When driving along a road through paddy-fields in October, it seems incredible that every blade of that luxuriant crop has been transplanted by hand. Yet the people who do this are branded as lazy. I think that they are quite ready to work for a sufficient inducement. Whenever I had works to execute I never experienced any difficulty in obtaining men. I made it a rule to pay every man with my own hands every Saturday his full wages without deductions. On Monday morning, if I wanted 300 men, there would be 500 to pick and choose from. I should like to see some of their depreciators try an hour's work planting paddy, or poling a casco up stream. The undulating nature of the ground renders it necessary to divide paddy land into small plots of irregular outline at varying levels, divided from each other by ridges of earth called pilápiles, so as to retain the rain or irrigation water, allowing it to descend slowly from level to level till it reaches its outlet at the lowest point. The Tagals fully justify their Turanian origin by the skill and care which they show in irrigation. About Manila, the sacáte, or meadow-grass, which is the principal food of the thousands of ponies in the city, is cultivated on lands which are exactly at a level to be flooded by the spring-tides. The mango-tree is carefully cultivated, and the fruit is, to some extent, forced by lighting fires of leaves and twigs under these trees every evening in the early part of the year to drive off insects, and give additional warmth. In Batangas and La Luguna, and, to some extent, in Bulacan, the Tagals cultivate the sugar-cane successfully. But where they really shine, where all their care is lavished, where nothing is too much trouble, is in the cultivation of the buyo (Piper betel). This is a climbing plant, and is grown on sticks like hops. There were many plantations of this near Pineda, which I frequently visited. It is grown in small fields, enclosed by hedges or by rows of trees to keep off the wind. The soil is carefully prepared, and all weeds removed. As the tendrils grow up, the sticks are placed for them. The plants are watered by hand, and leaf by leaf carefully examined every morning to remove all caterpillars or other insects. The plants are protected from the glare of the sun by mat-shades supported on bamboos. The ripe leaves are gathered fresh every morning, and taken to market, where they find a ready sale at remunerative prices for chewing with the areca nut, and a pinch of slaked shell lime. Whenever I have had Tagal hunters with me deer-shooting, I have been struck with their knowledge of the natural history of their locality. They thoroughly understood the habits of the game, and almost always foretold correctly the direction from which the deer would approach the guns. They have names for every animal and bird, and for the different ages or conditions, or size of antlers, of the deer.