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Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography
Chapter IV. Nature the Healer
by Thayer, William Roscoe
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A perfect biography would show definitely the interaction between
mind and body. At present we can only guess what this interaction
may be. In some cases the relations are evident, but in most they
are vague and often unsuspected. The psychologists, whose
pretensions are so great and whose actual results are still so
small, may perhaps lead, an age or two hence, to the desired
knowledge. But the biographer of today must beware of adopting
the unripe formulas of any immature science. Nevertheless, he
must watch, study, and record all the facts pertaining to his
subject, although he cannot explain them. Theodore Roosevelt was
a wonderful example of the partnership of mind and body, and any
one who writes his biography in detail will do well to pay great
heed to this intricate interlocking. I can do no more than allude
to it here. We have seen that Roosevelt from his earliest days
had a quick mind, happily not precocious, and a weak body which
prevented him from taking part in normal physical activity and
the play and sport of boyhood. So his intellectual life grew out
of scale to his physical. Then he set to work by the deliberate
application of will-power to develop his body, and when he
entered Harvard he was above the average youth in strength.
Before he graduated, those who saw him box or wrestle beheld a
fellow somewhat slim and light, but unusually well set up. During
the succeeding four years he never allowed his duties as
Assemblyman to encroach upon his exercise; on the contrary, he
played regularly and he played hard, adding new kinds of sport to
develop new faculties and to give the spice of variety. He rode
to hounds with the Meadowbrook Hunt; he took up polo; and he
boxed and wrestled as in his college days.
In a few years Roosevelt became physically a very powerful man. I
recall my astonishment the first time I saw him, after the lapse
of several years, to find him with the neck of a Titan and with
broad shoulders and stalwart chest, instead of the city-bred,
slight young friend I had known earlier. His body was now equal
to any burden or strain which his mind might have to endure; and
hence forth it is no idle fancy that suggests a perpetual
competition between the two. Thanks to his extraordinary will,
however, he never allowed his body to get control; but, as
appetite comes with eating, so his strong and healthy muscles
craved more and more exercise as he used them. And now he took a
novel way to gratify them.
Ever since his first taste of camp life, when he went into the
Maine Woods under the guidance of Bill Sewall and Will Dow,
Roosevelt felt the lure of wild nature, and on many successive
seasons he repeated these trips. Gradually, fishing and hunting
in the wilderness of Maine or the Adirondacks did not afford him
enough scope for his brimming vigor. He decided to go West, to
the real West, where great game and Indians still survived, and
the conditions of the few white men were almost as primitive as
in the days of the earliest explorers. When the session of 1883
adjourned, he started for North Dakota, then a territory with a
few settlers, and among the Bad Lands on the Little Missouri he
bought an interest in two cattle ranches, the Chimney Butte and
the Elkhorn. The following year, after the Presidential campaign
which placed Cleveland in the White House, Roosevelt determined,
as we saw in the letters I have quoted, to abandon the East for a
time and to devote himself to a ranchman's life. He was still in
deep grief at the loss of his wife and of his mother; there was
no immediate prospect of usefulness for him in politics; the
conventions of civilization, as he knew them in New York City,
palled upon him; a sure instinct whispered to him that he must
break away and seek health of body and heart and soul among the
re mote, unspoiled haunts of primeval Nature. For nearly two
years, with occasional intervals spent in the East, the Elkhorn
Ranch at Medora was his home, and he has described the life of
the ranchman and cow-puncher in pages which are sure to be read
as long as posterity takes any interest in knowing about the
transition of the American West from wilderness to civilization.
He shared in all the work of the ranch. He took with a "frolic
welcome" the humdrum of its routine as well as its excitements
and dangers. He says that he does not believe that there was ever
any more attractive life for a vigorous young fellow than this,
and assuredly no one else has glorified it as Roosevelt did with
his pen. At one time or another he performed all the duties of a
ranchman. He went on long rides after the cattle, he rounded them
up, he helped to brand them and to cut out the beeves destined
for the Eastern market. He followed the herd when it stampeded
during a terrific thunderstorm. In winter there was often need to
save the wandering cattle from a sudden and deadly blizzard. The
log cabin or "shack" in which he dwelt was rough, and so was the
fare; comforts were few. He chopped the cottonwood which they
used for fuel; he knew how to care for the ponies; and once at
least he passed more than twenty-four hours in the saddle without
sleep. According to the best standards, he says, he was not a
fine horseman, but it is clear that he could do everything with a
horse which had to be done, and that he never stopped from
fatigue. When they needed fresh meat, he would shoot it. In
short, he held his own under all the hardships and requirements
demanded of a cowboy or ranchman. To adapt himself to these wild
conditions of nature and work was, however, only a part of his
experience. Even more dangerous than pursuing a stampeding herd
at night over the plains, and plunging into the Little Missouri
after it, was intercourse with some of the lawless nomads of that
pioneer region. Nomads they were, though they might settle down
to work for a while on one ranch, and then pass on to another;
the sort of creatures who loafed in the saloons of the little
villages and amused them selves by running amuck and shooting up
the town. These men, and indeed nearly all of the pioneers, held
the man from the civilized East, the "tenderfoot," in scorn. They
took it for granted that he was a weakling, that he had soft
ideas of life and was stuck-up or affected. Now Roosevelt saw
that in order to win their trust and respect, he must show
himself equal to their tasks, a true comrade, who accepted their
code of courage and honor. The fact that he wore spectacles was
against him at the outset, because they associated spectacles
with Eastern schoolmasters and incompetence. They called him
"Four Eyes," at first with derision, but they soon discovered
that in him they had no "tenderfoot" to deal with. He shot as
well as the best of them; he rode as far; he never complained of
food or tasks or hardship; he met every one on equal terms. Above
all, he left no doubt as to his courage. He would not pick a
quarrel nor would he avoid one. Many stories of his prowess
circulated; mere heckling, or a practical joke, he took with a
laugh; as when some of the men changed the saddle from his pony
to a bucking broncho.
But he knew where to draw the line. At Medora, for instance, the
Marquis de Mores, a French settler, assumed the attitude of a
feudal proprietor. Having been the first to squat in that region
he regarded those who came later as interlopers, and he and his
men acted very sullenly. They even carried their ill-will and
intimidation to the point of shooting. In due time the Marquis
discovered cause for grievance against Roosevelt, and he sent him
a letter warning the newcomer that if the cause were not removed
the Marquis knew how one gentleman settles a dispute with
another. Roosevelt despised dueling as a silly practice, which
would not determine justice between disputants; but he knew that
in Cowboy Land the duel, being regarded as a test of courage,
must not be ignored by him. Any man who declined a challenge lost
caste and had better leave the country at once. So Roosevelt
within an hour dispatched a reply to the surly Marquis saying
that he was ready to meet him at any time and naming the rifle,
at twelve paces' distance, as the weapon that he preferred. The
Marquis, a formidable swordsman but no shot, sent back word,
expressing regret that Mr. Roosevelt had mistaken his meaning: in
referring to "gentlemen knowing how to settle disputes," he meant
that of course an amicable explanation would restore harmony.
Thenceforward, he treated Roosevelt with effusive courtesy.
Perhaps a chill ran down his back at the thought of standing up
before an antagonist twelve paces away and that the fighters were
to advance towards each other three paces after each round, until
one of them was killed.
So Theodore fought no duel with either the French Marquis or with
any one else during his life in the West, but he had several
encounters with local desperadoes. One cold night in winter,
having ridden far and knowing that he could reach no refuge for
many hours, he unexpectedly saw a light. Going towards it, he
found that it came from a cabin which served as saloon and
tavern. On entering, he saw a group of loafers and drinkers who
were apparently terrorized by a big fellow, rather more than half
drunk, who proved to be the local bully. The function of this
person was to maintain his bullyship against all comers:
accordingly, he soon picked on Roosevelt, who held his peace as
long as he could. Then the rowdy, who grasped his pistols in his
hands, ordered the "four-eyed tenderfoot" to come to the bar and
set up drinks for the crowd. Roosevelt walked deliberately
towards him, and before the bully suspected it, the "tenderfoot"
felled him with a sledgehammer blow. In falling, a pistol went
off wide of its mark, and the bully lay in a faint. Before he
could recover, Roosevelt stood over him ready to pound him again.
But the bully did not stir, and he was carried off into another
room. The crowd congratulated the stranger on having served him
right.
At another place, there was a "bad man" who surpassed the rest of
his fellows in using foul language. Roosevelt, who loathed
obscenity as he did any other form of filth, tired of this bad
man's talk and told him very calmly that he liked him but not his
nastiness. Instead of drawing his gun, as the bystanders thought
he would do, Jim looked sheepish, acknowledging the charge, and
changed his tone. He remained a loyal friend of his corrector.
Cattle-thieves and horse-thieves infested the West of those days.
To steal a ranchman's horse might not only cause him great
annoyance, but even put his life in danger, and accordingly the
rascals who engaged in this form of crime ranked as the worst of
all and received no mercy when they were caught. If the sheriff
of the region was lax, the settlers took the matter into their
own hands, enrolled themselves as vigilantes, hunted the thieves
down, hanged those whom they captured, and shot at sight those
who tried to escape. It happened that the sheriff, in whose
jurisdiction Medora lay, allowed so many thieves to get off that
he was suspected of being in collusion with them. The ranch men
held a meeting at which he was present and Roosevelt told him in
very plain words their complaint against him and their
suspicions. Though he was a hot-tempered man, and very quick on
the trigger, he showed no willingness to shoot his bold young
accuser; he knew, of course, that the ranchmen would have taken
vengeance on him in a flash, but it is also possible that he
recognized the truth of Roosevelt's accusation and felt
compunctions.
Some time later Roosevelt showed how a zealous officer of the
law--he was the acting deputy sheriff - ought to behave. He had a
boat in which he used to cross the Little Missouri to his herds
on the other side. One day he missed the boat, its rope having
been cut, and he inferred that it must have been stolen by three
cattle-thieves who had been operating in that neighborhood. By
means of it they could easily escape, for there was no road along
the river on which horsemen could pursue them. Notwithstanding
this, Roosevelt resolved that they should not go free. In three
days Bill Sewall and Dow built a flat, water-tight craft, on
which they put enough food to last for a fortnight, and then all
three started downstream. They had drifted and poled one hundred
and fifty miles or more, before they saw a faint column of smoke
in the bushes near the bank. It proved to be the temporary camp
of the fugitives, whom they quickly took prisoners, put into the
boat, and carried another one hundred and fifty miles down the
river to the nearest town with a jail and a court. Going and
coming, Roosevelt spent nearly three weeks, not to mention the
hardships which he and his trusty men suffered on the way; but he
had served justice, and Justice must be served at any cost. When
the story be came known, the admiration of his neighbors for his
pluck and persistence rose; but they wondered why he took the
trouble to make the extra journey, in order to deliver the
prisoners to the jail, instead of shooting them where he overtook
them.
I chronicle these examples of Roosevelt's courage among the
lawless gangs with whom he was thrown in North Dakota, because
they reveal several qualities which came to be regarded as
peculiarly Rooseveltian during the rest of his days. We are apt
to speak of "mere" physical courage as being inferior to moral
courage; and doubtless there are many heroes unknown to the world
who, under the torture of disease or the poignancy of social
injustice and wrongs, deserve the highest crown of heroism. Men
who would lead a charge in battle would shrink from denouncing an
accepted convention or even from slighting a popular fashion. But
after all, the instinct of the race is sound in revering those
who give their lives without hesitation or regret at the point of
deadly peril, or offer their own to save the lives of others.
Roosevelt's experience established in him that physical courage
which his soul had aspired to in boyhood, when the consciousness
of his bodily inferiority made him seem shy and almost timid. Now
he had a bodily frame which could back up any resolution he might
take. The emergencies in a ranchman's career also trained him to
be quick to will, instantaneous in his decisions, and equally
quick in the muscular activity by which he carried them out. In a
community whose members gave way to sudden explosions of passion,
you might be shot dead unless you got the drop on the other
fellow first. The anecdotes I have repeated, indicate that
Roosevelt must often have outsped his opponent in drawing.
We learn from them, too, that he was far from being the
pugnacious person whom many of his later critics insisted that he
was. Having given ample proof to the frontiersmen that he had no
fear, he resolutely kept the peace with them, and they had no
desire to break peace with him. Bluster and swagger were foreign
to his nature, and he loathed a bully as much as a coward. If we
had not already had the record of his. three years in the
Legislature, in which he surprised his friends by his wonderful
talent for mixing with all sorts of persons, we might marvel at
his ability to meet the cowboys and ranchmen, and even the
desperadoes, of the Little Missouri on equal terms, to win the
respect of all of them, and the lifelong devotion of a few. They
knew that the usual tenderfoot, however much he might wish to
fraternize, was fended from them by his past, his traditions, his
civilized life, his instincts; but in Roosevelt's case, there was
no gulf, no barrier.
Even after he became President of the United States, I can no
more imagine that he felt embarrassment in meeting any one, high
or low, than that he scrutinized the coat on a man's back in
order to know how to treat him.
To have gained solid health, to have gained mastery of himself,
and to have put his social nature to the severest test and found
it flawless, were valid results of his life on the Elkhorn Ranch.
It imparted to him also a knowledge which was to prove most
precious to him in the unforeseen future. For it taught him the
immense diversity of the people, and consequently of the
interests, of the United States. It gave him a national point of
view, in which he perceived that the standards and desires of the
Atlantic States were not all-inclusive or final. Yet while it
impressed on him the importance of geographical considerations,
it impressed, more deeply still, the fact that there are moral
fundamentals not to be measured by geography, or by time, or by
race. Lincoln learned this among the pioneers of Illinois; in
similar fashion Roosevelt learned it in the Bad Lands of Dakota
with their pioneers and exiles from civilization, and from
studying the depths of his own nature.
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