"You will at least admit we are not dreamers, Judge. I am in earnest in what I say. No man in the service in Cuba has received the advertising so far that this Colonel Rosefield has had, and there is a reason for it. He will emerge from the war the central hero of it all, even if we have to make him the winner of a battle where he was not present. More history is made by well circulated reports than there is by deeds." The Judge laughed: "I wonder if you intend to circulate reports about me." "That depends. If you do justice by us, we will see to the advertising, all right." "What do you mean by justice?" "Well, the Holy See is doing you inestimable service in withdrawing the Spanish friars from the Philippines, because it is thus removing the very source of the quarrel and enabling you to gain a world reputation by accomplishing within a few years that which the Spanish government failed to accomplish in three centuries. That is a good start toward the presidency." "It seems you have tricked me into payment for that service, which I freely acknowledge, because you have used the order that those in possession of church property shall be maintained in possession of that property to your advantage, by seizing on all the property before the American troops arrived on the scene." "A mere act of justice. That property belonged to the holy church before the schism took it away, and we have merely done to the schism what it first did to us. This is, therefore, a mere act of reparation; but we are not ungrateful to you that you have made it possible." The judge was secretly troubled at the part he had played. It was not in accord with his conception of right. But he readily saw that it was good politics, played for him by a power he did not understand. He ventured to say: "I wish to do exact justice by you, and no more." "We shall ask no more. In a sense the church in general has had reparation; but what about the friars?" "I do not understand." "His holiness, the Pope, can not banish them and thus leave the field clear for you, unless they can be remunerated for the lands they hold--not the churches, which belong to Rome, but the lands, which belong to the friars. It is a matter of justice to pay them for their property, and it would be of inestimable benefit to the United States to get rid of this troublesome element." "I understand the ground on which these churches were built belonged to the Spanish government, and that the government contributed considerable cash besides toward their erection. This being the case, the churches will belong to the United States after we shall have acquired the Philippines, and you would owe the federal government for them."