Roosevelt lay in the bottom of a dugout, shaded by a bit of canvas put up over his head, and too weak from sickness even to splash water on his face; for he was almost fainting from the muggy heat and the tropical sunshine. Forty-eight days, after they began their voyage on the River of Doubt, they saw a peasant, a rubber-gatherer, the first human being they had met. Thenceforward they journeyed without incident. The River of Doubt flowed into the larger river, Madeira; where they found a steamer which took them to Manaos on the Amazon. During the homeward voyage, Roosevelt slowly recovered his strength, but he had never again the iron physique with which he had embarked the year before. The Brazilian Wilderness stole away ten years of his life. He found on his return home that some geographers and South American explorers laughed at his story of the River of Doubt. He laughed, too, at their incredulity; and presently the Brazilian Government, having established the truth of his exploration and named the river after him, _Rio Teodoro_, his laughter prevailed. He took real satisfaction in having placed on the map of Central Brazil, a river six hundred miles long. _William Roscoe Thayer_ (_Arranged_) THEODORE ROOSEVELT The evil men do lives after them; so does the good. With the passing of years, a man’s name and fame either drift into oblivion or they are seen in their lasting proportions. You must sail fifty miles over the Ionian Sea and look back, before you can fully measure the magnitude and majesty of Mount Ætna. Not otherwise, I believe, will it be with Theodore Roosevelt, when the people of the future look back upon him. The blemishes due to misunderstanding will have faded away. The transient clouds will have vanished. The world will see him as he was.... Those of us who knew him, knew him as the most astonishing human expression of the Creative Spirit we had ever seen. His manifold talents, his protean interests, his tireless energy, his thunderbolts which he did not let loose, as well as those he did, his masterful will sheathed in self-control like a sword in its scabbard, would have rendered him superhuman, had he not possessed other qualities which made him the best of playmates for mortals. He had humour, which raises every one to the same level. He had loyalty, which bound his friends to him for life. He had sympathy and capacity for strong, deep love. How tender he was with little children! How courteous with women! No matter whether you brought to him important things or trifles, he understood. I can think of no vicissitude in life in which Roosevelt’s participation would not have been welcome. If it were danger, there could be no more valiant comrade than he. If it were sport, he was a sportsman. If it were mirth, he was a fountain of mirth, crystal pure and sparkling....