Devil was after bigger game. He scampered over the arching trunk, disappeared on the farther side, and hurried off at a run toward Manila, where a certain rich lawyer was rumored to be dying. From later whisperings it appears that His Majesty was not late. The strange part of the incident is that, although the tree was thus ill-used to serve the Devil's convenience, and is marked along its bark by his cloven feet, it was not blasted, but to this hour is green and flourishing. The Devil's Bridge, as everybody calls it, is an arboreal wonder, curving lightly and gracefully over the chasm, its branches resting on the bank opposite to its root, some of them growing upside down, but all as green and healthy as those of any tree that the Devil spared when he was looking for a way to cross the ravine. Had he waded the stream he not only would have wet his feet, which would have been unpleasant, but would have touched water that had once been blessed, and that would have been torture. The bad farmer did not survive this spectacle by many years, though it is not related that he reformed. The fair-to-middling one lasted for a while longer. The good one may yet be in the land of the living, unless he enlisted under Aguinaldo, which is not likely, because old men cannot run fast enough to be effective members of the Filipino army. The Great Earthquake After months of fighting, Li Ma Hong, the Chinese pirate, and his six thousand followers had been beaten out of Philippine waters. Manila was celebrating the victory on this last night of November, 1645. The church bells had been clanging and chiming, the windows had been lighted, flags and pennants had streamed from the house-tops, sounds of music and cries of rejoicing were heard, a thousand fairy lamps starred the darkness and quivered in the Pasig. The flag of Spain had been carried through the streets in solemn procession, the cathedral altar had smoked with incense, the friars had chanted the "Te Deum," but now all was gayety and music and perfume. A ball was among the festivities, and military and civic officers, pranked in the lace and bullion so dear to the Latins, were going through the narrow ways with their ladies on their arms. Taking no part in the joyous hurly-burly, two men walked apart, near the cathedral, in talk. One was a father in the church; the other, secretary and major-domo of the governor. The calling of the one, the age and dignity of the other, to say nothing of an old wound that gave a hitch and drag to his step, forbade their mingling with the throng. The secretary spoke: "No, father, I hardly agree with your view. That heaven has been on our side I admit, since we have conquered the infidels, seized their treasure, and strewn their corpses on our shores. But that the blessed St. Francis interposes in our behalf, I doubt."