The Pacific Commercial Advertiser

RHODES SCHOLARSHIP A DEEP MYSTERY

"I do not believe that there ever was a letter or a communication of any kind came to anyone in authority in Honolulu in reference to the Rhodes scholarships in Oxford," said Superintendent Atkinson yesterday. "I know that my department never received any. I remember that the statement was published that such a communication had been received, and I made inquiry concerning it at the time. The Governor's secretary, Mr. Hawes, it was then, told me that he had received such a communication, and said that it had been sent to my office. It never was sent, and he was unable to deliver the goods. My impression, at the time, was that he had become interested in the Rhodes scholarships, as I was, and that he received a communication relative to a West Point or Annapolis cadetship, and somehow got the impression in his mind that it referred to the Rhodes matter."

In the meantime, the fact remains that the statement was published, and not denied at the time, that Hawaii had been officially notified that it was entitled to two Rhodes scholarships. It was a most explicit publication, the names of Secretary Hay and of the manager of the Rhodes trust being mentioned, which would hardly have been the case if there had not been some official ground for the publication.

And the fact also remains that no official action was taken at this end, and that if Hawaii was entitled to the two scholarships, they have been lost for the present. Whether they can be recovered might perhaps be a more fruitful matter for official inquiry, than a perfectly vain search at this late date for a hypothetical official letter.