ion of the islanders, and
the gradual introduction of the latter into responsible positions of
government. With little of the encouragement which might have come from
appreciative interest at home, thousands of Americans have now labored
in the Philippines for almost twenty years, but with little disposition
to settle there permanently. Their efforts to develop the Filipinos have
achieved remarkable success. It has of late been found possible to turn
over such a large proportion of the governmental work to the natives
that the number of Americans in the islands is steadily diminishing.
The outbreak of the war with Germany found the natives loyal to American
interests and even saw a son of Aguinaldo taking service under the Stars
and Stripes. Such a tribute, like the services of Generals Smuts and
Botha to Great Britain, compensates for the friction and noise
with which democracy works and is the kind of triumph which carries
reassurance of its ultimate efficiency and justice.

* By the Act of July 1, 1902, the Legislature was to consist of
two houses, the Commission acting as an upper house and an elective
assembly constituting a lower house. The Legislature at its first
session was to elect two delegates who were to sit, without the right
to vote, in the House of Representatives at Washington. An Act of August
29, 1916, substituted an elective Senate for the Philippine Commission
as the upper house of the Legislature.

CHAPTER XIV. The Open Door

The United States arrived in the Orient at a moment of high excitement.
Russia was consolidating the advance of two centuries by the building of
the trans-Siberian railroad, and was looking eagerly for a port in
the sun, to supplement winter-bound Vladivostok. Great Britain still
regarded Russia as the great enemy and, pursuing her policy of placing
buffer states between her territories and her enemies, was keenly
interested in preventing any encroachment southward which might
bring the Russian bear nearer India. France, Russia's ally, possessed
IndoChina, which was growing at the expense of Siam and which might grow
northwards into China. Germany saw in eastern Asia the richest prize
remaining in the world not yet possessed by her rivals, and it was
for this that she was seeking power in the Pacific. Having missed the
Philippines, she quickly secured Samoa and purchased from Spain the
Caroline Islands, east of the Philippines, and all that the United
States had