Early Filipino Writings.--The Filipinos used this writing for setting down their poems and songs, which were their only literature. None of this, however, has come down to us, and the Filipinos soon adopted the Spanish alphabet, forming the syllables necessary to write their language from these letters. As all these have phonetic values, it is still very easy for a Filipino to learn to pronounce and so read his own tongue. These old characters lingered for a couple of centuries, in certain places. Padre Totanes [10] tells us that it was rare in 1705 to find a person who could use them; but the Tagbanua, a pagan people on the island of Paragua, use a similar syllabary to this day. Besides poems, they had songs which they sang as they rowed their canoes, as they pounded the rice from its husk, and as they gathered for feast or entertainment; and especially there were songs for the dead. In these songs, says Chirino, they recounted the deeds of their ancestors or of their deities. Chinese in the Philippines.--Early Trade.--Very different from the Hindu was the early influence of the Chinese. There is no evidence that, previous to the Spanish conquest, the Chinese settled or colonized in these islands at all; and yet three hundred years before the arrival of Magellan their trading-fleets were coming here regularly and several of the islands were well known to them. One evidence of this prehistoric trade is in the ancient Chinese jars and pottery which have been exhumed in the vicinity of Manila, but the Chinese writings themselves furnish us even better proof. About the beginning of the thirteenth century, though not earlier than 1205, a Chinese author named Chao Ju-kua wrote a work upon the maritime commerce of the Chinese people. One chapter of his work is devoted to the Philippines, which he calls the country of Mayi. [11] According to this record it is indicated that the Chinese were familiar with the islands of the archipelago seven hundred years ago. [12] Chinese, Description of the People.--"The country of Mayi," says this interesting classic, "is situated to the north of Poni (Burney, or Borneo). About a thousand families inhabit the banks of a very winding stream. The natives clothe themselves in sheets of cloth resembling bed sheets, or cover their bodies with sarongs. (The sarong is the gay colored, typical garment of the Malay.) Scattered through the extensive forests are copper Buddha images, but no one knows how they got there. [13]