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The family story is that he became acquainted with Brigida de Quintos, Mrs. Rizal's mother, while he was a student in Manila, and that she, being unusually well educated for a girl of those days, helped him with his mathematics. Their acquaintance apparently arose through relationship, both being connected with the Reyes family.

Many an unwary opponent realized after he had published what he had considered a clever answer that the same reasoning which scored a point against Rizal incontrovertibly established the Kalamban's major premise. Superficial antagonists, to the detriment of their own reputations, have made much of what they chose to consider Rizal's historical errors.

Rizal's insight discerned, and experience has demonstrated, that Legaspi, Urdaneta and those who were like them, laid broad and firm foundations for a modern social and political organization which could be safely and speedily established by reforms from above.

Thus the family were advised of his departure; this incident shows Rizal's perfect confidence in his countrymen and the extent to which it was justified; he could risk a chance finder to take so dangerous a letter to its address.

Thus as a prisoner he completed his journey. But this had not been entirely unforeseen, for when the steamer reached Singapore, Rizal's companion on board, the Filipino millionaire Pedro P. Roxas, had deserted the ship, urging the ex-exile to follow his example.

The entry of the burial, like that of three of his followers of the Liga Filipina who were among the dozen executed a fortnight later, was on the back flyleaf of the cemetery register, with three or four words of explanation later erased and now unknown. The day of Rizal's execution, the day of his birth and the day of his first leaving his native land was a Wednesday.

But the interviewer, quite honestly, reported Rizal to be regretting his novel instead of regretting its miscomprehension, and he seems to have been equally in error in the way he mistook Rizal's meaning about the republicans in Spain having led him astray.

The next event in Domingo's life which is revealed by them is a visit to Manila where in the old Parian church he acted as sponsor, or godfather, at the baptism of a countryman, and a new convert, Siong-co, whose granddaughter was, we shall see, to marry a grandson of Lam-co's, the couple becoming Rizal's grandparents.

The name America is frequently to be found in the old baptismal registers, for a century or more ago many a Filipino child was so christened, and in the '70's Rizal's carving instructor, because so many of the best-made articles he used were of American manufacture, gave the name "Americano" to a godchild.

In Rizal's later days he found a regular relaxation in playing chess, in which he was skilled, with the venerable ex-president of the short-lived Spanish republic, Pi y Margal. This statesman was accused of German tendencies because of his inclination toward Anglo-Saxon safeguards for liberty, and was a champion of general education as a preparation for a freer Spain.