Blue waters and green and the Far East today . e the ChinaSea, but we hope not. [69] MANILA. I shall be very loquacious concerning Manila,doubtless prosy; there is so much to say, so much tolearn and unlearn. Since the war was over, there has been a GreatSilence over these Islands; we hear nothing, knownothing. Now and then a small news item leaks outsome ray of light through the darkness, but it may besafely generalized that the average American knowsmore of Paris and the Congo than he does of these,our Islands. So I hope to be excused if I write at length about thefacts as I found them. Well
Blue waters and green and the Far East today . e the ChinaSea, but we hope not. [69] MANILA. I shall be very loquacious concerning Manila,doubtless prosy; there is so much to say, so much tolearn and unlearn. Since the war was over, there has been a GreatSilence over these Islands; we hear nothing, knownothing. Now and then a small news item leaks outsome ray of light through the darkness, but it may besafely generalized that the average American knowsmore of Paris and the Congo than he does of these,our Islands. So I hope to be excused if I write at length about thefacts as I found them. Well, the first and biggest fact about the Islands isWilliam H. Taft. Out here his figure, which to us athome is very vague, little known,—less so, perhaps,than any other man in public life,—looms very large,almost gigantic, very familiar; a clear, distinct sil-houette of the man who is bound to be a great figurein American life. The Island Government is Taft;whatever there is of good or ill in the American oc- [70] o o X >s> a>waoso. MANILA. cupation is Taft. His big thumb is on these word is law; his will is fiat; he is the be-ginning and the end. When the waters and theearth were parted and the world that was withoutform and void was created out here, Taft was was the military, then the civil, Governor,and now, as Secretary of War, is more omnipotentthan ever. Roosevelt leaves it all to him. He ap-points and discharges Governors and Councils; noth-ing is done unless he says, Let it be so. The pres-ent Governor, Smith, was a rather small Californialawyer, a weak man who refers everything to Taft,a mere figurehead. He cannot appoint a clerk with-out Tafts 0. K. Like many strong men, Taftlikes not strong men under him. Ide and Wright,next to Taft the strongest Governors we have hadhere, opposed Taft and lost their heads. _ So Taft is the Philippine Government; but markyou, the impulse of that Government, the ideal towhich it works, comes not from Taft
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