"They have verses of as many as twelve syllables, which are the ones generally used in their poems. They are divided into quatrains, whose four verses rhyme among themselves. The Filipino rhyme, however, consists in the last letter being a vowel or a consonant.... They read all their verses in a singing tone, and the quatrains of the twelve-syllable verse are read with the motif of the comintan, which is their national song. The custom of singing when reading poetry is a practice of China, and of all the Asiatic peoples whom I have visited. The kind of versification which I have just cited is evidently anterior to our conquest, as is also the above-mentioned air, which is adjusted to it. This air is melancholy and does not resemble at all any Chinese or Indian music that I have heard. There are several comintans, just as there are different boleros, Polish dances, or Tyrolian dances. Some of them have a great resemblance to the music of Arabia. On the slopes of Camachin [which is a mountain in southern Mindanao], I heard a song which is exactly and purely of that sort...." (Mas, pp. 115, 116.) The Celestina mentioned by Mas is a noted dramatic story--probably written about 1480, and by Rodrigo Cota, of Toledo, and others--which has exercised a very strong influence on the Spanish national drama. It has great literary merit, admirable style, and well-drawn pictures of human nature; and it attained so extensive and continual popularity that even the Inquisition did not place Celestina in the Index until 1793, notwithstanding its grossness of thought and language. (Ticknor, History of Spanish Literature, i, pp. 262-272.) [229] M. and D. read "Christ our Lord." [230] "In the Visayas," says Delgado (p. 317) "very rarely do the Indians imitate the Spaniards in their dress; for almost all of them go barefoot, according to their custom, and wear long black garments that cover the entire body (which we call cassocks or lambong), very wide breeches, and the shirt outside. For they can never accustom themselves, as do the Spaniards, to gathering it inside, as is the custom of the country. I have seen the same among the Tagálogs, with the exception of some servants of the Spaniards, and some officials and clerks, among them. But these men do not make the rule for the other nations of this archipelago, who are numerous and different. I can truly tell what I see among the Spaniards of Visayas, who dress in the same manner as the Indians; and very rarely do they put on shoes and stockings or slippers, except on an important feast-day when they go to the church, for they cannot endure it any other way. It is a fact that the Indians do preserve somewhat their ancient customs in districts where there is less civilization and instruction; but where they are well taught and directed, they have almost forgotten these."