MANILA -- Tonight Filipinos stumbling through the glass and debris-strewn streets, fighting fires, caring for the wounded and preparing for another day of front-line war were fighting mad as they declared:
"We can take it!"
Everywhere there were demands that the army and air force, which left Manila when the capital was declared an open city, return to make a bitter-end fight. Anger against the Japanese mounted among all sections of the population.
When I reached the 350-year-old Santo Domingo church I saw that the convent, the old Intendencia building which houses the treasury and mint and a famous girls' college were among the buildings that had suffered direct hits.
The Santa Rosa college was virtually destroyed by fire.
A college opposite the Santo Domingo church which burned furiously had suffered minor damage. Wreckage of a score of automobiles parked nearby was still burning.
Threatens Cathedral
The fire raged more fiercely threatening the $1,000,000 Manila Catholic cathedral as it swept westward through the crowded, narrow streets lined by ancient buildings, little Chinese shops and Spanish stores.
A student was killed and a nun injured as the bombs crashed a mile and a half from the port area.
Firemen were battling the blaze at Santo Domingo church which was almost destroyed as I went past the blazing towers. Santa Rosa college, built in 1869, was heavily marked by explosive and incendiary bombs. Three aged nuns were being escorted into the street.
A middle-aged priest, his blond hair flying, was helping firemen fight the blaze with weak streams of water, which could not reach the burning towers of the church.
I walked on ruined school books, torn tablets from the desks of children in the convent school, and examination papers which had been bomb-blasted out of the Catholic elementary school across the street from the burning church.
