The times., 1898-10-30
The vnnity-stricken Roosevelt.

Ihe Snnbty-Strtcken NOOseSeIf.
The whole country is informed about
the campaign of Colonel Roosevelt for
the Governorship of New York. News
papers outside of the State, including
Republican journals, reprint parts of
his speeches because of their superlative
egoism. No man in public life, at least
since the time of Andrew Johnson, has
ever dwelt so almost exclusively on his
own personality, his own achievements.
johnson assumed an air of meek
ness in his vanity, but this man
is exultantly, aggressively egotistical.
We are assured by an experienced
alienist that man so self-eentered is
rarely encountered outside an asylum
or a sanitarium. Most men, even those
who regard themselves as the pivot on
which the universe turns, are restrain
ed from an exhibition of their conceit
by self-interest if nothing else, shrink
ing from the ridicule it is sure to ex-
cite. Roosevelt is the most ingenious
of egoists. With the thoroughness that
is characteristic of all his enterprises
from the paying of his taxes under diff
culties to the whipping of a Spanish
army of twenty-four thousand men, he
has mastered the art of self-praise. An
example fit to be preserved as a model
and future standard, is his statement
that he told his business man to pay
his taxes. The ordinary person would
have affirmed the fact, but this surpass-
ing artist says: "On March 25 last
when / was working night and day
to get ready the fleets with which Dew
ey fought at Manila (which scores one
notable victoryl and Sampson at San
| tiago (which takes in the two main
achievements of the navyl: when 1 was
raising my regiment-one-fourth of
! whom were wounded or killed on Cuban
soil (which completes the war by the
capture of Santiagol and one-half the
! remainder brought to deaths door or
! beyond by fever (which proves that no
| perils or suffering were eyadedl-I took
pains TO write both to my lawyer and to
the man who had charge of my bust
ness while l was at the war-that
they We're to see that my taxes were
paid"
This is chiefly amusing. That Roosevelt
cannot state the simplest fact without
dragging in far from impartial his
tory of his career contributes something
to the mirth of the campaign. 1t was in
line with this, and still chiefly amusing,
when he asserted that his defeat would
be a repudiation of the war; and that
the monster WeYler and the defeated
Toral, as well as the shrewd Sagasta,
had their eyes on New York and would
hold a jubilee if the man who could
not be kept out of Santiago should be
kept out of Albany.
This ceases to be funny when 1t is re-
peated in speeches by Depew and others
and in letters by Seward. Their sole
motive is to give some look OF serious
ness to this egotist's appalling absurdi-
ties. to save him from fatal ridicule
When these mad vanities are upheld,
for any purpose, they are not to be
merely laughed at as asininities. They
are an Impeachment of the heroic ser
vices of soldiers. Because the Repub-
lican candidate for Governor of New
York makes an ass of himself, his party
aids him in robbing of their just hon
ors such gallant soldiers as General
Wheeler. General Kent, General Law
ton, General Hawkins, General Wood,
and others, who Were the strength of
that superb fighting line. AS lieu
tenant colonel, second in command of a
regiment of volunteers, Roosevelt was
led up San Juan Hill with the rest of
the command by the gallant Colonel
I i .
was brave thing, but not
one whit braver than the work
of the officers of the Ninth
and Tenth Cavalry That General Haw-
kins and his men had a great deal to
do even with the capture of San Juan
Hill, appears from the official repor.
of General Kent; that there was some
thing else in the surrender of Toral S
army and the defeat of Spain than the
subordinate action of Lieutenant Col
onel Roosevelt, is a matter OF accurate
history.
These other heroic officers, men of the
regular army, who held the line in try
ing circumstances and who advanced
without fear, have never called on man.
kind to admire them for the perform
ance of what they regarded as a simple
duty. Yet, at the least they were not
less brave and efficient than the voIun-
teer who can talk of nothing but his
own daring and success and who never
suggests that anybody else had any
part in the victory. Is it because, when
these quiet heroes We're charging tie
enemy, they had no other motive than
his defeat, while the volunteer officer
had his mind on political office? Was
Colonel Roosevelt charging on Capitol
Hill while advancing up San Juan's
heights? 1t look so. At any rate, his
unblushing self-praise in which he
holds himself superior to other more
modest, but not less efficient, heroes
and in which he divides even with
Dewey the credit of the victory of Ma
Mia Bay, is, in fact, reflection on the
tar more important services of larger
men.
Betting in New York.
The man who cannot afford to lose
money is daft when he makes a wager
on the results of an election unless the