RECOLLECTIONS OF FULL YEARS
turned a dying people to the light and life of modern liberties."
This sounds quite blasphemous in English, but the Filipinos take strange liberties with holy names which shock us but which to them are mere expressions of piety. Jesus is a favourite name for boy babies, while there is a street of "The Heart of Jesus" in Manila, and many others equally inconsistent with our more reticent taste.
Needless to say the cable between Manila and Washington was crowded that day with protests to the President; protests not only from citizens and committees of citizens, but from all Mr. Taft's colleagues in the government, both Filipino and American. Two days later my husband received a message from Mr. Roosevelt which gave us all a hearty laugh. It read, simply: "Taft, Manila, All right stay where you are. I shall appoint some one else to the Court. Roosevelt."
Altogether it was quite an exciting event. After the "smoke of battle" had cleared away Mr. Taft rose up out of his depression and went to work with renewed vigour and strengthened confidence, but I began to think that after all the demonstrations and protestations we should have to remain in the Islands the rest of our lives whether we wanted to or not. Six months later, however, we learned, to our consternation, that Mr. Root was going to resign as Secretary of War in the fall or winter following, and without a moment's hesitation as far as we could judge, the position was offered by Mr. Roosevelt to Mr. Taft. It was urged upon him, in fact. This was much more pleasing to me than the offer of the Supreme Court appointment, because it was in line with the kind of work I wanted my husband to do, the kind of career I wanted for him and expected him to have, so I was glad there were few excuses for refusing to accept it open to him. If it hadn't been
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