ther at the appointed place in great numbers.

Will stands on a temporary platform in the center of the group. He looks
around upon the swarthy faces, glowing with all the eagerness which the
stolid Indian nature will permit them to display. It is not always the
tallest nor the most comely men who are selected. The unerring judgment
of the scout, trained in Indian warfare, tells him who may be relied
upon and who are untrustworthy. A face arrests his attention--with a
motion of his hand he indicates the brave whom he has selected; another
wave of the hand and the fate of a second warrior is settled. Hardly a
word is spoken, and it is only a matter of a few moments' time before
he is ready to step down from his exalted position and walk off with his
full contingent of warriors following happily in his wake.

The "Wild West" had already engaged space just outside the World's Fair
grounds for an exhibit in 1893, and Will was desirous of introducing
some new and striking feature. He had succeeded in presenting to the
people of Europe some new ideas, and, in return, the European trip had
furnished to him the much-desired novelty. He had performed the work of
an educator in showing to Old World residents the conditions of a new
civilization, and the idea was now conceived of showing to the world
gathered at the arena in Chicago a representation of the cosmopolitan
military force. He called it "A Congress of the Rough Riders of the
World." It is a combination at once ethnological and military.

To the Indians and cowboys were added Mexicans, Cossacks, and South
Americans, with regular trained cavalry from Germany, France, England,
and the United States. This aggregation showed for the first time in
1893, and was an instantaneous success. Of it Opie Read gives a fine
description:

"Morse made the two worlds touch the tips of their fingers together.
Cody has made the warriors of all nations join hands.

"In one act we see the Indian, with his origin shrouded in history's
mysterious fog; the cowboy--nerve-strung product of the New World; the
American soldier, the dark Mexican, the glittering soldier of Germany,
the dashing cavalryman of France, the impulsive Irish dragoon, and that
strange, swift spirit from the plains of Russia, the Cossack.

"Marvelous theatric display, a drama with scarcely a word--Europe, Asia,
Africa, America in panoramic whirl, and yet as individualized as if they
had never left their own country."