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Show irfiS' COLONEL AND HIS LATEST ANANIAS fY OLONEL Roosevelt is our Bombastes Furioso, while David Starr Jordan I ( is a mollycoddle. The Colonel emits an exultant Fee, Fo, Fum when ho smells blood; the Chancellor of Stanford wouldn't shed the blood H' of a naughty turnip to save the universe from dissolution. The two men are H' at the antipodes of current thought. It is natural that they should disagree H j violently. So when Starr Jordan said that "the Colonel thought in terms H of war," it was to bo expected that the Colonel would call the Chancellor a H i H But his manner of applying the lie to Jordan is unusua,l. The Colonel H does not say: Jordan lies. He says: 'He is merely lying about me." Merely H lying! The implication is that with the Chancelor lying is a mere detail. It H is as much as to say that Jordan is lying as usual, or else I do not get the Hj sense of plain English. To the Colonel, in other words, the Chancellor's men- H dacity is a commonplace, something to be taken for granted. This is fighting H talk. Jordan will probably challenge the Colonel to a duel of tongues, he to H bo adjudged the winner who talks the other to death. H Tho. Colonel has not had any use for David Starr Jordan ever since Jor- H dan abused his confidence some sixteen or seventeen years ago. 1 say "abused H his confidence" because intimate friends of Roosevelt always maintained that H that was what Jordan did. Roosevelt was supposed to hold that opinion too, H but in public he declared that Jordan had lied about him. It was during H President McKinley's first administration, while Aguinaldo was making trouble H for the Americ rernment not unlike the trouble which Villa has made Hj for us more rece H Dr. Jordan ni .e privacy of a club quoted Roosevelt as saying that Mc- H Kinley was a "jellyfish President." The remark was repeated and got into H. print, kicking up the deuce of a row. Roosevelt promptly declared that Jor- H? dan had lied about him, and Jordan just as promptly declared that he had H" never quoted Roosevelt as using any such language. That was one of the Hi first occasions when Jordan denied his purported words. This practice be- H' I came rather common with him later, and in consequence some newspapermen Hrti would not interview him unless a third party was present to give corrobora- Hif! tive testimony as to the interview in the event of a repudiation. H It was on account of this peculiarity that somebody named Jordan "the H great repudiator." Despite Roosevelt's and Jordan's denials it was pretty H K geneially believed that Teddy had called McKinley a "jellyfish president" and H $ that Jordan's indiscretion at his club had led to the publication of the remark. H j At any rate Roosevelt cordially disliked Jordan ever afterwards. So there H was considerable surprise shown a year or two later when Roosr-velt as presi- H dent spoke at Stanford and eulogized David Starr in extravagant terms. No- H body believed that he realy meant what he said. His latest comment on Jor- dan is taken as showing how he has felt about him ever since the "Jellyfish" M ' incident. Editor of Town Talk. |
