A Woman's Impression of the Philippines by Mary Helen Fee
page 38 of 244 (15%)
page 38 of 244 (15%)
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white muslin shirt which he wore outside his drill trousers. He
carried us through the walled city and out by a masked gate to a drive called the Malecon, a broad, smooth roadway lined with cocoanut palms. On the bay side the waters dashed against the sea wall just as Lake Michigan does on the Lake Shore Drive in Chicago. But the view across the bay at Manila is infinitely more beautiful than that at Chicago. To the left stretches a noble curve of beach, ending with the spires and roofs of Cavite and a purple line of plateau, drawn boldly across the sky. In front there is the wide expanse of water, dotted with every variety of craft, with a lonely mountain, rising apparently straight from the sea, bulking itself in the foreground a little to the left. The mountain is in reality Mt. Marivales, the headland which forms the north entrance to Manila Bay, but it is so much higher than the sierra which runs back from it that it manages to convey a splendid picture of isolation. The sun falls behind Marivales, painting a flaming background for mountains and sea. When that smouldering curtain of night has dropped, and the sea lies glooming, and the ships of all nations swing on their anchor chains, there are few lovelier spots than the Luneta. The wind comes soft as velvet; the surf croons a lullaby, and the little toy horses and toy victorias spin up and down between the palms, settling at last around the turf oval which surrounds the bandstand. Here are soldiers in clean khaki on the benches; officers of the army and navy in snow-white uniforms; Chinamen in robes of purple or blue silk, smoking in their victorias; Japanese and Chinese nursemaids in their native costumes watching their charges at play on the grass; bareheaded American women; black-haired Spanish beauties; and native women with their long, graceful necks rising from the stiff folds of azure or rose-colored kerchiefs. American officers tower by on their |
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