upon him by "Professional Peace Reformers", whose aims were lofty indeed, but whose minds were muddy and whose observations and estimates of human nature were worthy of five-year-old children in the nursery.

As always, the ludicrous phases of his several peace interviews lightened the strain of his intense responsibility. Lawrence Abbott, in his vivid, delightful "Impressions", has recalled two of these humorous situations. Roosevelt had consulted the Japanese envoys and was assured that they were quite ready to accede to any reasonable terms. Then he went to the Russian envoys and asked if they would join in a conference if he could arrange with the Japanese to hold one. They replied readily that they would be glad to do so. "But," they added, "we fear that the Japanese representatives will not consent." Roosevelt told them that he would see what he could do. "And all the time," said Roosevelt to Lawrence Abbott, "I had the Japanese request in my pocket."

I must not bore my readers with too many references to the knot tied by Gordius, first King of Phrygia; but in my survey of my classmate's career I am reminded, again and again, that whereas the great Alexander cut only one "Gordian knot", our modern conqueror cut many, great and small. Roosevelt told friends that when he

had the envoys of Japan and Russia with him one day on board the presidential yacht, Mayflower, in Oyster Bay, luncheon was announced. Instantly Roosevelt bethought himself as to what delicate questions of precedence needed to be considered, as he invited his distinguished guests to the luncheon table. He had not the slightest idea as to the established code suitable for the occasion. So he promptly cut the petty Gordian knot. "Gentlemen," he said, “shall we now all go in to luncheon?” And all together they went in; there was no Alpha or Omega about it. "Doubtless they were all somewhat surprised," Roosevelt smilingly added, "but they probably put it down to my American inexperience in social matters."

And just here note the blending of two very diverse strains in Roosevelt's nature. In a certain sense as in this situation - he thought of himself as merely a man among men, and the trifling problems of social precedence made him smile. But there was that other occasion, when Prince Henry of Prussia was a guest at the White House, and dull-witted, devoted Holleben suggested to Roosevelt that "Prince Henry, a Hohenzollern," should precede the President in going out to dinner. With what result? I would give much to have seen Theodore Roosevelt's tense countenance and to have heard his incisive tones, as he replied defini

tively, "No person living precedes the President of the United States in the White House." I respond even now, in the writing, to the exalted, patriotic sentiment that was in my eminent classmate's heart as he uttered that proud finality.

The highly successful diplomatic work of Roosevelt in ending the Russo-Japanese War naturally drew upon him the plaudits of the civilized world. And this approving world-opinion was fittingly symbolized in the Nobel prize of a medal and forty thousand dollars in gold. The medal he of course could not "put from him." But with the money he did as did that ancient Hebrew warrior in Adullam's cave. David poured out the precious cup of water from Bethlehem's gate, as an offering to his God. He consecrated it; he dedicated it to the Highest. Similarly did Roosevelt. Practical idealist that he was, he could not use that money for his own purposes. He could not accept payment for doing what his righteous soul, throughout his life, pledged him to do, the Right. So he "consecrated" that gold by making it a fund to be used in conference and arbitration between the two

great warring classes, -Labor and Capital.

Roosevelt's close touch with newspaper men is illustrated by this letter sent me by Robert L. O'Brien, now editor of the Boston Herald:

"In 1906 I was correspondent of the Boston

Transcript at Washington, and I came into touch with President Roosevelt frequently. I was particularly impressed with his universality of information. Mr. J. K. Ohl, then correspondent of the Atlanta Constitution and afterwards Managing Editor of the New York Herald, once said that he never dropped into President Roosevelt's office without finding him familiar to the minute with what the Atlanta Constitution was saying on all public questions.

Every

"Nor was this experience unusual. newspaper man found that out. My first acquaintance with him came as a result of his sending for me because of something I had written in the Transcript with which he did not altogether agree. After that I visited him frequently. I noticed that there was no book or current writing in fiction, in biography, in history, in biology, in applied science of any form, with which he did not seem absolutely familiar, up to the minute.

"Mr. Bok, in his recent autobiography, has alluded to the relations that I had with President Roosevelt on his account. My recollection of the story is a little more detailed than Mr. Bok's. It came about when William Loeb, Secretary to the President, called me by telephone to say that Mr. Bok was there in the hope of inducing the President to run a regular department in the Ladies'

Home Journal. Mr. Loeb properly observed, 'Of course the President of the United States can't do that.' I agreed with him and said so. I told Mr. Bok what the White House had told me. This led to the slight modification of the plan by which I became introduced into it, and instead of Mr. Roosevelt's running the department himself, he talked with me, at regular periods, during the time he was being shaved, and I wrote out an interpretation, or elaboration, of his point of view, and it appeared, regularly, in Mr. Bok's magazine, in the department which I think he headed 'What the President Thinks.'

"We discussed all sorts of questions. I remember one on which President Roosevelt balked, and that was woman suffrage. He said that he had voted for woman suffrage in the New York legislature, and that he supposed he was a woman suffragist; had always so regarded himself, but that there were certain phases of feminine public activity which had considerably disquieted him, and that his interest in the anti-race suicide campaign had led him to place less emphasis upon the direct participation of women in politics than he had formerly done. At all events, he refused to give me information for an article on woman suffrage. It is fair to record that he afterwards publicly spoke with enthusiasm for the cause, and