SEMI-MONTHLY MAGAZINE
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vim vain .
"COURSCORE and seven years ago our fathers brought forth a new nation conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created
1 equal . . It is for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us . that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died In
and that government or the people, by the people, tor the people shall not perish from the earth. rrom Lincoln s oettysburg Address.
LAVE TRADING exists and flourishes in the Philippines today
just as it did when the first white man set foot on the islands in
1521. It is not strange that the practice of taking and keeping
slaves should have prevailed four centuries ago in a country which
was then inhabited by savages and barbarians, but it is an extra
ordinary fact that it should continue in a country the politicians
of which are asseverating that their people have arrived at a
stage of civilization comparable with that of the more advance!
nations ot the world, and are capable ot establishing and main
taining a just and stable government.
The prevalence of slavery, and its twin brother peonage, are hardly compatible
with this claim, and it is perhaps not altogether to be wondered at that the
Filipino resident delegates to the Congress of the United States should deny the
existence of the former, and remain silent as to the latter. Still it must require
a high degree of courage to deny facts known to every reasonably well informed
resident in the Islands and understood even by schoolboys in provinces like
Pampanga.
llio Spanish Penal Code does not prohibit or penalize slavery or the purchase
Many Ifugaos are Held in
Slavery by Filipinos
or sale of human beings. It does contain provisions
tion ot individuals and the abduction
Philippines at least they were more
than in the observance during
The Moros, or fanatical Mo
of the Southern Islands, have,
to raid the towns of the peaceful
of the Visayan Islands and
fate has awaited the prisoners
whom they took. Men have been
frequently compelled to harvest
for their captors the crops which
they themselves had planted and
were mercilessly butchered. Wo
men, girls and boys have been
carried away into slavery, the
former to servo as household
drudges or as
con cu bines,
and tho latter
to bo brought
up as slaves
pure and sim
r 1 e. So m o
men have met a similar fate. Tho
only reason that more have not been
enslaved is that it was usually con
sidered too much trouble to make full
grown individuals work. Slaves have
been held as chattels if it suited the
convenience of their masters to re
tain them, and otherwise have been
sold, bartered or given away. Zam
boanga was at tho outset largely pop
ulated by escaped Moro slaves who
had sought protection of the Spanish
.i r It
garrison mere, coming onginauy
from widely separated parts of the
Archipelago these unfortunates had no common native dialect,
hence there arose among them a Spanish patois now known as
Zamboaiiguefio.
So far as I am aware, tho Spaniards never made any real effort
to check slavery among the Moros. At all events when I visited
Jolo to make natural history collections in 1891 General Arolas,
the Governor, furnished me a guide who ho assured me could be
depended upon to be faithful as ho had numerous wives and some
torty slaves whom ho was obliged to keep in the walled
town, and under the circumstances could not afford to
behave badly lest he lose them.
It is the custom of the Moros to assemble and hold
tiangis, or markets, nt certain fixed places and at these
tiangis trafllc in slaves has been carried on regularly.
against forcible dctcn
of minors, but in the
honored in the breach
the Spanish regime,
hamincdau inhabitants
since then, continued
Filipino inhabitants
Luzon. An unhappy
llongot Mother and Child
Sold Into Slavery
mfM
FT
"When I visited Tawi Tawi I found that the Moros
inhabiting the southern coast of that island' were doing
a thriving business capturing slaves and selling them
to, Dutch planters in Borneo. They assured me that
the market was excellent, but prices were certainly
low, for both my American companion and I myself
were offered girls of marriageable age at from threo
to fifteen dollars, Mexican, each.
Conditions wcro formerly worse in tho Moro country
than elsewhere in tho Islands but slavery and peonage
have been nevertheless of comparatively common oc
currence throughout many other portions of tho
Archipelago.
Consider conditions among tho Negritos. At tho
time of their discovery a considerable part of tho ter
ritory of the Philippines was occupied by a race of
dark skinned, curly-headed dwarfs who were named
Negritos (little blacks) by tho Spaniards. There is
good ground for believing them to bo the aborigines
of tho Archipelago. They were then being gradually
driven into remote mountain fastnesses by the descend
ants of the original Malay invaders. Their hand was
against every man and every hand was against them
at least up to the time oL tho American occupation.
They are savages of low mentality, and most of them lead a nomadic or scini
lioinadic life. They constantly gel the worst of it in the struggle for existence
and today are found onlv on the
Islands of Mindanao, !?alavan, Tab
his, Negros, Panay, and Luzon, where
for the most part they inhabit very
remote and inaccessible mountain re
gions. Owing to their stupidity and
their extreme timidity it is compara
tively easy to hold them in slavery,
and they arc probably thus victim
ized more than arc tho people of any
other tribe. They arc constantly war
ring with each other in tho more re
mote of the mountain regions which
they inhabit. It would be going too
far to say tlint their moral sense has
been blunted. It is probably nearer
the truth to say that they never had
any. It is therefore a simple matter
for Filipino slave dealers to arrange
with Negritos for tho purchase of
their fellow-tribesmen. Tho latter
then proceed to obtain captives by
raiding somo hostile group of their
own people, killing ruthlessly if oc
casion nrises.
They aro more ready than are tho
people of any other Philippine tribe
to sell their children or other depend
ent relatives, and do this not infre
quently when pressed by hunger, a
condition npt to arise because of their
utter improvidence. Unfortunately,
the matter does not end here. It is by no means un
known for Filipinos to join in their slave-hunting
raids, or even to organizo raids of their own, killing
Negrito parents in order to get possession of their
children.
Like many primitives peoples, the Negritos arc inor
dinately fond of strong alcoholic drinks. It is
strictly against tho law to give or sell any of
the white man's liquors to them, but this natur
ally does not restrain slave-hunters who fre
quently get adults deeply intoxicated and then
trade with them for (Continued on Page 11)
A Negrito Family
Group Slave
Trading Flourishes
in This Tribe
The Author in the Field