As to other sciences, for example, he excelled in chemistry. Before he was twenty-one he had obtained degrees as surveyor and agricultural expert. He was an excellent engineer and so scientific an educator that when the Philippine Republic came to be erected the plan of the educational department and work was taken from his writings. In Leipzig he went deeply into psychology, in which he was fellow-student with Hugo Münsterberg. While he was at Dapitan he learned how to sail a ship, and taught their trade to the fishermen, because he showed them how to make and how to handle a better kind of net. Incidentally, he had the makings of a great journalist. Concerning his place as a poet, most of his poetry was written in Spanish and after the approved Spanish manner. Like other poetry it is virtually incapable of translation. The thought may be indicated but not the melodic significance, so important in Spanish, and of which he was a facile master. How impossible it is to reproduce this in translation is apparent to one that will compare the five-line Spanish stanza as Rizal left it and the best English version of the same stanza. A poem that he wrote at Dapitan, “My Retreat,” [182] dedicated to his mother, is an adequate expression of the reverent attitude toward nature that he managed to carry with him unimpaired in so many vicissitudes and long inhumations in the sordid dust of cities. This is the first stanza in Mr. Derbyshire’s version: [183] By the spreading beach where the sands are soft and fine, At the foot of the mount in its mantle of green, I have built my hut in the pleasant grove’s confine From the forest seeking peace and a calmness divine, Rest for the weary brain and silence to my sorrow keen. From poetry, we pass to sociology, a transition that might seem violent enough in one of less versatility. The commandants, of course, must be parts of the general machinery of espionage and report to Manila what they observed in this evil sprite that might show dangerous machinations against the peace and dignity of our lord the king. Some of the reports they made are still extant. One of them sent about this time by a commandant, the Captain Ricardo Carnicero, to Governor-General Despujol contains this account of a conversation: Carnicero. Tell me, Rizal, what reforms seem to you most vital for this country? Rizal. First of all, to secure representation for it in the Cortes [Spanish parliament] that there may be an end to the despotisms now committed upon it. Next to secularize the priesthood, [184] abolishing the power the friars now exercise over the Government and the country. To distribute the parishes as they become vacant, among the body of the clergy, so that the clergy may be both Spanish and Philippine. To reform the administration in all its branches.