Mail-steamers, subsidized by the Government, left the capital every fortnight for the different islands, and there was a quarterly Pacific Mail Service to the Ladrone Islands. [127] Regular mails arrived from, and left for, Europe every fortnight, but as there were intermediate opportunities of remitting and receiving correspondence, really about three mails were received and three despatched every month. The mail-route for Europe is _via_ Singapore, but there were some seven or eight sailings of steamers per month between Manila and Hong-Kong (the nearest foreign colony--640 miles), whence mails were forwarded to Europe, Australia, Japan, the United States, etc. Between the capital and several ports in the adjacent provinces there was a daily service of passenger and light cargo-steamers. Between Yloilo and the adjoining Province of Antique, the District of Concepcion and the Islands of Negros and Cebu, there were some half-dozen small steamers, belonging to Filipinos and Spaniards, running regularly with passengers and merchandise, whilst in the sugar-producing season--from January to May--they were fully freighted with cargoes of this staple article. The carrying-trade in sailing craft between the Islands was chiefly in the hands of natives and half-castes. There were also a few Spanish sailing-ship owners, and in the Port of Yloilo a few schooners (called _lorchas_), loading from 40 to 100 tons of sugar, were the property of foreigners, under the nominal ownership of Spanish subjects, for the reasons mentioned in the preceding page. The principal exporters employ middlemen for the collecting of produce, and usually require their guarantee for sales at credit to the provincial purchasers of imports. These middlemen are always persons of means, born in the Colony, and, understanding both the intricacies of the native character and the European mode of transacting business, they serve as very useful--almost indispensable--intermediaries.