I enclose some Filipino Revolutionary postage stamps. Maybe some of the
boys would like them.
Have you made up your mind whether you would like to try shooting the
third week in August or the last week in July, or would you rather wait
until you come back when I can find out something more definite from Mr.
Post?
We very much wished for you while we were at the (Buffalo) Exposition.
By night it was especially beautiful. Alice and I also wished that
you could have been with us when we were out riding at Geneseo. Major
Wadsworth put me on a splendid big horse called Triton, and sister on
a thoroughbred mare. They would jump anything. It was sister's first
experience, but she did splendidly and rode at any fence at which I
would first put Triton. I did not try anything very high, but still some
of the posts and rails were about four feet high, and it was enough to
test sister's seat. Of course, all we had to do was to stick on as the
horses jumped perfectly and enjoyed it quite as much as we did. The
first four or five fences that I went over I should be ashamed to say
how far I bounced out of the saddle, but after a while I began to get
into my seat again. It has been a good many years since I have jumped a
fence.
Mother stopped off at Albany while sister went on to Boston, and I came
on here alone Tuesday afternoon. St. Gaudens, the sculptor, and Dunne
(Mr. Dooley) were on the train and took lunch with us. It was great
fun meeting them and I liked them both. Kermit met me in high feather,
although I did not reach the house until ten o'clock, and he sat by
me and we exchanged anecdotes while I took my supper. Ethel had put an
alarm clock under her head so as to be sure and wake up, but although
it went off she continued to slumber profoundly, as did Quentin. Archie
waked up sufficiently to tell me that he had found another turtle just
as small as the already existing treasure of the same kind. This morning
Quentin and Black Jack have neither of them been willing to leave me for
any length of time. Black Jack simply lies curled up in a chair, but
as Quentin is most conversational, he has added an element of harassing
difficulty to my effort to answer my accumulated correspondence.
Archie announced that he had seen "the Baltimore orioles catching fish!"
This seemed to warrant investigation; but it turned out he meant barn
swallows skimming the water.
The President not only sent "picture letters" to his own children, but
an especial one to Miss Sarah Schuyler Butler, daughter of Dr. Nicholas
Murray Butler, President of Columbia University, who had written to
him a little note of congratulation on his first birthday in the White
House.
White House, Nov. 3d, 1901.