History of Philippine press / Carson Taylor.

8

History of the Philippine Press

I had I would give it with pleasure as my work has been
much appreciated by all good patriots, or better said by all
true Spaniards."
For a period of eight years Manila apparently depended
on the town gossips for news, as there is no record of the
publication of another newspaper until March 25, 1821,
when an eight-page weekly called Ramillete Patriotica Manilense came out for the first time, ramillete meaning "a collection of choice things." A few copies of this publication
still exist in the Archives of the Indies in Seville. It lived
barely three months, the last number appearing on June 24,
1821. Number 3, dated April 8, 1821, contains an introductory article indicating the character of the publication, translated as follows. "Having received by the frigate Maria,
which recently arrived from San Blas, the continuation of
the records of the sessions of the courts which we have begun
to publish, translated from the Morning Chronicle, we eagerly avail ourselves of this opportunity to publish national documents in our periodical. From what we have read in many
public papers from Europe and America, it is evident that
the enemies of the nation and the King have been suppressed
in all parts and that the constitutional system is approved
and consolidated more and more.
"On weighing the importance and abundance of the
material we have at hand it appears convenient that we
should publish first the decrees of the King, which, although
dated prior to the convocation of the courts, we judge to be
necessary to check the indiscretions of those who publicly
criticise the new order of things."
The decree published was dated March 9, 1820, and suppressed forever the Court of the Inquisition. The fourth
number of Ramillette Patriotico, except for original editorial matter, was entirely made up of reprint articles from
newspapers from Mexico. Number 5 contained news of the
local courts in the form of a list of prisoners for different
crimes, among which were 146 who were mixed up in the
riots of October 9 and 10 of the previous year, 2 for homicide, 17 for various kinds of robbery, 3 who had been in for
sixteen months for adultery, and one who was charged with
having stolen a handkerchief. The report finished with
"Spanish legislation when shall we see your reform?"
It also contained a long criticism of a "sermon of thanks
for the victories of our armies in Spain" by Fr. Francisco
Genoves, ending with the question, "To what purpose a sermon, after ten years, full of ideas more rancid than rotten
bacon?"