trying to do to him, and he did it
first. He had the splendid ability to say "No" when he should, a thing
many good men can not do. At such times his mouth would shut like a
steel trap and his blue eyes would send the thermometer below zero. No
one could play horse with H. H. Rogers. He, himself, was always in the
saddle.

The power of the man was more manifest with men than with women, yet he
was always admired by women, but more on account of his austerity than
his effort to please. He was not given to flattery; yet he was quick to
commend. He had in him something of the dash that existed when
knighthood was in flower. To the great of the earth, H. H. Rogers never
bowed the knee. He never shunned an encounter, save with weakness, greed
and stupidity. He met every difficulty, every obstacle, unafraid and
unabashed. Even death to him was only a passing event--death for him had
no sting, nor the grave a victory. He prepared for his passing, looking
after every detail, as he had planned trips to Europe. Jauntily,
jokingly, bravely, tremendously busy, keenly alive to beauty and
friendship, deciding great issues offhand, facing friend or foe, the
moments of relaxation chinked in with religious emotion and a glowing
love for humanity--so he lived, and so he died.

An executive has been described as a man who decides quickly, and is
sometimes right. H. H. Rogers was the ideal executive. He did not decide
until the evidence was all in; he listened, weighed, sifted, sorted and
then decided. And when his decision was made the case was closed.

Big men, who are doing big things that have never been done before, act
on this basis, otherwise they would be ironed out to the average, and
their dreams would evaporate like the morning mist. The one thing about
the dreams of H. H. Rogers is that he made them come true.

* * * * *

"Give me neither poverty nor riches," said the philosopher. The parents
of H. H. Rogers were neither rich nor poor. They had enough, but there
was never a surfeit. They were of straight New England stock. Of his
four great-grandfathers, three fought in the Revolutionary War.

According to Thomas Carlyle, respectable people were those who kept a
gig. In some towns the credential is that the family shall employ a
"hired girl." In Fairhaven the condition was that you should have a
washerwoman one day in the week. The soapy wash-water was saved for
scrubbing purposes--this was