Not that I am opposed to the presence of woman wherever she may seek to follow fortune, -- for I have yet to see the place or the company that was not bettered by her influence, -- but the competition of men and women in war reporting occasionally results in the oddest situations imaginable; and sometimes the contest of beauty and flashlight intuitions against energy and experience develops phases of human nature undreamed of outside of the pages of a novel. The tender eye and beguiling tongue of a woman will often upset the careful plans of the boldest and sharpest male correspondent that ever rode through a battle or hated a censor. He may spend the dreadful day on the firing line, and return to the telegraph station, half-dead with hunger and fatigue, only to find that she has wheedled the heart of the news out of army headquarters, and anticipated his despatch by several precious hours.

I have seen women war correspondents on the firing line more than once, although I have never read an account of a battle written by a woman that had anything of the ring and dash of the real fighting. Curiously enough, women seldom show any signs of timidity or shockability on the battlefield. Once in the presence of an actual conflict, they are as eager as the men to see the slaughter pressed, and it sometimes happens that officers are compelled to restrain them from leaving the trenches and rushing forward with storming parties. The sight of slain men seems to move them no more than others.

It is not often that a war correspondent has to engage in a physical race with a woman; but that ungallant and trying experience fell to my lot in Manila.

The adventure came about in this way: The commissioners sent by President McKinley to study the Philippine question in the islands were about to issue a proclamation to the natives declaring the purposes of the United States. This was to be the first definite announcement of our policy in our new possessions. The importance of the proclamation was enormously increased by the struggle between the political parties at home, over the Philippine question. One New York newspaper had authorized its correspondent to offer two thousand dollars for an advance copy of the document. There was deep intrigue for mastery in the matter. The phrasing of the proclamation would disclose the ultimate object of the first war of conquest waged by the United States. It would be the keynote of the bloody contest. The correspondents watched each other jealously, but with an innocent air of indifference to the approaching event, such being the artful methods of newsgathering.

On the day the proclamation was issued, a group of anxious and uneasy correspondents were gathered in the splendid residence of the Philippine Commission, waiting for the president to bring the first printed proofs for distribution. In my eagerness to seize an advantage, I stood on the doorstep of the building, ready to capture the first copy and dash on to the office of the censor, two miles away. My little native carriage was carefully turned with the horse's head toward the city, and the swarthy Tagalog driver sat with the reins in his hands waiting for the signal.

Through the marble-paved corridor I could see a slight, girlish figure seated in the great dim room where visitors were received, and I recognized her as the bright-witted young wife of a correspondent who had been disabled by a poisoned thorn piercing his leg. Her dainty army hat lay on the table beside her, and although she was apparently looking out on the dreaming blue sea through the open window, I knew that she was watching my every movement. She, too, was waiting for a copy of the proclamation, and the incessant tapping of her little foot on the polished floor gave warning that the race would be a bitter one. Her carriage stood in the garden, and I noticed, with alarm, that her horse was a finer animal than my poor, thin steed, which had been shot five times in one day -- a creature with a spirit too great for his grotesque body.

It was to be a race. Looking back through the dust that flew from the wheels, I could see the graceful woman in khaki skirt, blue jacket, and rakish army hat, bound into her carriage and, taking the reins up, lay her whip savagely over her horse's shoulders.

"For God's sake go faster!" I cried to my driver. "Don't let that horse pass us."

The wiry little native stood up and lashed the horse into a gallop. I whipped my pencil out and began to skeletonize the proclamation, striking out "and," "the," "a," and other words easily supplied in New York. Every moment, every stroke would count in the struggle. The houses on each side of the street seemed to fly as we rattled madly along the Calle Reale -- flaring grogshops, white villas, hospitals, barracks, crazy shanties -- but as I turned, I could see my rival gaining on me. She was leaning forward, with the reins held tight, and the whip swishing fiercely, the rim of her military hat blown up by the wind and her hair flying free about her temples.

"Faster! faster!" I shouted. "Fifty pesetas if we reach the palace first!"

My poor, long-suffering horse! Even now I shudder when I recall the sound of that terrible whip on his bony sides. With a snort of agony, the animal strained his muscles and tore along the rough road like a runaway. I stood up and urged the driver, and every passionate word I spoke added to the fury of his whip. We began to draw away from our pursuer. The carriage creaked and swayed from side to side. Once we narrowly escaped a collision.

But soon I could hear the swift clamor of my opponent's wheels, and my heart sank as I saw that she was again drawing near. To be beaten by a woman! The thought drove the hot blood to my head. To be outwitted by a woman in an intrigue was one thing, but to be defeated on the open highway -- the perspiration rolled down my face in great drops.

"Faster!" I shrieked, thumping my driver between the shoulders. "A hundred pesetas if we win!"

The frightened driver turned his head and grinned. His teeth were stained red with betel-nut, his lips were white, his eyes rolled.

"Horse mucho tire," he gasped, as he swung his lash ferociously.

The grinding of the wheels behind us grew louder. My horse was covered with foam, and his flesh quivered as he galloped, shaking the ramshackle carriage violently in the flight. The noise of the struggle began to attract attention. Squads of soldiers ran out of their barracks, invalids leaned out of the hospital windows, natives stood still and stared, storekeepers cheered in their doorways, a horde of yelping dogs raced after us in the trailing dust, and -- Heaven be gentle to me! -- General Lawton sat in front of his headquarters, and laughed when my hat blew off. The street seemed to reel in the dazzling sunlight. The fury of the flight made the wheels jump as they struck the stones, and I was bumped about on the seat until my teeth chattered.

So, for the space of nearly five minutes, we swept on in a rip-roaring, crashing, mad tilt for victory, losing or gaining inch by inch. My driver moved our carriage zigzag to block the street. Chivalry had vanished; courtesy was forgotten. It was a struggle for news, fierce and sexless -- the old-style man against the new-style woman. To surrender the road to my rival meant a defeat that could not be explained by cable. The modern newspaper and its thirsty presses take no account of the amenities of life. It has one supreme law -- send the news and send it first. Friendship, home, health, and life itself, if necessary, must be sacrificed in the effort.

The dust choked us; the sunlight dazzled our eyes; the jolting made my fever-weakened body ache. My hair was tossed and filled with flying dirt. The barking of the dogs and the wild plunging of the horses swelled the strain of misery.

"Faster!" I screamed, as I clung to my seat. "I'll give you the horse if you beat her!"

The wiry driver crouched as he took a new hold on the reins for a final burst of speed. My rival stood up and bent over the dashboard. Her brows were drawn together, and the corners of her mouth drooped. The delicate nostrils were dilated. Every line showed the thoroughbred. The horses were almost abreast, and the wheels clashed harshly.

"See-kee!" snarled the driver to the panting steed, "see-kee! see-kee!"

There was a loud crash, and I was thrown out of my seat. We had run into a heavy wagon drawn by a water buffalo; one shaft was tangled in the rope harness, and the buffalo was lunging angrily at my horse's flank.

I looked up and saw a dainty hand waving farewell to me. My rival had a clear road, and was forcing the pace. She looked back for a moment as I stood there in the street. Her face was radiant. Again she shook her hand, with an air of saucy defiance that maddened me.

In a few moments we extricated ourselves and started in pursuit. The horse was lame and his spirit was gone. Again the pencil struck word after word from the proclamation. A woman had disgraced me in a race; perhaps experience and skill would recover the lost ground. She would forget to prepare her despatch in advance and would have to wait in the censor's office. I might steal in, get the censor's signature and be off for the cable office before she could realize the situation. I was dealing with a clever woman and would need my wits about me.

We passed out of the Calle Reale, and skirting the green meadow where the noble Rizal was bound and shot for loving his country too well, drove through the Lunetta, -- that music-haunted strip of sea-park where Spain used to slaughter native patriots by the score. Dewey's white warships rode at anchor in the blue flood, the ramparts and guns of the "walled city" -- the ancient part of Manila -- rose before us, but there was no sign of my rival. Over the creaking drawbridge we rolled, and through the little, sentinelled gate, into the narrow, paved streets with their quaint Spanish houses. And presently we drew up in front of the stone-and-plaster palace from which the United States waged war for the conquest of the Philippines. A leap from the carriage, a dash through a stately marble entrance hall, up a flight of stairs, past the stern, sculptured face of Magellan, along a corridor lined with the offices of the army staff, and I stood breathless and hatless before the bald, spectacled, cold-eyed censor.

In the next room sat my rival, bending over her despatch, the busy pencil trembling in her fingers. Her face and clothes were covered with dust. Her hair was in disorder. Her bosom heaved.

"All?" he roared. "All that? You're going to cable the whole thing?"

My blood danced. I looked quickly at my rival. She would hear.

"Yes -- all," I answered in a low voice, and with a pantomime appeal for secrecy.

"All?" he shouted, so that every word could be heard in the other room. "Do you mean to say that" -- and he grew shriller at every word -- "you intend to send the whole proclamation?"

The enemy was warned. I saw her start. The color flamed in her pale face. She gathered her despatch up and waited. Her foot beat a sharp tattoo on the floor. Her head was thrown back impatiently. The race was to be resumed.

How slow the censor was! He drew enclosing lines about the proclamation with a blue pencil, and wrote his initials on each page. Then he yawned.

"It'll cost money to cable that," he said, as he languidly scanned the despatch.

"Quick!" I urged. "Let me have it. Every second counts."

The censor frowned, and adjusted his spectacles.

"We don't do things in a hurry here," he said. "I must see what there is in this despatch. The newspapers are too sensational, and the general won't stand any nonsense."

There was something maddening in the easy insolence of the man. I could have strangled him with pleasure -- two miles and a half to the cable office, and my foe in the next room ready to follow me. But at last he surrendered the despatch, and I made for the street.

My horse was tired out. I seized a carriage standing close by, and ordered my driver to start at a gallop for the main cable office on the outskirts of the city. There was a branch office nearer, but it would be dangerous to let a woman get to the main office alone. Who could tell what gentle arts of persuasion and flattery, what tear-in-the-voice diplomacy might accomplish? A minute lost or won, even a second, would settle the fight for possession of the cable. The man who competes with a woman must be sure that she does not get between him and his base of operations. A thousand subtle forces alien to the slow male mind may trip and trap him. I had learned by bitter experience that a woman will out-reach a man by the very elements which are set down by philosophy as her weaknesses. She can arouse sympathy and compassion when a man will excite ridicule. She can grasp an advantage, however shadowy it may be, and convert it into a solid thing. She can see when a man is blind. When her soul is aroused she fears nothing and knows nothing but that she is a woman, and that she is bound to have her way. In short, she is the most dangerous, the most cunning, the most wilful, and the most damnably adorable rival that ever confronts the male war correspondent.

"Gallop!" I cried. "Use your whip as if your life depended on it."

The stinging lash went singing through the air and the horse went forward at full speed.

"Faster! Faster!"

Back through the Calle Reale we went, lurching and rattling, with a train of barking dogs racing in our dust; back past the hospitals, saloons, shops, barracks, and white villas, making the highway hideous with our onrush. The soldiers and the shopkeepers cheered me as I went by, and General Lawton flung my hat at the carriage in a burst of enthusiasm. Everybody understood that it was a race for the cable, and everybody thought I had won. But I knew better. I trembled as I thought of that frail figure flying in the opposite direction to the branch office, the determined face, the quick wit, and man-compelling tongue. On, on, on, past schools and monasteries, past the army gospel tent, over the road on which the Spanish troops fled before the American vanguard, past houses riddled with shells from Dewey's guns, past wonderful trees that shed fragrance at night and are scentless in the daytime, with dogs in front, dogs on each side, and dogs behind, snapping and snarling and tumbling over each other. The sweet faint odor of the green ylang-ylang flower was in every nostril. The tropic sun was reflected in every window. A cool breeze fanned my face. The road was clear.

When we reached the little wooden cable office, whose walls were scarred by many a bullet, I burst into the manager's office and laid my despatch before him.

"I want to hold the wire."

"It will cost money to make sure of it," said the manager.

Glancing around the office I saw that every telegraph instrument was idle. Not a sound disturbed the silence. My rival's despatch had not yet begun to arrive on the city wire. At that moment the instrument through which her message must come began to click loudly. The manager ran to the key and listened. It did not need that rough chuckle to tell me that my enemy had filed her despatch. The manager turned to me with a curious smile.

"You want your message to go first?"

"Of course -- it must go first. I am first on the ground."

"Yes," he said, "you are first by nearly a minute. Will you send it at the press rate, the commercial rate, or the urgent rate? The commercial rate is three times greater than the press rate, and the urgent rate is nine times more than the press rate."

"Send the first page at the urgent rate," and I groaned when I figured out the cost.

My first page was finished. The cable operator asked for instructions, and the manager faced me.

"Press or urgent?"

The city wire clicked sharply, and the operator began to write out my rival's despatch. There was no time to lose. An urgent despatch would take precedence over all but government messages. It was a plunge in the dark, yet I had to take it, for in another moment the competing despatch would be on the cable, if it was marked "urgent," and I would be helpless to recover the wire.

"Urgent," I said. "I must win."

Then I sat down and tried to count the expense of sending the proclamation to New York. The woman was mastered at last. She might send an urgent despatch right on the heels of my message, but the money would be wasted. Official matters would crowd in between the two despatches at Hong Kong, Singapore, Calcutta, Bombay, Aden, Port Said, Gibraltar, and all along the route to America, widening the distance between my message and hers. Her words would reach New York a day after mine and, for newspaper purposes, a day is as good as a century. The fight was won.

In a few minutes we heard a light step and my rival entered. Her face was colorless and drawn. She looked imploringly at the manager. The burly Englishman smiled at us.

"I can't tell secrets," he said. "Some one has been beaten, but you'll never get a hint out of me."

She smiled and shook hands with me.

"I suppose you have been cabling a few words," she said, with an innocent face.

"Oh, just a little message to let them know I'm alive."

"I sent a word or two myself."

We looked into each other's eyes and understood.

"That message of yours will cost just seven thousand six hundred and two dollars and forty-two cents in silver," whispered the manager in my ear as I left the office.