ABSTRACT
In Paris when the exposition of 1889 came on Jose Rizal was struck with the fact that in that vast and imposing procession of the children of earth his own people, whom he felt and knew to be as worthy as the others, had no place. Therefore he organized an international league to make known to the world the facts about the Filipinos and to refute the slanders that Spanish writers had sown thickly in European literature. "The Indolence of the Filipino" it is called, if he had written nothing else, thoughtful men would still admire him for the cool, masterly marshaling of his reasonings in this. He purposes to deal with the truth. The early Spaniards reported the Filipinos to be daring and indefatigable sailors, whose fleets of merchantmen covered the waters of the Islands and made far voyages, even regularly to Siam.
