enough so that he might devote his life without any concern about a living to the work of a naturalist. He said to him that the money he would leave him would not support him in extravagance, but would take comfortable care of him and told him that if he wanted the extras, "the butter and jam," as he called them, he would have to get them out of his salary or profession. He was greatly delighted when his father gave his consent to the devotion of his life to science.

About a year from that time his father died, but he continued his college course with the understanding that he would be a naturalist and a professor of some department of science in a university. But as he drew near the day of his graduation, he became mixed in his mind as to the wisdom of the calling he had selected. The work done in botany and in zoology at Harvard and most other universities in this country was done most of it indoors under the microscope, and his free nature craved the out-of-door investigation, the field work of the science. He felt that he would be too circumscribed in a professor's chair. But he did not know what to do, as two or three other callings suggested themselves to him. So he went up to the silence and solitude at the summit of the Alps to talk with God about it. And the God who spoke to Moses on the Mount spoke to him. In the execution of his Divine commission he came down from the mountain and passed through the doorway of a law office out into the public life to which he felt he had been called, and where he believed he would best develop himself, serve his fellowmen and honor his God.

MEMBER OF STATE ASSEMBLY

T

CHAPTER IV

MEMBER OF STATE ASSEMBLY

HE year after Roosevelt's graduation at Har

vard was spent in travel and study. During

that period he did some tall mountain-climbing and was admitted to the famous Alpine Club of London, his sponsors being Mr. Bryce and Mr. Buxton, distinguished men who became his lifelong friends. In the fall of 1881 he entered the law school of Columbia College and read law in the office of his uncle, Robert B. Roosevelt. His uncle was a prominent Republican leader with high moral principles, who was chairman of the Citizens' Committee of Seventy, during the fight against Boss Tweed and his "ring." He was a member of the New York City Board of Aldermen, was President of the New York International Association for the Protection of Game and one of the founders of the New York State Fishery Commission. He was United States Minister to the Netherlands and was himself an author. Young Roosevelt, in this highly charged, political atmosphere, with his strong intention to enter public life, soon took his attention away from the college law course and his uncle's office and entered New York City politics at the bottom

of the ladder. His residence was in the 21st assembly district, and he began immediately acquainting himself with the members of the precinct and district committees and engaging in practical work at the primaries.

The 21st assembly district contained a strip along Fifth Avenue, including some of the richest families in the city, and went over into the East Side, including a larger number of the plainer people and those who were under the domination of Tammany Hall. Some of the richest and most intelligent citizens in the Fifth Avenue neighborhood felt that their district had been under bad leadership and under poor representation at Albany; that the baser element was predominant. The ward heelers felt, themselves, that in order to obtain money for the campaigns and the votes of the richer element, it would be better to run a highbrow on their ticket for the assembly. Young Roosevelt, then about twentythree years of age, consented to be a candidate for the Legislature if nominated. Jacob Hess, the district boss, was not friendly to the proposition, but Joe Murray, a rival leader, espoused Roosevelt's cause, and he was nominated.

To launch the campaign, a dinner was given at Delmonico's. Boys from the East Side were not in evidence, the nabobs were out in force. The young candidate read a written address, which occupied a full hour's time, in an emphatic but not inspirational manner, but he laid down rock-bottom facts. He arraigned in detail the evils in the municipality, State and nation. He told what the remedies should be. He said that if they were to elect him he would do his very best to check, in the city and State, evils that were so apparent. Persons who were there said that