Unofficial letters of an official's wife [by] Edith Moses.

AN OFFICIAL'S WIFE

like American rooms adorned with Filipino curios
and pictures from art magazines and periodicals.
The Igorrote servant had been sent on a message
by Mrs. Allen, so our head hunter acted as waiter,
and his dusky form dressed in a simple " gee string"
lent local color to the scene. The little table was
fresh, and the white china and the silver spoons
(we had tin ones at the sanitarium) gave such an
air of home to the scene that one might have fancied himself in America had it not been for the
presence of this naked savage handing around cups,
especially as he had donned a red turban as full
dress, which gave him a warlike appearance.
Later we began our preparations for the night.
Mrs. Allen had only three cots. Mrs. Wilson and
Auria were assigned to the two extra ones, while
the doctor, his wife, and I decided to sleep under
the mango trees. It was a clear night. The storm
clouds had passed away, and the stars glittered as
they can do only in the tropics. It is much warmer
here than at Baguio, as we are fifteen hundred
feet lower. The pine does not grow on these lower
levels, and the mango, banana, palm, and cocoanut flourish. You know how hard it is to sleep
"under a strange roof." For hours I lay without
even a piece of canvas over my head, looking up
into the starry night, and, although I tried all the
usual devices to induce sleep, I could not close my
eyes. Opposite us in an open tent, with a lighted
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