"We went along at a good speed in an open carriage drawn by a pair of lively young horses that were said to have been newly imported from Australia; they will lose their spirit after a while in this hot climate, and a year or two from now it will not be easy to get them to go faster than a slow trot. Everybody takes a drive who can afford it, besides a good many who cannot stand the expense. Their doing so has caused a curious custom to be adopted by the drivers; whenever you hire a cab in the streets, you must pay for it in advance, or the driver will not go with you. The drivers have been cheated so much that they have become suspicious and won't trust anybody, and certainly they are not to be blamed. Mr. Segovia says that a great many of the Spaniards who come here are without money or character, and think they have a right to swindle any one who will trust them. The merchants are obliged to be very cautious, but in spite of all their care they lose a good deal by these adventurers. "Every little while in our drive we came to a canal, and a portion of the way we followed the banks of the Pasig. The canals are small, and only scantily filled with half-stagnant water, and the smells that rise from them are anything but nice. Dead dogs and cats were floating on the water, but the men rowing the numerous boats did not seem to mind them. You can go all around the Binondo suburb in a boat, and some day we mean to do so, if we can stand the odors. "As we passed near the river we saw a funny sight--a raft of cocoa-nuts, with a native on it, floating down the stream. The nuts are tied together with pieces of the husk, which are partially detached with a knife, and the whole mass is so buoyant that a hundred of them attached to each other will support a man. A native starts with a raft of nuts from somewhere up the river, and floats down to market. He goes to sleep there, and lets the current carry him along; and if his conveyance runs on shore, he wakes up, gives it a push out into the stream, and goes to sleep again. It is an easy and cheap mode of travelling, and when he has sold his raft, he walks home, or works his passage on a boat bound in his direction. [Illustration: A CREOLE IN EUROPEAN DRESS.] "Mr. Segovia pointed out the various classes of people in Manilla, and it did not take us long to be able to distinguish them from one another. He divides them into Spaniards, Creoles, Tagals, Chinese, and Mestizoes; the Tagals are the natives, the Creoles are children of Spanish fathers and native mothers, and the Mestizoes are of Chinese parentage on one side, and native on the other. The word Mestizoes is generally abbreviated to "Metis," as our friend explained to us, and we will call them so in this letter. [Illustration: SPANISH METIS.]