As already made clear, there are but six of the Visayan Islands with which any one interested in the Philippines merely as a student of world politics or of history need bother. The area and population of these are as follows:[62]
| Island | Area (sq. m.) | Population |
| Panay | 4,611 | 743,646 |
| Negros | 4,881 | 460,776 |
| Cebu | 1,762 | 592,247 |
| Leyte | 2,722 | 356,641 |
| Samar | 5,031 | 222,090 |
| Bohol | 1,441 | 243,148 |
Whenever, if ever, an independent republic is established in the Philippines, the six islands above mentioned could and should constitute self-governing commonwealths similar to the several States of the American Union. The rest of the islands lying between Luzon and Mindanao could easily be disposed of governmentally by being attached to the jurisdiction of one of the said six islands.
Mindanao and the adjacent islets called Jolo were organized as the Department of Mindanao and Jolo, under General Kobbe, with the 31st Volunteer Infantry, Colonel Pettit’s regiment, the 40th Volunteer Infantry, Colonel Godwin’s regiment, and the 23rd Regular Infantry. Thus the archipelago was completely accounted for, for the time being, just as all the territory of the United States was long accounted for by our military authorities at home, with the Department of the East, headquarters Governor’s Island, New York; the Department of the Lakes, headquarters Chicago; the Department of the Gulf, headquarters Atlanta, etc. In this state of the case, General Otis re-embraced his early pet delusion—if it was a delusion, which charity and the probabilities suggest it should be called—about the insurrection having gone to pieces; and decided to come home. Possibly, also, he was homesick. General Otis was a very positive character, a strong man. But even strong men get homesick after long exile. When you hear the call of the homeland after long residence “east of Suez,” you must answer the call, duty not forbidding. General Otis had stood by his ink wells and the Administration with unswerving devotion for twenty months, and was entitled to come back home and tell the public all about the fighting in the Philippines, and how entirely over it was, and how wholly right Mr. McKinley was in his theory that the visible opposition to our rule and the seeming desire to be free and independent did not represent the wishes of the Filipino people at all, but only the “sinister ambitions of a few unscrupulous Tagalo leaders.” Accordingly on May 5, 1900, he was relieved at his own request, and departed for the United States. He was succeeded in command by a very different type of man, Major-General Arthur MacArthur, upon whom now devolved the problem of holding down the situation and of actually getting it stably “well in hand” by June 30, 1901, the date of expiration of the term of enlistment of the twenty-five volunteer regiments organized under the Act of March 2, 1899.
[1] Strictly speaking, only twenty-three regiments were sent out from the United States. Under the Act of March 2, 1899, providing the volunteer army of 35,000 men for the Philippines, twenty-four regiments of infantry and one of cavalry were organized. The infantry regiments were numbered Twenty-six to Forty-nine, both inclusive, the numbering taking up where the numbering of the regular infantry regiments then ended, with the Twenty-fifth. The cavalry regiment was called the Eleventh Cavalry, the regular cavalry regimental enumeration ending at that time with the Tenth. The Eleventh Cavalry and the Thirty-sixth Infantry were organized, officered, and largely recruited from men of the State Volunteers sent out in ’98, who, in consideration of liberal inducements offered by the Government, consented to remain.
[2] The population of the city of Manila according to the Philippine Census of 1903, vol. ii., p. 16; was 219,928. The three next largest towns are: Laoag, in the province of Ilocos Norte, about 270 miles north of Manila, near the northwest corner of Luzon, population 19,699; Iloilo, capital of the island of Panay and chief city and port of the Visayan Islands, some 300 miles south of Manila, population 19,054; and Cebu, capital and chief port of the island of Cebu, a day’s voyage from Iloilo, population 18,330. See Philippine Census of 1903, vol. ii., p. 38.
[3] 115,026 is the exact figure. See Philippine Census, vol. i., p. 57.
[4] The exact figure for Luzon is 40,969, and that for Mindanao, 36,292. Ib.
[5] Philippine Census, vol. i., p. 56.