266   My Brother Theodore Roosevelt

of political scoundrelism as I have ever known. Of course, this scoundrelism could succeed, only because last year, the big business men, the great `Conservatives,' and professional `Intellectuals' and the like, joined in securing the victory of Tammany at the polls, and the consequent enthronement of the BarnesSherman crowd in our party. If only we could have elected Harry Stimson for governor, there would not have been an effort made to handle Teddy as he has been handled." Already his indignation was beginning to wax hot against certain methods much in vogue in the Republican party at that time.

He had had no intention of running for the presidential nomination in 1912, and, indeed, in the autumn of 1911 told many of his most faithful supporters that he was very much averse to doing so; but.-already a swelling tide of disapproval of the Taft administration had increased in volume to such an extent that it swept over a large part of the country. The Insurgents pleaded for a definite leadership, and to them, and to many who did not call themselves by that name, there was but one leader whom they were willing to follow, and that was Theodore Roosevelt.

The force of this great wave culminated in the letter of the seven governors in January, 1912, a letter in which those same seven governors begged him to take, openly, the leadership of Progressive Republicanism, and to allow his name to be used as a presidential nominee in the June convention of 1912. Just before that letter was published, he writes in his usual sweet way in connection with a visit which he and Mrs. Roosevelt had intended to pay me in New York (they were at Sagamore Hill). After speaking of an illness which prevented Mrs. Roosevelt from coming to me, he said, knowing that I had made certain engagements for them: "Do you wish to have me come alone? Do exactly what you think best. I will be in for Tuesday night in any case, and will be at your house as agreed. I don't know when I have ever enjoyed anything more than my lunch at Fannie's [our dear friend Mrs. James Russell Parsons],

The Great Denial   267

-it was a real feast of Lucullus,-only far better." This letter

is very boyish and content with friends and family, and most

unlike a man absorbed in schemes of sinister usurpation, schemes

of which he was so soon to be accused.

In the library at my own house in New York City, a fateful

meeting took place shortly after this last letter came. I confess

to having had serious doubts as to what his answer should be

to that request of the seven governors. Personally, I felt the

sacrifice asked of him was almost too great. I realized perfectly

the great struggle before him and all that it probably would mean, and it seemed to me that he had already given all that was required of just such service to his beloved country. But, just as he felt in 1898 that, having preached war upon Spain, he must

take active part in that war, so in 1912 he came to feel strongly that, having inaugurated certain policies as President which had not been carried out by his successor-having preached the necessity for industrial legislation which had not been backed by those in public authority-it was his duty to bare his breast to the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," and accept the position of leader of Progressive Republicanism in order to try to translate into practical reality the ideals which he had upheld before his countrymen. His answer to the seven governors pledged himself to such leadership, and the great upheaval of 1912 took place.

Never before in his varied career had Theodore Roosevelt felt such a sense of loneliness, for many of his nearest and dearest friends were not in sympathy with some of his beliefs in 1912. I shall never forget the great meeting at Carnegie Hall, when he proclaimed "the faith that was in him." He was like an inspired crusader that night when he cast away the notes from which he had occasionally been reading and made the magnificent peroration in which he proclaimed the fact that his doctrine was "Spend and Be Spent," and that no man worthy the name of man would not be willing to be an instrument for the success of his ideals-a broken instrument if need be. He re-

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