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It all costs very little," explained Fil's father. "But they are so thick, I could not put more than one in my umbrella stand at home," I said. "There you are joking again," laughed Fil, who added: "We Filipinos hang our umbrella up on the veranda roof, where it is ornamental, as well as useful when wanted."
"By our religion, and by the warmth of our own hearts, we Filipinos believe it to be a cruel sin to send our parents and relatives to asylums. God gave us to them at the beginning of life, and God gives them to us at the end of life," replied Fil's pious mother. "What a very, very beautiful saying, and what a beautiful deed!" I said. Fil's grandmother was sitting in a corner of the room.
"If that's how you're going to land you'll dig a hole in the ground like a bomb! Do move out, and let me get to my drawer! You're growing too big for this bedroom!" "Nobody's looked at my new hair ribbons yet!" interposed Fil's plaintive voice. "See, I've got six! Aren't they beauties!
"Not this better kind," replied Moro, who brought down a huge fruit, all covered with sharp spurs and spikes, sharper and harder than rose-thorns. "Nature has kept her rich custard guarded by spikes and by an awful odor," remarked Fil's father, as he broke open the thick skin with an ax.
We Filipinos, also, split the fiber and weave it into many kinds of cloth. Sometimes we mix silk or cotton with the abacá hemp." "I am sure our friend would like to learn about sugar," remarked Fil, who had a sweet tooth for candy. Fil's father took up this part of the story, and said: "Sugar of course comes from a sweet cane, which is grown on high land. The cane is cut down.
"Just think of practically growing chocolate bonbons on a tree, beneath the window of your nipa huts, in these wonderful Philippine Islands," I added, and every one smiled. "It is really true, when one adds the sugar," remarked the Padre. "Now tell me please about coffee, also," I begged. Fil's father continued: "The coffee comes from another low bush.
"Furry fruit-bats, as large as flying cats," laughed Fil, who was proud of his secret cave and of his discovery. "You don't really mean to say that those large flying things have fur, and eat fruit?" I asked. "Exactly," replied Fil's father. "These are the large Philippine bats. The wings of some of them are three feet across. Ladies use their fur to decorate gowns.
Fil's father, who was a planter of wide acres, replied: "The cocoa bean and the coconut are two very different plants. Do not confuse them. The cocoa bean, out of which you grind cocoa powder and chocolate for a drink, for bonbons, and for puddings, comes out of a fruit shaped like a large red cucumber. This fruit grows on a tender bush, which must be shaded by a thick banana palm.
I said, "I never thought of all this, when at home I bought the lovely white statues of lions and birds, from the vendor man with the basketful, on our street corner." We were all so tired when we came out of the wood to the canal, that Fil's father told us to wait until a buffalo cart came down the white shell road. "A buffalo cart!" I exclaimed. "I'm afraid to ride in that.
"At least I do try I put a bit here and there, but I write so slowly, I'm only half-way through before she's bounced on to something else, and I've missed the beginning of it. I have to stop, too, sometimes, to think how to spell the words." The others laughed, for Fil's spelling was proverbial in the form, and was often of a purely phonetic character.
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