The sentiment noted at the end of the last chapter seemed to be the motive of Mr. Roosevelt's public life. Not only was he better informed on the whole than almost any President who had sat in the chair before, but he was a good lawyer, familiar with national and general history and awake to all contemporary doings, questions, and interests south, west, east, and abroad. He was also more a man of action and affairs than any of his predecessors. He had, in a very high degree, alertness, energy, courage, initiative, dispatch. Physically as well as mentally vigorous, he read much, heard all who could usefully inform him, apprehended easily, decided quickly, and toiled like Hercules. He was just and catholic in spirit, appreciating whatever was good in any section of the country or class of people. He respected precedent but was not its slave. Rather than walk always in ruts with never a jolt, he preferred some risks of tumbling over hummocks. Few public men of any age or country have more fully met Aristotle's test of a statesman: "ability to see facts as they exist and to do the things needing to be done." [Illustration: Portrait.] Copyright. l904. by Pach Bros., N. Y. John Hay, Secretary of State. [Died July 1, 1905.] He had able aids; pre-eminent among these were John Hay, Secretary of State, and Elihu Root, Secretary of War. Each was, to say the least, the peer of his greatest predecessors in his office. It was mainly to Mr. Root that we were indebted for starting the Cubans prosperously as an independent nation. His service for the Philippines so far as it went was not less distinguished; and he effected vitally important reorganization and reform in the war office. A well co-ordinated plan was developed whereby army officers were given advanced training in the various branches of military science as in the European countries. Neither the President nor Secretary Root advocated a large standing army, but they both strove to bring the army "to the very highest point of efficiency of any army in the civilized world." The ability of Secretary Root to inaugurate reforms in a department which when he became its head was overridden by tradition, was well expressed by President Roosevelt as follows: "Elihu Root is the ablest man I have known in our governmental service. I will go further. He is the greatest man that has appeared in the public life of any country, in any position, on either side of the ocean in my time." [Illustration: Portrait.] Copyright. 1903. by Clinedinst, Washington. Elihu Root, Secretary of War. [Secretary of State, July 1905.]