th similar results.

During the 1909 season, the railroad having reached Camp One, five
large Stanley steam automobiles were operated by the government in
transporting passengers from this place to Baguio, and more than two
thousand persons were thus moved over the road.

Meanwhile, the unexpectedly heavy expense involved in completing the
road had been made the subject of severe criticism by the public press
of Manila. Most of the critics were entirely honest, having no idea
of the character of the country opened up, or of the importance of
making it readily accessible.

Just at the time when the commission should have crowded its programme
through to conclusion, it faltered. The only government construction
work performed at the summer capital that year, in addition to what
has been mentioned, was the erection of a small office building and of
a barrack building for labourers, the enlarging of five government
cottages, the addition of out-buildings, and the enlarging of a
building which served as a combination sanatorium and hotel.

This policy of inaction was a mistaken one. It made the Benguet Road
seem like the city avenue which ran into a street, the street into
a lane, the lane into a cow path, the cow path into a squirrel track
and the squirrel track up a tree, for while one could get to Baguio,
there was very little there after one arrived. The accommodations
at the sanatorium were strictly limited, and there was some apparent
justification for the charge freely made that the Philippine Commission
had voted to spend very large sums of money to open up a health resort
from which only its members and its staff derived benefit.

The government had at the outset been obliged to construct its
buildings on a piece of private land purchased from Mr. Otto Scheerer,
as prior to the passage of the Public Land Act and its approval by the
President and Congress, building on public land was impossible. Now,
however, a town site had been surveyed, and plans for the future
development of Baguio had been made by one of the world's most
competent experts. The time had arrived for action. Mr. Forbes, then
secretary of commerce and police, argued vigorously for the carrying
out of the original plan of the commission by the construction of
adequate public buildings. To help the development of the place,
he purchased two adjacent building lots and on the tract of land so
secured built a handsome and expensive home, where he su