Page:A Sailor Boy with Dewey.djvu/58

46 In the meantime the others made an even longer tour than before, up and down the shore.

"It's a great counthry, so it is," observed Matt Gory, as the three of us strode into the forest. "They have a mixed-up population, as you was sayin', and the foightin' is worse tin toimes over nor a Donnybrook Fair. Thim Spaniards be afther thinkin' they kin control the nagers an' other haythins, but they can't. They are a thavin', lyin' set, an' would be afther stabbin' yez in the back fer a tin-cint piece."

"But the Spaniards control Manila and the other large cities."

"So they do, me b'y. But that's not a drop in the bucket, so to spake, wid millions o' haythins living on a thousand or more islands, some of which have niver yit been visited by white men. It will take two or three cinturies to make these nagers half dasent, so it will!" And Matt Gory shook his head to show that he meant all that he said.

Our talking, and the fire on the beach, had evidently caused an alarm among the feathered denizens of the forest, for we had to walk a considerable distance before we roused up any game worth bringing down. All of us had provided ourselves with clubs and in about an hour we had secured eight birds and a small squirrel, which I