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Show BBBBBBWBBMgBBBBBBMBHBHHHHHHHHlHil BBBBBBBBBjBjyifPWffiBS rir-WB3!mmnmrmwi i iwTg'y """ '"' '"" " 1HH 6 SOODWIN'S WEEKLY I THE REAL ROOSEVELT thJ, HI . As The Colonel Appears Not ':o the Plain and Crodulous People, But to His Familiars Hi A Few A'icedotes After the Manner of Suetonius. Hr H The other day my attention was attracted by M these words in a Chronicle editorial: "At the ! present time a great many believe that the fundamental objection of Colonel Roosevelt to hi President Taft is that he fired Gifford Pinchot B j for insubordination." This observation Btarted a M train of reflection. I thought of Suetonius, and B f I thought how interesting and instructive it M'' would be to have a life of Roosevelt written M after the style of one of the "Lives of the ml Caesars." Something of the kind has been pub- lished. I refer to Mrs. Annie Riley Hale's fas- icinating book "Rooseveltian Fact and Fable," ovhich was written before the Colonel went to Africa. But this book deals more with the public pub-lic acts than with the private life of the renowned re-nowned epoch-maker. Suetonius is more diffuse on personal conduct and habits than on public events, and he presents pictures of the inner manner of being. He has given us memoirs rather than history, intimate biography that satisfies sat-isfies a natural curiosity as to the personal char-iacteristics char-iacteristics of men who in their time were masters of the destinies of the people that ruled the world. A great collector of anecdotage was Suetonius He omits nothing, paints nothing, argues nothing, but his rich treasures of informa- tion are more powerful and impressive than ar- i gument. As in comparative anatomy one bone will enable the expert to construct the whole hmm skeleton, so in the Suetonius style of biography B one story will suffice to reveal the man. Suelon- B iiis enables us to understand the state of gov M ernment and the manners of his times better M than any historian that wrote of tne same period. H Now the men to whom SuetonluB introduces us H were hardly known to the people of their own H day. What the people knew of them was what Hj was said of them by the orators, and the orators H of Rome were as far from truthful as our yellow B journals and muckraking magazines. Many of I their portraits of Roman heroes were caricatures, confessedly so, designed for the ends of faction. hmh Even Cicero tossed about atrocious libels at rau- H dom. The question then as now was not "Are H they true? but will they tell?" In the Roman H hustings were eloquent sycophants also, who H fashioned monumental idols out of very poor clay H for the worship of the mob. Men were adored H for what they were not. Roman history might H have been simplified if the peopio uad been told as much about the Caesars as was reserved for Hj posterity in the pages of Suetonius. H And so I have thought how Interesting and H instructive it would be to have a Suetonius take V us behind the scenes while the drama is on that B is redolent of the personality of Theodore Roose- AVAw velt. We might benefit much more than posterity VAVfl from inside information touching the closet-do B ings of the man who is popularly believed to be B groping his way through a jungio of malign VAVH vicissitudes with his eye ever on the polar star. H Of course I don't mean idle tittle-tattle. I mean Hf the kind of information which Frederick the ftvAvMi Great pronounced essential to good biography IR information about things that elucidate charuc- H tor, about things that deserve to be remembered, VAvH not curiosities. The clubs of New York and Wash- Hfl ington are full of it, and meanwhile the Roose- H veltian figure is floating through the mists of time H in many varied semblances from warrior and HH statesman to braggart and demagogue. How in- H teresting it would be to know the truth, to sea H him as he is! HH Perhaps it will be said that the truth is known, flH but that It will not be accepted while the people are under the spell of their hero's fascinations The people have not been entertained with Roosevelt anecdotage. They have been told al' about the Dear Maria Archbishop Ireland em-brogllo, em-brogllo, about the Harrlman Incident, and other matters more or less official in their nature, and these matters have been made the subject of partisan discussion, the result being that whatever what-ever seemed discreditable to Colonel Roosevelt has been assumed to be the Invention of his political enemies. The people when they credit a leader with a moral purpose, and are convinced that he has largeness of aim, are not to be turned from him even by just censure of mischievous mis-chievous performances. Indeed, of such a man they are unable to form a just estimate from his public acts. It is what he does in his private capacity that tells. A notable Illustration Is the case of Admiral Dewey. Now the only Roosevelt Roose-velt the people know is the Roosevelt in the limelight. It would be strange were it otherwise seeing that he has seldom been elsewhere. But there is another Roosevelt. Boss Piatt showed him to us in his memoirs. Poor Piatt! he was suspected of prejudice, and besides he was not generally regarded as a witness worthy of the belief of the plain people. Other witnesses have given testimony, but very little of it has got into print for the reason that it is incredible. The fact is an anecdote in Itself, one that throws a flood of light on our times, but so great is the diversity of coloring, so at variance the outline of the two portraits of the Colonel, the one known to the public and the one known to his familiars, that it has been deemed the height of folly and futility to unveil the latter to the general public. There's another anecdote in point. It was told mo by a gentleman of national fame and reputation. reputa-tion. Colonel Roosevelt was at a dinner one night in Washington. He did all the talking. The subject was himself, his experiences, his doings do-ings in the Wild and Woolly West. After the dinner two of the Roosevelt audience walked together to-gether to their hotel. One was the gentleman who told mo the story, the other was and still is a senator of the United States. Said the senator: sen-ator: "Suppose wo should tell anybody what the president talked about tonight and it should get into print, what would happen?" -mo other made answer: "Nobody would believe us." Now it is matter of that kind, the subject matter of that monologue, that would delight a conscientious Suetonius. And it is matter of that kind, matter that reflects the inner man that would enable tho people to estimate the altitude or the Roosevelt spirit, to determine how much he has of faith, of valor, of constancy; to judge to what extent he has been subordinating his private affections and his passions to his zeal for tho greatness and utility of the nation. Thero are anecdotes to be told that might enable en-able the people to answer questions as important import-ant as the one the Chronicle suggests with reference refer-ence to Colonel Roosevelt's objection to President Presi-dent Taft. That particular question I happen to bo able to answer because of Information received months ago from two highly respectable sources. Colonel Roosevelt doeB not object to President Taft because of the firing of Gifford Pinchot. Two anecdotes will make tho matter plain. Tho first deals with a conference between President Taft and Colonel Roosevelt shortly after the last presidential election. Gifford Pinchot came up for discussion in that conference. Colonel Roosevelt Roose-velt warned his successor against the forester. He commended Pinchot for his zeal and his In tegrity but pronounced him a crank and a marplot. mar-plot. The second anecdote I have told before in these columns. It is tho story of the episode in Colonel Roosevelt's cabin aboard ship just before he started on his trip to Africa. I learn from the Chronicle that this story is now in circulation circula-tion in the east, a somewhat incorrect version ver-sion of which came over the wires the other day. The story came to me direct from one of the Colonel's intimate acquaintances who was both an eye and an ear witness. The story is about a dispatch received by the Colonel. He opened it, read it, frowned, clenched his teeth and ejaculated: "The big fat I'll make him regret this." Then he exhibited the dispatch without further comment but with an air of disgust. It was from President Taft, who wished the Colonel bon voyage in the most hearty terms. It closed with these words: "I owe everything every-thing to my brother Charles and you." It was believed by the gentlemen present that the J Colonel's rage was due to the inclusion of I "Brother Charles" and the order In which credit was given. I do not vouch for the accuracy of their diagnosis. I only know that the men who made It were probably qualified by long acquaintance acquaint-ance to Interpret Rooseveltian outbursts. If their Interpretation be wrong It is nevertheless of value by reason of what it implies with reference to the Colonel's tempearment and passions. It gives us a picture of a small man concerned with likes and dislikes and very much affected by attitudes at-titudes toward himself. It is stories akin to tho forgoing that should be collected. ' Such stories are better than Confessions. The writer of Confessions Con-fessions shows himself with his faults, but he i gives himself only pleasing faults, not the odious ones that no man is without. We have seen Roosevelt as tho petulant man. What about the physical side of him? We know ho has the blood lust; that wanton animal slaughter involving no personal hazard is his favorite pastime the killing of beautiful beasts driven within gunshot of him but has he nerve in tho presence of danger? In the midst of an unexpected catastrophe could he sit his horse without batting an eye as Grant did in a panic in his first campaign? I have an anecdote that will help along speculation. It is pertinent because be-cause Colonel Roosevelt obtained his first grip on the imagination of the people by means of newspaper news-paper misrepresentation regarding his performances perform-ances in Cuba, and because by his swashbuckling methods and his intimacy with heroes of the range ho has managed to keep alive the illusion that he is something of a D'Artlgnan with the fever of romance in his blood, intoxicated with tho heady novelty of life Once when Colonel Roosevelt as president was swinging round the j circle he included Riverside in his Itinerary and J stopped at the Glenwood Inn. Tho management received instruction to reserve in addition to the apartments sot aside for the distinguished guest rooms immediately adjoining and rooms above and beneath. This precaution may have been re- ' quired by the secret service department. It is not my story. Tho president arrived at night, and was shown his rooms by the hotel manager. Just as they entered the apartments an accident occurred causing all the electric lights to go out and leaving everybody in darkness. The president presi-dent in alarm threw his arms around his companion com-panion and excitedly asked: "Wh-wh-at's that!" Perhaps the strenuousness of the trip had deranged de-ranged the president's nerves. This is a plausible (Continued on Pago 13.) THE REAL ROOSEVELT. f (Continued from Pago C.) I assumption because when he waa president tho Colonel was usually armed. I have bee a told so, and besides I know what happened la a small town in Colorado where the train stopped for him one day. Having soiled his hands on the rail of the rear platform while addressing the throng, he got off to wash them at a pump, thus killing two birds with one stone; for in addition to purifying his hands he exhibited the Innate democracy of himself. Like a plain citizen he took off his coat in preparation for the ablution and exhibited to the awe-struck bystanders a pair of hips adorned with two big pistols. I think I have indicated the value of contemporary contem-porary anecdotage. Unfortunately the stories I have told are not illustrative of any of tho Colonel's virtues. But of course there must be stories possessing an entirely different flavor, equally interesting and equally valuable for the purpose of personal study. If we examine tho Colonel at our leisure we shall find, as we shall find of any man, that he has some fine traits of character with which the people are not familiar. It is not improbable that he personifies the very nicest balance of temporalities and spiritualities. It is not fair to judge a man of Colonel Roose-vetl's Roose-vetl's far-reaching influence from one set of emotions. emo-tions. We must remember that his business is politics and that the politician if he would be successful suc-cessful must wear a mask. He cannot afford to be himself all the time. Which reminds me of another an-other story. When the Colonel was electioneering electioneer-ing as president a rope was always stretched In front of his open-air platforms at a distance of thirty feet. This was a precaution ordered by the head of the secret service department. The president presi-dent knew by whom it was ordered and why it was ordered, and he never objected. But always as soon as he mounted the platform he frowned at the rope and exclaimed in a voice to be heard by the most distant spectator, "Who put that rope there?" Then he would address the people in front: "Come up close here. Come right up to me so that I can look into your faces." It is by such palaver that the dear people are coddled. And why not? The sincere politician desiring ti benefit tho people must first of all win them. They are like babes and must be coaxed and wheedled and Teddy knows how. It has been said that the one essential qualification of a great man Is that of being misunderstood by his opponents. op-ponents. I do not believe it. I think Colonel Roosevelt is misunderstood only by his admirers. His admirers believe he is all angel; his opponents oppo-nents know that every man is a compound of angel and brute. Town Talk. |