[Footnote 41:  Mr. Forbes had been Governor-General of the Philippines from 1909 to 1913.  His work had been extraordinarily successful.]

[Footnote 42:  Secretary of Agriculture.]

[Footnote 43:  In charge of government road building, a distant relative of the Ambassador.]

[Footnote 44:  Major General William Crozier, U.S.A., Chief of Ordnance.]

[Footnote 45:  See Chapter XIX, pages 160-164.]

[Footnote 46:  It was General Sheridan.]

[Footnote 47:  See Chapter XIX, pages 160 and 164.]

[Footnote 48:  The treaty between the United States and Great Britain, adopted through the urgency of Mr. Bryan, providing for the arbitration of disputes between the two countries.]

CHAPTER XX

“PEACE WITHOUT VICTORY”

“Of one thing I am sure,” Page wrote to his wife from Washington, while waiting to see President Wilson.  “We wish to come home March 4th at midnight and to go about our proper business.  There’s nothing here that I would for the world be mixed up with.  As soon as I can escape with dignity I shall make my bow and exit....  But I am not unhappy or hopeless for the long run.  They’ll find out the truth some day, paying, I fear, a heavy penalty for delay.  But the visit here has confirmed me in our previous conclusions—­that if we can carry the load until March 4th, midnight, we shall be grateful that we have pulled through.”

Soon after President Wilson’s reelection, therefore, Page sent his resignation to Washington.  The above quotation shows that he intended this to be more than a “courtesy resignation,” a term traditionally applied to the kind of leave-takings which Ambassadors usually send on the formation of a new administration, or at the beginning of a new Presidential term, for the purpose of giving the President the opportunity of reorganizing his official family.  Page believed that his work in London had been finished, that he had done everything in his power to make Mr. Wilson see the situation in its true light and that he had not succeeded.  He therefore wished to give up his post and come home.  This explains the fact that his resignation did not consist of the half dozen perfunctory lines which most diplomatic officers find sufficient on such an occasion, but took the form of a review of the reasons why the United States should align itself on the side of the Allies.

     To the President

     London, November 24, 1916.

     DEAR MR. PRESIDENT: 

We have all known for many years that the rich and populous and organized states in which the big cities are do not constitute the political United States.  But, I confess, I hardly expected so soon to see this fact proclaimed at the ballot-box.  To me that’s the surprise of the election.  And your popular majority as well as your clear majority in the Electoral College is a great personal