State-Sponsored Gambling by the Spaniards

The Introduction of Gambling

The natives gambled before the Spaniards came.

Pigafetta tells us of cock-fights and of bets in the Island of Paragua. Cock-fighting must also have existed in Luzon and in all the islands, for in the terminology of the game are two Tagalog words: sabong, and tari (cockpit and gaff).

The fostering and perfecting of this game is due to the government.

Pigafetta tells us of it only in Paragua, and not in Cebu nor in any other island of the south, where he stayed long time.

Morga does not speak of it, in spite of his having spent 7 years in Manila. Yet he does describe the kinds of fowl, the jungle hens and cocks.

Neither does Morga, speak of gambling, when he talks about vices and other defects, more or less concealed, more or less insignificant.

Moreover, excepting the two Tagalog words sabong and tari, the others are of Spanish origin, as soltada (setting the cocks to fight, then the fight itself), presto, (apuesta, bet), logro (winnings), pago (payment), sentenciador (referee), case (to cover the bets), etc.

We say the same about gambling: the word sugal (jugar, to gamble), like kumpisal (confesar, to confess to a priest), indicates that gambling was unknown in the Philippines before the Spaniards.

The word laró (Tagalog, to play) is not the equivalent of the word sunni.

The word balasa (baraja, playing-card) proves that the introduction of playing-cards was not due to the Chinese, who have a kind of playing-cards also, because in that case they would have taken the Chinese name.

The word tayá (taltar, to bet), paris-paris (Spanish pares, pairs of cards), politana (napolitana, a winning sequence of cards), sapore (to stack the cards), kapote (to slam), monte, and so on, all prove the foreign origin of this terrible plant, which only produces vice, and which has found in the character of the native a fit soil, cultivated by circumstances.

Along with gambling, which breeds dislike for steady and difficult toil by its promise of sudden wealth and its appeal to the emotions, with the lotteries, with the prodigality and hospitality of the Filipinos, went also, to swell this train of misfortunes, the religious functions, the great number of fiestas, the long masses for the women to spend their mornings and the novenaries to spend their afternoons, and the night, for the processions and rosaries.

The lack of capital and absence of means paralyze all movement.

This is how the native has perforce to be indolent for if any money might remain to him from the trials, imposts and exactions, he would have to give it to the curate for bulls, scapularies, candles, novenaries, etc.

And if this does not suffice to form an indolent character, if the climate and nature are not enough in themselves to daze him and deprive him of all energy, recall then that the doctrines of his religion teach him to irrigate his fields in the dry season, not by means of canals but with masses and prayers; to preserve his stock during an epizootic with holy water, exorcisms and benedictions that cost five dollars an animal; to drive away the locusts by a procession with the image of St. Augustine, etc.

It is well to trust greatly in God.

But it is better to do what one can and not trouble the Creator every moment, even when these appeals redound to the benefit of His ministers. We have noticed that the countries which believe most in miracles are the laziest, just, as spoiled children are the most ill-mannered.

Whether they believe in miracles to palliate their laziness or they are lazy because they believe in miracles, we cannot say; but the fact is the Filipinos were much less lazy before the word miracle was introduced into their language.

The facility with which individual liberty is curtailed, that continual alarm of all from the knowledge that they are liable to secret report, a governmental ukase, and to the accusation of rebel or suspect, an accusation which, to be effective, does not need proof or the production of the accuser.

With that lack of confidence in the future, that uncertainty of reaping the reward of labor, as in a city stricken with the plague, everybody yields to fate, shuts himself in his house or goes about amusing himself in the attempt to spend the few days that remain to him in the least disagreeable way possible.