Page:In brightest Africa.djvu/211

 *men in the act of facing the charge of a lion and lioness, the lioness characteristically leading the charge. The third group, a sequel to the other two, shows the three hunters chanting a requiem over the dead lion.

I have done another lion—one that interests me more than all the others. And this piece of sculpture came about in this way. When I met President Roosevelt at the White House on my return from Africa in 1906, I was impressed with the power and humanity of the man as all were who knew him. One of the great experiences of my life was that quiet talk with Theodore Roosevelt in the shade of the acacia tree on the Uasin Gishu Plateau when I came to know the man and to love him. After our return from Africa, he was constantly reminding me of my unwritten African book and saying that he wanted to write a foreword and a chapter for that book. But I had no such hankering to write as I had to do sculpture, and so I put it off. At last, however, in 1919, after the war was over, I sat down one day and started to write him a letter to say that I would begin the book. I had written the two words, "Dear Colonel," when the telephone rang. It was my friend, George H. Sherwood, the executive secretary of the Museum.

"Ake," he said, "I have bad news for you. Colonel Roosevelt died this morning."

For me the bottom dropped out of everything. From that time until I got back from the funeral I did nothing. When I returned from the funeral I was terribly depressed. I had to find expression. I found it most naturally in modelling. I set to work