| PAGE | |
| Some One Turned On the Current | [ Frontispiece] |
| Here was Freedom Within His Grasp | [ 69] |
| “I Am In Command Here!” | [ 126] |
| “Hello, Here Are Some Canoes!” | [ 205] |
| Up the Face of the Cliff | [ 288] |
| He Gazed Down Into the Still Face | [ 333] |
| A Man Stepped Silently From Behind a Tree | [ 356] |
A United States Midshipman
In the Philippines
CHAPTER I
THE START FOR PALILO
The “Isla de Negros,” a small inter-island steamer, lay moored alongside the dock in the turbulent waters of the Pasig River, the commercial artery of the city of Manila. As the last of its cargo was noisily carried on board by a swarm of half-naked stevedores, the slender lines which held the steamer to the stone quay were cast off, and with many shrill screeches from its high treble whistle the steamer swung its blunt bow out into the strength of the current.
On the upper deck of the vessel, clad in white naval uniforms, two United States midshipmen stood in silent contemplation of the activity about them. They watched with undisguised interest the hundreds of toiling orientals; resembling many ant swarms, traveling and retraveling incessantly between the countless hulls of steamers and lorchas and the long rows of hastily constructed storehouses facing the river frontage. Here and there stood a khaki-clad sentry, rifle in hand and belt filled with ball cartridges, America’s guardian of the precious stores now being idly collected. Into these spacious storehouses the sinews of war for the army of occupation were being hoarded to be afterward redistributed among the small steamers plying between the metropolis, Manila, and the outlying islands of the archipelago.
The American army in the Philippines, always too small for the stupendous task before it, was at last, owing to the added disaffection of the tribes in the Southern islands, receiving the attention from home which had long been withheld, and its numbers were being increased by the arrival of every transport from the far-away homeland.
“We are here at last, Syd,” Midshipman Philip Perry exclaimed, a ring of triumph in his voice as he turned toward his fellow midshipman, Sydney Monroe. Friends of long standing were these two; for four years at the Naval Academy at Annapolis they had been companions and classmates, and during the past year they had together witnessed stirring service in South America and in China.
“We’ve missed nearly six months of the war,” Sydney replied querulously; “from the last accounts, Aguinaldo is on the run. Why,” he ended mirthlessly, “the war may be over before we even see the ‘Mindinao.’”
“Pessimistic as usual,” Phil laughingly retorted; “where we are going, in the words of the immortal John Paul Jones, they ‘haven’t begun to fight.’”
The steamer had now swung her bow down river, and the chug of the engines told the lads that they were fairly started on their voyage to Palilo, the capital of the island of Kapay, where the gunboat “Mindinao” was awaiting them.