ght!" but there was no disturbance, and each speaker was listened to
with respectful attention from start to finish. It was without a doubt a
meeting to show true American liberty and free speech at its best.

But all of the stops on his tours were not so pleasant to Governor
Roosevelt. In every community there are those who are low-bred and bound
to make an exhibition of their baseness. At Waverly, New York, a stone
was flung at him through the car window, breaking the glass but missing
the candidate for whom it was intended. At once there was excitement.

"Are you hurt, Governor?" was the question asked.

"No," returned Theodore Roosevelt. And then he added, with a faint
smile, "It's only a bouquet, but I wish, after this, they wouldn't make
them quite so hard."

There was also a demonstration against the candidate at Haverstraw, New
York, which threatened for a while to break up an intended meeting. But
the worst rowdyism was encountered at Victor, a small town in Colorado,
near the well-known mining centre of Cripple Creek. Victor was full of
miners who wanted not "sound money," but "free silver," for free silver,
so styled, meant a great booming of silver mining.

"We don't want him here," said these miners. "We have heard enough about
him and his gold standard. He had better keep away, or he'll regret it."

When Theodore Roosevelt was told he might have trouble in the mining
camps, he merely shrugged his shoulders.

"I know these men," he said. "The most of them are as honest and
respectable as the citizens of New York. I am not afraid of the vicious
element. The better class are bound to see fair play."

The governor spoke at a place called Armory Hall, and the auditorium was
packed. He had just begun his speech when there was a wild yelling and
cat-calling, all calculated to drown him out. He waited for a minute,
and then, as the noise subsided, tried to go on once more, when a voice
cried out:--

"What about rotten beef?" referring to the beef furnished during the
Santiago campaign, which had, of course, come through a Republican
Commissary Department.

"I ate that beef," answered the governor, quickly. And then he added to
the fellow who had thus questioned him: "You will never get near enough
to be hit with a bullet, or within five miles of it." At this many burst
into applause, and the man, who was a coward at heart, sneaked from the
hall in a hurry. He was no soldier and had never suffered the har