Note 5 — III

Dreary and unprogressive life.Manila offers very few opportunities for amusement. There was no Spanish theatre open during my stay there, but Tagalog plays (translations) were sometimes represented. The town possessed no club, and contained no readable books. Never once did the least excitement enliven its feeble newspapers, for the items of intelligence, forwarded fortnightly from Hongkong, were sifted by priestly censors, who left little but the chronicles of the Spanish and French courts to feed the barren columns of the local sheets.5 The pompously celebrated religious festivals were the only events that sometimes chequered the wearisome monotony.