The Triumphant Life of Theodore Roosevelt edited by J. Martin Miller

88 LIFE IN THE WEST
man,' but a broad-hatted ruffian of cheap and commonplace
type, who had for the moment terrorized the other men in the
bar-room, these being mostly sheep herders and small grangers.
The fact that I wore glasses, together with my evident desire
to avoid a fight, apparently gave him the impression—a mis-
taken one—that I would not resent an injury."
"Beware of entrance in a quarrel; but being in, bear thyself
that the opposer may beware of thee," is the precept laid
down by Shakespeare. How Mr. Roosevelt bore himself on
this occasion he leaves to the imagination, but an eye-wit-
ness to the encounter states that after a short but decisive
tussle he took the "bad man's" gun away from him and then
proceeded to give him a practical illustration of the "strenuous
life," by kicking him unceremoniously from the room. To say
that this act made him popular with the cowboys would be
putting it mildly. To use a familiar Western expression, Mr.
Roosevelt "made good."
HE DANCED DOWN THE MIDDLE
The following incident will serve to explain in a measure
his popularity with his companions of the plains. In one of
his books he tells of a deadly affray that took place in a town
not very far distant from his ranch. It seems that a Scotchman
and a Minnesota man had become involved in a dispute.
Both were desperadoes, and after a bitter quarrel the former,
mounted on his broncho, rode to the door of his enemy's
house, "looking for trouble," but before he could open fire was
promptly shot down by the American. Mr. Roosevelt, in
relating the occurrence, described how, a few days later, he
opened a cowboy's ball, with the wife of the victor of his
contest, he himself dancing opposite the husband. "It was the