CAMPING WITH THE PRESIDENT 43 



come their old townsman. After much hand-shaking, 

 the committee conducted us down to a Httle hall, where 

 the President stood on a low platform, and made a 

 short address to the standing crowd that filled the 

 place. Then some flashlight pictures were taken by 

 the local photographer, after which the President 

 stepped down, and, while the people filed past him, 

 shook hands with every man, woman, and child of 

 them, calling many of them by name, and greeting 

 them all most cordially. I recall one grizzled old fron- 

 tiersman whose hand he grasped, calling him by name, 

 and saying, "How well I remember you! You once 

 mended my gunlock for me, — put on a new hammer.'* 

 -Yes," said the delighted old fellow; "I'm the man, 

 Mr. President." He was among his old neighbors 

 once more, and the pleasure of the meeting was very 

 obvious on both sides. I heard one of the women tell 

 him they were going to have a dance presently, and 

 ask him if he would not stay and open it! The Pre- 

 sident laughingly excused himself, and said his train 

 had to leave on schedule time, and his time was 

 nearly up. I thought of the incident in his "Ranch 

 Life," in which he says he once opened a cowboy ball 

 with the wife of a Minnesota man, who had recently 

 shot a bullying Scotchman who danced opposite. He 

 says the scene reminded him of the ball where Bret 

 Harte's heroine " went down the middle with the man 

 that shot Sandy Magee." 



Before reaching Medora he had told me many an- 

 ecdotes of " Roaring Bill Jones," and had said I should 

 see him. But it turned out that Roaring Bill had be- 

 gun to celebrate the coming of the President too early 

 in the dav, and when w^e reached Medora he was not 



