CHAPTER XIV.

The Washington Magazine of Lies.

1. Star - Chamber Creations.

In overwhelming support of everything that has been said come the reports of the returned soldiers. The disgrace of the situation as they picture it is unspeakable. Back in November last, nearly three months before we broke out on the Filipinos, a stirring protest, signed by a number of Colorado volunteers against being longer held in Manila, was published in the Pueblo Cheiftain. (Nov. 11, '99.) It recited that

since landing on Luzon the men had not eaten a decent meal unless they paid for it out of their own cash, and that on August 13, at the battle of Manila, the men charged upon the Spanish trenches when they were so weak from constant hunger that they could hardly carry their ammunition; and declared that had the Spanish forces remained in their trenches they would have had little trouble in dispatching the attacking force, so utterly exhausted were the men from continuous duty and weakened from hunger.

Soldiers who went through this knew the inestimable debt of the United States to Aguinaldo. The protest continued:

As true Americans, we, on May 5 last, enlisted in the cause of humanity. We were soon convinced of one fact, viz., that we did not have to go to Cuba to find hungry men. In the cause of humanity we offered our services, and not for the special aggrandizement of any one, two or three men. Over 1000 Colorado boys are anxiously awaiting developments.

Even then the common soldiers were getting it through their medullas that the army officers and the McKinley politicians were the principal beneficiaries of the fighting.

On the 5 of March Sergt. Fritz Andrere of the U. S. V. signal corps, 18th company, having returned on account of ill-health, was in Los Angeles and interviewed by the Herald said:

If the American people knew what they were doing, or rather what they have allowed to be done in the Philippines, they would shrink in horror from the task. It will take worse than Spanish cruelty to suppress the rebellion in the Philippines, and Butcher Weyler will be an angel compared with the governor general who is to be successful in exterminating these people, who are naturally peace-loving, but who will fight to the bitter end for the holy principle of freedom.

The conflict between our forces and Aguinaldo's men was brought about by some of the American officers whose ambition is stronger than their sense of right, and the politicians in Washington who consider these far-away islands a good thing.

I have many friends among the Filipinos, and my sympathy is entirely on their side. I believe the natives have been abused, and from what I can make out, Aguinaldo's report of the conflict, and the causes that led up to it, are more plausible than the American account of it.

Is this man some poor runagate? He was offered a first lieutenancy in a new signal service corps that was to be formed. He told the reporter emphatically that he was 'glad not to be mixed up in such a disgraceful assassination as was being carried on around Manila.' He too has discovered that some thing other than the people is behind this war.

If someone high in authority would now come forward and firmly assert that the Filipinos did not want the war and begged after the first hostilities to have it stopped, but our commander, acting under higher inspiration, refused to stop it, would not that disclose a determined purpose in our authorities to fight if they could patch up an excuse, and evidence some powerful underground motive for the war? Gen. C. McC. Reeve, of Minnesota, supplies the firm assertion that the war was unnecessary.

On Sunday, February 5, the day after the fighting began, Gen. Torres of the insurgents came through the lines under a flag of truce and had a personal interview with Gen. Otis, in which, speaking for Aguinaldo, he declared that the fighting had been begun accidentally and was not authorized by Aguinaldo, that Aguinaldo wished to have it stopped, and that to bring about a conclusion of hostilities he proposed the establishment of a neutral zone between the two armies of any width that would be agreeable to Gen. Otis, so that during the peace negotiations there might be no further danger of conflicts between the two armies. To these representations of Gen. Torres, Gen. Otis sternly replied that the fighting, having once begun, must go on to the grim end. And it has been going on ever since. The little brown fellows whom we all expected to disperse in short order are fighting well. [Interview in St. Paul Globe, April 26.

If Stabber-general Otis did this was it from an arbitrary spasm of his own fibers or under executive spell? Otis certainly knows the wishes of Washington, whether he wishes one thing or the other himself. Rev. Clay MacAuley, who had been in Manila, wrote a letter to the Boston Transcript June 1, which furnishes tips that pry open the jaws of the sphinx.

"For a long time," says he, "I could not believe that the disastrous recent events were known to the Washington authorities. I was inclined to lay the responsibility for the increasing perils upon the military commander directly in charge. Yet now it seems clear to me that Gen Otis did this work in the main in literal obedience to his superior."

Mr. McAuley talked with Gen. Otis and states that "Gen. Otis expressed regret that there was not a better knowledge of the situation among the Washington legislators than there seemed to be. And he impressed me deeply by his declaration: 'I was ordered to this post from San Francisco; I did not believe in the annexation of these islands when I came here, nor do I believe in their annexation now." Also, "I had the privilege of a conversation with Admiral Dewey," who "spoke much of his concern over the turn affairs had taken and said that he was 'powerless to act.' Yet in one point in the remarks he declared: 'Rather than make a war of conquest of this people, I would up anchor and sail out of the harbor.'"

'Mr. McAuley says he wrote President McKinley, whom he met in Washington, regarding the situation, and predicted the outbreak which has since occurred.'

If the statement of Otis's position is true there is not doubt he gave and gives the president accurate private tales of the facts, and the president burns them. If Otis regrets that the situation is not better known among Washington legislators he unquestionably does his best to make it known to them through the president, and the president pockets the knowledge. In that case someone is coolly lying to the public. For Adgt.-Gen. Corbin declared under the sting of the round robin of the censored Manila newspaper men, "The standing instructions of the President and Secretary of War are that the public shall be given all information we receive. This has been and will continue to be done. Of course, plans of campaigns that would be of help to Aguinaldo and other rebels, have not and will not be promulgated, but all facts

of events transpiring have been given in full.”* Either there is a quibble here-to bring everything wanted to be suppressed under plans of campaigns that would help Aguinaldo,' including the painful facts about the situation which Gen. Otis sends to the president and regrets that the legislators do not know, or the instructions. of the president to give all news to the public are a josh. The public has not had the facts and no one who looks at half the evidence will doubt that the president is their crematory. Let him fix up the lie between himself and Corbin as best he can, the public is lied to from Washington.

Is it said that perhaps the Rev. MacAuley is the fabricator? The reasons for believing him are as follows: He has no motive to lie, the president has, a hundred of them; his statements were sent to the Boston Transcript and copied over the country by the Associated Press, if they are lies the authorities can find out of Otis and nail them in five minutes, the letter was published July 7 and they haven't done it; a lie like that about a general in action is rather personal and traducing and would in high probability bring some form of retribution from headquarters, none has come; the writer of such a letter would know this and not invent stories that would become a hornet swarm about his ears; merely to be proved a public falsifier would do Mr. MacAuley more harm than publishing several letters in the Boston Transcript would advantage him; lastly and potently, we know that in this war the Administration has become a professional Russian censor and represser of Philippine truth-see round robbin—and is therefore to be distrusted in everything it says; it is maliciously hoodwinking the people to compass its funeral designs; and for that reason an outside witness would be taken without oath where the Government would not be accepted on ten oaths. We therefore conclude that the

*Special Washington dispatch to Los Angeles Times, July 17, 1899.

president of the United States is the liar. It is so much. more revelation of the villainous practices of an imperialist government against its own people and proof that our Washington tyrants are conducting this war with ulterior and star-chamber intentions.

Among the returning invalids from Manila is Captain Charles A. McQuesten, one of Gen. Otis's staff, and a physician who was health officer at Manila. All this is promise that he will not wantonly criticise things. But more than this, he is a believer in the military policy, "he strongly supports the military government of the islands." Such a man will certainly not tell stories to injure his general or the military government which he supports. And this is Capt. McQuesten's narrative as reported by the Associated Press, June 20, in San Francisco. I give the most of it:

Capt. McQuesten made a close study of the conditions of the Philippine situation. He is of the opinion that it will take from 100,000 to 150,000 soldiers to properly subject and hold the islands. He also says that the Peace Commission was an absolute failure, and its work from the start was without effect. He strongly supports the military government of the islands.

"Schurman knows that the commission is a failure, and is coming home in July," said the captain. "Unless troops, thousands of them, are sent to the aid of our men there, they will be driven back into Manila in the course of the next few months during the rainy season. Our men simply cannot stand the climate. Fifty per cent. of them will be incapacitated by sickness, and the territory overrun and will have to be abandoned. Manila will be in a state of siege again.

"Our soldiers and men have accomplished wonders. But nothing decisive has come of it, because our men were not in great enough force. One of the great dangers that our men have to face is the climate. The newcomers will be at a disadvantage because the troops returning home are inured to the climate. As a matter of belief, the Filipinos think they have the Americans licked already. .

"I will say a word for the western volunteers. They make the finest soldiers in the world, and their fighting qualities are wonderful. But the volunteers all want to return home, and I hardly think that the plan to enlist three skeleton regiments from the volunteers now in the Philippines will be a success.

This man has no need for any of Otis's public reticences. He can tell the truth and the laws of evidence compel us to accept him. Believing him, the course of