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 was wont to say: "En cada fraile tenía el rey en Filipinas un capitan general y un ejercito entero"—"In each friar in the Philippines the King had a captain general and a whole army." The efforts of the missionaries were by no means restricted to religious teaching, but were also directed to promote the social and economic advancement of the islands. They cultivated the innate taste for music of the natives and taught the children Spanish. They introduced improvements in rice culture, brought Indian corn and cacao from America and developed the cultivation of indigo and coffee, and sugar cane. Tobacco alone of the economic plants brought to the islands by the Spaniards owes its introduction to government agency.

The young capital of the island kingdom of New Castile, as it was denominated by Philip II, in 1603 when it was described by Morga invites some comparison with Boston, New York, or Philadelphia in the seventeenth century. The city was surrounded by a wall of hewn stone some three miles in circuit. There were two forts and a bastion, each with a garrison of a few soldiers. The government residence and office buildings were of hewn stone and spacious and airy. The municipal buildings, the cathedral, and the monasteries of the three orders were of the same material. The Jesuits, besides providing special courses of study for members of their order, conducted a college for the education of Spanish youth. The establishment of this college had been ordered