About 1860 the government began to concern itself with the construction of public buildings and improvements, and the result is seen in many pueblos in the finely laid-out plazas and well-built municipal edifices grouped about the square--the "tribunal," or town house, the jail, and the small but significant schoolhouses. The government of the town was vested in a "gobernadorcillo" and a council, each of the "consejales" usually representing a hamlet or barrio. But the Spanish friar, who in nearly every pueblo was the parish curate, continued to be the paternal guardian and administrator of the pueblo. In general, no matter was too minute for his dictation. Neither gobernadorcillo nor councillors dared act in opposition to his wishes, and the alcalde of the province was careful to keep on friendly terms and leave town affairs largely to his dictation. The friar was the local inspector of public instruction and ever vigilant to detect and destroy radical ideas. To the humble Filipino, the friar was the visible and only representative of Spanish authority. The Revolt of 1841.--Repression of the People by the Friars.--Unquestionably in the past, the work of the friars had been of very great value; but men as well as institutions may lose their usefulness, as conditions change, and the time was now approaching when the autocratic and paternal régime of the friars no longer satisfied the Filipinos. Their zeal was no longer disinterested, and their work had become materialized by the possession of the vast estates upon which their spiritual charges lived and labored as tenants or dependents. The policy of the religious orders had, in fact, become one of repression, and as the aspirations of the Filipinos increased, the friars, filled with doubt and fear, tried to draw still tighter the bonds of their own authority, and viewed with growing distrust the rising ambition of the people. Apolinario de la Cruz.--The unfortunate revolution of 1841 shows the wayward and misdirected enthusiasm of the Filipino; and the unwisdom of the friars. Apolinario de la Cruz, a young Filipino, a native of Lukban, Tayabas, came up to Manila filled with the ambition to lead a monastic life, and engaged in theological studies. By his attendance upon lectures and sermons and by imitation of the friar preachers of Manila, Apolinario became, himself, quite an orator, and, as subsequent events showed, was able to arouse great numbers of his own people by his appeals.