A Womans Impression of the Philippines | Page 7

sewing or our attention. At the end they played the "Star Spangled Banner," and we all stood up, the soldiers at attention, hat on breast. One of the passengers refused to take off his hat, so that we had something to gossip about for another hour.
In the afternoon we took a ride up Pacific Heights on the trolley car. Pacific Heights is a residence suburb where the houses are like those on the Peak at Hong Kong, clinging wherever they can get room on the steep sides of the mountain. The view of the city and of the blue harbor dotted with ships was beautiful. In the evening we went to a band concert in Emma Square, and on the third day made our memorable trip to the Pali.
We had been hearing of the Pali ever since we landed. It is a cliff approached by a gorge, whence one of those unpronounceable and unspellable kings once drove his enemies headlong into the sea. We could not miss a scene so provocative of sensations as this, so several of us teachers and an army nurse or two packed ourselves into a wagonette for the journey. We started bright and early, or as near bright and early as is possible when one eats in the second section and the first section sits down to breakfast at eight o'clock.
Our driver was a shrewd, kindly, gray-haired old Yankee, cherishing a true American contempt for all peoples from Asia or the south of Europe. He was conversational when we first started, but his evident desire to do the honors of Honolulu handsomely was chilled by a suggestion from one of the saints that, when we should arrive in the suburbs, he would let down the check-reins. The horses were sturdy brutes, not at all cruelly checked; but the saint could not rise superior to habit. Unfortunately she made the request with that blandly patronizing tone which in time becomes second nature to kindergartners. Its insinuating blandness ruffled our Jehu, who opined that his horses were all right, and that he could look after their comfort without any assistance. He did not say anything about old maids, but the air was surcharged with his unexpressed convictions, so that all of our cohort who were over thirty-five were reduced to a kind of abject contrition for having been born, and for having continued to live after it was assured that we were destined to remain incomplete.
We drove through the beautiful Nuuana Avenue with its velvet lawns, and magnificent trees, and then wound up the steep valley between the terraced gardens of the mountain-sides. Not a hundred yards away a shower drove by and hung a silver curtain like the gauze one which is used to help out scenic effects in a theatre; and presently another swept over us and drenched us to the skin. Half a dozen times in the upward journey we were well soaked, but we dried out again as soon as the hot sun peeped forth. We did not mind, but tucked our hats under the seats and took our drenchings in good part.
At last we arrived at a point where the road turned abruptly around a sharp peak, the approach to which led through a gorge formed by a second mountain on the left. We could tell that there was a precipice beyond, because we could see the remains of a fence which had been recently broken on the left, or outside, part of the road. The driver stopped some twenty-five or thirty yards outside the gorge, saying that he could approach no nearer, as the velocity of the wind in the cleft made it dangerous. Our subsequent experiences led me to doubt his motive in not drawing nearer, and to accredit to him a hateful spirit of revenge.
We alighted in another of those operatic showers, and made our way to the gorge, laughing and dashing the rain drops from our faces. We were not conscious of any particular force of wind, but no sooner were we within those towering walls of rock than a demon power began to tear us into pieces and to urge us in the direction of the broken fence. The first gust terrified us, and with universal feminine assent we clutched at our skirts and screamed.
The next blast sent combs and hairpins flying, drove our wet hair about our faces, and forced us to release our garments, which behaved most shockingly. I saw a kind of recess in the cliffs to the right under an overhanging shelf of rock, and, though it was approached by a mud puddle, made straight for it and in temporary quiet let go my threshing skirts and braided my hair. I could see our driver in the distance, pretending to look after his