We came away greatly satisfied, and halted some moments at the head of the staircase. The President’s chamber was on the second story. All at once in the large room below us I saw a young man, alert in his bearing and perfectly confident. He gazed at the ceiling and walls of the room, and was thoroughly occupied. There was no one else in the apartment. I asked Greenhalge to look at him. “That man,” said I, “looks precisely as if he had examined this building, and finding it suitable has made up his mind to inhabit it.” “He is a living picture of that purpose,” replied Greenhalge. “But do you not know him? That is Theodore Roosevelt, Chairman of the Civil Service Commission, I must make you acquainted. But first listen to a prophecy: That man down there who wants this house will get it. He will live here as President.” On reaching the foot of the staircase Greenhalge met you and made us acquainted. We conversed for some moments, and then you were called to the President. You and I did not meet for some years after that day at the White House. You were toiling at problems of government and service, looking ahead always, looking to things over which you are brooding and toiling this moment. Some of the problems have been solved, others still demand solution. My work led me to various parts of the earth, and around it. But at home or abroad I watched your activity with care and deep interest. Not very long after that prophecy I read for the first time this statement concerning you: “We need just such a man to be President.” These words, uttered casually at that juncture, were like the still small voice, their might was in their quality. When a few years of service, unique in many ways, had brought you to the Navy you accomplished your task in that place and went farther immediately. By this time your name and the office of President were associated in the minds of many people. Next came the Cuban war with experience and triumph. And then you were governor at Albany. While still in that office you were named for Vice-President, and elected. Later you were President. But only when elected by the people could you act as seemed best to you and not as antecedents commanded. I have watched and studied your career with deeper interest than that of any man who has ever been President of the United States. There is no case in our history of such concordance between the judgment of a people and the acts of a man. “Thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many.” Jeremiah Curtin. St. Hyacinthe, P. Q., September 6, 1906. FOREWORD