BY THE REV. J. E. TENISON-WOODS, P.G.S., ifec. 689 



well-to-do centre of an agricultural district. It has a population 

 of between forty and tifty thousand, and consists of the usual 

 crowded streets of bamboo huts shaped like bee-hives, with a fine 

 stone church in the midst, a ruined Casa Reale, and one or two 

 other stone buildings of modest pretensions. It is a favourite 

 watering-place, whose situation, the neatness of its streets, its fine 

 Plaza, and the multitude of its houses give it a very picturesque 

 appearance. This is much increased by the surrounding meadows, 

 orchards, and gardens, all of tropical beauty and luxuriance. 

 The climate, from its proximity to the sea, is said to be fresh and 

 agreeable and free from the epidemic maladies of the islands. 

 Nevertheless, the Spaniards resort to it but little. There are 

 scarcely any European residents, the large population consisting 

 almost exclusively of Tagalo Indians withafew Mestizos. When the 

 Spaniards originally settled on this part of the coast they found a 

 large native population established further from the sea and 

 nearer to the lake, and here the missionaries built their church, 

 and the officials their civil and military establishments. But all 

 this and the town itself were destroyed by the terrible eruption of 

 the volcano in the month of December 1754. When this ceased 

 and the population began to return to their fields, the town was 

 founded anew on the banks of the river, and as far as possible 

 from the volcano. The ruins of the former town form conspi- 

 cuous objects in the plain. 



The parochial church is of the usual Spanish style, evidently 

 constructed with a view to probable earthquake contingences. 

 There is a Campo Santo or public cemetery of the kind usual in 

 the Philippines, that is a combination of cemetery and catacomb. 

 It is, however, far from the population and well- ventilated. There 

 is a primary school, a monastexy and a prison. The soil in the 

 neighbourhood, like most volcanic regions, is very rich. Its prin- 

 cipal productions are wheat, rice, maize, coffee, cocoa, pimento, 

 — which includes pepper, capsicums, chilis, and other hot condiments 

 — hemp, cotton, besides many vegetables and abundance of fruits. 

 Moreover, as the country abounds with aromatic flowers, there are 

 bees in abundance, from which the natives gather valuable stores 



