RECOLLECTIONS OF FULL YEARS
hot sands we tread, cleanses it of all impurities, and makes it the beginning and the end of a most transcendental principle of sovereignty and law.” The Filipino or Spanish editor is nothing if he is not hyperbolic.
When we arrived in Manila it was a source of great worry to us that we could not send our children, eight and ten years old, to school. The Jesuits had a school for boys in the Walled City, and Mr. Taft considered for awhile the possibility of sending Robert there, where he might, at least, learn Spanish; but so strong was the feeling against the Friars that this would have been taken by the people as a certain indication that the President of the Commission was leaning toward the Church in his deliberations on the vital subject. As I have said, they could not look upon this question, in any of its bearings, in a reasonable light.
We eventually settled Helen in a convent where she made an effort to learn Spanish, and Rebert we turned over to Mrs. LeRoy, the wife of Mr. Worcester’s Secretary, who was a graduate from the University of Michigan and a most excellent teacher.
Mr. and Mrs. LeRoy went to the Philippines as bride and groom. They were classmates, graduated together, and this was their first big venture into the world. They were a valued part of our little pioneer circle, and it was with the greatest dismay that we learned, after about two years in the Islands, that Mr. LeRoy had developed tuberculosis. He had either brought the germs with him from the United States or had contracted the disease there, where, indeed, it is most prevalent. He continued to act as Secretary for Mr. Worcester beyond the time when he should have gone to another climate to devote himself to a cure, but finally, when he realised that the sentence was upon him, he decided to leave the Islands, and my husband was able to secure for him, because of his splendid efficiency, a position in the Consular service under Mr. Hay, at Dur-
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