ell, the English are with us, you see. Admiral Cradock, I
understand, does not approve our policy, but he stands firmly with
us whatever we do. The word to stand firmly with us has, I am very
sure, been passed along the whole line--naval, newspaper,
financial, diplomatic. Carden won't give us any more trouble
during the rest of his stay in Mexico. The yellow press's abuse of
the President and me has actually helped us here.

Heartily yours,
W.H.P.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 38: This was another manifestation of British friendliness.
When the American excitement was most acute, it became known that
British capitalists had secured oil concessions in Colombia. At the
demand of the British Government they gave them up.]

[Footnote 39: Mr. Nelson O'Shaughnessy, Charge d'Affaires in Mexico.]

[Footnote 40: Mr. and Mrs. Francis B. Sayre.]

[Footnote 41: Colonel House succeeded in preventing it.]

[Footnote 42: Senator Augustus O. Bacon, of Georgia who was reported to
nourish ill-feeling toward Page for his authorship of "The Southerner."]

[Footnote 43: Probably an error for John Reed, at that time a newspaper
correspondent in Mexico--afterward well known as a champion of the
Bolshevist regime in Russia.]

CHAPTER VIII

HONOUR AND DISHONOUR IN PANAMA

In the early part of January, 1914, Colonel House wrote Page, asking
whether he would consider favourably an offer to enter President
Wilson's Cabinet, as Secretary of Agriculture. Mr. David F. Houston, who
was then most acceptably filling that position, was also an authority on
banking and finance; the plan was to make him governor of the new
Federal Reserve Board, then in process of formation, and to transfer
Page to the vacant place in the Cabinet. The proposal was not carried
through, but Page's reply took the form of a review of his
ambassadorship up to date, of his vexations, his embarrassments, his
successes, and especially of the very important task which still lay
before him. There were certain reasons, it will appear, why he would
have liked to leave London; and there was one impelling reason why he
preferred to stay. From the day of his arrival in England, Page had been
humiliated, and his work had been constantly impeded, by the almost
studied neglect with which Washington treated its diplomatic service.
The fact that the American Government provided no official residence for
its Ambassador, and no adequate fin