I should think about a month before leaving Hong Kong, that is, about the first of April, when it became pretty certain that there was to be war with Spain, I heard that there were a number of Filipinos in the city of Hong Kong who were anxious to accompany the squadron to Manila in case we went over. I saw these men two or three times myself. They seemed to be all very young earnest boys. I did not attach much importance to what they said or to themselves. Finally, before we left Hong Kong for Mirs Bay [13] I received a telegram from Consul-General Pratt at Singapore saying that Aguinaldo was there and anxious to see me. I said to him "All right; tell him to come on," but I attached so little importance to Aguinaldo that I did not wait for him. He did not arrive, and we sailed from Mirs Bay without any Filipinos. From his testimony before the Committee it is clear that Admiral Dewey's first impressions of the Filipinos, like those of most Americans after him, were not very favorable, that is to say, he did not in the outset take them very seriously. It will be interesting to consider these impressions, and then to compare them with those he gathered on better acquaintance from observing their early struggles for independence. The more intimate acquaintance, as has been the case with all his fellow countrymen since, caused him to revise his first verdict. Answering a question put by Senator Carmack concerning what transpired between him and the Philippine Revolutionists at Hong Kong before he sailed in search of the Spanish fleet, the Admiral said [14]: They were bothering me. I was getting my squadron ready for battle, and these little men were coming on board my ship at Hong Kong and taking a good deal of my time, and I did not attach the slightest importance to anything they could do, and they did nothing; that is, none of them went with me when I went to Mirs Bay. There had been a good deal of talk, but when the time came they did not go. One of them didn't go because he didn't have any tooth-brush. Senator Burrows: "Did he give that as his reason?" Admiral Dewey: "Yes, he said 'I have no tooth-brush.'" They used to come aboard my ship and take my time, and finally I would not see them at all, but turned them over to my staff. Now the lack of a tooth-brush is hardly a valid excuse for not going into battle, however great a convenience it may be in campaign. But the absence of orders from your commanding officer stands on a very different footing. Aguinaldo had not yet arrived. Three hundred years of Spanish misgovernment and cruelty is not conducive to aversion to fictitious excuses by the lowly in the presence of supreme authority. The answer was amusingly uncandid, but disproved neither patriotism nor intelligence.