by José Rizal
IV
"God save thee, ancient Mariner! From the fiends, that plague thee thus! Why look'st thou so?"--"With my cross-bow I shot the Albatross!"
COLERIDGE.
It was one of those magic December mornings of the tropics--the verynuptials of earth and sky, when great Nature seems to fling herselfincontinently into creation, wrapping the world in a brooding calm oflight and color, that Spain chose for committing political suicidein the Philippines. Bagumbayan Field was crowded with troops, bothregulars and militia, for every man capable of being trusted witharms was drawn up there, excepting only the necessary guards in otherparts of the city. Extra patrols were in the streets, double guardswere placed over the archiepiscopal and gubernatorial palaces. Thecalmest man in all Manila that day was he who must stand before thefiring-squad.
Two special and unusual features are to be noted about thisexecution. All the principal actors were Filipinos: the commander ofthe troops and the officer directly in charge of the execution werenative-born, while the firing-squad itself was drawn from a localnative regiment, though it is true that on this occasion a squad ofPeninsular _cazadores_, armed with loaded Mausers, stood directlybehind them to see that they failed not in their duty. Again, therewas but one victim; for it seems to have ever been the custom ofthe Spanish rulers to associate in these gruesome affairs some realcriminals with the political offenders, no doubt with the intentionalpurpose of confusing the issue in the general mind. Rizal standingalone, the occasion of so much hurried preparation and fearfulprecaution, is a pathetic testimonial to the degree of incapacityinto which the ruling powers had fallen, even in chicanery.
After bidding good-by to his sister and making final dispositionregarding some personal property, the doomed man, under close guard,walked calmly, even cheerfully, from Fort Santiago along the Maleconto the Luneta, accompanied by his Jesuit confessors. Arrived there, hethanked those about him for their kindness and requested the officerin charge to allow him to face the firing-squad, since he had neverbeen a traitor to Spain. This the officer declined to permit, forthe order was to shoot him in the back. Rizal assented with a slightprotest, pointed out to the soldiers the spot in his back at whichthey should aim, and with a firm step took his place in front of them.
Then occurred an act almost too hideous to record. There he stood,expecting a volley of Remington bullets in his back--Time was, andLife's stream ebbed to Eternity's flood--when the military surgeonstepped forward and asked if he might feel his pulse! Rizal extendedhis left hand, and the officer remarked that he could not understandhow a man's pulse could beat normally at such a terrific moment! Thevictim shrugged his shoulders and let the hand fall again to hisside--Latin refinement could be no further refined!
A moment later there he lay, on his right side, his life-bloodspurting over the Luneta curb, eyes wide open, fixedly staring at thatHeaven where the priests had taught all those centuries agone thatJustice abides. The troops filed past the body, for the most partsilently, while desultory cries of "_Viva Espana!_" from among the"patriotic" Filipino volunteers were summarily hushed by a Spanishartillery-officer's stern rebuke: "Silence, you rabble!" To drownout the fitful cheers and the audible murmurs, the bands struckup Spanish national airs. Stranger death-dirge no man and systemever had. Carnival revelers now dance about the scene and Filipinoschoolboys play baseball over that same spot.
A few days later another execution was held on that spot, of membersof the _Liga_, some of them characters that would have richly deservedshooting at any place or time, according to existing standards, butnotable among them there knelt, torture-crazed, as to his orisons,Francisco Roxas, millionaire capitalist, who may be regarded as thesocial and economic head of the Filipino people, as Rizal was fittedto be their intellectual leader. Shades of Anda and Vargas! Out thereat Balintawak--rather fitly, "the home of the snake-demon,"--not threehours' march from this same spot, on the very edge of the city, AndresBonifacio and his literally sansculottic gangs of cutthroats were,almost with impunity, soiling the fair name of Freedom with murderand mutilation, rape and rapine, awakening the worst passions of anexcitable, impulsive people, destroying that essential respect forlaw and order, which to restore would take a holocaust of fire andblood, with a generation of severe training. Unquestionably did Rizaldemonstrate himself to be a seer and prophet when he applied to sucha system the story of Babylon and the fateful handwriting on the wall!
But forces had been loosed that would not be so suppressed, the timehad gone by when such wild methods of repression would serve. Thedestruction of the native leaders, culminating in the executionsof Rizal and Roxas, produced a counter-effect by rousing theTagalogs, good and bad alike, to desperate fury, and the aftermathwas frightful. The better classes were driven to take part in therebellion, and Cavite especially became a veritable slaughter-pen,as the contest settled down into a hideous struggle for mutualextermination. Dark Andres went his wild way to perish by theviolence he had himself invoked, a prey to the rising ambition ofa young leader of considerable culture and ability, a schoolmasternamed Emilio Aguinaldo. His Katipunan hovered fitfully around Manila,for a time even drawing to itself in their desperation some of thebetter elements of the population, only to find itself sold out anddeserted by its leaders, dying away for a time; but later, underchanged conditions, it reappeared in strange metamorphosis as therallying-center for the largest number of Filipinos who have evergathered together for a common purpose, and then finally went downbefore those thin grim lines in khaki with sharp and sharpest shotclearing away the wreck of the old, blazing the way for the new:the broadening sweep of "Democracy announcing, in rifle-volleysdeath-winged, under her Star Banner, to the tune of Yankee-doodle-do,that she is born, and, whirlwind-like, will envelop the whole world!"
MANILA, December 1, 1909
