“I have never preached the imposition of an excessive maternity on any woman. I have always said that every man worth calling such will feel a peculiar sense of chivalric tenderness toward his wife, the mother of his children. He must be unselfish and considerate with her. But, exactly as he must do his duty, so she must do her duty. I have said that it is self-evident that unless the average woman, capable of having children, has four, the race will not go forward; for this is necessary in order to offset the women who for proper reasons do not marry, or who, from no fault of their own, have no children, or only one or two, or whose children die before they grow up. I do not want to see Americans forced to import our babies from abroad. I do not want to see the stock of people like yourself and like my family die out--and you do not either; and it will inevitably die out if the average man and the average woman are so selfish and so cold that they wish either no children, or just one or two children. “We have had six children in this family. We wish we had more. Now the grandchildren are coming along; and I am sure you agree with me that no other success in life--not being President, or being wealthy, or going to college, or anything else--comes up to the success of the man and woman who can feel that they have done their duty and that their children and grandchildren rise up to call them blessed. “Mrs. Roosevelt and I have four sons, and they are as dear to us as your sons are to you. If we now had war, these four boys would all go. We think it entirely right that they should go if their country needs them. But I do not think it fair that they should be sent to defend the boys who are too soft or too timid ‘to face the cannon,’ or the other boys who wish to stay at home to make money while somebody else protects them.” THE BRINGER OF CULTURE In the lore of the Middle West brilliantly stands out the figure of Johnny Appleseed, who traveled westward distributing apple-seeds to the farmers and ranchers, from whence sprang up the great apple orchards that have blessed these regions. It was service of a similar kind that Roosevelt performed when he went among these primitive people of the wilderness. Schools were scarce in those days and opportunity for culture was almost entirely lacking. But here had come among them a man who had graduated from one of the great Eastern colleges, and who had brought with him a choice library of books that contained characters and philosophy entirely comprehensible by these untutored minds when interpreted by such an enthusiastic and sympathetic expounder as young Roosevelt.