of the Sultan of Sulu-General Arolas and His Excellent Record as Governor-Spanish Governor Murdered by the Sultan-The Island of Tawi Tawi-Condition of the Slave Trade-A Problem for the United States to Solve. G EOGRAPHICALLY the Sulu archipelago of the Philippines is a group of 150 islands, the chain extending from southwest to northeast between Borneo and Mindanao. The last Spanish report names 150 islands, of which ninety-five are inhabited, besides several hundred islets and rocks. On one side of the chain is the Sulu sea and on the other side the Celebes sea. This chain is likely to play a very prominent part in the annals of American history in the Philippines if the necessity rises for us to attempt their political subjugation and pacification. The history of the Sulus is the history of the Moros, for there is their stronghold. After the Spanish discovery of the Philippines, as the invaders endeavored to extend their sovereignty southwestward from Mindanao, they found as an obstacle in their way the settlements of Sulus. Strangely enough, however, there was in the early days of Philippine history a short alliance between the opposing forces, on which is still based the claim of Spanish sovereignty over the Sulus. The Mohammedans reached this chain of islands as a result of civil warfare in Borneo. Two sultans who were brothers were in conflict in that great island, and the unsuccessful one, with his followers, fled across the channel into the Sulu islands. It was another exodus of the same sort from Borneo that brought the Mohammedan element into Palawan and the adjacent islands. This defeated sovereign, establishing his capital at the town of Sulu, or Jolo, as the Spanish name it, began a Mohammedan civilization which rapidly became a strong power in that part of the world. A cousin. MORO PLOTS AND COUNTERPLOTS. of this sultan settled on Basilan, which is the nearest to Mindanao of the Sulu chain, and soon became its sole ruler. He was loyal to the sultan at first, but in time plotted against him and attacked the capital city unsuccessfully. After many fights on land and sea he retired again to his own possessions in Basilan. Then the sultan himself went to Manila and pledged his vassalage to the Spanish on condition that they would help him subjugate his rebellious cousin. The promise was promptly made, but the squadron which was equipped under the agreement was delayed several months beyond the promised time before it sailed southward. In the meantime the sultan, tired of waiting, attacked the rebels and routed them completely, although he was himself killed in the battle. The Spaniards in due season arrived at Sulu, and, not finding the sultan, turned and went back to Manila. They preserved the treaty with great care and upon this has been based the Spanish claim of sovereignty over the Sulu sultanate. SPANISH DEFEATED BY MOROS. The next ruler, however, Adasaolan, extended his influence far and wide. He developed the archipelago, made alliances with the Mohammedan king of Mindanao and the chief of northern Borneo, and compelled all his subjects and tributaries to adopt the Koran at the point of the sword. He built the first mosque in the city of Sulu and received honors and titles all the way from Turkey, from the head of the Mohammedan church, the Sublime Porte, in recognition of his services to the faith. It would seem that his claim of sovereignty and his possession of the territory gave him a better title to the islands than the treaty of Manila gave to the Spanish. Nevertheless, in 1595 the Spaniards sent an expedition to take possession of their property and incidentally to spread the gospel among the heathen. Nearly all their officers were killed, half the men incapacitated by sickness and wounds, while the war-ship which carried the expedition was so shattered that it was able to get only as far as Cebu on the return journey. From this time on, the Sulu pirates carried their daring incursions throughout the waters of the archipelago, hardly interrupted until English men-of-war suppressed the evil in the present century. Their pirate craft frequently sailed into the neighborhood of the city of Manila and actually captured trading vessels within sight of the peninsula of Cavite. At one time the Sulu pirates held Bohol, Cebu, Negros, Leyte and even a part of Panay under tribute. When communities refused to pay tribute they were attacked by these daring invaders, their men slain, their houses burned, their property looted, and their wives and daughters taken as slaves away to the south. COLONIAL OFFICE-HOLDERS ROB SPAIN. Undoubtedly the Madrid government did the best it could under the circumstances. It appropriated large sums of money for men-ofwar, forts, weapons and ammunition, and directed the Philippine officials to exterminate the piratical communities. But the money was diverted into the pockets of colonial office-holders. Thousands of inoffensive natives were slaughtered in the wars, while the governors wrote home accounts of imaginary victories and glowing descriptions of the blessings of peace. At the end of their terms they came back rich for life. The most pretentious effort made by the Spanish to terminate the constant warfare between Spain and Sulu was the establishment of a settlement at Zamboanga, at the extreme southeast point of Mindanao. Here they built a walled city, constructed strong forts and made it a naval station and arsenal second only to Cavite. Directly opposite Basilan, and in such close proximity to the Sulu archipelago, it provided a fine base of operations, offensive and defensive. But so little care was taken of the sanitation of the place that it soon became known as the sepulchre of Spain. The absence of sewage and sanitation, combined with the heat and moisture, developed malarial diseases whose deadliness astonished even the Spaniards. Of one garrison of a thousand men, 850 died in a single year. In 1750 the governor-general of the Philippines sent a large expedition from Manila to attack Sulu, but the fleet returned to Zamboanga having accomplished nothing. The islands were continually ravaged by the Mohammedan sultan. At last, in 1770, there was a |