The rise of Theodore Roosevelt - Edmund Morris [44]
Although he had not lacked for female company hitherto in his life, it had been confined mostly to the Roosevelt family circle. Even his intimacy with Edith had the quality of a brother-sister relationship. Sickly and reclusive as a child, preoccupied with travel and self-improvement in his teens, he had had little opportunity to knock on strange doors. Now, doors were opening of their own accord, disclosing scores of fresh faces and alluring young figures. Understandably Theodore was dazzled. Almost every girl he met is described in his letters as “sweet,” “bright,” or “pretty.”
What the girls thought of him, with his crooked spectacles, grinning teeth, and alarmingly frank conversation, was another matter. The evidence is that they tolerated him (to one debutante, he was “studious, ambitious, eccentric—not the sort to appeal at first”) until they found they had grown fond of him.23
It might be mentioned here that neither during his student years, nor indeed at any time in his life, did Theodore show the slightest tolerance for women (or for that matter men) who were anything but “rigidly virtuous.” His judgments of people lower down the moral or social scale could be particularly prudish. “Have just received a letter telling me that [cousin] Cornelius has distinguished himself by marrying a French actress!” he wrote in his diary one day. “He is a disgrace to the family—the vulgar brute.”24 Sex, to him, was part of the mystical union of marriage, and, however pleasurable as an act of love, its function was to procreate. Outside marriage, as far as he was concerned, it simply did not exist.25
Of the inclinations that naturally beset a young man when he returns, hot from the intimacies of a sleigh-ride, to his private room, it is perhaps unnecessary to speak. There are erasures and pages torn out of Theodore’s diaries, yet also the ecstatic declaration, when he finally fell in love, “Thank Heaven, I am … perfectly pure.”26
At the same time that he became a ladies’ man, he developed into something of a fashion plate, or, as he preferred to describe himself, “very swell.” Invited away for the weekend, he was suddenly ashamed of his hat, and sent home for a beaver. Selecting a new wardrobe, he agonized for days over his afternoon coat, “being undecided whether to have it a frock or a cutaway.” He complained that his washerwoman did not act squarely “on the subject of white cravats.”27 He sported one necktie so brilliant it cast a glow upon his cheeks, and combed his whiskers until they swayed in the breeze. Sniggers could be heard in the Yard, as he marched dazzlingly by. But Theodore, in the manner of all dandies, pretended not to notice he was being noticed.28
WHEN HE ASSURED his parents that he was not neglecting his studies, he was telling the truth. Indeed, he got through prodigious quantities of work. Iron self-discipline had become a habit with him, and he plotted every day with the methodism of a Wesleyan minister. The amount of time he spent at his desk was comparatively small—rarely more than a quarter of the day—but his concentration was so intense, and his reading so rapid, that he could afford more time off than most. Even these “free” periods were packed with mental, physical, or social activity. “He was forever at it,” said one classmate. Another marveled: “Never have I seen or read of a man with such an amazing array of interests.”29 Tumbling into bed at midnight or in the small hours, Theodore could luxuriate in healthy tiredness, satisfied that he had wasted not one minute of his waking hours.
His regimen was flexible, but balanced. Any overindulgence in sport or flirtation would be immediately compensated for by extra study. When an attack of measles laid him low in February 1877, he made up for lost time by canceling his Easter vacation in New York, secluding