The Monastic Orders. 303 



pleasure of being made acquainted with Fray Joaquin Fonse- 

 ca, who also holds the appointment of Professor of Theology 

 in the University of St. Thomas, and were presented by him 

 with a copy of an imperfect epic poem composed in Spanish, 

 which had for subject the history of the island of Luzon and 

 its inhabitants.* Of this interesting fragment we shall pub- 

 lish a translation in another place. 



Just as we were leaving the Dominican monastery, its 

 worthy Prior begged our acceptance, by way of souvenir of 

 om' visit, of a copy of Dante's Divina Commedia in the 

 original text, and a dictionary of the Ybanac, one of the 

 idioms most extensively used throughout the Archipelago. 



The monastery of the Franciscans presents no other 

 feature of interest, than in so far as it is an emblem of the 

 melancholy spiritual decay in which the members of this 

 order at present find themselves in Manila. The dirt and 

 untidiness which were not merely apparent in the various 

 apartments, but which were even but too obvious in the 

 external appearance of the brothers of the order, make a 

 most disagreeable impression ; for poverty and necessity, 

 these two cardinal principles of the mendicant orders, are by 

 no means incompatible with cleanliness and neatness. 



The Franciscans possess 16 missions in 14 of the provinces, 



published under the auspices of Government, and which treats much more of religious 

 than of political topics. There are but two printing and publishing houses in Ma- 

 nila, one of which is in the hands of the Dominicans, and prints almost exclusively 

 Prayer-books and religious works. 



• This historical poem is entitled " Luzonia, o sea Los Genios del Pasiy." 



