Newly digitised is this little treasure from the the library of the University of Michigan, Anting-anting stories: And other strange tales of the Filipinos (Boston: Small, Maynard & Company, 1901).

I once got a hold of this as a cheap-and-nasty print-on-demand edition but now it can be read in all its original glory. Far from a genuine collection of Filipino folklore, it’s mostly a Boy’s Own series of adventure stories featuring brave Americans holding their own against superstitious, cruel and ignorant savages. Published in 1901 during the Philippine-American war the unapologetic racism must have had some propaganda value back in the United States, though one story — Told at the Club — is much more sympathetic. I don’t know who ‘Sargent Kayme’ was, but the Michigan edition includes the handwritten annotation ‘pseud.’ after his name. There is enough detail to suggest that the author was reasonably familiar with the Philippines to be able to describe details such as local architecture and the appearance of port towns like Dumaguete, but not quite clued in enough to know that gorillas are not endemic to the islands, for example. The front cover looks like a pastiche of various nineteenth century archetypes of the ‘savage’ from Africa to Australia.