in several
directions. Far up the mountains could be seen the snow-drifts, while
lower down were the heavy forests and underbrush, the haunts of the game
they were seeking.

In this Wonderland Theodore Roosevelt hunted to his heart's content for
many days--bringing down several more elk and also a fair variety of
smaller game. It was now growing colder, and knowing that the winter
season was close at hand, the hunters decided to strike camp and return
homeward.

The movement was made none too soon. The snow was already filling the
air, and one morning, on coming from his tent, Theodore Roosevelt found
the ground covered to a depth of a foot and a half. To add to his
discomfort the pony he was riding began to buck that day and managed to
dislocate his rider's thumb. But Theodore Roosevelt stuck to him and
showed him who was master; and after that matters went better. The snow
continued to come down, and before the end of the journey was reached,
at Great Geyser Basin, the hunters almost perished from the cold.

Such pictures as the above give us some idea of the varied life that
Theodore Roosevelt has led. Even at this early age--he was but
thirty-three years old--he had been a college student, a traveller, an
author, an assemblyman, a ranchman and hunter, and a Civil Service
Commissioner. He had travelled the length and breadth of Europe and
through a large section of our own country. He had visited the palaces
of kings and the shacks of the humble cowboys of the far West, he had
met men in high places and in low, and had seen them at their best and
at their worst. Surely if "experience is the school wherein man learns
wisdom," then the future President had ample means of growing wise, and
his works prove that those means were not neglected.

As already mentioned, when Grover Cleveland became President a second
time, he requested Theodore Roosevelt to retain his place on the Civil
Service Commission. This was a practical illustration of the workings of
the merit system, and it made for Mr. Cleveland many friends among his
former political enemies. By this movement the workings of the
Commission were greatly strengthened, so that by the time Theodore
Roosevelt resigned, on May 5, 1895, the Commission had added twenty
thousand places filled by government employees to those coming under the
merit system. This number was larger than any placed under the system
before that time, and the record has scarcely been equalled