After dinner Roosevelt left in the evening to go into the city of Plattsburg, a mile or two away from the camp, to take the midnight train for New York. As he stood on the platform of the railway station some time after eleven in the evening he was interviewed by the newspaper reporters. No military person was present. What he said was given out on territory not under military jurisdiction and it had nothing to do with the Plattsburg speech. Roosevelt spoke to the newspaper men in his usual forcible fashion: "In the course of his speech he remarked that {221} for thirteen months the United States had played an ignoble part among the nations, had tamely submitted to seeing the weak, whom we had covenanted to protect, wronged; had seen our men, women and children murdered on the high seas 'without action on our part,' and had used elocution as a substitute for action. 'Reliance upon high sounding words unbacked by deeds,' said he, 'is proof of a mind that dwells only in the realm of shadow and of sham.' Under the Hague Convention it was our duty to prevent, and, if not to prevent, then to undo, the hideous wrong that was done in Belgium, but we had shirked this duty. He denounced hyphenated Americans, professional pacifists and those who would substitute arbitration treaties for an army, or the platitudes of peace congresses for military preparedness." The next day Wood received a telegraphic reprimand from the Government in Washington. "In this telegram of disapproval. Secretary Garrison said it was difficult to conceive of anything which could have a more detrimental effect than such an incident. The camp, held under the {222} Government auspices, was conveying its own impressive lesson in its practical and successful operation and results. 'No opportunity should have been furnished to any one to present to the men any matter except that which was essential to the necessary training they were to receive. Anything else could only have the effect of distracting attention from the real nature of the experiment, diverting consideration to issues which excite controversy, antagonism and ill-feeling, and thereby impairing, if not destroying, what otherwise would have been so effective.' General Wood replied, as follows: 'Your telegram received, and the policy laid down will be rigidly adhered to.'" [Footnote: _The Independent_.] {223} THE GREAT WAR {224} {225} IX THE GREAT WAR On April 6, 1917, war having been that week declared by the United States against Germany, Major-General Leonard Wood, ranking officer in the United States Army--that is to say, the man occupying the senior position in our army--being then in sound health of mind and body and fifty-six years of age, wrote and personally delivered two identical letters, one to the Adjutant-General of the Army and the other to the Chief of Staff, requesting assignment for military service abroad. No acknowledgment or reply was ever received from either source.