EL FILIBUSTERISMO

XXXII. EFFECT OF THE PASQUINADES

CHAPTER XXXII

EFFECT OF THE PASQUINADES

As a result of the events narrated, many mothers ordered their sons

immediately to leave off their studies and devote themselves to

idleness or to agriculture. When the examinations came, suspensions

were plentiful, and he was a rare exception who finished the course,

if he had belonged to the famous association, to which no one paid

any more attention. Pecson, Tadeo, and Juanito Pelaez were all alike

suspended--the first receiving his dismissal with his foolish grin

and declaring his intention of becoming an officer in some court,

while Tadeo, with his eternal holiday realized at last, paid for an

illumination and made a bonfire of his books. Nor did the others get

off much better, and at length they too had to abandon their studies,

to the great satisfaction of their mothers, who always fancy their sons

hanged if they should come to understand what the books teach. Juanito

Pelaez alone took the blow ill, since it forced him to leave school for

his father's store, with whom he was thenceforward to be associated

in the business: the rascal found the store much less entertaining,

but after some time his friends again noticed his hump appear,

a symptom that his good humor was returning. The rich Makaraig,

in view of the catastrophe, took good care not to expose himself,

and having secured a passport by means of money set out in haste for

Europe. It was said that his Excellency, the Captain-General, in his

desire to do good by good means, and careful of the interests of the

Filipinos, hindered the departure of every one who could not first

prove substantially that he had the money to spend and could live in

idleness in European cities. Among our acquaintances those who got off

best were Isagani and Sandoval: the former passed in the subject he

studied under Padre Fernandez and was suspended in the others, while

the latter was able to confuse the examining-board with his oratory.

Basilio was the only one who did not pass in any subject, who was

not suspended, and who did not go to Europe, for he remained in

Bilibid prison, subjected every three days to examinations, almost

always the same in principle, without other variation than a change of

inquisitors, since it seemed that in the presence of such great guilt

all gave up or fell away in horror. And while the documents moldered

or were shifted about, while the stamped papers increased like the

plasters of an ignorant physician on the body of a hypochondriac,

Basilio became informed of all the details of what had happened