May 27, 1905.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
411 
^eU and the ladies of his harem. Our new friend would 
then nsually reciprocate by presenting to Pershing some 
cliickens and eggs, or perhaps a knife or a sarong. 
Then, after more talk, our guests would rise and with 
•wime remark about affairs of state needing them, would 
shake hands all round again and take their departure, 
;'.nd another Datto would have been won from the ranks 
• 'I] the hostiles. 
But it was heart-breaking work nevertheless. Time 
after time have I seen Pershing's plans fall all to pieces 
alter he had spent weeks and sometimes months on 
tliem, and through no fault of his own. 
The Moro priests, or Panditas, as they are called, 
were very bitter against us and intensely hostile. 
Nothing seemed too absurd for them to charge against 
i'ershing. Did a Sultan die: It was because he was a 
friend of Pershing. Was the valley devastated by an 
earthquake or a hurricane, it was Allah showing his 
wrath because the people did not arise in their might 
and drive the dogs of Christians into the sea. Once 
it was an epidemic of cholera that was laid at his door, 
but through it all he remained the same calm, cheerful 
person whom nothing seemed to discourage, and no 
sooner would one cherished scheme for the pacificatioa 
of the people crumble away than he would be hard at 
work on another to take its place. 
And that's the way the Moros will be finally con- 
quered. By good, fair, square, honest treatment win- 
ning their confidence and respect. It is the men like 
Pershing who meet with the real, substantial, lastin,:5 
success in handling the natives of the Philippines, and 
who will finally succeed in solving the problem. Al- 
ways friendly, always courteous, always honest with 
them, taking them seriously at all times, even though 
tlieir customs often do seem ridiculous and absurd to 
us, and believing that months of patient waiting and 
diplomacy are infinitely to be preferred to a resort to 
ai'ms which should never be used until all else has 
failed. 
But to get back to this fiesta I started to tell you 
about. Having decided to have the celebration we sent 
out runners to all the neighboring rancherias with 
letters of invitation to every one to come in and cele- 
Ijrate with us. In the invitations we also set forth the 
programme for the day, which consisted of tugs of war, 
foot, pony and horse races, throwing the spear, wrest- 
ling, jumping, etc., most of the events being open - to 
both Moros and soldiers alike, the whole celebration 
to wind up with a big dinner and a dance in the 
^evening. 
The natives took kindly to the idea, and when the 
appointed day rolled around we were assured of a big 
'attendance. Along about 8 o'clock in the morning we 
heard the measured beats of a drum and presently our 
first guests appeared, headed by my friend, Pedro, 
dressed in his very best clothes, the trousers of which 
were made of a pair of bath towels he had talked me 
out of the day before, and looking more like a catfish 
than ever. He and his party had hardly reached the 
outposts, when from every direction could have been 
seen small parties of Moros hurrying toward camp. 
The camp, as is usual in an enemy's country, was 
entirely surrounded by a line of outposts placed here 
and there in commanding positions and anywhere from 
250 to 500 yards apart. It was a rule that all natives 
wishing to enter must do so at certain of these out- 
posts where they were required to leave their weapons 
before being admitted. The non-commissioned officers 
in charge of these designated entrances, of which there 
was one on each side of camp, gave them little slips 
of wood with numbers written on them in exchange 
for their knives, spears, etc., and tags with correspond- 
ing numbers were attached to the arms which were put 
to one side and retained until their owner was ready 
to leave camp. Having completed his business, what- 
ever it was, and wishing to depart, the native went to 
the outpost at which he had entered, presented his slip 
which was taken up, and his knife or knives returned 
to him. When a native desired to bring a number of 
weapons into camp with him for the purpose of selling 
them, he was escorted to the market place, where special 
stalls were provided for the sale of arms, over which a 
heavy guard was always maintained. No one was per- 
mitted to handle, or purchase, these arms except from 
the non-commissioned of^cer in charge, nor were 
natives ever allowed to purchase articles of that char- 
acter within the limits of camp. 
Only a very few permits were given, even to our 
most trusted friends, to enter camp wearing their knives. 
Datto Pedro and Datto Grande, whose loyalty and 
friendship had been thoroughly tested, being the only 
natives, so far as I can now remember, who were habitu- 
ally allowed to do so. This regulation, as may be 
readily understood, was absolutely necessary, and while 
at first it gave us no end of trouble to enforce, and 
was the occasion of much hard feeling toward us on 
the part of some of the natives, they soon became re- 
conciled and apparently thought no more about it. 
Of course, no Moro of rank would any more think 
of appearing in public without his knife, than we would 
think of going to hear Parsifal in a bathing suit. So, 
whenever such a one presented himself at an outpost, 
the officer of the guard was notified and went out and 
escorted him to the commanding officer. Sometimes 
when the visiting Moro was of very, very high rank 
indeed, not only he, but his entire escort as well, were 
allowed to retain their weapons. In such cases, how- 
ever, there was always a company of infantry held in 
readiness, discreetly out of sight behind the tents, in 
case anything should happen, but nothing ever did.. 
As the Moros arrived at the entrances to camp on 
this day of which I am telling you, they were met by an 
officer who passed them in, their leaders being per- 
mitted to retain their arms. They then proceeded to 
Pershing's tent where they paid their respects to him, 
after which they scattered about the camp, meeting 
friends and seeing the sights. 
They were especially interested in the guns of the 
mountain battery and never seemed to tire of ex- 
amining and asking qustions about them. How far 
would they shoot? How much did they cost? What 
was the price of the cartridges for them? and so on, 
ad lib., some of which questions were rather hard to 
answer off hand, particularly in Spanish, which is the 
court language in Moroland, but wdaich was spoken none 
too fluently by either the Moros or ourselves. 
I rather imagine that more than one dusky gentle^ 
man present there that day could have told just how it 
felt to be the man in front of, instead of the one be- 
hind, the gun, so far as these little beauties were con- 
THE SULTAN OF BAYANG. 
cerned,- for there were Moros there from all parts of 
the lake, and among them must have been many who 
had fought against us. 
In fact one Datto called at my tent, and opening his 
jacket, pointed to a scar on his breast, which he said 
was the result of a rifle bullet fired at him by me 
AHMIR BANCURU, THE WEALTHIEST MORO IN MOROLAND. 
during the fight at Fort Paiidapatan, some months be- 
fore, and I remembered both the circumstances and the 
man's face. 
At this fight my company had advanced to within 
about thirty yards of the fort, when I found the Moros 
to be in such strong force that I halted and sent back 
for reenforcements. While, we were waiting for these 
to come up, this Moro, whose name was Narga, and 
I were engaged in an impronaptu duel. The ground 
was utterly devoid of cover of any kind, and while 
kneeling there directing my men and wishing heartily 
that I had never left home and mother, for there were 
about 600 Moros in that fort and its trenches, and each 
one of them seemed to be armed with a latest model 
automatic gun and unlimited ammunition, and to be 
shooting at me personally, when I awakened to the fact 
that a disagreeable person in a red turban and a yellow 
jacket was popping up from the trench right in my front 
every three or four minutes and taking a pot-shot at 
me. There could be no question as to his intentions, 
which were unpleasant; nor as to his aim, which was 
bad, else I would not be writing this. But at such short 
range he could not help coming altogether too close 
for comfort, so I took my rifle, a Winchester, using 
Krag cartridge, and started in to silence his batteries 
before he silenced mine. After potting at each other 
for the better part of an hour I finally landed him, but 
he managed to crawl away and get through our lines 
than night, to reappear at this fiesta and shake hands 
with me. 
We had two very distinguished visitors at our party, 
the Sultan of Bayang, and his father-in-law, Ahmi Ban- 
curan, whose pictures will show you what real, sure 
enough members of the Moro four-hundred look like. 
Bancuran, _the Sultana of Bayang, didn't come, of 
course, but' we called on her later and found her a 
really pretty girl and were royally entertained. 
Pedro, with an eye to the revolver I had promised 
him for Christmas, came to my tent soon after his 
arrival and presented me with a very handsome Spanish 
sword in a beautifully carved silver sheath, the handle 
being of silver of Moro workmanship, and a cage con- 
taining three live quail, an old hen and two chicks, 
which Lomocdi had trapped for me. These quail, which 
are very plentiful over there, are shaped like our Bob 
White, but their plumage is very much darker, almost 
black in fact, and they are without the markings on 
cheek and throat which Bob and his wife sport, and 
are only as large as the English sparrow. As soon 
as I could, I took these that Pedro had brought me 
over to the edge of camp and released them. When 
free, the old hen flew a short distance into the grass 
and in a minute or two I heard a familiar ka-Ioi-hee, 
ka-loi-hee, and the chicks, which had only run a little 
ways and then squatted, scurried into the cover and I 
saw them no more. 
Pedro was very much disappointed at not receiving 
the revolver, but took it with true oriental stoicism 
and said, when I explained that it had not yet arrived, 
and how sorry I was at the delay, "bueno — patiencia," 
by which he meant that it was well and he would have 
to be patient. 
About 10 o'clock, when almost every one had arrived, 
we started up the sports. The first event was a tug-of- 
war between teams from different organizations sta- 
tioned at Camp Vicars. No team from the Moros was 
entered in this event, but in the next, a 100-yard dash, 
several natives ran and one of them came in first. They 
also took part in the three-legged and potato races and 
seemed to enter heartily into the spirit of the thing, 
those participating being laughed at and guyed by the 
other Moros quite as much as our men were by their 
comrades, all of which they took goodnaturedly and 
seemed to enjoy. 
In the spear throwing contest, a tree about twelve 
feet high was used for a target. The bark was peeled 
from one side of it for a distance of five or six feet 
above the ground and, standing off /some thirty or 
thirty-five yards, they cast their spears at it with won- 
derful force and accuracy, using a peculiar underhand 
motion difficult to describe and more so to imitate. 
The spears used in casting were from~ five to six feet 
long ajid had light "behuca" shafts, and steel heads of 
varying lengths and shapes. I had never seen them 
throw their spears before, except on one or two oc- 
casions when, while attacking a fort they threw them 
up in the air from the inside, in hopes that in falling 
they might hit one of us, and I was more interested in 
this event than in any other part of the day's pro- 
ceedings. 
I learned subsequently that of recent years they do 
not use spears very often, except for hunting, or in 
an ambuscade, as many of them have guns and prefer 
to use them for long range work. At close quarters 
they use the kris, or carapilan, which are much handier 
than a spear and quite as effective. It seems to me 
though, they might much better have stuck to their 
spears, as they are certainly very expert with them 
while they can't hit the broad side of a barn with a 
rifle. 
By far the most popular event on the programme was 
the pony races, which w^ere run Moro fashion and were 
very exciting. The Moros are great lovers of horses 
and have some very fine ponies among them. They 
ride perched way up in the air on a wooden saddle, 
wdiich they rest on a sack of dried grass or native cot- 
ton, at least ten inches thick. For stirrups they use 
small pieces of wood with a notch cut in one end; this 
they place between the great and second toes, the 
great toe resting in the notch. These stirrups are sus- 
pended from the saddle proper by a short piece of 
twisted hemp, so that when the rider is mounted his 
feet are little lower than the top of the pony's back 
and he looks like a monkey riding a trick pony at the 
circus. 
The ponies themselves are beautiful little animals 
from eleven and a half to thirteen hands high, the 
average being about twelve hands, anything over that 
being rare. The Moros never use their ponies for 
draught purposes, either riding them or else using them 
for pack animals. As a rule they are mean little beasts 
and will bite or kick or strike whenever they get a 
chance. But they can carry a man weighing in the 
neighborhood of 180 pounds up hill and down dale all 
day and then try to rtsn away or throw him when he 
gets into camp at night. 
The Morro method of racing differs considerably from 
ours. The course is a straightaway about 300 yards 
long. The competitors line up 100 yards or so in 
rear of the starting point and at the word set off in a 
dead run. It doesn't seem to make any difference 
whether they all cross the starting line at once or not, 
just so long as they are not too badly strung out, and 
it is considered perfectly good form to do anything 
that will help you win, even to slashing another pony 
across the face with your quirt, or, if necessary, running 
into a rival and upsetting him. 
On this day there were at least thirty ponies entered 
in the various races, the winners being a little black, 
owned by Ahmi Puk-Puk of Paulus, and a roan, by 
all odds the finest pony I saw in the Philippines, belong- 
ing to Ahmi Tompugo, of Tubyran. Most all Moro 
ponies are single-footers, and this roan could go at that 
gait as fast as my big American horse could trot, which 
wasn't slow, and what was more he could keep up his 
gait much longer than my horse could his. 
After the sports were over, we got up a race between 
the winning ponies, and the two American horses, which 
had won in their races, and while the American horses 
beat, as was to be expected, they didn't have a walk- 
over by any means. 
The horse races wound up the day's programme, 
except for the dance and feast which was to come later 
in the afternoon and in the evening. In the interim 
many of our guests took themselves off to the market 
place to while away the time gambling, and others 
