The colony showed signs of breaking up. The native scouts had gone, leaving their weeping "_hindais_" on the shore. "Major O'Dowd," his wife, and Flora had also departed to a station _sin Americanos_ up in the interior. At this, the doctor, for the first time in his life, broke into song, after the style and meter of immortal Omar: "Hiram, indeed is gone; his little Rose Vamosed to Lintogoup with all her clothes; But still the Pearls are with us down the line, And many a _hindai_ to the _tubig_ goes." "Tubig," he said, "did not mean 'water.' It was more poetical, expressing the idea of fountain, watering-place, or spa." It was my last day at Aloran. In the morning I ascended a near elevation, and looked down upon the sleepy valley spread below. There was the river winding in and out; there was the convent, like a doll-house in a field of green. Vivan had gone on with the trunks and boxes packed upon a carabao. The ponies were waiting in the compound. Valedictories were quickly said; but there was little Peter with his silken cheeks, the brightest little fellow I have ever known. It seemed a shame to leave him there in darkest Mindanao. Turning the horses into the Aloran River at the ford we struck the high road near the _barrio_ of Feliz. Galloping on, past "Columbine" bridge, "Skeleton" bridge, "Johnson's Despair," and Fenis, we arrived at Oroquieta in good time. But what a change from the old place as we had known it! Hiram, indeed was gone. The doctor had set out for pastures new. The "Arizona Babe" and "Foxy Grandpa" had departed for fresh fields. Like one who, falling asleep in a theater, awakes to find the curtain down and the spectators gone, so I now looked about the vacant town. The actors had departed, and "the play was played out." Chapter XIII. In Camp and Barracks with the Officers and Soldiers of the Philippines. Bugle-calls, loud, strident bugle-calls, leaping in unison from the brass throats of bugles; tawny soldiers lining up for guard-mount before the officer of the day, as spick and span as a toy soldier; troopers in blue shirts, with their mess-kits in their hands, running across the street for rations; men in khaki everywhere, raising a racket on pay-day, fraternizing with the Filipinos when off duty; poker games in the barracks, with the army cot and blanket for a table; taps, and the measured tread of sentries, and anon a startled challenge, "Halt! Who's there?"--such were the days in Cagayan in 1901.