the name agree, and show that you are ready to
meet in very deed the responsibility which is yours.
There may be little Ciceronian grace about these passages, but there
is unmistakable verbal power. So many words of one syllable and of
Saxon derivation are used as to warrant the opinion that the speaker
possesses a distinctive style. That it is an effective style was
proved by the response of the audience, which greeted these particular
passages (although they contain by implication frank criticisms of the
British people) with cheers and cries of "Hear, hear!" It should be
remembered, too, that the audience, a distinguished one, while neither
hostile nor antipathetic, came in a distinctly critical frame of mind.
Like the man from Missouri, they were determined "to be shown" the
value of Mr. Roosevelt's personality and views before they accepted
them. That they did accept them, that the British people accepted
them, I shall endeavor to show a little later.
There are people who entertain the notion that it is characteristic of
Mr. Roosevelt to speak on the spur of the moment, trusting to the
occasion to furnish him with both his ideas and his inspiration.
Nothing could be more contrary to the facts. It is true that in his
European journey he developed a facility in extemporaneous
after-dinner speaking or occasional addresses, that was a surprise
even to his intimate friends. At such times, what he said was full of
apt allusions, witty comment (sometimes at his own expense), and
bubbling good humor. The address to the undergraduates at the
Cambridge Union, and his remarks at the supper of the Institute of
British Journalists in Stationers' Hall, are good examples of this
kind of public speaking. But his important speeches are carefully and
painstakingly prepared. It is his habit to dictate the first draft to
a stenographer. He then takes the typewritten original and works over
it, sometimes sleeps over it, and edits it with the greatest care. In
doing this, he usually calls upon his friends, or upon experts in the
subject he is dealing with, for advice and suggestion.
Of the addresses collected in this volume, three--the lectures at the
Sorbonne, at the University of Berlin, and at Oxford--were written
during the winter of 1909, before Mr. Roosevelt left the Presidency; a
fourth, the Nobel Prize speech, was composed during the hunting trip
in Africa, and the original copy, written with indelible pencil on
sheets o
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