Mrs. Taft had been a suffragist all her life, though never of the aggressive type. Regarding the ballot for woman she said: “I favour bestowing upon women every civic right, but I should like to put in a prohibitory clause debarring them from running for office. If women should indulge in a scramble for office, I think that the natural scheme would become disjointed and the aim of the home destroyed. I can see nothing unfeminine in women casting the ballot, but it seems to me for the present that it is impracticable to dissociate the right to vote from the right to hold office.” It was while her husband was Secretary of War that Mrs. Taft showed her resourcefulness on that long journey which they took with their ten-year-old son Charlie. The Philippines were opening their first Assembly and had called “Santa Taft,” who had given them their government, to come to see what they had done with it. Next, he was to cross Siberia over the new railroad and return through Europe. Helen Taft was at the Cathedral School outside Washington, and Robert, the older son, was at his Uncle Horace Taft’s school at Watertown, Conn. Few women would have cared to make that trip, crowded with important entertainments, where one must always look well, through a climate ranging from Siberian cold to Philippine heat, without a maid, and with an irrepressible youngster who must always be kept in presentable condition. But Mrs. Taft did not hesitate. Her place was with her husband, and it was an opportunity for little Charlie to see the world. As usual, she was the most charmingly gowned woman at every function they attended. And best of all, they all had a good time. It was during this eventful trip that Mr. Taft, in alighting from a train, snagged an ugly hole in his only pair of dress trousers. This was tragedy, as he had an appointment to be received by the Czar of all the Russias. Mrs. Taft did her best, but although her husband stepped carefully, the cloth gave way again, exposing the knee. Rumour claims that the imperturbable gentleman merely donned a long coat and entered the Czar’s presence with it on, and later told the Emperor the whole story and produced the proof. At any rate, no international complications ensued with Russia on the grounds of the implied discourtesy of the American representative in being very late for his appointment.