THE MODERN INHABITANTS. 125 
and everybody knows how to prepare coconut leaves for thatching 
and pandanus leaves for lashing together the parts of a house or rancho, 
Some of the natives are remarkably versatile, being called upon to 
practice various callings, as occasion may require, One of the Spanish 
governors, who elsewhere speaks somewhat disparagingly of the 
Chamorros, writes as follows: 
The late master armorer of the post, Don Vicente Pangelinan, worked with greater 
or less perfection as armorer, locksmith, blacksmith, wood carver, cabinetmaker, 
carpenter, silversmith, lathe turner. He was well fitted to perform clerical work, 
having been employed as clerk in the treasury, assisting with the local accounts as 
well as with the college fund in cases of urgency; speaks and writes Spanish fairly 
well and speaks English, and remaining after all these accomplishments a person of 
simple life and modest bearing. 
The successor and son-in-law of Don Vicente, the present armorer, 
also works as gunsmith, locksmith, blacksmith, silversmith, turner, 
carver, inlayer, clock repairer, and tortoise-shell worker. He is also 
a thrifty rice grower, and attends personally to his plantations. One 
of the most interesting sights is to see him take a condemned musket 
and conyert 2 portion of its barrel into a knife blade, welding in the 
steel spring for the edge and fitting to it a handle of buffalo horn 
inlaid with mosaic designs of silver, mother-of-pearl, or tortoise shell. 
All of this he does with most primitive appliances. With equal skill 
and apparent pleasure in his work he converts an old piece of iron 
into a fosifo or scuttle hoe or into a plowpoint. The husband of one 
of Don Vicente’s granddaughters is the principal silversmith of the 
island. He makes spoons, forks, ladles, cups, or bowls well shaped 
and finely finished, and he imitates models furnished him remarkably 
well, melting up worn coin and silver pesos for his material. 
The principal cabinetmaker, a Filipino by birth, is also a rice 
planter. He makes beautiful wardrobes of ifilwood, carving them in 
designs of his own invention and finishing them beautifully. Not 
many chairs are made in Guam, as the natives prefer benches or 
settees. The ordinary tables, benches, and other furniture bear a 
close resemblance to the forms now popular in the United States 
known as ‘* mission furniture.” Canopies for beds and tops of ward- 
robes are often carved, and show Philippine influence, the forms 
resembling those used by the Malayan people. The beds are usually 
provided with woven bottoms of rattan, like our cane-bottom chairs. 
There are men in Guam who make these bottoms, but they get their 
‘behuko,” as they call the rattan, from the Philippines. 
Boards for the sides of houses and for floors are sawed by band 
with large two-handled ripsaws, the logs being inclined against a 
raised platform, so that one man may stand on a stage above and the 
other on the ground. Serviceable carts are made with tough elastic 
