My two winters at Alassio after leaving Berlin, though filled with deferred work, were restful. During a visit to America in 1903, I joined my class at Yale in celebrating its fiftieth anniversary, giving there a public address entitled "A Patriotic Investment." The main purpose of this address was to promote the establishment of Professorships of Comparative Legislation in our leading universities. I could not think then, and cannot think now, of any endowment likely to be more speedily and happily fruitful in good to the whole country. In the spring of 1904 I returned to my old house on the grounds of Cornell University, and there, with my family, old associates, and new friends about me, have devoted myself to various matters long delayed, and especially to writing sundry articles in the "Atlantic Monthly," the "Century Magazine," and various other periodicals, and to the discharge of my duties as a Trustee of Cornell and as a Regent of the Smithsonian Institution and a Trustee of the Carnegie Institution at Washington. It is, of course, the last of my life, but I count myself happy in living to see so much of good accomplished and so much promise of good in every worthy field of human effort throughout our country and indeed throughout the world. Following are the letters referred to in this chapter. FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. WHITE HOUSE, WASHINGTON. OYSTER BAY, NEW YORK, August 5, 1902. MY DEAR AMBASSADOR WHITE: It is with real regret that I accept your resignation, for I speak what is merely a self-evident truth when I say that we shall have to look with some apprehension to what your successor does, whoever that successor may be, lest he fall short of the standard you have set. It is a very great thing for a man to be able to feel, as you will feel when on your seventieth birthday you prepare to leave the Embassy, that you have been able to serve your country as it has been served by but a very limited number of people in your generation. You have done much for it in word and in deed. You have adhered to a lofty ideal and yet have been absolutely practical and, therefore, efficient, so that you are a perpetual example to young men how to avoid alike the Scylla of indifference and the Charybdis of efficiency for the wrong.... With regards and warm respect and admiration, Faithfully yours, (Signed) THEODORE ROOSEVELT. HON. ANDREW D. WHITE, Ambassador to Germany, Berlin, Germany. WHITE HOUSE, WASHINGTON. OYSTER BAY, NEW YORK, September 15, 1902 MY DEAR MR. AMBASSADOR: Will you read the inclosed on your seventieth birthday? I have sealed it so you can break the seal then. Faithfully yours, (Signed) THEODORE ROOSEVELT. HON. ANDREW D. WHITE, U. S. Ambassador, Berlin, Germany. WHITE HOUSE, WASHINGTON. OYSTER BAY, September 15, 1902. MY DEAR MR. AMBASSADOR: