ORGANIZING THE ROUGH RIDERS

Roosevelt is offered the command of the First Regiment United States Volunteer Cavalry, "The Rough Riders," but asks that Leonard Wood be made colonel and he lieutenant-colonel. — Sworn in May 6, 1898. The plainsmen and mountaineers aflame to join the unique regiment. College-bred youths of the East equally eager to enlist in the ranks. - May 9-19, 1898, Rough Riders organized at San Antonio, Texas. The strangest comrades ever gathered under the flag. - A New York clubman cooking for a New Mexican troop. - Swells and cowboys, gamblers and Indians, shoulder to shoulder. - Queer mascots at San Antonio.

BEFORE he thought of raising a regiment of his own, Mr. Roosevelt tried other ways of going to the war with Spain. At first he wished to be appointed on General Fitzhugh Lee's staff, but finally preferred a place in the line. He turned to New York, in the hope that he might be made one of the field officers of the 71st Regiment from that state. The Governor, however, was embarrassed with many applications.

At last, he adopted the plan of recruiting a regiment among the men of his old Wild West, and Secretary Alger offered to make him the colonel of such a command. Roosevelt's only military experience,

however, had been gained in a four years' service with the New York militia, in which he had risen to a captaincy. He wisely reflected that, while he was learning his new duties, the army would go off to Cuba, and leave him and his regiment behind on the training field. He therefore asked the Secretary of War to appoint him lieutenant-colonel and make Leonard Wood the colonel. Wood was a surgeon in the regular army and had been the physician in attendance on President McKinley. Although war was not his business, he had led a body of troops against the Apache Indians in an emergency and won a medal of honor. In the course of his service he had picked up a sound general knowledge of army methods.

Roosevelt and Wood had never met until the former came to Washington as Assistant Secretary. They had then been immediately attracted to each other, and soon became fast friends. The surgeon had been fired with an ambition to lead a relief expedition to the Alaskan mining region on the Klondike the winter before, and had urged Roosevelt to join him. They were now equally eager to serve in the

and Wood had tried in vain for an appointment

from his own state, Massachusetts. He welcomed the chance to join his friend in raising the Western regiment, and, with high ardor, they entered upon their duties.

The office of the Assistant Secretary in the Navy Department took on the air of a cavalry camp, with its saddles and bridles and spurs strewn about, and its air of martial bustle.

The plan of a Western regiment set the plainsmen and the mountaineers aflame with excitement. They telegraphed offers of their services, singly and in hastily formed bands. People began to speak of the picturesque organization as "The Rough Riders," a term borrowed from the circus. The idea seized upon the imagination of adventurous Eastern youth. From the South, and indeed from all directions, applications flowed in a torrent.

No one caught the contagion of the Roosevelt spirit more quickly than the college athletes of the East. Young men of education and fortune pressed more earnestly for a chance to serve in the ranks under Roosevelt, than to gain commissions from the President as officers of other commands. While he had to decline applications by the thousands,