Two of our party got into his carriage, while other two went in that belonging to the governor of the town, and behind smart-stepping ponies we bowled off up the road that led west along the Bay. Old Malthus would have been interested to see the number of children that exist in these provincial villages, and it really seemed as if at least one hundred and two per cent. of the population were kids. About eighteen infants could be seen leaning out of every window, in every native hut, and in the streets, by-ways, and hedges they were thick as locusts. Most of these children trailed little else than clouds of glory, since clothes were scarce and expensive. An undershirt was all that any of them seemed to wear, and only the dudes of the one hundred and two per cent. wore that. Much to our amusement, the loiterers by the wayside everywhere saluted us with a "Buenos tardes, Padre," and it appeared that since the holy father is the only one who drives regularly in a landau, the whole population thought of course we must be he, or some of his saintly brethren. And so we went until the gathering darkness compelled a return to the starting-point. An elaborate supper, consisting of hard-shelled crabs and other indigestibles, was followed by an impromptu dance and musicale, and the evening ended in a burst of song. Next morning the little steamer took us and a load of fish and vegetables back to the capital. July 6th. Our modern journals, I know, rejoice to go into all the gruesome details of crime and its punishment, and many of their readers take as much morbid pleasure in poring over accounts of hangings, pictures of the culprit, diagrams of his cell, and last conversations with the jailer, as do the reporters in getting the information with which to make up long, padded articles paid for by the column. I am not morbidly curious myself, and trust you will not think I went to see the capital punishment of two murderers for any other than purely scientific reasons. The two men who were executed on July 4th, just passed, were convicted of chopping a Spaniard to pieces to get the few dollars which he kept in his house, and to avenge themselves for harsh treatment. They were nothing more than native boys, one twenty and the other twenty-two, employed as servants in the family of the unfortunate victim. In short, they were sentenced to death by the garrote, and to the end of carrying out the decree a platform was erected in the open parade-ground behind the Luneta. But the people in the neighborhood objected. The women said they could not sleep from thinking over it, and could not bear to have their children see the scaffold. General Blanco was petitioned, and the place of execution was changed to a broad avenue that leads down through the back part of Manila, by the public slaughter-house. Surely the selection was appropriate.