Manila was in the time of the Spaniards a most temperate city; a drunken man was a very rare sight, and would usually be a foreign sailor. Since the American occupation, some hundreds of drinking saloons have been opened, and daily scenes of drunkenness and debauchery have filled the quiet natives with alarm and horror. When John L. Motley wrote his scathing denunciation of the army which the great Duke of Alva led from Spain into the Low Countries, "to enforce the high religious purposes of Philip II.," not foresee that his words would be applicable to an American Army sent to subjugate men struggling to be free "for their welfare, not our gain," nor that this army, besides bringing in its train a flood of cosmopolitan harlotry, [10] would be allowed by its commander to inaugurate amongst a strictly temperate people a mad saturnalia of drunkenness that has scarcely a parallel. Such, however, is undoubtedly the case, and I venture to think that these occurrences have confirmed many of the Tagals in their resolve rather to die fighting for their independence than to be ruled over by such as these. More important still was it to take care that the Tagal insurrection should not have been in vain. That rebellion probably cost fifty thousand human lives, immense loss of property, and untold misery. It was fought against the friars and was at last triumphant. The Spanish friars had been expelled and their lands confiscated. Were the Americans to bring them back and guarantee them in peaceable possession, once more riveting on the chain the Tagals had torn off? This seems to have been General Otis' intention. I think he might have stood upon the accomplished fact. But he did not. The Treaty of Peace under Article VIII. declares that the cession cannot in any respect impair the rights of ecclesiastical bodies to acquire and possess property, whilst Article IX. allows Spanish subjects to remain in the Islands, to sell or dispose of their property and to carry on their professions. Presumably General Otis felt bound by the Treaty in which these general stipulations had been embodied by the Peace Commission, in direct contradiction to the advice given them by Mr. Foreman (see p. 463, 55th Congress, 3rd Sess., Doc. No. 62, part 1), who pointed out the necessity of confiscating these lands, but Mr. Gray replied: "We have no law which will allow us to arbitrarily do so." As soon as the effect of the treaty was known, Archbishop Nozaleda, who had fled to China from the vengeance he feared, returned to Manila. He seemed to have a good deal of interest with General Otis, and this did not please the natives, nor inspire them with confidence. Furthermore, it was reported and generally believed that the friars' vast estates had been purchased by an American Syndicate who would in due time take possession and exploit them. One can understand the Tagals' grief and desperation; all their blood and tears shed in vain! The friars triumphant after all!