No one connected even remotely or nominally with the bold delineator of friar government was safe; through the persecution of his relatives he himself could be made to suffer. His brother Paciano was now banished to Mindoro on some blown-up charge of thinking sedition. The pretext was nothing; anything would serve, from barratry to simony. Another brother-in-law was still available, Manuel Hidalgo by name. Him the authorities caught on a charge of sacrilege. A child of his had died of cholera, and he had buried it without the ceremonies of the church. The civil law prescribed in cholera cases immediate burial, and the health-officers demanded it. A poor man in such an emergency might well have been distracted between conflicting decrees of church and state. It seems that in other such cases when the head of the family obeyed the civil precepts he heard nothing of sacrilege. But they were not brothers-in-law of Rizal. Pounce, came the church upon the wretched offender. The next thing he knew he was deported. [110] Next two of Rizal’s sisters fell into the same net. Sedition and sacrilege were handy offenses. They could be preferred against anybody for anything. His father was the next victim. In his case the plain purpose was ruin, to be achieved by means suggested to ill minds through an out-cropping of one man’s childish malice. Mr. Mercado raised prize turkeys. The intendant, or manager, of the Dominican estate, which claimed ownership in all the land in the region of the Mercado homestead, had a nice taste in these birds when skilfully cooked, and it was his pleasing habit to demand from time to time gifts of the choicest of the Mercado turkeys to adorn his own table. The time came when it was no longer possible thus to propitiate the petty tyrant; disease had carried off the firstlings of the flock, and what were left were absolutely needed to replenish the breed. From homely incidents like these we see the Philippines as they were and illuminate again the unforgettable pages of Rizal’s stories. The intendant made no secret of his purpose to revenge himself; they had at least the virtue of candor, these little satraps. He conceived that his immortal dignity had suffered because he had been refused turkeys when there were no turkeys, and nothing would ease the sting of that burning wrong but retribution. When the next rent-day came, Mr. Mercado found that his rent had been doubled. He paid the increase and made no complaint. The next rent-day he found that again the rate had been doubled. This likewise he paid without protest. When the next rent-day came and he found the rate was again increased he made the fatal blunder of appealing to the courts. [111]