Part 12

Thus, with telegrams and cablegrams of sympathy flooding the little Oyster Bay office by thousands, the father and mother of the boy who had given his life above the lines--received the news that their youngest born would never return.”

The only public statement Colonel Roosevelt made concerning Quentin’s death was in every way typical of the man:

“Quentin’s mother and I are very glad that he got to the front and had a chance to render some service to his country and show the stuff that was in him before his fate befell him.”

Quentin lies buried in France. There his body will remain. No formal treaty our country could make with France would be as eloquent of the good will that exists and will continue to exist between these two great republics as the fact that in French soil lie the bodies of Americans who fought and died in the common cause of humanity. Thus Quentin’s father thought; thus the world thinks. The following letter from Colonel Roosevelt to General March, while respecting the wishes of those parents who want the bodies of their boys brought home, carried a message of comfort and agreement to those parents who desired their dead soldier sons to remain in the resting places prepared for them near the field of battle by their comrades:

My Dear General March:

The inclosed clipping states that all the American dead will be taken home after the war, according to orders received by the army chaplains. I do not know whom to write to in the matter, so I merely ask that you turn this over to whomever has charge of it.

Mrs. Roosevelt and I wish to enter a most respectful but most emphatic protest against the proposed course so far as our son Quentin is concerned. We have always believed that

Where the tree falls, There let it lie.

We know that many good persons feel entirely different, but to us it is painful and harrowing long after death to move the poor body from which the soul has fled. We greatly prefer that Quentin shall continue to lie on the spot where he fell in battle and where the foemen buried him.

After the war is over Mrs. Roosevelt and I intend to visit the grave and then to have a small stone put up saying it is put up by us, but not disturbing what has already been erected to his memory by his friends and American comrades in arms.

With apologies for troubling you,

Very faithfully yours,

THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

It seems strange that up to the very time of America’s participation in the war there should be people in this country who did not realize the self-sacrificing work for the national cause done by the Colonel, yet such was true.

At a mass meeting in Madison Square Garden Roosevelt was talking about the part the United States should take in the war, when a man shouted:

“Why aren’t you over there yourself?”

Some men cried, “Put him out!” But Roosevelt raised his hand for silence and said, “No, don’t put him out. Let him stay. I want to answer him.”

When the audience was still he went on:

“I couldn’t go myself, but I did send my four sons, every one of whose lives is a thousand times dearer to me than my own. There, you creature, that is my answer to any man who dares to ask an American father why he isn’t engaged in this war.”

The scorching anger of the Colonel and the scorn of the audience made the heckler slink away with a rebuke he will always remember.

DEMOCRACY IN THE ARMY

Long before the United States entered the war Roosevelt with his friend, Major-General Wood, vigorously advocated a policy of national preparedness, urging universal military training for the nation’s youth. In explanation of his desire to see universal military service prevail the Colonel said:

“I want to see Mrs. Vanderbilt’s son and Mrs. Astor’s son, with Pat and Jim of Telegraph Hill, sleeping under the same dog tent and eating the same food. I want to see the officers selected from among them on the strict basis of merit, without regard to anything else. Then we will have a democratic system.”

Roosevelt took a great deal of pride in the five-star service button he wore. In a conversation with newspaper men some months after his boys had gone abroad, he told them that he had received news that Theodore had been in action and a bullet had struck his trench helmet and glanced off. Theodore wrote home, his father said, that he regretted he had not been wounded, just for the experience. Later, Theodore was to receive his full share of such experiences.

At the time of this conversation public announcement had just been made that “Archie” had been promoted in rank from second lieutenant to captain. Roosevelt told his hearers that “Archie” had led a raiding party out into No Man’s Land at night and that the promotion had been won by gallantry under fire during this raid.

The Colonel said further that Kermit, with the Anglo-Indian forces in Mesopotamia, as the leader of “a troop of Whirling Dervishes,” Indian cavalry, had also been in action.

Later the Colonel’s pride in his family’s war record was to extend to include the women of his family. Mrs. Roosevelt, in the heart-breaking trials she passed through, had proven herself a true heroine. Her daughters and daughters-in-law proved in many ways their devotion to their country’s cause. Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., did especially effective work.

She was the first American woman sent abroad for war service by the Y. M. C. A. She arrived in Paris a few weeks after Pershing. There she conducted a French class for Americans, with ambulance drivers for pupils. Then she worked in the first canteen in Paris, and was in charge of all the women’s work in establishing the first American officers’ hotel.

When she had been in Paris six months the army created “leave areas” for the American soldiers. These areas were put under the control of the Y. M. C. A., whose officials gave Mrs. Roosevelt charge of the women’s part of the work.

REQUIEM

“Under the wide and starry sky Dig the grave and let me lie. Glad did I live and gladly die And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me: Here he lies where he longed to be; Home is the sailor, home from the sea, And the hunter home from the hill.”

--_Robert Louis Stevenson._

XVIII

“Great-Heart”

Since Roosevelt’s death there have been many suggestions made for a memorial to him. Many of the projects are highly commendable and well worthy of popular support, yet the fact remains that Roosevelt’s own works will bring coming generations their best remembrance of him.

Fortunately for posterity, this great American was a faithful recorder of his own works, and libraries and book stores are full of his writings or those of authorized biographers that give us a full range of his extraordinarily active life. Fortunately, too, for the world is the fact that Roosevelt recognized the film as another effective medium for bringing him in touch with the people, and authorized before his death the representation of his life and work in motion pictures.

The deep and permanent impression Roosevelt made on the people of his time--which will extend far into the future to influence coming generations of Americans, is due not only to his personal acts but also to his literary work. As an author and as an editor, the Colonel contributed historical writings and entertaining narratives to the literature of our country that earned him brilliant distinction and made his name and works familiar to all who read. His work as a historian led to his election in 1912 to the Presidency of the American Historical Association, and also to his admission into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Roosevelt served “The Outlook” as contributing editor from 1909 to 1914 and then joined the staff of the “Metropolitan Magazine,” remaining on its staff as contributing editor until his death. His contributions to these magazines on contemporary subjects were always interesting, forceful and constructive, and exercised a profound influence on the life and development of the nation.

That Roosevelt was born to be an author as well as a statesman is proven by the fact that no matter how busy he was he always found time to write. In college and while he was reading law in his uncle’s office, he found time to write “The Naval War of 1812,” a standard work on the subject. He wrote his “Life of Thomas Hart Benton” and his “Hunting Trips of a Ranchman” while he was pursuing his arduous career as a rancher. When his duties as Civil Service Commissioner at Washington were pressing upon him he yet found time to write several books on hunting, as well as part of his splendid work “The Winning of the West.” Thus it was throughout his career. Greater and greater grew the demands upon his time, yet the number of volumes to his credit mounted steadily.

Since his cattle-raising venture had failed, and since he knew the income from any public positions he should hold would be inadequate to the expenses of the office and generally uncertain, he determined that his pen should support him. The fact that, when he died, his income from his writings was about one hundred thousand dollars a year shows how well he kept his resolution.

Mr. J. H. Whigham, publisher of the “Metropolitan Magazine,” thus interestingly describes the way in which Roosevelt formed and kept his literary decisions:

“His first coming to the ‘Metropolitan’ was in keeping with all the Colonel said and did. The thing that worried him most in making a connection was whether he could faithfully carry out his part of the bargain. I had known Roosevelt first in Cuba when I lived for some weeks with the Rough Riders and shared the precarious but precious potatoes of the Colonel’s own mess. It didn’t require much perspicacity to see that he was the sort of leader to tie to and cherish. Naturally, therefore, when the ‘Metropolitan Magazine’ came into my control I looked around for Roosevelt. He was contributing editor of ‘The Outlook’ then, and there is no need to say that he couldn’t be weaned away from his allegiance to the Abbotts, for whom he always had the greatest affection. I managed, however, to get him interested in what we were trying to do with the ‘Metropolitan,’ and he promised to let me know if he ever changed his plans.

“When the war broke out I came back from Europe to find that the Colonel’s time with ‘The Outlook’ was up. Before I could see him, he had begun to publish some syndicated newspaper articles in which he denounced the invasion of Belgium. Hurrying over to his office, which was then in Forty-second Street, I caught him on the verge of closing a year’s arrangement with the syndicate. I reminded him of my prior claim which he freely granted. He couldn’t see, however, how he could deliver full value to a monthly magazine. The syndicate could publish two or three times a month and so get back their money. I told him that was our affair. We wouldn’t worry about not getting our money’s worth. But the Colonel said that he couldn’t avoid worrying. He didn’t like being in the position of not being able to deliver full value. He had never been in that position before, and he didn’t propose to be there now. I gave him excellent reasons, as I thought, why he would be worth as much to us as to any newspaper syndicate, and he was nearly convinced but not quite. I left him feeling pretty sure that he would decide against us. But I was determined not to lose him. After wracking my brains for two or three hours for a new argument I suddenly remembered that I had mentioned no period for the proposed association. Suppose that I offered him a three years’ contract instead of one, would not that give us a greater and more exclusive value and so satisfy the Colonel that both parties would profit by the agreement? It was late at night and I had difficulty in getting the number of his private wire at Oyster Bay. Nevertheless I finally brought him to the telephone and made my new proposal. He laughed; and said, ‘You seem to want me pretty badly. I’m sure I can’t think why. It’s true your new offer puts a new complexion on the matter. Come out and see me tomorrow at nine. I have to decide this business by ten in the morning.’

“I went, and it was decided in our favor. We never regretted it and I’m thankful to say the Colonel never regretted it either.”

The Colonel at the time of his death was also a regular contributor to the “Kansas City Star.”

ROOSEVELT AT HOME

So far as his private life is concerned, Roosevelt will be recorded in history as being thoroughly representative of that love of family, domestic simplicity, and devotion to the duties of married life, which go to make a great race. These traits were of course largely influenced by Mrs. Roosevelt herself. She exercised a restraining power upon his impulsiveness. Before entering on any enterprise, he always asked himself, “What will she think of it?”

She was noted for her graceful mastery of every social situation, and as Mistress of the White House, she cultivated and preserved those traditions of hospitality that belong to that high place.

Roosevelt was a devout member of the Dutch Reformed Church. A friend thus describes the Colonel’s attendance at a little church of his faith in Washington: “He came in quietly, unattended, went well up front, bowed a moment in prayer and was ready for the service. The sermon was a good plain gospel sermon and he seemed to enjoy it. His singing and responses to the Scripture readings were like his talks to Congress--clear and energetic, as if he didn’t care who heard him as long as he knew he was right. Throughout the sermon he gave the most earnest attention. He impressed one as being a man who believed in exercising the same sincerity in religious matters as in any others, and I got a new light on his now famous ‘square deal’ principles.”

After the service Roosevelt said:

“The services this morning were enjoyable. The sermon was good and I agreed with him in the points he made that the home is the chief foundation stone of the republic and the hope of the church. The ‘Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty’ is one of the grandest of hymns; after a week spent on perplexing problems and in heated contests it does so rest my soul to come into the house of the Lord and worship and to sing, and mean it, the ‘Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty,’ and to know that He is my Father, and He takes me up into His life and plans, and to commune personally with Christ who died for me. I am sure I get a wisdom not my own and a superhuman strength in fighting the moral evils I am called to confront.”

A man with this belief can pass from this world unafraid and eager for the adventures of the higher world beyond him. Thus went the Colonel. Warrior though he was his end was peaceful; he approached his grave:

“_Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch_ _About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams._”

The historian will draw many great lessons from the life of Roosevelt. His devotion to public duty, his advocacy of the square deal, his hundred per cent. Americanism, his superhuman activity in many fields, will be outstanding features of every biography.

Perhaps, however, the following extract from a memorial tribute made by Dr. Newell Dwight Hillis sums up his characteristics as well as anything that can be said in a few words:

HOPE FOR RICH MEN’S SONS

“One of the logical inferences from the successful career of Roosevelt,” said Dr. Hillis, “is that even the richest man’s son can succeed in this republic. In the republic, for some strange reason, a prejudice has grown up in favor of the poor boy and against the son of the palace and the private car. Little by little, extreme wealth has become a handicap, and the child of the millionaire is out of the race before he enters it. It is a real obstacle for a man who aspires to political office and honor to fall heir to enormous wealth. The favorites of fortune are those who drive the mule along the canal path or in their teens support a widowed mother, or come from a log cabin to the great city.

“Now and then, however, there is a youth who uses his wealth instead of abusing it. Mr. Roosevelt’s entire career is an incentive to rich men’s sons. Born in a great house; a graduate of Harvard--rich man’s college; traveled abroad; a Civil Service Commissioner with George William Curtis, an intellectual aristocrat; Police Commissioner of New York; a cattle man on the plains of Montana; leader of the Rough Riders in Cuba; Governor of New York; Vice-President and President of the United States--all this represents a long and brilliant career. But Lincoln did not work harder; Garfield was not more industrious; McKinley was not as close a student; Henry Clay was not more democratic; and among Mr. Roosevelt’s closest friends were untaught men, illiterate ranchers, who were full of latent intellect and sound sense. His capacity for friendship was one of the ex-President’s most striking characteristics. By his patience, his industry, his hunger for knowledge, his mingling with all sorts and conditions of men, his incessant travel, Mr. Roosevelt overcame every handicap imposed by wealth and became a hero to the rich and poor, the cultivated and the untaught, and a guide and friend and standard for all classes, in all countries.”

* * * * *

On January 8, 1919, Theodore Roosevelt was buried on the hillside of the Oyster Bay Cemetery, near the blue waters of the Sound he loved so dearly and close to the trees and hills he had roamed among from boyhood. On his grave was dropped a wreath from an aviator who had been a friend of “Quentin, the eagle”--the hero son who had died in France.

Two months later, “Bill” Sewall came down from the Maine woods to visit the resting place of the man who had been his companion on many a journey into the wilderness. “It’s just the kind of place Theodore would like to be buried!” he said.

THE END.

Transcriber’s Notes

Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.