RECOLLECTIONS OF FULL YEARS
floor and we were not only quite frozen but we were thoroughly smoked.
At Baguio we got letters and telegrams from Manila and one of the telegrams announced my husband’s appointment as Governor of the Islands, so I knew that an adjustment of state affairs had been made and that I should reach Manila to begin a new era in my Philippine experience. Mr. Taft wrote me that the plans for his inauguration were practically complete and that he was issuing cards for a big reception in honour of General MacArthur at our house on the evening of the Fourth of July. This filled me with something like panic, because I didn’t expect to reach Manila until after the first of July and I didn’t see how I could get ready on such short notice to entertain hundreds of people. However, it was not for me to enter a protest on such a score, so it was decided that we would go down as soon as we possibly could.
We spent two days enjoying the delightful hospitality of our friends in Baguio and in exploring the country round about, and I, after listening to builders’ dreams of what was to be and now is, proceeded to select a site for my own future summer home.
We sat around a roaring fire of an evening and sang all our songs, rather ruefully; we recounted our many adventures, and expressed our sincere regret that our holiday was over; then on the morning of the 25th of June, at the dreary hour of half past four, we mounted our refreshed and rested horses and started down the long Naguilian trail to the coast. I wish only to add that the heat in the lowlands, after our long breath of white man’s air in the mountains, was almost more than we could stand, and I made the fatal mistake of leaving Baguio in a heavy flannel riding shirt and with no thin blouse handy to take its place.
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