down on the Ifugao country we had just come from; down one side and up the other could be traced the remains of the old Spanish trail, a miracle of stupidity.  To the right (west), but out of sight, lay Sapao, where the rice-terraces have received their greatest development, rising from the valley we were gazing into some 3,000 feet up the slope.  Sapao, too, is the seat of the Ifugao steel industry, so that for many reasons I was sorry it was off our itinerary.  The point where we were resting has some interest from its associations, for our troops reached it in their pursuit of Aguinaldo, at the end of a long day of rain, and had to spend the night without food or fire or sleep.  It was not possible to light a pipe even, a noche triste indeed.  Most of the men stood up all night, this being better than lying down in the mud; to march on was impossible, as the country was then trailless, except for the Spanish trail mentioned, to attempt which by night would have been suicide.  A tropical forest can be pretty dreary in bad weather, almost as dreary as a Florida cypress swamp on a rainy Sunday.

We now made on, having crossed into Bontok sub-province, and by midday had reached a point on the trail above an Igorot village called Ambawan.  Here we were met by a number of the officials of the province, who gave us a sumptuous tiffin in the rest-house.  And here, too, we bought a number of baskets made in Ambawan, graceful of design and well-woven, though small.  Governor Evans offered an escort of Constabulary through the next village, Talubin, the temper of its inhabitants being uncertain, but Mr. Forbes declined it, and ordered the escort sent back.  We were riding as men of peace, determined to mark our confidence in the good intentions and behavior of the various rancherias we passed through.

Immediately on leaving Ambawan, we had to drop from the new trail (ours) to the old Spanish one for a short distance, for our trail had run plump upon a rock, waiting before removal for a little money to buy dynamite with.  Having turned the rock, the climb back to the new trail proved to be quite a serious affair, as such things go, the path being so steep and so filled with loose sand and gravel clattering down the slope at each step that only one man leading his horse was allowed on it at a time, the next man not starting till his predecessor was well clear at the top.  A loss of footing meant a tumble to the bottom, a matter of concern if we had all been on the path together.  But finally we all got up and moved on, this time over the narrowest trail yet seen, a good part of the way not more than eighteen or twenty inches wide, with a smooth, bare slope of sixty to eighty degrees on the drop side, and the bottom of the valley one thousand to fifteen hundred feet or more below us.  Many of us dismounted and walked, leading our horses for miles.  With us went an Igorot guide or policeman, who carried a spear in one hand, and, although naked, held an umbrella over his head with the other, and a civilized umbrella too, no native thing.  However, it must be admitted that it was raining.