ll
the United States forces during the most critical period, expressly
cabled the Secretary of the Navy that he had entered into no formal
agreement with Aguinaldo. If General Otis followed his instructions,
and of that there can be no doubt, he also refrained from entering
into any entangling agreements. As for Consul-General Wildman, any
undertaking he may have assumed with Aguinaldo must have been upon
his own personal and individual responsibility, and would be without
formal standing, inasmuch as he has not the express authorization
from the State Department absolutely requisite to negotiations in such
cases. Therefore, as the case now stands, the peace commissioners are
free to deal with the Philippine problem at Paris absolutely without
restraint beyond that which might be supposed to rise from a sense
of moral obligation to avoid committing the Filipinos again into the
hands of their late rulers."

Senor Agoncillo, the commissioner of the Philippine insurgents at
Paris, made, in conversations on the steamer China, when crossing
the Pacific Ocean from "Nagasaka to San Francisco, this statement in
vindication of Aguinaldo, and it is the most complete, authoritative
and careful that exists of the relations between Admiral Dewey and
the insurgent leader:

_Brief Notes By Senor Agoncillo_.

"On the same day that Admiral Dewey arrived at Hongkong Senor
Aguinaldo was in Singapore, whither he had gone from Hongkong, and
Mr. Pratt, United States Consul-General, under instructions from the
said Admiral, held a conference with him, in which it was agreed that
Senor Aguinaldo and other revolutionary chiefs in co-operation with the
American squadron should return to take up arms against the Spanish
government of the Philippines, the sole and most laudable desire of
the Washington government being to concede to the Philippine people
absolute independence as soon as the victory against the Spanish arms
should be obtained.

"By virtue of this argument Senor Aguinaldo proceeded by the first
steamer to Hongkong for the express purpose of embarking on the Olympia
and going to Manila; but this intention of his was not realized,
because the American squadron left Hongkong the day previous to
his arrival, Admiral Dewey having received from his government an
order to proceed immediately to Manila. This is what Mr. Wildman,
United States Consul-General in Hongkong, said to Senor Aguinaldo
in the interview which took place between