HUGHES, FEBRUARY 28, 1902

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WASHINGTON, D. C., February 28, 1902.

The committee met at 10.30 o'clock a. m.

Present: Senators Lodge (chairman), Allison, Proctor, Dietrich, Culberson, and Patterson.

STATEMENT OP BRIG. GEN. ROBERT P. HUGHES—Continued.

The CHAIRMAN. General, you may proceed with your general statement. Of course you need not go into the details of military operations, but give us a general idea.

#romblon -o-

CAPTURE OF ROMBLON.

General HUGHES. On taking possession of the town of Capiz, in captured correspondence, etc., it was found that Romblon was made a center for mail distribution and for general business by the insurrectos of those southern islands—the Visayas and farther south.

When Diocno evacuated Capiz, no one knew or would tell in what direction he had gone after sailing out of the river. Some thought he had gone to Romblon. Others thought possibly he had gone to Calivo. Having troops enough to make the capture of Romblon, and Captain Ackley being there with the gunboat Concord and one of the smaller gunboats, and being willing to aid in so doing, I determined to go up and take possession of Romblon, which was done with the loss of two men I think, the Navy covering the landing of the two companies that I threw ashore.

After taking possession I went ashore and found some Chinamen and told them I wanted them to hunt up the presidente and send him to me. He had escaped to the brush along with all the others. Late in the evening he came aboard my transport, and I had a talk with him. He seemed a reasonable sort of native. I told him to find his people and tell them to come in and give up their arms. He said he would do it, and he did it in about two weeks. He got in the 84 rifles there were on that small island.

Senator PATTERSON. What date was this?

General HUGHES. It was in December, 1899, but just the date I can not give from memory. It was about the 16th, I should say.

#cebu -o-

OPERATIONS IN CEBA [CEBU].

Returning to Capiz from Romblon, I took up a battalion of the Nineteenth Infantry and transferred it to Cebu in order to push operations on that island, and then returned to Iloilo.

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#sara -o-

INSURRECTO ATTACK IN SARA.

During my absence from Iloilo Province the insurrectos who had been scattered at Passi collected a force and made an attack on a company in Sara, commandancia of Concepcion. The fight was a sharp one for a few moments, as there were possibly 400 insurrectos, and they had brought in their ropes, I was told, to hang the officers. The captain of it, I believe, belongs to Mr. Proctor s State—Captain Brownell. But the matter was decided in a very few moments.

#negros1 -o-

In these operations in Panay, Negros had been warned that she might expect trouble from people escaping from Panay, which proved to be true. When I returned reenforcements were sent to Negros to aid in driving out the people who had gone over there with their rifles from Panay, which was done in due course of time.

#antique -o-

Early in January—

Senator ALLISON. 1900?

OPERATIONS AGAINST ANTIQUE.

General HUGHES. 1900. I prepared a command to go to the third province of Panay, Antique, which extends along the entire west coast. It required about three weeks, I think, to overrun Antique, the insurgents only attempting one fixed resistance. That was at the crossing of the Antique River. But they were soon brushed away, and then they disappeared, just as they had previously done in Iloilo and Capiz provinces. The troops taken over were then left as a garrison in that province.

#  

It will now be seen that all the organized resistance had been scattered in the island of Panay, which is very much the most densely populated of the islands of the group.

WHEREABOUTS OF THE INSURGENTS.

The question was, What had become of the insurgents? We knew the enemy to be there in some shape, but just what shape they had taken we were unable to find for a little while. We could find where they had built trenches and find men in them, but they had on no indications of being soldiers. There was nothing to indicate that they belonged to any organized band of soldiers. They were dressed in their sinamay shirts and straw hats, but had no guns. The proposition was a pretty difficult one. Finally, they began firing on some of our detachment; that is, couriers, mail carriers, etc.

Senator ALLISON. Without guns?

General HUGHES. They probably had guns at that moment.

Senator ALLISON. But they did not appear to have any?

General HUGHES. When you got to them they had no guns. Their methods of concealing their arms were unknown to us.

CONCEALMENT OF INSURGENT ARMS.

But about that time the governor authorized the employment of native scouts, and I authorized the enlisting of a few at all military stations, to be used as guides and in any way they could find them of value. They soon found rifles where our men could not discover any. Our men would pick up a piece of bamboo and throw it down. The native

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would pick up the same piece of bamboo and he would take it and run in his hand and take out a rifle. There was the difference.

The insurrectos, furthermore, had developed a much more violent course than had been pursued before in their methods of attacking our men. But I have gotten beyond the general current. I will have to go back and follow events.

The CHAIRMAN. Of course, we do not want to compel you to tell all of your military operations in detail.

General HUGHES. I understand.

The CHAIRMAN. We merely wish a general idea.

General HUGHES. I want to get the thing straight.

OPENING OF THE HEMP PORTS.

While I was absent in Antique and out of communication with headquarters anywhere, there was great anxiety for the opening of the hemp ports in Leyte and Samar, and in order to do so the governor sent down a regiment under General Kobbe and gave him administrative control temporarily of those two islands. The Forty-third Regiment was landed in Samar and Leyte at a few localities, especially where there was a large supply of hemp.

CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE INSURRECTOS IN CEBU.

The people in Cebu made a campaign against the insurrectos in the hills and brushed them away.

OCCUPATION OF BOHOL.

The island of Bohol had never as yet been occupied in any way. They bad been bothering the governor about it, claiming that they were being interfered with by bad people from Cebu and Leyte. I sent a command of four companies over there, which took possession of the island. They were received good naturedly, but a formal protest was made against their coming there, as they had established the Republic of Bohol.

GOVERNMENT OF BOHOL.

Senator ALLISON. The Republic of Bohol?

General HUGHES. Yes; and had an existing government, they claimed.

SURRENDER OF INSURRECTO GENERALS IN BOHOL.

During the time between January and the renewed efforts of the insurrectos under a change of tactics, the intelligent, educated people mostly came in under our protection. There were about half a dozen, I think, of their generals who came in and told me they had had enough.

The vice-presidente of what they called the Estado Visaya, Judge Napa [Judge Mapa], Judge Leon, and a great number of educated people came in. They took up their residences in the suburbs of Iloilo. Most of them having houses in Jaro, they were allowed to go back and settle down. Some of them went to Molo, having houses there.

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#departmentofvisayas -o-

DEPARTMENT OF VISAYAS.

In April what had been the district of Visayas was changed to a department. In that change the Romblon group of islands was thrown out as being farther north than necessary. That was the only change. Of course, in this action organizing the departments Leyte and Samar were retransferred to me. General Kobbe was relieved and sent to the department of Jolo.

OPERATIONS OF THE ENEMY IN SAMAR.

Offensive operations on the part of the enemy began in Samar about the time this transfer was made, and General MacArthur about the same time assumed command of the division.

He directed me to go to Samar and Leyte and let him know what was necessary to meet the case. After a careful examination of the situation I reported to him that it would be necessary, if we intended to continue offensive operations, to send a new regiment, which he did not feel that he could do. He asked me to submit some other method of carrying on the operations. I suggested then that he send enough troops to put Samar on a purely defensive basis, which could be done with about six companies, and let me have the entire Forty-third Regiment for Leyte; that I would steal enough more out of the other islands of the department to get Leyte in order. He accepted that suggestion, and turned Samar temporarily over to the department of southern Luzon, and a garrison sufficient to hold the necessary posts was sent there from Luzon.

This gave me troops enough to keep up activity in all the islands under my control, which was done with a good deal of energy, and it stirred up a great deal of animosity apparently among the class of officers who were leading the guerrillas, and the condition of things, especially in Panay, got so bad that I remember reporting about October, I think—

Senator ALLISON. Nineteen hundred still?

General HUGHES. Yes, 1900; that it was simply "hell." You can only understand it by letting me give you a statement of some of the conditions.

METHODS OF SECRETING ARMS BY THE INSURGENTS.

They would come in without uniforms, carrying their guns probably tied along a leaf of nipa. There would be no evidence of an arm anywhere.

Senator PATTERSON. How would they carry their guns?

General HUGHES. They would take a long leaf of nipa, or they would take two of these leaves of nipa and put their guns between them and throw them over their shoulders and carry it anywhere you please. You would not suspect the man of having a gun. They would take one of their bamboo buckets and pretend to carry rice or water. You could see no signs of a gun. Nobody would suspect it. In forty different ways they would get their guns along.

#wagner -o-

KILLING BY THE INSURGENTS.

They killed an officer at Pavia after he was captured; we were satisfied of this from an examination of the conditions on the site of the

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crime. Pavia is a town probably 5 miles from Jaro. He was going to his station at Pototan. He was killed after capture we were satisfied from the way he was shot in the back of the head. It was Lieutenant Wagner, of the Twenty-sixth Volunteers.

#pavia -o-

The presidente of Pavia was mortally wounded by the chief of one of these guerrilla bands who came in with his people in white shirts and all that, and no uniform. They came in and demanded of the presidente that he should aid and assist them in destroying the detachment stationed in the town. We kept a detachment of troops in Pavia. The presidente saw the insurrecto coming and went out to meet him and told him he must get out of there; that he would have nothing to do with him; and started to go off. The insurrecto caught him and gave him a couple of strokes with his dagger, and while the presidente lingered long enough to come to town for assistance and to tell what had happened, his wounds were mortal.

They killed the chief of police and what we would call a druggist, and one or two others, at Barotac Nueva. They were killed simply because they had befriended the Americans. They killed a man named Mata, who was teaching in Manduriao under the auspices of one of the missionaries. They killed three men at Pototan simply because they had taken the oath of allegiance to the United States.

Senator CULBERSON. I wish to be advised about one thing. Are you stating these matters upon your own knowledge or are you stating them upon information and belief from inquiries made by you of others?

General HUGHES. In some of these cases we afterwards hanged the people who did it. There was a reign of terror all through that section—

Senator CULBERSON. It was not my purpose to go into that. I simply want to know if you are making these statements upon your own knowledge or upon information derived by you from others.

General HUGHES. In some cases it is derived from others who were authorized to investigate it. Of course I could not investigate all these things. I had too much to do; but I had the investigations made.

Senator CULBERSON. You are stating this now upon the authority of reports made to you?

General HUGHES. Yes, sir; as a rule.

The CHAIRMAN. Official reports?

General HUGHES. Official reports.

Senator CULBERSON. Official reports which are in the records?

General HUGHES. Some of them must be of record out there. I do not think that class of record comes here.

Senator CULBERSON. That is all I wanted to know—whether you knew it of your own knowledge or were stating it upon information derived from others.

General HUGHES. Some of them were official reports. For instance, take the case of the three men killed at Pototan. I think that was the official report of the officer commanding Pototan, but I can not go into the details of it because I am speaking here entirely from memory.

The CHAIRMAN. Were any of these within your own knowledge?

General HUGHES. Only by the knowledge that came through the trial of the criminals afterwards, and the fact that the evidence had to be reviewed by me and action taken. Final action had to be taken by myself in some of the cases, and in those, of course, I saw the evidence.

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KILLING OF BENEDICTO.

A man by the name of Benedicto, a very nice, civil sort of native, a man of education, who had come into Jaro, where his home was, was killed by the muchachos of his own house—his own servant and, I think, the cook, etc. No; I will not say the cook. The cook was a Chinaman; he was not in it. The only excuse for this action that ever was made was that he had been called upon to contribute money to the support of the insurrectos and had refused to do it.

In this case it was found in the trial of the matter that these muchachos were to have about 5 pesos apiece, I think, for performing the deed. The testimony on that matter is in the trial of the men. Three of them, I think, were hanged. The other one, I think, was sentenced for life, possibly. I do not remember. All of this is from memory. I had to review the cases, and so I can remember the general facts. Now, in Jaro, it must be understood, there were two detachments of troops, some of them not two blocks away, when this was done.

DISAPPEARANCE OF DR. MAPA.

At about the same time Dr. Mapa, a practicing physician, who had also come in and gone back to his home and his practice, disappeared. The report came in that he had been kidnapped. We had it investigated and found he had disappeared, and we did not know what had happened. The family were dreadfully distressed, and we could not relieve them; but presently they heard from outside that he had been kidnapped by the band of Quintin Salas.

In the course of time, I have forgotten the time—ten days probably—he came to my office looking as if he had not slept much for some time, and gave me an account of his experience. This I have only from him. But it had all the earmarks of truth. He was called, that is, a message was delivered to him by some muchacho, to go to a certain house down in the back part of the town, next the Jaro River, to see a patient. He got into his guiles and went off in good faith, and suddenly, in a quiet part of the road, he was seized, the horse taken out of his guiles, and he was carried across the river, and finally, in some place which he said he did not know, a mere shack of some kind, he met Quintin Salas.

Senator PATTERSON. Who was he?

QUINTIN SALAS

General HUGHES. Quintin Salas was the chief insurrecto of this section or zone, as they called it. He had quite a talk with him. The doctor had lost a good many personal articles that he had when he went out, so he told me, but one that seemed to distress him most was a very fine diamond that had been taken from him. That was all that was said just at that time.

At the end of the month, however, he came to me in distress, and he wanted to know what to do.

Said he, " When I was released by Salas and allowed to return to my home, gave my pledge that I would send him so much money per month, and if I do not send it he will kill me." I had every reason to believe the man was telling the truth. His brother, the judge, had left Jaro some time before and gone to Molo.

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About this time he left Molo and came and made his home right near my offices. But the only way I could help this man that I could see—because he had to be protected, and you can not protect a man against assassins, in my opinion, when they are natives—was this: I told him to put up the monthly amount that he had agreed to pay and to transmit it to the commanding officer of Jaro, with a letter stating that he desired that money to be sent to Quintin Salas under the agreement made. I wrote to the commanding officer at Jaro to send the money out to Quintin Salas through the lines, stating to him that if he were an officer the money did not belong to him; if he was a robber and a thief, it did. When we captured the papers we found that envelope with the money still in it. I do not think Dr. Mapa ever made any more payments.

But that was the condition of things. No man's life was worth anything unless he complied with the demands of those people, and it was with me for some time quite a question, or at least I revolved in my own mind for some time, as to whether or not retaliation was possible. I finally decided that it would not do with these people outside. They could kill two for every one that I would shoot if I undertook to kill man for man, and the thing was too serious to execute without being perfectly sure that I would reach the result. And knowing the character of the chiefs outside I did not believe it would reach the result.

So these conditions went on to an extent that I think under certain circumstances would have been found almost criminal on my part; but I wish to explain that the reason was that their indifference to the loss of life was such that I do not think retaliation would have had any effect. I am still of that opinion that if I had attempted to shoot man for man, for a presidente and the other people they were killing outside, they would simply have laughed at me and let me go on and would have paid no attention to me.

Senator PATTERSON. They were indifferent to the lives of others. Were they indifferent to their own lives?

General HUGHES. They were indifferent to every other man's life. They will take care of their own, if a good pair of heels or a good bolo will do it, but they are absolutely indifferent to taking life.

The organization of town governments throughout the whole department was kept constantly going on. This was under General Order, No. 40, which did not require the taking of the oath of allegiance by the officials.

ORGANIZATION OF SCHOOLS.

The organization of schools was also industriously carried on, and in Iloilo, owing to the fire, I had to build the schoolhouses before we could open any schools, which I did.

CENSUS OF CHILDREN WHO WOULD GO TO SCHOOL.

But before doing it I took a census to find how many children would go, and it was remarkable that on inquiring of parents whether or not they would send their children to the schools the almost invariable question was, "Are you going to teach English?" On being answered in the affirmative, they would say, "Very well, our children will go." I do not know whether they thought it would be valuable to them or because they wanted to join us.

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Senator ALLISON. You say you spoke to the parents. Were the parents generally intelligent people or were they of the miscellaneous class and more or less intelligent?

General HUGHES. These people probably had learned to read and write, as a rule.

Senator ALLISON. In Spanish?

CENSUS OF QUALIFIED VOTERS.

General HUGHES. In Spanish; and others could read and write in their own language. But in taking the census of those who were qualified under the conditions of franchise—that is, to vote, which required that they should either read and write Spanish or their own language, or that they should have so much property, etc.—the number who showed up were less than 200 in a population which had increased to 15,000 from 5,000 in a little over a year. The first year it increased to 15,000, by actual count made by Captain Talbert of your town, Mr. Chairman. He was the provost who took the census.

Senator PATTERSON. At that time and in these provinces did they allow those to vote who could speak and write their own language or the Spanish or was it the Spanish or the English?

General HUGHES. My recollection is that under General Otis' order No. 40, of 1900, they could be admitted if they could read and write either Spanish or their own language.

Senator PATTERSON. The only reason I ask you is because under the laws of the Commission—

General HUGHES. That is later, of course.

Senator PATTERSON. That is later.

General HUGHES. It requires English or Spanish. But General Otis' order you will find differs in some particulars.

OUTBREAK IN BOHOL.

There was an outbreak in Bohol very unexpectedly, as we had gone there at the invitation of the people during this year, brought about by a Tagalo who had been the chief of police on the island under the so-called republican government. This man wentout and carried with him 8 of our native scouts, which is the only unfortunate occurrence we had with the entire 1,800 native scouts, whom we finally employed in that department.

The mistake had been made, I think, of enlisting too many at one station. They had tried to form a company of them in the one place, which was not the customary way of doing. We usually took selected men, probably not more than 6 or 8, from any one place; and in the number of men they had enlisted over there, 50 I think, there were evidently some insurrectos. They took their rifles and their allowance of ammunition with them, and I think it is the only break we had in the whole two years we employed this force.

ATTACK ON DUMANGAS.

The new condition of affairs was initiated by insurrectos in Panay by the attack on Dumangas. They made two or three minor attacks at posts or stations on their way to Dumangas, but Dumangas was the objective, and they made an attack on it. They finally succeeded in

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roasting the garrison out. The garrison was withdrawn without loss, however. At the time I was in Samar, Leyte, or Cebu—I am not certain where. From this time on, which was probably in October—but I can not fix the date—until March 3, 1901, there was nothing but activity throughout the department, you might say.

SURRENDER OF DELGADO.

The great bulk of the rifles being in Panay, it had a great influence over the people of the other islands, and along in January or February the people of Iloilo and Molo and Jaro, that is, those of standing, wrote a letter to Delgado, the commander in chief of the insurrecto forces on the island, to come in and surrender and give up his fighting. Delgado replied that he was very sorry to do so, but that he would obey the order. He came in himself with his headquarters detachment, and then sent his orders through us to all the other chiefs.

It required a good deal of diplomacy with some of those chiefs to get them in, but it ended in their all coming in with two exceptions. They could not get Quintin Salas' command of 120 rifles, and they could not get in Diocno and his Tagalogs. He was in Capiz Province and the troops up there were finally able to wound him and so captured him.

But by the time the civil commission came down there all these provinces had surrendered their arms, and any disturbing element that was still out was composed of the brigands or robbers in the mountains. They are not yet entirely gone.

Senator ALLISON. The mountain robbers?

MOUNTAIN ROBBERS.

General HUGHES. Yes, sir; a short time before I left there in December, a party of them came out from the mountains and attacked a barrio, robbed the people of their carabao, and carried them off. The police called on the nearest army station for assistance, and I think that that band of robbers will not come down any more. That is my impression. I presume that others will be treated in the same way; at least, that is what we intended to do.

The CHAIRMAN. That is simply brigandage, of which I suppose there has been more or less always.

EARLY EVIDENCES OF BRIGANDAGE.

General HUGHES. I hunted up all their histories I could get hold of, and in one of them it is stated that it was so bad in 1730 that they had to prepare their forces to go out to meet them and try to suppress them. It never has been suppressed from that day to this. It has been going on the entire time, and it is going to be a good deal of bother to suppress it. But with native troops who are well armed and accustomed to traveling the same trails that the robbers do and can follow them, there will be no trouble at all in killing them off when they show themselves.

But we have to let them commit some offense before we can attack them, because we do not know that they are robbers until they act.

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The modes of life are so peculiar in some of the mountains that it is unsafe to take it for granted that any party you meet up there are robbers.

Colonel Scott, in crossing over Antique to Capiz Province, ran onto a colony of people in there to whom they could not speak at all. He had people with him who spoke Visayan, Tagalog, Spanish, etc., but none of them could make themselves understood by these strange people, nor could the strangers be understood by them, and do not know to-day who those people are.

They are perfectly quiet, respectable-looking people. They never come down to the coast. We had people who live on the Antique coast. They could give no account of them at all. They are perfectly harmless, so far as we could tell, but they were not Negritos. Who they are we do not know to this day.

The insurrectos who escaped to Negros were heavily punished by two or three attacks and disappeared, so that when it came time to organize the civil government in the two provinces there was no reason why they should not be organized.

SUGAR CROP IN NEGROS

In that island the crop of sugar grown last year, although the drought and grasshoppers injured the growth somewhat, was so rich in sap, they informed me before I came away, that it was really an average crop, which means a good deal of sugar. There has been but little trouble since the organization of civil governments over there.

The ladrones have bothered them once or twice. They came in and attacked the native troops and found them asleep, and I think possibly killed one or two of them and wounded some others, and got two or three rifles, I think, which was probably what they were after.

The CHAIRMAN. Samar was not organized at that time.

SAMAR UNSUBDUED BY THE SPANIARDS.

General HUGHES. Samar never has been organized. Samar bad never been subdued by the Spaniards. The Spaniards never risked going into the interior of that island, and they never risked going into the interior of Leyte, I think. There is not a road across it. I had a road projected, and got it so that it could be used as a trail, but as a road it had not been finished when I left there. There was nothing but trails.

CHARACTER OF TRAILS IN THE ISLANDS.

In speaking of these trails I wish to say that the foot trail of the natives is something our men can not travel. We have tried it, and you will find that the trail probably goes up trees in one place or up some perpendicular obstacle. The natives are experts in climbing and have much exercise in it in getting cocoanuts and in collecting tuba. They can get along without any trouble, but our men, with haversack, gun, etc., can not get along at all. In using Abella's maps with our men the foot trails have to be discarded, but they can usually get along over the carabao trails. They may have to do some swimming, because the carabao are at home in either water or on land.

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CONDITION OF THE PEOPLE IN CEBU.

In Cebu I went around to the main towns in April to see the condition of the people and the general condition of the island before there was a civil government established. In the towns I visited I suggested to the presidentes that they call their people together and let them decide. They did call them together, and I talked to them. I told them we simply wanted their decision as to whether they wanted to continue the war and stay out or wanted to join the Americans and have peace.

They were unanimous for peace. They were not very particular as to terms, but they were tired of the whole thing. The number of rifles, as estimated by me at that time, was about a hundred in the hands of men who were in the hills. Of course there were some hundreds of bolomen, but I believed at the time that if civil government was organized it could be a great assistance to us in getting that island in good condition.

Senator ALLISON. You are speaking of Cebu?

General HUGHES. Yes, sir; Cebu. I do not know that that influenced the Commission, but anyway they established the government, and for some weeks it looked as if everything was going to come out right, and I believe had it not so happened that the commanding officer, Colonel McClernand, and his regiment were withdrawn by reason of muster out, the thing would have come out all right; but his coming away and bringing away his regiment changed the situation, and the insurrectos kept up the war.

In Bohol there were a few rifles out. It was a mere question whether the civil government would aid us or not. The man chosen for governor seemed to be a pretty strong character and he thought at the time that if he had a hundred rifles he could settle it. I sent and got him the rifles, but the contract proved a little too heavy for him. So the provinces of Cebu and Bohol were turned back to me for doctoring, and that was the last piece of work I did before coming away. I presume that both Cebu and Bohol have been returned to the civil government ere this.

Senator DIETRICH. It is almost 12 o'clock.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you think you can finish on Monday!

General HUGHES. I think I can finish my general statement on Monday.

Thereupon (at 11 o'clock and 50 minutes a. m.) the committee adjourned until Monday, March 3, 1902, at 10.30 o'clock a. m.

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