The Works of Theodore Roosevelt in Fourteen Volumes: The Wilderness Hunter

Book excerpt: From the Preface of "The Wilderness Hunter." This second of fourteen volumes is Roosevelt's account of his exploits hunting across America. Theodore Roosevelt Sagamore Hill, June 1893 FOR a number of years much of my life was spent either in the wilderness or on the borders of the settled country-if, indeed, "settled" is a term that can rightly be applied to the vast, scantily peopled regions where cattle ranching is the only regular industry. During this time I hunted much, among the mountains and on the plains, both as a pastime and to procure hides, meat, and robes for use on the ranch; and it was my good luck to kill all the various kinds of large game that can properly be considered to belong to temperate North America. In hunting, the finding and killing of the game is after all but a part of the whole. The free, self-reliant, adventurous life, with its rugged and stalwart democracy; the wild surroundings, the grand beauty of the scenery, the chance to study the ways and habits of the woodland creatures-all these unite to give to the career of the wilderness hunter its peculiar charm. The chase is among the best of all national pastimes; it cultivates that vigorous manliness for the lack of which in a nation, as in an individual, the possession of no other qualities can possibly atone. No one, but he who has partaken thereof, can understand the keen delight of hunting in lonely lands. For him is the joy of the horse well ridden and the rifle well held; for him the long days of toil and hardship, resolutely endured, and crowned at the end with triumph. In after years there shall come forever to his mind the memory of endless prairies shimmering in the bright sun; of vast snow-clad wastes lying desolate under gray skies; of the melancholy marshes; of the rush of mighty rivers; of the breath of the evergreen forest in summer; of the crooning of ice-armored pines at the touch of the winds of winter; of cataracts roaring between hoary mountain masses; of all the innumerable sights and sounds of the wilderness; of its immensity and mystery; and of the silences that brood in its still depths. Theodore Roosevelt Sagamore Hill, June 1893 Publisher's Note: Any remaining fonts transposed in converting Roosevelt's 19th century fonts to meet the demands of 21st century printers will be corrected in the next printing. This is true of all Roosevelt volumes.