330 MANILLA. 



or other places, and not allowing them to remain standing ; further- 

 more, the parish curates are required to treat them with equal respect. 

 So far as concerns the provinces, the government may be called, 

 notwithstanding the officers, courts, &c, monastic. The priests 

 rule, and frequently administer punishment, with their own hands, 

 to either sex, of which an instance will be cited hereafter. 



As soon as we could procure the necessary passports, which were 

 obligingly furnished by the governor to " Don Russel Sturges y quatro 

 Anglo Americanos," our party left Manilla for a short jaunt to the 

 mountains. It was considered as a mark of great favour on the part 

 of his excellency to grant this indulgence, particularly as he had a 

 few months prior denied it to a party of French officers. I was told 

 that he preferred to make it a domestic concern, by issuing the pass- 

 port in the name of a resident, in order that compliance in this case 

 might not give umbrage to the French. It was generally believed 

 that the cause of the refusal in the former instance was the imprudent 

 manner in which the French officers went about taking plans and 

 sketches, at the corners of streets, &c, which in the minds of an un- 

 enlightened and ignorant colonial government, of course excited sus- 

 picion. Nothing can be so ridiculous as this system of passports ; for 

 if one was so disposed, a plan, and the most minute information of 

 every thing that concerns the defences of places, can always be 

 obtained at little cost now-a-days ; for such is the skill of engineers, 

 that a plan is easily made of places, merely by a sight of them. We 

 were not, however, disposed to question the propriety of the governor's 

 conduct in the former case, and I felt abundantly obliged to him for a 

 permission that would add to our stock of information. 



It was deemed at first impossible for the party to divide, as they 

 had but one passport, and some difficulties were anticipated from the 

 number being double that stated in the passport. The party consisted 

 of Messrs. Sturges, Pickering, Eld, Rich, Dana, and Brackenridge. 

 Mr. Sturges, however, saw no difficulty in dividing the party after 

 they had passed beyond the precincts of the city, taking the precau- 

 tion at the same time, not to appear together beyond the number 

 designated on the paper. 



On the 14th, they left Manilla, and proceeded in carriages to Santa 

 Anna, on the Pasig, in order to avoid the delay that would ensue if 

 they followed the windings of the river in a banca, and against the 

 current. 



At Santa Anna they found their bancas waiting for them, and 



