the beginning were thrown in the farmers's way by the rulers, who were
influenced by childish fear and saw everywhere signs of conspiracies
and uprisings. The natives were not allowed to go to their labors,
that is, their farms, without permission of the governor, or of his
agents and officers, and even of the priests as Morga says. Those who
know the administrative slackness and confusion in a country where the
officials work scarcely two hours a day; those who know the cost of
going to and returning from the capital to obtain a permit; those who
are aware of the petty retaliations of the little tyrants will well
understand how with this crude arrangement it is possible to have the
most absurd agriculture. True it is that for some time this absurdity,
which would be ludicrous had it not been so serious, has disappeared;
but even if the words have gone out of use other facts and other
provisions have replaced them. The Moro pirate has disappeared but
there remains the outlaw who infests the fields and waylays the farmer
to hold him for ransom. Now then, the government, which has a constant
fear of the people, denies to the farmers even the use of a shotgun,
or if it does allow it does so very grudgingly and withdraws it at
pleasure; whence it results with the laborer, who, thanks to his means
of defense, plants his crops and invests his meager fortune in the
furrows that he has so laboriously opened, that when his crop matures,
it occurs to the government, which is impotent to suppress brigandage,
to deprive him of his weapon; and then, without defense and without
security he is reduced to inaction and abandons his field, his work,
and takes to gambling as the best means of securing a livelihood. The
green cloth is under the protection of the government, it is safer! A
mournful counselor is fear, for it not only causes weakness but also
in casting aside the weapons strengthens the very persecutor!

The sordid return the native gets from his work has the effect of