VI. The women of Taitai, who formerly surpassed all other Indians in
their worship of idols, are now as completely devoted to the pursuit
of Christian rites and customs. Even those of high rank among them are
not ashamed to sweep the floor of our church, and to appear in public
with broom and water, in order that they may be able to command their
servants to do the like. This is the praise due to the women; the
men deserve another. A very old man dropped from his hands the slip
of paper given to him monthly, on which was written the name of the
saint whom he had received by lot. Grieved at his loss, the good old
man ran back to the village of Taitai, which is about a mile from his
own; and thence (as he did not find the father who used to distribute
that kind of slips of paper) he went on to Antipolo, over a rough and
hilly road. When he reached there, after going four miles, he first
asked the father's pardon for his carelessness; and then begged him
not to refuse to give him another in place of his lost patron. This
fact shows plainly enough with what zeal these tribes strive after
the greater matters of salvation. In another place an Indian was
lying sick, and had received communion and been anointed with the
holy oil. Early in the evening he began to be in such agony that
the people in the house took him for dead, and, after laying out the
body, put him on his ancestral bier. After they had watched the whole
night about his body, when dawn returned he returned also, stammered
something, and about noon uttered his words articulately. Then he
said first that he seemed to have been dead three years, because of
the cruel torments which he had himself suffered in hell, and which
he had seen an infinite number of Indians suffer. There demons--as it
were, smiths--kindled forges with bellows, poured melted iron over the
wretched souls, and in the midst of their pitiful howlings burnt them
forever with never-ceasing tortures. After he had seen these things,