,4 ,rf"Mj i% "WTIft ir\V' J NtCLPU*f F ,NEL HOURS AT A THE AMERICAN POUTlClAN IS FOMO OF /\DORNNNCNT ON FOR SX HOURS Drawn by W. K. Haselden. Reproduced by permission of the London Daily Mirror. How AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT is MADE 198 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Among the chief of their artists are Sargent, Abbey, Shannon, Whistler, and Boughton, all of whom lived and did their work in London. In their youth they found the land of the stars and stripes too uncongenial to work in. As lads they went to London or Paris, where they studied, and all finally settled in London, where their life's work was done, and their reputations were made. This is a noble army of talent, to which the States may be proud to have given birth. Among the artists who work well in their own country as figure painters are : John Alexander, Melchers, Frank Benson, Ed. Tarbell, Dannat, Alden Weir, Ralph Clarkson, a brilliant painter of Chicago ; Tanner, the negro, who paints re- ligious canvasses in mystic style ; and two women, Mary Cassatt and Cecilia Beaux. Then William Chase, whose still life is preferable to his portraits ; Alexander Harrison's wonderful seascapes ; and among landscape painters, Wyant, Tryon, and Childe Hassam. Then there is the old conven- tional school of Innes. Among the women painters Miss Lydia Emmet is not only charming with the brush as a worker, but is delightful as a woman. Other well-known women painters and sculptors are : Lucile Fairchild Fuller, Mrs. Chase, Miss Gaines, Miss Malvina Hoffman, Ellen Rand, and Mary Foote. THREE ELECTIONS 199 Among sculptors are : Borglum, who, while forceful and dramatic, sometimes lacks repose ; French, Taft, and of course, St. Gaudens, their greatest sculptor, who is now dead. Then there are the Post-Impressionists, awfully and terribly new and sensational. American Art has found her feet. She is throwing off the mantle of French and English learning, and is rapidly coming to the fore along her own lines. Rich people to-day subscribe to buy pictures for the nation. They give canvasses "In Remembrance," or leave them by will, more especially in Chicago ; and yet in 1900 I could not find a collection of American canvasses in America. The country has at last awakened to the fact that she has some artists of real value, and she is wise enough to encourage them to re- main on her own shores by buying their pictures. Speaking broadly, they are still too influenced by foreign ways, but the talent is undoubtedly there, and perhaps in a few years America will have founded a real School of her own. She is do- ing her best to achieve this anyway. There is an Art School in Chicago, where nearly four thousand students are yearly taking instruc- tion. It shows how much these boys and girls of the people love their art, when one learns that many of them, and a very large percentage of them, have to earn their own living to pay their way. Some 200 AMERICA AS I SAW IT of them run out from twelve o'clock to two, and serve food at the quick-lunch restaurants, where, in return, they receive two free meals. Others sell newspapers in the streets before and after class, just as many of the University Students of both sexes pay their way through college by wash- ing windows, lighting street lamps, removing snow from the sidewalks, doing anything and everything ; in fact, nothing is considered infra dig. Many of the men, the biggest physicians, engineers, and the finest lawyers of America in important positions to-day, by personal strength of character and sheer hard work, have risen from the humblest beginnings. All honour to them. On one occasion I was having my finger-nails manicured by a bright little American girl, and as there was no one else in the room we got into conversation. She told me her day's work was from nine o'clock till six at the Club where we were sitting. She then went out and had a meal ; and at half past seven she attended a night school. She was such a superior young person, that I was surprised at her going to a free night school. These free night schools, which are universal, are one of the great features of America, and the large attendance shows the desire for learning. "And what do you do there ?" I asked. She looked rather shy, as she replied : "Well, I am married. I have been married for From The New New York. THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM Drawn by Joseph Pennell. THREE ELECTIONS 201 four years, and my husband is a young lawyer. We just have a bedroom at a boarding establish- ment, so that I have no housekeeping or worry of that kind, and I earn enough to support myself, and a little over, at the Club. He does the same at another job, and now that he has really taken his Law degree, he will soon get on. But, you see, I have no learning, and he has not enough, so he goes with me to night school to learn English Grammar, Literature, French, and things like that, in order that we may be able to take our place socially when he has made a position for himself." Wasn't that splendid. These two young people were earning a few pounds a week, and by sheer determination and self-denial were devoting every evening to gaining knowledge and fitting them- selves for the position they were aiming to attain in American society. This is an everyday occurrence. Virtues like vices come home to roost. The nouveaux riches in America are becoming more cultured daily - - the nouveaux riches in Eng- land remain stupidly illiterate. Education of the soul is more possible in poverty than in wealthy surroundings. Sorrow is like good nourishing food : it strengthens our better selves ; but most of us prefer ice-cream and truffles. CHAPTER IX WHAT is AN AMERICAN ? AN officer of a British mail-boat once said : "The first time I was in New York I was in the docks at Brooklyn for five days before I heard one word of English spoken, except by the men of our own ship. The cargo was entirely handled by foreigners, mostly Italians, Spaniards, or Germans, and everywhere I turned I heard a foreign tongue." To anyone who has not been to the States this sounds preposterous ; but I can vouch that in an enormous district in Chicago it is the same ; that a large part of Boston is ditto, and yet this is English-speaking America. What is an American ? Temperamentally he is different from his English cousin. He is not bound by tradition, history, or custom. He is never told that he must do a thing in a certain way merely "Do it, and do it now." "Get there" is his motto. " Keep at it. Never tell your superior it can't be done ; just keep at it till it is done." Morally he is good ; but not goody-goody. 202 WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 203 Mentally he is improving, although unfor- tunately inclined to think disdainfully of the things he does not personally care for as not worthy of count. He often thinks hard and to the point rather than meditatively. His financial morality is not on the whole perhaps as high as that of other nations. Spiritually, he is ruled by religion in any and every form Catholic, Methodist, Christian Science ; but he is not a man of visions or dreams, or a spiritual idealist in any way, yet he is often a sentimentalist. The ways of America suggest "Intensive Living" (paraphrasing "intensive farming") rather than strenuous living. One is inclined to think that Roosevelt's "Strenuous Life" was a misnomer and better expressed by "Intensive Life/' "strenu- ous" implying a strained condition rather than the intense, fully lived existence, which is a charac- teristic of many American people. Idleness is rightly considered a vice. The American looks down on, and disapproves of, the "leisured class." They have no home in the States. It is no place for drones they are driven away to other lands by public opinion. This is because America has not yet realised the enormous economic, political, and hard-working charitable value of the leisured classes. But she will ; in fact, she is already be- ginning to do so. 204 AMERICA AS I SAW IT America, which is really the most cosmopolitan land on this earth, - - for there is no nation un- represented on its soil, --tries hard to be uncos- mopolitan in every way, in its endeavour to be English. One seldom talks to man or woman five minutes before being told his or her antecedents came from somewhere in Great Britain. And yet, if one looks at the names constantly appearing in lists of American citizens in a newspaper, they hardly appear British. MARRIAGE LICENCES G. Ajello, Francesca Terranova. Frank Waliezek, Wiktoria Arnik. J. Sennek, Stefania Hucanovich. Luka Kulech, Akilina Lazawska. John Rous, Mary Zdemek. A. Provenzano, G. Maniscala. Joseph Siwek, Martha Wanderska. P. Bendachowski, R. Szatkowska. Martin Borowski, Caroline Rzyniek. Jan Leznak, Upajanipa Uhosyk. William A. Shye, Ollie Dyer. Max Glebman, Libbie Breutman. Sett Bastiani, Aurelia Raggi. Petter Uruck, Mary Lamey. P. C. Baumeister, Bertha Saunders. Brugi Masiliano, Mary Biri. Ferdinand Rosen, Johanna Schneider. Ignacz Kafka, Mary Bialkwazka. V. Trentadue, Gloriannina Cardia. Ludwik Sulka, Bronislawa Czaja. W. Cholenenski, Florence Travinska. WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 205 Jan Jaros, Marina Cholewa. Kenneth M. de Vos, Mar A. Rice. Jan Nicolavici, Hervey, 111., Elita Biran. Jan Slawik, Helena Popek. John J. Gorski, Stella Wojciechowski. Frank Zajebal, Emma Krai. S. Falsone, Benedotta Corsigha. Nikola Cignavac, Sava Njegomie. A. Pawlowski, Victoria Czaeowska. D. Weissman, Bertha Kacherzinsky. T. Smietana, Maryanna Gerhacxyk. A. Raikauskis, M. Vilinsaite. The United States will finally digest and absorb the heterogeneous mass of foreigners which is now in their maws, as they have done many times. "We welcome all Northern nationalities," said an American ; "they make good citizens and readily take on the colour and habits of our people. Half a generation passes and they disappear, as it were, and their racial individuality is obliterated. Not so is the case of the Latin races who come to us ; they are so very different in temperament, customs, and habits that their absorption takes much longer, and their criminal percentage is much larger. However, they like the country, and eventually all blend in the huge waves of the 'American ocean of life/ There need be no fear now. The worst strain of this nature is over. It is believed with good reason that the great variety of the lower classes has been a safe- 206 AMERICA AS I SAW IT guard ; Nature playing one nationality against another, and thus preventing any danger that might arise from one class of possibly dis- satisfied immigrants." The modern American is the product of three hundred years of American civilisation, freedom of thought, and living. He is a race unto himself. What a pity it is that some Americans start conversation with an Englishman, feeling a certain resentment of the poor Britisher's assumed supe- riority. There is no "assumed superiority." There may be a difference of manner, a difference of viewpoint ; but nothing more. The Britisher, on the other hand, often expects to find "aggressive swagger" in the American, and looks for it. If only these two people would forget the na- tionality of the other, they would be even better friends than they are. The temperamental dif- ference is slight ; otherwise there is no difference of consequence. Englishmen dive their hands into their pockets, an idle, lazy-looking habit, and Americans keep theirs energetically free ; the hands and the pockets are the same, only the out- ward appearance of manner differs. The same applies to Canada, who is most patriotic unless we foolishly call her "one of our possessions," and WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 207 Z?roaw 6y ^. K. Haselden. Reproduced by permission of the London Daily Mirror. OPENING SCENE AT THE AMERICAN NATIONAL THEATER 208 AMERICA AS I SAW IT then she is furious, and no wonder. Wives are not chattels, and colonies are not possessions. The United States itself occupies a tract of land extending from Old Mexico in the South to Canada in the North ; from the Pacific on the West to the Atlantic in the East, an area of three million twenty-seven thousand square miles. On this nearly a hundred million people from every quarter of the globe have planted themselves. Each race, each religion, each colour, has left its mark, and that conglomerate mass makes up the American of to-day. They have driven out the Aborigines, and the Indian is practically dead ; he was of pure breed, but could not stand the onrushing tide. British blood once held sway ; but the old stock on which so many nationalities have been grafted has lost its individuality under the more modern growths. There are Puritanical strains ; Eastern superstition ; Latin poesie ; Saxon love of music ; German doggedness ; Scandinavian truth and honesty. If the blood corpuscles of the free-born American were tested, they would probably contain germs of a hundred different races all commingled into a somewhat olive skinned, dark-haired race. In Europe the population per square mile in 1907 was about one hundred and six persons. In America it was only nine. America is rather like a pumpkin pie ; it has so WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 209 many ingredients it is hard to discover where the real pumpkin flavour lies. One moment it is dressed in furs like an Esquimau in the North, and the next in cottons on the shore of the Mississippi. There is a distinct American type appearing, virile, strong, tough, self-reliant. Just glance at the pictures of the new Senators and Representa- tives in Munsey's Magazine. They are one and all men of broad, intellectual brows, high foreheads, large noses, strong mouths, nearly all have clean- shaven faces, and every single one has that thick- set, broad, determined, strong-willed jaw the American jaw, one might call it ; it is becoming a national feature. It must be a finely lucrative country for steel-grinders or razor makers, for every man shaves. The men of this new American race come from all parts, and yet that jaw is distinctive in every picture : James A. Gorman, from New York. Thomas P. Gore (blind), from Oklahoma. Oscar W. Underwood, from Alabama. William Hughes, from New Jersey. Gilbert M. Hitchcock, from Nebraska. Hoke Smith, from Georgia. Luke Lea, from Tennessee. John Sharp Williams, from Mississippi. Francis G. Newlands, from Nevada. G. Martin, from Virginia. 210 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Furnifold M. Simmons, from North Carolina. Senator Smith, from Maryland. Thetus W. Sims from Tennessee. James T. Lloyd, from Missouri. Albert S. Burleson, from Texas. John N. Garner, from Texas. A. Mitchell Palmer from Pennsylvania. W. S. Hammond, from Minnesota. Henry D. Clayton, from Alabama. Wm. C. Adamson, from Georgia. Robert L. Henry, from Texas. Carter Glass, from Virginia. Lemuel P. Padgett, from Tennessee. John A. Moon, from Tennessee. Fitzgerald, from New York. James Hay, from Virginia. This particular American type of jaw is not as noticeable among, say, the great doctors, like Dr. John Murphy of Chicago, or Dr. William and Dr. Charles Mayo of Minnesota, or Dr. Alexis Carrel of Nobel Prize fame, all first-class men. An Englishwoman who has wandered from New York to Niagara, to Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas City, El Paso, San Antonio, Galveston, New Orleans, Washington, Annapolis, Philadelphia, who has stayed in beautiful homes both in cities and on country-sides, may be said to know a little bit of America, but stay "What do you think of Boston ?" "What do you think of California ?" "What do you think of America ?" WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 211 It might as well be asked, What do you think of the sun or the moon ? America is hot and cold, educated and illiterate, rich and poor, and the puzzled stranger's brain cannot "think" of it anyway, not all at once. It can only receive impressions in a sort of snapshot, kaleidoscope form, and stutter : "I like it, the people interest me, and hence I come back again and again, and hope to come many times more to make your acquaintance further, and correct any wrong impressions I have formed by the way. No country in all my travels has interested me so much as America." The entrance to an American city is almost as ugly as the entrance to London ; no, not quite, because our miles of rails which run over house- tops and chimney-stacks are beyond description horrible ; those dingy back gardens, with tumble-down chicken-houses, and endless washings hanging out to dry, those squalid streets, and our dead dull skies. Yet Americans love our chimney pots because they have so few of them in their own land of central heating. One shudders to think of the foreigner's first impression when landing on our shores : Ghastly landing-stages and grewsome custom-houses ; and the oldest railway carriages always seem to be palmed off on these trips. In fact the worst rail- 212 AMERICA AS I SAW IT way travelling in England is generally from the coast. Once started, the peace and beauty and calm of the rich English pasture-land unfolds it- self, with its splendid trees and broad green mead- ows ; its villages with their pretty cottages and flower-gardens nestling round the church, that has sent forth her benedictions for centuries ; ay, and in many a God's acre are buried the forbears of those early settlers in New England. Then follows that awful entry to our great metropolis. 'Tis a hideous entrance, a melancholy introduc- tion to that first view of London, and yet how Americans love us when they get to know us, and return again and again to our shores, until we become "an English habit". The "American habit" must be taking pos- session of me ; I feel in my blood that I shall so constantly be to and fro, America will become my habit, and not a bad habit either. With all the wealth in America I often ask my- self if the populace are any better off ? The country is about as large as Europe ; it has more resources, and it has a sixth of the population of Europe ; but is America really better off ? The rate of wage is higher ; the rate of every- thing else is higher, too. Consequently, propor- tionately the position is much the same. Wake up, Uncle Sam ; you are really not quite WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 213 such a good investment as you dream you are. It makes one's heart ache to learn of the num- ber of immigrants who go under. Look at the poor Italian. He arrives with his family in the west ; he cannot speak a word of the language, he is a simple person from a simple land, he is accustomed to sunshine and warmth ; the cold of the winter is an absolute pain to his thin blood. He falls into the hands of the sweater ; he is farmed out by hundreds, is shipped off to God knows where, and he often becomes a veritable slave in the hands of his employer. But for the constant supply of this cheap labour, working at starvation prices, the workshops of the States could not be fed to-day. The numbers of aliens who be- come insane is increasing at such a rate, probably due to the terrible straits to which many of them are subjected in the first years after landing, that the States have seriously begun to consider this problem of alien insanity ; and none too soon. So long as people can borrow umbrellas they put off laying by for a rainy day. Every day got through without spending money, and every day when one learns something, is a day of value. Any fool can go out and spend money ; but it takes a wise man to keep it. Truly a penny saved is a penny gained. 214 AMERICA AS I SAW IT "The averge cost of maintenance per annum for each patient in our State hospitals exceeds $250, and as there are thousands of alien insane patients, we begin to realise the annual cost of these unfortunates to our taxpayers. As the average hospital life of the insane patient is probably upwards of ten years, the total cost of maintenance runs into millions. "The problem of the alien insane presents a curious anomaly. The federal government alone decides who shall enter this country, but makes practically no provision for those entering who become incapacitated through mental deficiencies. The entire burden of the care falls on the several states. Moreover, the United States alone has the right to deport the insane, and this only within the three years' limit of the federal law, and from causes arising before landing. The states may only repatriate insane patients when they go voluntarily." . . . "During the fiscal year ended Septr. 30, '12, the State of N. York returned to foreign countries through the U. S. Immigration Service and its own efforts, 1,171 insane, as against 784 for the previous year, and to other States 582 insane as against 342, a total of 1,753 f r X 9 I2 > as against a total of 1,126 for 1911, an increase of 55.7 per cent. The re- sult of this work should reduce, during the coming year, the abnormal increase in recent years in our insane hospital population. It also indicates in some degree, what relief should be experienced by the taxpayers of New York & other states if the entire problem of the alien insane should be adequately solved, through appropriate federal legisla- Sweated foreign labour is a peril to the country, and a disgrace to the employers. People work in overcrowded rooms, and few enquire into these matters. Municipal councils are retrograde WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 215 and often dishonest. Birth certificates are not enforced ; infant mortality and child labour are all subjects that require to be taken seriously in hand. The women are educating themselves miles ahead of the men in these directions, and again I say, they are the proper persons to inspect and regulate for the abolition of these evils. It is rarely that aliens of the first generation succeed. It is their children who have become Americanised in the public schools and the free night schools, who make the move. And it is their children again who become established as American citizens. It is an amazing country. But let us pause : A million people are entering America every year. Many, many rise, and are successful ; and yet, withal, the percentage is small. Almost as many fail. Up to now the alien influx has been absorbed by the American, but there are distinct signs that the American is in danger of being absorbed by the alien to-day. European socialism is in the air. Mob rule is asserting itself, syndicalism is working steadily towards upheaval. The darkies are discontented, and multiplying, and great prob- lems lie before the United States at no distant date. The people who enjoy the greatest freedom in the world live under the British flag. There is less corruption in Canada near by than in the 216 AMERICA AS I SAW IT States. Canada is far greater in size. America is quite alive to these facts, and the people of the United States are emigrating into the north- west of Canada in tens of thousands ; in fact, at the rate of a hundred thousand a year. Scan- dinavians who went to the North-West of the States some years ago, and have succeeded in improving their land in such a way that they can sell it at a profit, are doing so. With this small sum of money, and their sons growing up, they are crossing the border to the West, to Manitoba, Alberta, and Saskatchewan. A hundred and twenty million pounds have left the States for Canada in six years in this way. If the lift sticks, don't wait ; run up the stairs, it saves time in fact try something else ; that is what these men have done. They go there with a knowledge of the climate, and understand the possibilities of the land, and with a certain sum of money, and having already learnt the English language, they prove in every way ex- cellent immigrants. At the present moment, there are almost as many people entering Canada from America as there are from the ocean ports. These facts speak for themselves. They say that the United States do not offer such vast opportunities now as formerly, and that these men see greater possibilities of success under the British flag. WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 217 There are lots of Americans who think that God Almighty made the United States perfect, and that everything else is a misfit. Patriotism is a fine thing when it can see, but it must not be blind. They progressed well while they re-stocked with Anglo-Saxon or Scandinavian blood ; but now that they are being swamped with the Latin blood of the south, the Jew, the Greek, and the Pole, what will happen ? What becomes of the American loafer, the throw- back of every land ? Of course it is always the survival of the fittest. When starvation faces a man unless he works, it is extraordinary how he will buck up and do things. The pauper is not pampered in America as he is in England. The men who, from desire or force of circumstances, become idlers, either sink into the criminal classes or degenerate into tramps or "hoboes." The tramp has become rather an institution in America, resented by policeman, farmer, railroad brakeman, and village constable alike. Without home or family, although frequently a deserter from both, without money, decent cloth- ing, self-respect, or morals, too lazy to be a real criminal, he wanders about the earth, preying upon defenceless homes for his food, and sometimes com- mitting petty deeds of violence. These people die of disease in the ditch, or are constantly killed 21 8 AMERICA AS I SAW IT by falling from railroad trains in their attempt to steal rides from town to town, by hanging on to the cars. There are few workhouses or charitable institu- tions to pander to them or give them a night's shelter free. The tramp either has to do some- thing for himself, or else give up the job of living and die. There is immense poverty in the larger cities of America. It is extraordinary to a stranger to see the poverty and squalor, and the awful condi- tion of the slums of some of the big cities. They are not safe after dark. Struggling, starving humanity is a dangerous element to contend with. Many of these undesirables are shipped back again to their own lands. They have proved no good in a new country, and the old ones have to take them back. I am more and more convinced that people with grit and determination, with character and pluck, will get on just as well, ay, even better, in their own lands, than they will across the seas. It is all a matter of work and character and tak- ing an opportunity when it comes ; for it does not in the least matter in what country a man lives. The day of the United States as a great immi- gration field seems to be waning. Canada offers better opportunities. Politically, the upheaval in its change of President every four years is a WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 219 detriment. In Canada there is nothing of that kind to contend with. Is America's greatest prosperity passed ? Is well-governed republicanism tottering ? Is mob- rule finding its feet ? There is a certain club in New York called the City Club, which does excellent civic work, and every Saturday the members give an interesting luncheon to men and women to meet some par- ticular star. It was my good fortune to be present on an occasion when Mrs. Alice Stebbins Wells of Los Angeles, California, the first woman to serve upon the police force in America, was present. Mine host was Mr. Bleecker Van Wagenen, and an interesting gathering it proved. This good lady who entered the force in 1910, was appointed for life under the Civil Service. She was a nice-looking woman with dark hair plainly parted, pleasant manners, wore a snuff-coloured cloth uniform with a darker coloured braid, and the police badge on her breast. She advocated women being added to the police administra- tion in America. She spoke of the police as "a peace arm" ; said that their duty was to prevent crime by enforcing law and order, and told us how in her plain clothes she went to the music halls, the skating-rinks, the cinematographs, and all places of public entertainment in California in 220 AMERICA AS I SAW IT pursuit of her work. Every city, she said, should provide women policemen, to whom other women could go in distress. She regretted that the saloon had always had such a large influence in public life. She pointed out that it was often the only social club where a man could go to cash his cheques, sit in warmth and comfort, and read the papers. She suggested more "dry states," and that coffee saloons should be made more attractive. She told us that in some places women formerly used to get as much as fifty per cent of the profit on the amount of drinks they could sell during the evening. She dwelt on the fact that the children of the future would be more moral and more intelligent ; and certainly America is waking up for a great battle against the social evil, from which more good women than women of the underworld are suffering. If, she said, this cannot be effected on a legal basis, it must be done on a moral one. She was very earnest and modest in her delivery, and one felt she was the type of woman that would do good whatever her part in life might be. This was the first woman policeman in America, although there are several in Europe and Canada. England lately dressed up a policeman in female attire to "catch a flirt." Counterfeit coin is poor currency. No doubt women policemen will become universal before long. Suddenly a most awful noise rent the air. The WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 221 very club-house seemed to tremble. "What is that? "I asked. "They are blasting rocks to get at new founda- tions near by." "Blasting rocks !" I exclaimed in amazement. "Yes, they are excavating for the new subway ; that is all." And they were not using ergite or there would have been less noise. It certainly did seem an extraordinary thing to be sitting at luncheon in the centre of New York and to hear blasting going on underneath or next door, just as complacently as if one were in the wilds. But New York stands on a solid bed of rock, and that is why they are enabled to build such enormously high sky-scrapers without fear of their being blown over in a blizzard, because with grappling irons they can fasten them to the rocks themselves. Is it prophetic that the bell of Liberty is badly cracked ? The Panama-Pacific Exhibition of 1915 wanted Philadelphia to lend them the precious relic, and this lead to the discovery of its rent. The glass case was opened, and lo ! the crack was found to have increased badly since its last inspection. The Sons and Daughters of the Revolution rose. " The bell must not go to San Francisco, and the bell must be mended," was their mandate. 222 AMERICA AS I SAW IT These Conservative Societies, these descendants of old times, are working hard to keep up tradition, to ferret out ancestry, to uphold old customs, to maintain a better standard, and an older courtesy in their adopted land. In 1900, I never seemed to go to a single enter- tainment in which were not dozens of women decorated with badges, on the bars of which were stamped the names of their various ancestors. Democratic America revels in titles and decorations. And the women who could not decorate themselves as Daughters of the Revolution, wore badges representing the different clubs to which they be- longed ; now one seldom sees this. Every Freemason loves a decoration. Nearly every American covets a button or a title. Blue ribbon is for temperance ; white ribbon for Purity; Grand Army button worn by survivors of the Northern Army in the Civil War; Red, White, and Blue Aztec Society button, worn by direct male descendants of the officers of the army in the Mexican War. Then of course there are election buttons, bicycle club buttons, and many others ; and if a button cannot be found, the American flag can always be used as a pocket- handkerchief. The United States Govern- ment gives but one decoration, and that is for gallant and distinguished conduct in which life is imperilled. WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 223 Crattw by W. K. Haselden. Reproduced by permission of the London Daily Mirror. ALL OUT FOR THE DUKE 224 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Any man elected as a member of either house of the National Congress or State Legislature is en* titled to be called " Honourable" by courtesy. The old Colonel of the Southern Confederacy is dying out, but new Colonels, who have never been under fire, have taken his place. This is really a courtesy title given promiscuously by a man's friends. There is little army but there are many Colonels. In 1912 when the National Society of the Daughters of the Revolution had been formed about twelve years, there were seventy-five thousand active members, constituting nearly fifteen hundred chapters ; each state had its regular organisation, and the headquarters of the National Society had raised unto itself a magnificent building in Wash- ington. It really is a magnificent building. Each state has its room, and each state has decorated its own room according to its own taste. It has a fine lecture hall in which meetings are constantly held, and altogether, the Daughters are a very energetic body both in their club, and outside, where their work is to mark historic buildings, and generally keep aflame the memory of the American Revolution. There is an even more select body of women known as the Colonial Dames, and the proudest position a woman can attain is to be admitted into this august body of British descent. It is the WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 225 same idea as the old clanship of Scotland, or the county records of England. How these dear American dames love to preserve their battle-fields. They are almost as important as the cemeteries. We have so many battle-fields in Europe ; yet some of them have been fought over several times. But they hardly look like scenes of gore to-day, for the ploughman has done his work. Honour has been gained, and agricultural prosperity has taken the place of bloody strife. Every possible excuse to preserve a battle-field brings joy to the eyes of the elite in the States. At heart America is conservative, at heart Great Britain is democratic, though both pretend to be otherwise. In education we English are napping, and often live on empty tradition. We are too fond of teaching our boys (in those very conservative and extremely private institutions we call Public Schools) to be gentlemen. English gentlemen yes, we are proud of our English gentlemen ; they and their clothes have long been models for the world, but we must teach them something more. We must let the scholars swim in the classics, and bathe the others in modern science, modern languages, modern everything. We must equip our boys for professions and trades, so that when they leave Eton, Harrow, Charter- Q 226 AMERICA AS I SAW IT house, or Winchester, at seventeen or eighteen years of age, they have already spent a couple of years along the lines of their future career. As it is, we turn them out in thousands every autumn, fine young Englishmen, but quite unable to earn half-a-crown a week. Heaven forbid they should ever forget to be gentlemen, but let them take in some of the practical side of science, en- gineering, law, medicine, literature ; anything, in fact, towards which they have a leaning, and in which they should be encouraged. Being a gentleman will not earn a living any more than earning a living will make a gentleman, and a man has got to learn that the road to pleasure is much shorter than the road back. As I suggested to the Woman's Club in Chicago, we must do more to exchange our students, and professors also. America wants more gentlemen, we want more workers. Is it not possible, when the autumn ses- sions begin every year, for the headmasters of large educational departments in each country to have ready a list of boys who wish to cross the ocean for one to three years. How splendid for our British youth to go to those mighty steel works at Bethle- hem and to learn engineering at the University of Lehigh next door. Although literature and science are both taught, ninety per cent of the men at Le- high are taking the engineering four years' course. WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 227 How good for the American boys to come over to our Vickers', Maxim's, Armstrongs', or to work at our engineering schools in Liverpool, Birming- ham, Sheffield, or Leeds. This is a stupendous question. We can help one another. Cecil Rhodes has endowed scholar- ships at Oxford for American students. No American has endowed anything, so far as I know, for British-born subjects in the United States. Here is a chance for a millionaire to do something with his money. Professors and students should be exchanged continually. We ought to know one another better. We want to know one another more, and yet many of us do not understand how to set about it. Our technical schools resemble the American schools, but our Eton and Harrow boys do not care to go to our technical schools, although they would gladly attend those in a new land, with new ideas, new teachings, new inspirations. Parents feed boys and drop sweetmeats into their mouths, and then boys expect when they are grown up that the world will do the same ; but it won't. Many English lads are unable to choose a trade or profession because they really know nothing about trades and professions. The school makes no effort to enlighten them. It would be invalu- able to hold weekly classes for the older boys where these subjects might be suggested, and all details 228 AMERICA AS I SAW IT of examinations, expenses, and possibilities ex- plained. Then the lad would have a chance of making up his mind, and spend his last year at school at appropriate work, specialising in fact. The best men and women are the progeny of thoroughly selfish parents. Unselfish parents heap coals of fire on their own heads. Again let me say that America wants our cul- tured men ; we want her workers ; each has much to learn from the other, so interchange would be of the utmost advantage to both. The present sys- tems of education of the two countries are dissimi- lar, both have good and bad points. In England our better class boys go to Preparatory Schools (fees averaging, say, $500) from eight to twelve years of age, and there learn the groundwork of everything. Public Schools (fees from $500 to $1000) from thirteen years of age to eighteen. 'Varsity, between eighteen and nineteen years of age. Average expenses at Oxford and Cambridge are about $1500. It can be done for less, or much can be spent. Much of education is occupied in eradicating individualism, much of after life in eradicating education and fostering individualism. Once away from School, boys try to be original, and girls struggle to be conventional. Many boys go to a crammer for a few months after leaving their Public School, because the education is stupidly not arranged to follow on WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 229 sufficiently for an average boy to enter the Uni- versity direct. Degrees are generally taken at twenty-one or twenty-two years of age ; those in medicine, not till twenty-five. Our County Council school children receive their education free from five to about fourteen years of age, and after that, technical schools can be attended. Now in America, children of every class go to the Public School equivalent to the County Council school, which gives free education from five to sixteen years of age. The sons of the President and of the latest immigrant may sit side by side. Although the writer feels this system is quite as bad as the over-conservative privacy of the expen- sive English public school, yet the American edu- cation is probably better to-day than in our pri- vate schools, and certainly more practical than that of our public schools. Preparatory Schools in the States are " crammers" for special College Work. This has to be paid for. Andover prepares for Harvard, Exeter for Yale. The nearest comparison to the English public schools are St. Paul's, Groton, and St. Mark's, where the training of character and physique are emphasised. Germany has no such schools. About half the students go direct to the Uni- versity from the Public Schools. Many of these youths earn their fees during the vacations as tram- conductors, newspaper boys, teachers, or in steam- 230 AMERICA AS I SAW IT ships, to pay their way for their courses of study in the ensuing term. All the time their god is the American flag. The patriotism of the country is simply splendid, and it is all due to youthful education being centred round the star-spangled banner. Every morning in many schools the teachers salute the flag. Every pupil does the same. And further, the Sons and Daughters of the States have been known to pack the stars and stripes in their boxes when travelling in foreign lands. Great Britain is not outwardly patriotic. Why, we appear to be almost ashamed of our flag, we fly it so seldom. One can walk down Regent Street and see almost every other nation's flag floating in the wind, and not a single Union Jack. The English seem as shy of flying their flag, as they seem ashamed of demonstrating affection. Englishmen invariably show their worst side to strangers, largely from shyness, their best side is generally packed away in the store-room. In America they are wise enough to have small classes instead of forty or fifty scholars in each, as we so stupidly do. How can any teacher study the little idiosyncrasies of forty or fifty children or young people in a class, how can he influence their lives when he never has a chance to get at them, except in herds ? Examination marks do not necessarily mean big attainment in knowledge, WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 231 though they may stand for immediate and super- ficial assimilation of facts. We all want more indi- vidualism, more ideals, more technical knowledge, more insight into the pitfalls of life, and the incul- cation of fundamental moral qualities. How necessary this last teaching is. We are sometimes taught how to earn a living, but we are supposed to live our lives by instinct. Until now little has been done to teach boys and girls the seriousness of life. They have simply gone along, and chaos has been the result. Learning without education in the true sense of the word fills, without developing, the mind. But there, education is a big field and we have much to learn from America and Germany about head work ; while we can teach them something in the formation of character and physical well- being. The raw immigrant is almost as quickly turned into an American citizen, as a Chicago pig is trans- formed into a canned sausage. Once landed, no matter where he comes from, the flag and patriot- ism are rubbed into his bones. We stupidly do not even show our aliens the Union Jack, nor teach them to respect it. Of course, the argument against this is that America wants this immigration. We do not. America is under-populated, we are over-populated. This may be so, but we allow the alien ; and as we 232 AMERICA AS I SAW IT permit him and his family to land, we ought to make him a British patriot as quickly as possible. When taking a first-class passage to the States, one hardly expects to be asked among a host of other questions : Age (give years and months) ? Able to read ? Able to write ? Name and Address in full of the nearest Relative or Friend in the Country from which Alien comes ? Final Destination (City or Town) ? (State) ? By whom was passage paid ? Whether in possession of $50 or upward, and, if less, how much ? Whether ever before in the United States, and, if so, when and where ? State full Address to which you are going, and if to join a relative or friend, state what relative or friend, with Name and Address ? Whether ever in Prison or Almshouses, or an Institution, or Hospital for the care and treatment of the Insane, or supported by Charity ? Whether a Polygamist ? Whether an Anarchist ? Whether coming by reason of any Offer, solicitation, promise, or Agreement, express or implied, to labour in the United States ? Condition of Health, Mental and Physical ? Deformed or Crippled, Nature, length of time, and Cause ? Height ? Feet ? Inches ? Color of Hair ? Marks of Identification ? Complexion ? Colour of Eyes ? WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 233 Then one is asked which of the following lan- guages one can speak. African (black). Armenian. Bohemian. Bosnian. Bulgarian. Chinese. Croatian. Cuban. Dalmatian. Dutch. East Indian. English. Finnish. Flemish. French. German. Greek. Hebrew. Herzegovian. Irish. Italian (North). Italian (South). Japanese. Korean. List of Races or Peoples Lithuanian. Magyar. Mexican. Montenegrin. Moravian. Pacific Islander. Polish. Portuguese. Roumanian. Russian. Ruthenian (Russniak). Scandinavian (Norwegians, Danes, and Swedes). Scotch. Servian. Slovak. Slovenian. Spanish. Spanish-American. Syrian. Turkish. Welsh. West Indian. But when one sets out on the return journey, one is faced by only six questions : Port of Embarkation ? Port at which passenger landed ? Name of Passenger ? 234 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Profession ? Country of which Citizen or subject ? Country of intended future permanent residence ? When one asks, What is an American ? one thinks of Jane Addams and her work. She and her fol- lowing are not socialists, but social reformers. Hull House is one of the best-known institutions in America. Speaking one day to a lady at lunch- eon about Miss Jane Addams, I remarked : "I suppose she is the best-known woman in the States." "She is the best-known woman in the world," was her reply. Be that as it may, Jane Addams is a great per- sonality. She was born in 1860. After travelling some years in Europe, her sympathy was aroused by the dwellers of the slums. She had a small in- come of her own, and in 1889, established Hull House, a settlement in Chicago. This is now heavily endowed by her followers. It is individuality that counts. Miss Jane Addams has individuality, and she has gathered about her thirty or forty men and women workers, who are devoting their lives to social work, statis- tics, and general experiments, for the betterment of the alien. She has a kindly face ; her hair, which is brushed straight back from her forehead, is growing grey, and there is something pathetic in the look of her WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 235 eyes ; they express sympathy and suffering. Satur- day night is a great night at Hull House ; it is the night when Jane Addams invites her friends to dinner, and all kinds of people, interested in all kinds of work, meet as her guests. The affair is informal ; there is a sort of go-as-you-please air about everything ; many brilliant ideas are ex- changed and suggestions vouchsafed at those three long dining tables, at one of which the lady of the house herself presides in the simple banquet- ing hall of Hull House. The night I was there, different groups were discussing Suffrage. Jane Addams' s candidate, Roosevelt, had just been rejected. She had had the proud honour, for a woman, of seconding his nomination in the Convention of the Progressive Party in 1912. Mr. Roosevelt had promised Suffrage, and Miss Addams, who is a good speaker and has become very political, was greatly upset at the defeat of her candidate. It was the first time an American woman had taken such an active part of self-assertion in politics. Hull House has become a model for settlement workers in all lands. Miss Addams has conducted a great altruistic movement without silly senti- mentality. She believes in training the mentally weedy by hard work, because she thinks that when physically equipped for bread-winning, the higher 236 AMERICA AS I SAW IT moral qualities follow. When I first saw her, I thought her a strange little woman, keen, sharp, somewhat socialistic, and apparently old. She was not she was then only forty. When I saw her twelve years later in 1912, I thought her young, vigorous, and full of life. Success had come. That night at Hull House there was great ex- citement because the Suffrage Party had just won four states. They said, with these additions, the voting women in the States then numbered two mil- lion, with a representation of seventy Electors in the Electoral College, and yet the women of New York have not yet got the vote. Hence the " Thanks- giving" and "Protest" march in New York City. They are getting as active and excited in America over Suffrage as we have been for the last ten years in England. One of the things these women voters will have to do is to see to their birth certificates, or rather the want of them ; for the country seems singularly like Russia in this respect. In Great Britain every child born must be registered within a few weeks by one or other parent. He requires his birth certificate when entering school or the Army for University entrance and examinations ; in fact, his birth certificate is as important as himself. Some day I hope it will have to be produced before his marriage, and then we may stop some of these WHAT IS AN AMERICAN ? 237 irresponsible child-marriages which do so much harm. Hull House is situated in the slums, the very slummiest part of Chicago. Once a beautiful old farm-house, it still retains something of its ancient splendour, and opens its big halls to its neighbours. There are dances every night for the young people ; there is a theatre where wonderfully good theatrical performances are given on Saturday night, by local amateurs, who spend their time playing pieces by John Masefield, John Galsworthy, Bernard Shaw, J. M. Barrie, and foreign writers. They rarely produce anything American, which, to my mind, is a pity. I should venture to differ from the ethics of Hull House on the domestic question. We have all got to live. We of the middle class have all got to have our beds made, our food cooked, our rooms kept clean, and have clothes to wear. Children must be reared and tended ; therefore it is ab- solutely necessary for the comfort of an empire to teach domesticity and love of home. Socialism is ideal, but oh, so unpractical ! It is as selfish as Christian Science. Everything for the individual sounds delightful ; but we are all units in a vast complex system, and although we can each have our own individuality we must con- form to rules and regulations, and we must every one of us contribute our mite to the happiness of 238 AMERICA AS I SAW IT our surroundings. Miss Jane Addams, with all her wonderful work and her desire for the better- ment of everybody and everything, seems to me to be encouraging too much independence and too little consideration for that institution which is the backbone of every nation and is known as the home. There is no dishonour in service. Everyone on God's earth must be subservient to another. Every man must render service to somebody, though his last master must always be his own conscience. I once asked a delightful American his impres- sions of London while I was busily writing my own on his country. He wrote : "Every American expects to go abroad sooner or later to see the countries from which his ancestors came, and to see, as it were, * History in the Flesh/ for he knows more history and more English literature than one would guess. "In going to England I was struck of course at first with the, to me, funny little railroad trains and cars, and later with the dangerous compartment system, where one is bundled into a section or compartment of a train with * goodness knows who/ and is obliged to stay there helpless, if molested, until the next station at least. This we consider outrageous. I believe it is being gradually abolished. The apparent civility of the lower classes was also evident ; apparent be- cause one feels that it is only superficial and that the 'good as you ' feeling lies very close to the surface air, ' Yes, sir ; thank you, sir/ WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 239 "The low buildings of London rob it of its resemblance to a great American city, and to us it seems like a very, very large village, such as we have a number of at home, but much larger; the same thing over and over again wherever you go (barring its public buildings). No very striking charac- teristics which would lead one to say : "' Well, at last here is a city/ " I was also struck with the lack of flexibility of custom ; for instance, my first arrival in London occurred one chilly night in February. I came Calais to Dover and arrived in London about eleven o'clock at night. I had foolishly brought only one rug, and the trains were not heated, so I was quite chilled when I got out of the car and ready for a good hot drink, a fire, and a warm bed. As ill luck would have it, being a stranger, I went to the C Hotel, walked into the lobby, and asked for a room, and then for a hot whiskey, as I was chilled through. A room was assigned to me, but I was told that I could not have my whiskey until I went to my room. " In the lobby a bright fire was burning and it was not so for- bidding as it might have been, and it was there that I wanted my drink and at once ! but no ; further requests met with further refusals, and still shivering, I went, protesting, away from the comfortable office and bright fire to a cold, cheerless room on the third floor, where a chilly maid was down on her knees blowing at a hole in the wall (it looked like it) as I thought, but on close scrutiny I found it to be a tiny fireplace in which were a few little sticks and seven and a half pieces of coal. "The bed was turned down, but the sheets were damp and cold. In desperation I drove the maid out for the whiskey and hot water, and undertook the task of persuading the fire to go on myself, and incidentally nearly swallowed it all in taking too deep a breath. "Finally the 'drink' came. I imbibed it, and another. The fire consented to go on and, fearing the damp sheets, I 240 AMERICA AS I SAW IT retired to rest as I was, piling the blanket and my steamer rug over me. "Such was my welcome to London. "But I had been brought face to face with this sort of thing which one meets so often in England. "'It isn't done, you know.' "'Why not ?' asks the surprised American. "'Because it hasn't been.' "'Then now is the time to do it,' replies the American. "This everlasting 'It is not done' may be all right, but it is maddening. An American traveller abroad was taken into a chapel as an especial favour, in the corner of which an antique lamp was burning. "Approaching this with the American in tow, the sacristan said in tones of awe, 'This lamp, sir, has been burning for over a thousand years, it has never been extinguished ; the oil is replenished now and then and other wicks added, but the light has never gone out in that time.' "'Never ?' said the American. "Never !' said the sacristan, with fervour. "'Well, it's out now,' said the American, and at the same time blew out the lamp. "This probably never happened, but it illustrates the American spirit of intolerance of restraint without what to them appears to be reason. "The American feels that the European is still carrying a stone on one side of the poor donkey to balance the load of wheat on the other. "With a few exceptions I really find it difficult to under- stand the English men in their speech. They appear to swallow their words, as it were. The English women, on the contrary, seem quite free from this peculiarity and it is delightful to listen to a cultured English woman's conversa- tion, clear, distinct, correct inflections, with good values, unfortunately, however, lacking in colour and tone. "Many, many things are different and interesting: WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 241 clothes, shoes, attitude of the audience in a theatre oh dear, I always feel in an English theatre (not a Music Hall) as though, presently, some one will tap me on the shoulder and say, * Sorry, sir, but you must go out, sir; you smiled, sir; not allowed to smile, sir; thank you, sir; yes, sir. "Checking the trunks; that was a shock. You see your trunks delivered to the railway official, but when you ask for checks, you are told that 'that is not the custom/ and 'There you are, sir/ When you reach your destination, you pick out whatever trunks you like and take them away. 'You are expected to take only your own, sir, you know.' It is funny, and one only smiles. You are put on honour, as it were. "Ticket to Edinburgh, sir ? that's the train, sir; oh, no, sir don't bother to pay, sir you can pay some one else, sir some other time, sir, will do when you're coming back will do, sir." "England expects every man to be honest. "Two delightful bits of English life came to me quite un- expectedly. My first tea in London was on this wise. I had been called to the office of an English concern in the city for a conference, which began in the morning early. We had lunch in due season and then my confreres went to another appointment, I being left in one of their offices to go over my papers for a few hours. It was cold and rainy, and although the office was pleasantly furnished and there was an open fire, still I was feeling rather tired and a bit lonely when in came a commissionaire with a tray, most inviting, in its appeal, with tea, bread-and-butter, and cake. "My first thought was that somebody was ill, until the man said very pleasantly, 'I thought you'd like tea, sir;' and then I was sure I wanted it. "It was good, and ever since I have understood and sym- pathised with the five o'clock tea habit of England. Good luck to it ! 242 AMERICA AS I SAW IT "My next pleasant surprise was a glimpse of English suburban, if not country, life. "I had an appointment in the city to meet an Englishman, with whom friends in New York wished to open business relations. "I called early one afternoon, and found him in, but very stiff and cold and not at all responsive. He finally rose, and said he had an engagement to play tennis and must leave. I rose also, and said I envied him his tennis, for I was very fond of the game. "What,* he exclaimed, 'you play tennis ?' "Upon my reaffirming this, he changed absolutely, became quite human, and invited me to go at once to his house for an afternoon. "We went together to my hotel, the Metropole, got my tennis things, and then to his house at East Sheen. There I found his wife, a very sweet woman, and four daughters waiting for him on the tennis-court. What a lovely home it was, and what a charming life they lived altogether. "We played tennis until tea-time and then again until dark, about eight in the evening. Then a bath and dinner. It was all most delightful, a revelation of an English home and home life. We became good friends, for I went often for tennis, and soon our business relations were established on a firm and sound footing. "Then I was struck with the ugly old women sitting behind beautiful flowers at street corners, and told they were the 'flower girls/ "We have no barmaids, and no women drink at public bars ; these being both allowed rather horrified me. "I thought top-hats and frock-coats gave a great air of distinction to your business men. It was a pretty custom, and Fm sorry to hear it has gone. I liked it. Bond Street seemed so narrow and small for its big and wide reputation. "Your Music Halls with their big, comfortable seats were de- lightful, and I wish we had something of the kind in America." WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 243 American artisans are being made in many ways, and the American mechanic takes front rank. It is a land of machinery. One of the most interesting things in New York, and one of the things that is doing most valuable work, is the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. I dined with Mr. and Mrs. Edwin Hewitt, and after dinner we went down to see this marvellous building, started in 1859 by my host's grandfather. Old Cooper was a poor boy ; as a lad he so much missed the possibility of learning his beloved engineering, for want of funds, that he decided in his mind that if he ever got on in the world, he would help other young people to acquire easily what was denied. Gradually he accumulated a little fortune. With it, this engineer, who had become the engineer of his own destiny, became the engineer of many young men and women's futures. He started his Institute. It is much along the lines of the Polytechnic in London, or the technical schools in Manchester and other parts of England. Although begun and maintained by this one man and his family for years and years, it has now grown too large for that, as will readily be under- stood when one realises that from twelve hundred to two thousand people attend classes every week, and there is always a large waiting list. These classes are for mechanical and electrical engineering with 244 AMERICA AS I SAW IT all kinds of machinery ; architecture, chemistry, science, physics, telegraphy, stenography and book- keeping (especially for women), decorative art, modelling, painting from life, literature, economics, and elocution. This Cooper Union night school was really the first one started in America. Something like sixty per cent of the men employed in mechanical work in New York have been trained at the Cooper Union ; and I was much struck by the fact, in go- ing through the building, that so many young men spoke with a foreign accent. It seems that twenty- five per cent of the people there hardly know the English language, and another large percentage are foreigners. Does this not show the desire of the alien to better himself and forge ahead ? Different degrees are granted, and the students holding them readily find employment. People are educated for specific posts, not trained for posi- tions that do not exist, as is so often the case in England. Educational readjustment has become a necessity to-day. It was very curious when speaking to the pupils to find how many of them were employed at the night school on a different class of work to that which they did all day. For instance, a girl who was earning her living as a dressmaker, did two hours' chemistry every night because she wanted to become a dispenser. A man who was a carriage WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? 245 builder was learning designing ; an hotel-lift man was studying mechanical engineering. A cook- man from a " Down Town" restaurant was learning how to make weight and measure machines, as he thought he had invented something, but could not apply his idea without more knowledge, and so on. A great work, indeed -- the result of a great con- ception by a great man. The American Mechanic is a wonder. He does twice as much work as his British confrere. He takes on pace with every month, and like American machinery he soon wears out, falls to pieces, and rots away. English machinery is made to last, but such quality is no longer wanted ; something new is always being invented ; "Let the thresher, or the engine, work straight ahead for all it can for two or three years, then thrust it aside, and buy a newer and more up-to-date one," is the present cry. It is the day of change ; cheap goods are wanted, cheap clothes, cheap machinery, cheap everything. New inventions are coming along all the time, and to-day nothing is good enough to be worthy of being made a permanent fixture. It is the hour of unrest in every land, the day of quick, mechanical work, and general rush. To-morrow has become to-day. We all live in advance, or try to. CHAPTER X THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION "En este mundo traidor, No hay verdad, Nada es mentera, Pues to do toma el color, Del cristal, con que se mira." "In this deceitful world There is no truth, there is no lie, We see it, through the colour Of the glass, before the eye." THE United States is a marvellous country for assimilation. People assimilate good music, good drama, good art ; they assimilate everything. Just as Queen Alexandra smiled herself into the hearts of the British people, the American woman paves her way into the portals of good society. Unless a New Yorker can reach a certain standard of society success, she will not be able to procure a box in the "Horseshoe" at the Opera-house, which is the hall-mark of social status. A Duke's coronet of strawberry leaves is hardly more cov- eted. The moment a man has made money in Detroit, Denver, or Kansas, where his rise has been deplored 246 THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 247 Drawn by W. K. Haselden. Reproduced by permission of the London Daily Mirror. AN EUGENIC WEDDING 248 AMERICA AS I SAW IT by his enemies and envied by his friends, he sets sail for Manhattan. There, he at once buys a corner house and starts his wife off to "get into society", and what is more, that wife generally succeeds. My admiration for the unbounded capacity of the American woman is profound. This society lady, however, does not appreciate sufficiently the important work being done by the really great women of her country. "Things that ought to count, don't," said such a woman to me. She is right. The nation has few ideals, few heroes, and little reverence. It is a thorny road to travel, a road without ideals, without heroes, with- out traditions. If a man has no God, he stumbles and falls by the way. If he has no ideals, his life becomes unregulated, and if a nation is made up of men who have no standards of value or reverence, except flag and constitution, they may reach a certain height, then they become giddy, they lack balance, and like Humpty Dumpty, they fall ; for a nation after all is but a conglomeration of in- dividuals. Every salad is better for a little vinegar, and honest speech must not be taken unkindly. One finds this lack of ideals, reverence, and want of public life when enquiring into the present position of the sons and grandsons of THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 249 those who have accumulated great American wealth. Their fathers have collected their dollars so fast that they have had little time to look after their sons, who have not always inherited their brains, with the result that these sons have some- times dissipated their family wealth, have married women of the sphere from which their parents originally came, or from the front row of the chorus in some theatre, which is worse, and in many cases have "thrown themselves back" in a manner that is greatly to be deplored. This may largely be the result of superficiality, or it may be heredity. Educated men who marry common women always repent. English noblemen marry American heiresses or English actresses ; German officers marry Jewesses or merchants' daughters to-day alliances utterly tabooed a few years ago in both countries. In fact, we begin to wonder whether the French mariage de convenance, or the Japanese "marriage by arrange- ment" has not good points and larger possibilities for nuptial success than appear on the surface. Anyway the people of those lands are socially equal, and have money sufficient for their position ; so they start the thorny path of matrimony well equipped. Ill-assorted alliances fail ninety times in a hundred. An enormous percentage of the American-European marriages are failures. Everything is subservient to fashion the world 250 AMERICA AS I SAW IT over. New York copies Europe, the West copies New York. The proprietors of the hotels go to Europe every spring to learn the latest dishes, the latest form of tea-cup or serviette, just as regularly as the bonnet-woman, or the blouse-maker goes to learn the most modern modes in dress. If So-and-So in London or Paris says: "This is the proper thing to do," New York, St. Louis, and Chicago must follow suit. There are fashions in everything. Fashions in art, fashions in music, and so on, and America is ready to accept every new fad and every new freak. She is the land of assimilation. "American taste in music is snobbish," once said a big concert impresario to me. "How so?" "Only two things succeed. Either I must pay for enormous ads (advertisements) for my perform- ance, as was done by insuring a man's fingers so that all the country could talk about his fingers ; or the artist must come here with a large European reputation which we can boom. No American- born genius will ever get a chance on his own merits. The proletariat are sometimes musical, but always poor, and the rich are mere snobs in matters of taste. We have a front door which we open with a golden key, and the backyard is immediately be- hind. We have no educated middle class to speak of." THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 251 Thus he spoke. He may or may not be right, although his remarks might well apply to my own country. Anyway I heard much excellent music at the Bagby concerts in New York, the Symphony Orchestra at Boston, and the Thomas Orchestra concerts in Chicago. Again and again the traveller asks himself, How is it that America which is so vast, has so much talent, and so little real genius ? Is genius dying out in the world ? To turn to music. There are any number of interpreters, but how few are creative inter- preters. Among the latter McDowell, of whom they are justly proud, was a real American. Other composers of note are Ethelbert Nevin, De Koven, Chadwick, Victor Herbert, and Souza. One hears rag-time music on every side, and mighty pretty some of it is, too. America seems to claim it as her own. Beethoven in his Leonora Overture and Berlioz in his Hungarian March used the same idea. Rag-time is vigorous and has character, and a spice of it may be found in all folk-music. The American word "rag" is to syn- copate a regular tune. Some people call this mixture of two rhythms the music of the hustler ; anyway, it is often fascinating and invigorating, and America may be founding a national rag-time music of her own. Amongst singers America is well to the fore. 252 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Emma Eames, Nordica, Mary Garden, Farrar, Homer, Felice Lyne, are all of the first rank ; David Bispham, and the much regretted Eugene Oudin,'represent American men in the world of song. As a skilled violinist one might mention Maud Powell. The sphere of art has already been con- sidered. Young men and women are rising up, it is true, but again it is a case of much talent and little genius. If one turns to science, the name that stands fore- most, and miles ahead of everybody, is Thomas Edison. Next to him comes Eastman, who is also a great exploiter and business man. Among inventions, America may be justly proud of Morse's telegraph, Bell's telephone, and Edison's phonograph. All these were pure in- ventions. The flying-machine was perfected by the Wright Brothers, but not invented by them. It is a country of applied science to-day. To Westinghouse all praise is due for his air-brake, and as a leading electrical engineer, one must mention Horace Field Parshall who made our Twopenny Tube. In Nobel prize-winners America does not make much show. As a specimen of American versatility, one might name F. Hopkinson Smith, equally good as painter, writer, and architect. And yet, after all, what are these few names among a population of a hundred million ? THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 253 The United States is a big workshop, open to all the world to work in. Wise men who have made their pile go away from its hurly-burly to more cultured lands, and suffer the stigma of being called " unpatriotic " by those who remain. Turn to exploration, Peary stands out alone. Is it that America is not imaginative in anything except business ? Is it that all her creative faculty runs to the accumulation of dollars ? Or why is it, one continually asks oneself, that there are so many clever people and yet so few who are really brilliant ? Then again in literature, Hawthorne, Washing- ton Irving, Emerson, Walt Whitman, Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, Whittier, Bryant, Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Mark Twain (a master of wit), and a host of other names rise out of the past. But who is taking their place to-day ? William Dean Howells is probably the best writer, and there are excellent weavers of romance such as Winston Churchill, Margaret Deland, Edith Wharton, S. O. Jewett, Thomas Nelson Page, Gertrude Atherton, Owen Wister, George W. Cable, and many others. It is strange there are so many novelists and yet so few playwrights. Since Clyde Fitch's death there seems hardly anyone to take his place ; con- sequently there are an enormous number of Eng- lish plays upon the boards. However, this state 254 AMERICA AS I SAW IT of affairs is scarcely to be wondered at when one of the two groups that control the theatre of the States has announced that no American can write a play worth risking on the boards, and the chief does not take the trouble to read one when it has been sent to him. Among the few clever, well-known playwrights that America has produced, one may name Wm. Vaughan Moody, who wrote "The Great Divide" ; Percy MacKaye, Louis K. Anspacher, married to that good actress, Kathryn Kidder, who wrote "The Glass House." It is quite amusing to the visitor to see thoroughly American plays, such as Kate Douglas Wiggin's "Rebecca"; Alice Hegan Rice's "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch"; George M. Cohan's "Broadway Jones"; George Ade's charming sketches. Augustus Thomas has had several artistic and distinguished productions ; for instance, "Arizona" and "The Witching Hour." These are all thoroughly American, and are played in a thoroughly American manner. There were really no playwrights in America until about twenty years ago ; that art like the art of writing comic songs in which they now ex- cel has developed since then. The comic songs they doubtless got from the darkies who have al- ways had deliciously plaintive serio-comic tunes and verses. It is a curious thing also that the most musical voices in America belong to the darkies THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 255 of the South and descendants of the Britishers from over the seas in Virginia and Massachusetts. Among actors no one has achieved world-wide reputation, unless one mentions Booth, Lawrence Barrett, Ada Rehan, Edwin Forrest, and the one- part-man, Joseph Jefferson. One of the actors loved by the people of New York is George M. Cohan, who is among the amusing people of America. His face is his fortune, and his quiet manner while doing and saying the most ridicu- lous things is very attractive. His talent is a case of heredity. The whole family, including the father and mother, have been on the stage ; in fact, in " Broadway Jones," three or four of them appeared together. The life of Broadway Jones of Broadway is extremely American ; it repre- sents every virtue and some vice, and the poor young man is ruined by dissipation and extrava- gance. George M. Cohan is no mean playwright and he may, with verity, be called a "good all- round man." Among the amusing American-born actors I also saw was Hitchcock ; though he certainly cannot sing, he is highly entertaining. One of the most cultured, charming performances I wit- nessed was George Arliss in "Disraeli." Never have I seen a more enthusiastic audience. Probably the best actress in America to-day is still Mrs. Fiske ; she is a great personality and a 256 AMERICA AS I SAW IT veritable institution. After the conscientious work of years, after performing in plays which were really worth while, and not merely plays of the moment, this woman of strong intellectual character has won a place for herself as an Ameri- can institution. Nazimova, the Russian-American, would be a really good actress were it not for her contortions. She has a certain snake-like charm, a certain amount of power, and a decided individuality ; but spoilt by wilful contortions. Her suggestive wrigglings in "Bella Donna" made it almost im- possible to sit through the play. There is no doubt that in America at the pres- ent moment more suggestiveness on the legitimate stage exists, especially in musical comedy, than in any other country I know. Censorship there is none. It was really a treat to see Edythe Olive perform in "Rutherford and Son/' Her beautifully modu- lated, soft, deep voice was a pleasure after the high-pitched tones. Her suppressed emotion meant much more than neurotic wrigglings, and Norman McKinnel, as the rich parent in the same drama, must have been a revelation of fine acting and gentle force. That play was given at the Little Theatre in New York, which city must be congratulated on its Little Theatre. It is certainly the best of its THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 257 kind. It is a gem. The one in London is smaller, plainer, and less harmonious ; that in Paris is a hideous place, where weird and extraordinary triple bills appear ; but still all honour to it, for Grand Guignol was the first Little Theatre, and started a new idea. Dainty little plays cannot be given in huge theatres any more than spectacu- lar scenes can be rendered in drawing-rooms. In England we have a much-abused system of actor-manager. In many ways the actor-manager is a menace because his power over his own theatre is supreme ; he is able to choose the parts that suit himself and to do the plays that appeal to his particular taste ; no one else has a chance of per- forming what he wants. Even if it is not a suc- cess, and success unfortunately is gauged by the takings of the box-office, the actor-manager can still ride his hobby-horse and may bring the play triumphantly to the winning post by educat- ing a public to appreciate his wares. The actor- manager is all-powerful, and the actor is nowhere in England, unless a syndicate believes in him sufficiently to make him an actor-manager. The American actor is still more handi- capped ; he cannot even be his own actor- manager. The theatres from New York to San Francisco seem to be in the hands of one or two trusts. Trusts may be a form of socialism, mon- ied socialism, theatrical socialism, but socialism, 258 AMERICA AS I SAW IT nevertheless, and this clique of theatre owners runs exactly what it likes, and how it likes, and whom it likes. If a man or woman is popular with one of the syndicates, that man or woman is worked to death, but if their form of expression and their line of play do not happen to fall in with the requirements of this theatrical trust system, or the taking of so many thousands of dollars at the box-office, it is no use those particular people having any talent or temperament, for they can do nothing with it. They are boycotted. At the New Year, 1913, Barrie, Sutro, Pinero, Shaw, Galsworthy, Masefield, Louis N. Parker, Fagan, and Hichens, were all being played in America all British writers, and all successful. We return the compliment in England by enjoy- ing American musical comedies galore, in ex- change for our more serious drama. One of the great theatrical proprietors told me that seventy-five per cent of the actors were English, except in musical comedy. "They speak the language better, and they wear their clothes better, especially the men," he said. "In fact, four out of five productions in America are by English or French authors and are acted by English people ; and, of course, there is no risk in putting on a play which has had a good run in London or Paris." Sometimes it is greater to have a brilliant failure than to achieve a mediocre monied success. THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 259 It is always difficult for a man of talent and ideas and a tendency towards genius to write, and be tested, in that great crucible known as "the public." The public in America is more heterogeneous than in any other land, especially in New York, which is like a great terminus, where all kinds and conditions of people arrive and depart ; but they leave their mark behind. Modern economic con- ditions make life strenuous in every land. People begin their working day early, end late, and rush to the theatre in a condition of apoplectic indiges- tion for their evening fare. Is it to be wondered at that a man should prefer to be amused than to be asked to unravel psychological problems. It is sad that the American man is so dependent on amusement. He cannot, as a rule, sing or play himself; he is seldom a reader; he is too tired to amuse others after his day's work, and above all he does not want to think. He just wants to be amused. That is why high-kicks, short skirts, humorous songs, and pretty women always draw, while brilliant, intellectual plays appeal to smaller audiences. This is the same, however, all the world over. As W. S. Gilbert once said to me, "If they want rot they shall have it ; I can write rot as well as anyone else." As New York sets the fashion of fashions, so New York also sets the fashion of the drama. Anything that is a success there is perfectly certain 260 AMERICA AS I SAW IT to be a success "on the road." Most of the plays are started off outside Manhattan, so that the act- ors may pull their performance into shape. This is called "trying it on the dog." Then they come to New York, and in one night their fate is decided, though it takes weeks in Boston or Chicago to get a verdict from the public. If the critics are united in their praise, the house next night is full ; if the critics are divided, the house is half full ; if the critics are unfavourable, and the house is empty on the third night, the fate of the play is sealed, and it must be taken off. America suddenly showed her originality in the production of "The Yellow Jacket." An actor and an author well acquainted with the ways of Chinatown in San Francisco bethought them- selves of adapting, making, and arranging a Chinese play, just as nearly like a Chinese performance as possible. Assimilation, of course. It was perfectly delightful. Just as Shake- speare was once acted without scenery, these per- formers rose to the top of several piled-up chairs as if they were a mountain, and declaimed their impressions of the scene below, until we really felt that it was a mountain. They rowed away in a boat that was no boat, and yet we seemed to see and feel that boat moving. This excellent performance just lacked the ideal a harsh voice occasionally broke the spell, or a hideous-toned THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 261 "Bump your head" would grate on the ears of the audience, when " Bend your head/' in softer tones, would have been so much prettier. Still "The Yellow Jacket" was original. It was American, and it displayed imagination. Much of it was in pantomime and to quaint music, by William Fiirst. Mr. Benrimo wisely brought it to London, and it had a big success. The public is a fickle jade, the creative mind an uncertainty ; consequently, there is much less surety in the production of the creative brain than in the work of the business man, and yet the busi- ness man may receive and does receive ten, ay, a hundred fold as much return for his output. In America it is especially so. One has only to read a case like the Pujo Commission to see that it has been considered perfectly legitimate to make transactions, government transactions, too, where- by the returns have been several hundred per cent. This cannot be done in art, science, or literature. Louis N. Parker made a brilliant hit in the States in 1912. He had four successful plays running at the same time. Verily a record. In the case of two of these plays the manager, after "trying them out" in some remote town, prophesied barely a week's run in New York. He was wrong. One never can account for this sort of thing. A man writes two books ; one is successful and the other 262 AMERICA AS I SAW IT is a failure, and generally it is the one he imagines is going to bring him fame and fortune that does less well. The same with a play. It really seems as if there were a pyschological moment for pro- duction. Just at a certain hour a certain thing hits the public taste. Even the same play or the same book produced at another date may fall flat. Little do they know of the stage who merely see the play from the stalls. At the top of a theatre in Central Park, in a small, low, stuffy room with a skylight, Louis N. Parker was rehearsing "Joseph and his Brethren.' 5 It was bitterly cold outside, all snow and slush and puddles ; but inside the heat was terrific. There were thirty or forty people rehearsing at close quarters, and the heater was overheated. At a kitchen table in his shirt-sleeves, looking very hot and very busy, with a manuscript be- fore him at which he never looked, sat the dram- atist. It was the last act of this great religious drama, and good as the actors were, the finest of them all was the playwright himself. "A cry of soft surprise, please, gentlemen; re- member, you have not seen Joseph for twenty years," he said. "Ah, that is better; step forward to look at him more closely, let the cry swell. Come closer still, in twos and threes, please not all together THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 263 and let your cry become a roar of joy. Again, please Ah, that is better." Then, turning to Joseph, who had just given a line, he said : "Not so dramatic a plaintive cry : I am Joseph - not ' I am Joseph,' but ' I am Joseph' Very humble, very gentle, ' I am Joseph.' Now, gentle- men," turning to the others again, " let your sur- prised cry swell forth by contrast. Thanks ; yes, just so." Then Parker clapped his hands : " Pause, please, and turn and speak to one another as if you were still uncertain. Converse in low tones of surprise, and you, Joseph, must throw back your arms, and say again more loudly ' I am Joseph, your brother.' " And so, on and on, he went, giving light and shade to the speeches, working up the effects and putting the thing into shape. I saw Ibsen rehearse in his slow, dull, heavy manner in Christiania ; I saw W. S. Gilbert re- hearse in his determined but gentle way without any book at all at the Savoy ; and I have seen others ; but Louis N. Parker is an actor by in- stinct and a producer by habit. He was wonderful. For every inflection, every movement, he had a reason. He was far more often out of his seat than in it, moving a bench or stool, showing a 264 AMERICA AS I SAW IT position, running up the common wooden steps which would later be replaced by gorgeous marble stairs, or falling prone to shew humiliation as he wished it shewn. He was everywhere, and did everything. In an hour these men in tweeds and blue serge suits, these girls in skirts and blouses, had thrown themselves into the situation, and one almost saw the robes and marble and gorgeousness to come. That was a rehearsal. The production itself ten days later was a brilliant success. What an interesting man Parker is, too. Born in France, his French accent is perfect. A musi- cian until deafness robbed him of much of its joy, Parker is a master of Pageantry as shewn in his organisation of six great English Pageants. One of the kindliest and hardest-worked of men, suc- cess real success did not come to him until 1912 when he was sixty years old. At that time, " Drake" was running in London to full houses, besides the three plays on the boards in the United States. "Disraeli" with Arliss ; "The Paper Chase" with Mme. Simone ; "Pomander Walk" with Dorothy Parker, his daughter. A rehearsal is a queer thing, more especially a pantomime rehearsal. Pantomime as we know it is not known in America. It has been tried sev- eral times, but has been looked upon as a childish performance and abandoned in despair. We THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 265 think it too grown up in England, for the mod- ern pantomime is certainly written for the adult and not for the babe, and there are as many, if not more, grown-up people at Drury Lane every Christmas than there are children, but America finds the good old English pantomime beneath her dignity. Picture films, however, have come to stay and Sarah Bernhardt in " Lucretia Borgia " on the screen was really a revelation. Those films may be carried to remote villages where the people who would never, never have had a chance of seeing the finest living actress of the day play in person can now witness her art. That in itself is a triumph. The picture shows are somewhat ousting the drama. It was, therefore, interesting to go to the enormous studio in New York where Mr. Daniel Frohman's company is making these films. This studio is so colossal that there is room for three or four big scenes to be enacted at the same time. When I was there, they were rehearsing the duel from "The Prisoner of Zenda," with most of the original company that played seventeen years ago in the first production ; James K. Hackett was "Rodolph," Beatrice Buckley, the "Flavia," and Walter Hale, the "Rupert." They had built the castle on the stage with every correct property, and duly rehearsed the 266 AMERICA AS I SAW IT scene again and again, before the photographer began to work. The soldiers made their entry, and their words "It is time to kill the King !" rang through that big building as Hackett made his dramatic en- trance, sword in hand. Mr. Frohman directed the rehearsal himself as carefully as he would a scene from the legitimate drama, and when all was ready, the photographs were taken. Mr. Daniel Frohman is a courtly gentleman, tall, thin, aesthetic, a man of taste and culture, and keenly absorbed in his work. Minute, indeed, is this photographic machine ; it is not a foot square. It reels off these pictures on the same principle as a Maxim gun fires its deadly shots. That reel contains one thousand feet of pictures and takes twenty minutes to reproduce upon the screen. The famous Bernhardt play, which lasted an hour and a half, covered five reels of one thousand feet each. Sixteen of these little pictures passed upon the screen in one second, and they are remarkably clear and sharp, although not an inch square. There is no doubt that this is a great invention. It was Edison who invented the cinematograph, and Eastman the celluloid films. In time both will certainly become great educa- tional factors, for when a man like Frohman is prepared to spend five to six thousand pounds twenty-five thousand dollars on getting up a THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 267 play of this kind, Shakespeare can be brought to the country village, historical plays can be given with appropriate scenes in the schools, and a certain love of learning and a vast amount of education can be instilled into the youthful mind. The eye is so much more receptive than the ear. The salient scenes and speeches of Anthony Hope's delightful "Prisoner of Zenda" had been compressed sufficiently to run each act through in twenty minutes. The actors were not only dressed, but actually painted. Again and again they re- hearsed the entrances, the exits, the duel, the falls ; then the photographer went to work. They said some of the words so as to strike the right gestures, for time was as important in this case as the play itself. Every now and then the photographer, who was always looking through his lens, made a suggestion of group concentra- tion, or Mr. Frohman rose and made the actors come more to the front, or told a man to fall across the stage, or bend, or sit ; or a group was artisti- cally improved. It was indeed a bit of mosaic work of deep interest, to attain the right perspec- tive for the lens. Actor, author, manager, photog- rapher, artist, costumier, all had to be considered and consulted, to attain a satisfactory whole. The "Famous Players' Film Company" rec- ognises the educational value of presenting "stars" of the contemporary stage in their foremost sue- 268 AMERICA AS I SAW IT cesses in motion pictures, thus bringing within the reach of all the histrionic wealth of the period. It will immortalise the artistic gifts of actors, after they have passed away. The telephone bell rang. "Will you come to supper to-night at the Plaza Hotel at eleven o'clock ?" said a voice. I hate suppers and late hours, and was about to frame a polite "No," when the voice continued : " Beerbohm Tree is only in America for a week, and I Louis N. Parker am giving a little supper, so come along and join two such old friends." I accepted. We were twenty-six, and we all sat at one table a table large and round enough for a quadrille to be danced on its top. The largest round table I remember is at Hur- lingham. The quaintest is at Peterhof, near St. Petersburg, where there are round holes opposite everyone's seat, and each course comes up from the regions below on its own plate through the hole. Our table, although a quaint idea, was as liable to paralyse speech as a ball-room with wall- flowers sitting all round would be unconducive to dancing. But this was a theatrical party, so everyone talked hard. When actors have nothing else to say, they can always talk about their parts, or themselves, and everybody is interesting when he talks shop. THE LAND OF ASSIMILATION 269 Many yards away from me, across a vista of candles and roses (for I was next the host), sat Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree, and on his left the famous French actress, Mme. Simone (Le Bargy), who plays both in French and English. She is small and fair, and gay, and in a French fashion wore a huge plumed hat with her low dress. She was exquisitely gowned. On Sir Herbert's left sat Elsie Leslie, a fair American playing in another of Parker's pieces "Disraeli." Lennox Paule, an Englishman, was rehearsing for Reinhardt's "Turandot." Bessie Abbott, who was singing in " Robin Hood," was both pretty and charming ; and her husband, Mr. Story, the sculptor, was there too. Then Miss Constance Collier, ever handsome and just free from a long run in " Oliver Twist," also had her husband, Julian L'Estrange, with her. Both these English folk have taken firm root in American hearts. Jefferson Winter, the talented son of the great dramatic critic of the States, forgot the cares of the Press and enjoyed himself. Daniel Frohman chatted away with Beerbohm Tree's handsome niece, Mrs. Beerbohm. When I could tear myself away from my host's good stories, I found an interesting companion in Monsieur Francois Tessan, of " La Liberte " in Paris. Mary Carlisle, the miniaturist, a sister of Sybil Carlisle ; Miss Dorothy Parker, who is a pretty little actress ; beautiful Mrs. Guiness of New 270 AMERICA AS I SAW IT York ; Walter Creighton, son of the late Bishop of London ; Mr. Brandon Tynan (who played Joseph later), Mr. Hapgood, formerly the witty editor of Collier's Weekly, and his handsome wife ; and pretty little dark-haired Mrs. Hardisty, made up a most enjoyable party. Every one told good stories, the host made an excellent speech, and it was after two o'clock be- fore that merry little coterie broke up. The year 1913 was dawning, and a steamer, in which I was to be borne to the Tropics, was getting up her fires. To lay a plan is so easy, to hatch is so rare. CHAPTER XI TRANSPORTATION NEW YORK is perfectly delightful. There are many things I love about it. I love the hospitality of its people. I love the charm of its women. I love their beautiful clothes. I love the delicious American foods. But its transportation is perfectly vile. In fact, those who are responsible for the transport antics of New York should, according to my mind, be transported themselves to another land as our convicts formerly were to Australia ; for that is what, with us, the word "transportation" means. In London, Paris, or Berlin, when a woman goes out to dinner, or a theatre, or to the station, she hails one of the numerous taxis (we have 70,000 motor vehicles in London) and for twenty- five cents, or at most fifty cents, is landed at her destination, clean, and happy, and composed. This cannot be done in New York. Oh dear, no. Two or three dollars is required to accomplish the same distance. The taxis all seem born old, and the prices are prohibitive to the ordinary traveller. 271 272 AMERICA AS I SAW IT New York boasts, yes, actually dares to boast, that it is easy to get about within her bound- aries ; that all the streets run one way, and all the avenues another. But New York does not realise that there is a little place called Broadway, which does neither the one, nor the other, but jiggles and wriggles about in an utterly irresponsible manner, from the top to the bottom of this throb- bing, long, thin island-city. There seem to be about three times as many people as there are conveyances for moving them about, and New York has not yet awakened to the fact that we slow old folk in London convey twice the number of people at the same time in the same car-space. We have up- and downstairs com- partments. Into the top usually climb the men and women who are travelling the longest distance. Into the bottom, those who are getting out a few streets hence. No, dear New York is old in many of its ways, and yet it is so often behind us. Cars are its chief means of transit, and yet it is content to have one-storied cars, into which it packs twice as many people as they will hold, who struggle and fight for seats, of which there are only sufficient to accommodate a small percentage of the pas- sengers, the rest of whom endeavour to hang on straps. There is not always a strap for this pur- pose ; with the result that every time the brake is applied to the car, which always seems a strenuous TRANSPORTATION 273 performance, somebody is jerked violently into somebody else's lap. Can anything be more amusing than to see a fat old gentleman suddenly landed on the knee of a dainty lady going to the theatre "down-town," in her light gown and pretty chiffons ? The car had given a sudden jerk, and the fat old gentleman who happened to be a darky had not even had time to clutch a strap, so down he popped on the pretty lady's lap. The occupants of the cars are delightfully interesting. There is every sort of person to be seen. Apparently the first thing that a lower middle-class man does, when he becomes suc- cessful, is to buy a diamond ring, and the first thing that a lower middle-class girl does is to buy a pearl necklace. I never saw so many diamond rings or so many pearl necklaces as are visible daily in the street cars of New York. The people are extraordinarily good-natured, and generally smile as readily when they get a bump as the audience titters at a public dinner when the photographer has half-blinded them by his hideous flash-light. Oh, that transportation ! Why should so much time be wasted in this would-be bustling New York by paying for fares at the door of the car ? Why on earth are not books, containing a hundred, or fifty, or, say twenty, five cent tickets, sold in advance to the people, who would merely 274 AMERICA AS I SAW IT have to drop one into the box at the entrance, instead of waiting to fuss about and find their purses, and get their change, and generally hinder everybody else, coming along behind ? Why not save still more time by instituting season tickets ? Every day we English people are told it is "the most magnificent form of city transportation in the world/' so we must lose our way in the intricacies of this New York system, "transfer" until our brain reels and our legs ache, get into the wrong cars, be bumped until we are black and blue, and smile and pretend we like it. As the car often runs underneath the overhead railway, the double roar of the train clattering over the iron girders above, the traffic on the square-set stones at the sides, and the noise of the car itself makes a veritable nerve-racking din. An English girl and I perfectly petrified the car conductors by jumping off and on the trams while they were moving. They seemed to think it the most dangerous thing in the world, and could not believe that in London we were in the habit of jumping off and on as the motor-buses gently slowed down, instead of requiring the huge ve- hicle to stop for us to step off. Will they never believe in New York that Englishwomen can do things quickly ? Really New York would be quite delightful were it not for the expense and fatigue of getting about. Oh, for one of our Lady Guides TRANSPORTATION 275 Bureaux in New York ! Think of the joy of being able to engage a lady a few hours a day to shop and steer one about, to save headaches and worry and wasted money. Anyone who looks quiet and neat to-day is probably a lady, anyone who looks smart is probably a cocotte, or wants to be. The art of wearing improper clothes properly is a gift, just as everyone seems rich until one lifts the lid of their cash box. Will New York never cease mending its roads ? Five times I have visited the city, and each time they seem harder at it than ever. The main streets are perfect ; but many of the side-streets are dis- gracefully paved. One's heart aches to see beauti- ful motor-cars switchbacked over holes in the roadway, or across loose boards laid carelessly down. Street lakes are universal. In fine weather these holes assert themselves by switchback bumps to the motor (called "automobile" in the States for shortness) ; in wet weather they have to be circumnavigated with respect. Perhaps the New Yorkers are like the penguins. I had a particular friend of that species at the London Zoological Gardens. This delightfully human personage, with his large body and tiny legs, lived in a little garden where he took his daily constitutional, round and round a broken concrete path. I used to love to watch him trip-up again and again over his badly paved road ; he was very 276 AMERICA AS I SAW IT wise in other ways, so he probably knew exactly when to lift his little feet ; but he doggedly pre- ferred to be jerked forward and lose his balance month after month rather than alter his habits. Habit is a hard taskmaster. One day the authori- ties mended his path. The old penguin died of grief. Passing along the streets one notices numerous different reminders of other lands, the stamp of foreign invasion, to whit --the greengrocers. There are large open counters, placed well down in the street, whereon every form of vegetable and fruit is displayed, giving a foreign and attractive appearance to the shop. No doubt this style of brightly hued, open, greengrocery stores has come from Italy, just as the pretty little clay pots so often displayed for flowers and plants, in florists' shops, are made by the Italian immigrants, who have brought their art with them to the American shores. Then again, the barbers' shops, with their many-coloured poles, and the three balls of the pawnbroker, to say nothing of the sign-boards one finds hanging out everywhere, remind one of Great Britain of old. Many centuries ago every shop in England had these sign-boards hung out, because the people could not read. Even to-day, the village inn still displays its sign to attract the passer-by. The sign-board, however, has largely TRANSPORTATION 277 disappeared in London, although it is still to be seen in some of our old provincial towns, and continually in New York. Not only does the sign-board exist in Russia to-day, but every small Russian shop is placarded with pictures denoting what it has for sale inside. On one wall are coloured drawings of bonnets and hats, on another sausages and hams ; all its wares are painted outside. The same applies to Mexico, where the people who cannot read can easily find what they want from the picture writing. These mural illustrations may be seen in New York to-day. Then again, one finds a strong French element. There are little kiosks everywhere from which newspapers are dispensed. They are not so tall, nor so pretty as the kiosks on the boulevards in Paris, and are often tucked away under the staircase of the overhead railway, but still, they are there, to remind one of the French capital, and washed blouses are hung up and stuffed with coloured paper, just as they are in Paris. America is full of foreign ways. New York has many cities within its city; real cities, conservative strongholds. Look at Chinatown on the east side of Manhattan Island ; it is a whole district given up to the Chinese. The sign-boards are written in their characters, the windows are full of their wares. Extraordi- 278 AMERICA AS I SAW IT nary dried fish make a veritable fringe over their doorways ; enormous vegetables, and small boxes of compressed tea are to be seen on every side. They have their restaurants, their shops, their newspapers. They have, in fact, a Chinese town. They even had their own theatre, but it became such a haunt of vice that it had to be abolished. There are many Chinese men, but few Chinese women, and it gives one a little shudder to see a nice American woman married to one of these Orientals. Everything is clean in this quarter, neat, orderly, tidy. On passing into the next street, all is changed. This is the Italian stronghold. Here can be seen macaroni, more vegetables, coloured scarves, and dirty garbage on the side-walks (pavements). Everything is untidy and slipshod. The names of the people and the goods they sell are placarded up Italian on every side. Round the next corner is the German quarter. Each of these nations has its own particular district : the Spanish, the Scandinavian, the Rus- sian, the Turk, the Greek, the Servian, the French, the German, and the Jew. They each have their own particular newspapers, and they each live their own particular lives ; they say newspapers are published in forty different languages on Man- hattan Island. As they learn English, and gradu- ally get on, these foreigners leave their own racial TRANSPORTATION 279 haunts and start forth into the bigger world out- side to make their fortunes. They are all ambi- tious to make money and ride in golden coaches, and just a small percentage succeed. Another relic of another land is to be seen in the Indian figures made of wood, life size, painted in brilliant colours, standing outside tobacconists' shops. This used formerly to be one of the signs in England, and there is a Scotchman in Highland dress near Tottenham Court Road in London, who has become quite historical. He is almost the only one of his kind left in our metropolis, and on nights of jubilation or festivity, the students of Univer- sity College Hospital, near by, hire the gentleman out for the night, and hoist him on their shoulders, marching him along the streets to patriotic and amusing songs. The story of the Scotchman on Mafeking night might fill a volume. He survived it all, and is still reposing outside the little tobac- conist's shop, waiting for another festive occasion, on which to perambulate the streets on the shoul- ders of the youthful fraternity of medical students. We really must take to "gums" in England. Not gum-drops, nor gum ("mucilage," as the American briefly calls it !) for pasting letters, but gum rubbers. Not rubbers for washing dishes or floors, but rubbers for foot-gear what we call goloshes a word as unknown in the States as rubbers and gums are in England. 280 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Rubbers are an American national institution, and the sooner we take to them the better ; they are cleanly, they are sensible, they prevent wet feet and bad colds ; gums are adorable. One wears nice thin stockings and smart shoes, puts on rubbers, and sallies fearlessly forth into the mud and rain. In every hall is a chair. Down one pops, extricates one's feet from their outside covers, and with clean shoes, walks into my lady's draw- ing-room, often called "parlour" by our Yankee friends. I simply love gums, and recommend them as delightful. They are universally used in North America, Canada, Russia, and Scandinavia, and we too must wake up, and use them. In universally adopting this excellent habit we really have been slow. New Yorkers are still having boots blacked at odd corners, they are still enduring the sight of dust-bins in the middle of the afternoon in the best thoroughfares, and they have more darkies than ever, and more magnificent stores. They still talk of us as "mighty slow," and themselves as "mighty quick." They forget that our letter post crosses London in a couple of hours, while theirs sometimes takes a couple of days. They do not realise that we can buy a thing at a shop in the morning and have it delivered before tea-time in the afternoon, while they are lucky if they get it next day. They still think that we are very TRANSPORTATION 281 slow in London, and imagine that we are living in the fifteenth century on our side of the globe. They still charge much more for their telegrams than we do, and one cannot prepay the reply to save time. They are only just struggling with the joys of a parcels post, and they still omit to put the numbers of their telephones on their private letters. Wake up, Brother Jonathan, you are more asleep than you are aware of ; your strenuousness is often mere formula. When will the States rouse up, and copy some of our time-saving systems ! Dear old Uncle Sam, you really do nap sometimes. For instance in England, I write a twelve-word wire to Jones, that costs sixpence or one cent a word. In the corner of the form is an allotted space on which I put "R.P."; these two letters are not charged for, but denote that sixpence has been given for a paid reply. When that telegram arrives at its destination, it is typed off and a reply-form is put with it into the envelope. The boy, who delivers it (on a bicycle if its destina- tion is in the country), waits because he knows it is reply paid. Time is saved also temper. But the telephones ! Ah, there you beat us hollow in everything except price. Your girls answer more quickly, the service is decidedly better, and the telephone is more universally used. Take a town like Chicago, which is only about 282 AMERICA AS I SAW IT one third the size of London, the telephone book is about twice as big as our own, which, speaking roughly, would lead one to believe that the tele- phone is used three times as much in Chicago as in London. It is more prompt and more efficient. There are delightful telephones in every bed- room at the good hotels. There is quick connec- tion, and the whole telephonic system is excellent ; they discovered it, and they maintain it at a point of excellence. In inverse ratio the postal arrangements are atrocious. Strange as it may seem, I have often consider- able difficulty in understanding the American voice on the telephone, and they are often totally unable to comprehend my English accent. The telephone girl can rarely catch what number I am asking for, and I have to repeat and repeat; until she understands my English intonation. In England we pay twopence for a telephone call at a public place, which is four cents ; and the charge is half that sum in a private house. In America it is more than double. In fact, in American hotels one has to pay ten cents (or five- pence) for every single call ; so no wonder it is quicker. They can afford to have two operators to our one at that price. The Britisher wonders how the American, who prides himself on being practical and doing things quickly, manages to exist without a post-office. TRANSPORTATION 283 It is one of the most difficult things imaginable in a Yankee town to find a post-office at all ; as diffi- cult, indeed, as to unearth a newspaper shop in London. Both are few and far between ; they are seldom in a prominent position ; in fact, they have an air of being thoroughly ashamed of themselves and hiding round back corners. Having found the post-office, it takes an extraordinary time to find out what one wants. No one is in a hurry as regards letters in the States, and as for parcels and pack- ages, they have wandered about that vast country at their own sweet will. I left my watch in the West to be cleaned. A magnificent shop informed me that it would take ten days ; but it was five solid weeks before that watch was returned to my possession, because, in some mysterious manner, everyone seemed to have mislaid it, and as it could not follow me by parcels post (there was no such thing at Christmas, 1912), it had to be sent by express or registered mail ! Much extra delay was caused by the fact that it could not easily be readdressed without my signature, and much nego- tiation had to be gone through before it could be sent on from one town to another. But America was quite content without a par- cels post till 1913. They did not hurry themselves about that, did they ? All Europe was ahead of them, and wide awake, while Uncle Sam gently slumbered. Oh, you dear old rascal, you are so 284 AMERICA AS I SAW IT busy telling yourself, and telling us, and telling everybody else, how advanced you are, that Europe often passes you by before you have real- ised the fact, and leaves you still talking. Letters in America take just as long as they please. They meander across the country at their own sweet will unless the writer is extrav- agant enough to spend, not twice, but five times the amount of postage, and affix a "special delivery" stamp. Then that letter, with five pence (ten cents) upon it, arrives at the proper time as all self-respecting letters ought to do always, without a surtax. Even letter-boxes have their own characteristi- cally shy ways. It is difficult for a Britisher to find a letter-box in America. In the first place, it is not called a letter-box at all, it is called : "FOR MAIL." There are not such things as letters or posts in the States ; they are called "mail." In England, at the street corner, stands a great big red pillar-box. It can be seen from afar, and by pushing the lid inwards, all the letters drop to the bottom. In Germany, bright, very bright blue boxes ornamented with gold, are stuck on the walls of buildings, notifying that they are for letters. In America the stranger looks about until he is lucky enough to find a dark green, unpretentious TRANSPORTATION IT Drawn by W'. K. Haselden. Reproduced by permission of (he London Daily Mirror. ARE THE AMERICAN POLICE REALLY so NAUGHTY? 286 AMERICA AS I SAW IT box, fixed to some lamp-post ; he would never notice it, if he did not look hard to find it. That is the letter-box. Having found it, his troubles begin. If he is carrying parcels or an umbrella, woe betide him. The lid does not push in by the pressure of the letter (mail, please) ; the whole thing has to be lifted up bodily by one hand, while the envelope is inserted with the other. Any- thing more wasteful of time, or exasperating to temper I do not know, especially in the winter, when one's hands are full. One may walk street after street, block after block, they call it, and not find any pillar-box at all. Ah, joy of joys, there is a real red letter-box at last. Having searched in vain for something large and imposing and easily seen, not even noticing the queer little boxes on lamp-posts at odd cor- ners, that are not worthy of a country village, we make for that red box with joy. Here at last is something worthy of the United States mail and a fitting depository for a large bundle of letters and important papers. Oh, the disappointment ! "WASTE PAPER AND FRUIT SKINS" is written in large white lettering upon the only important-looking thing that might be a pillar-box. Letters don't count for much in America judging by the casual way in which they are treated. TRANSPORTATION 287 Their receptacles are far from noble, and their speed of transit is only phenomenal for its sluggish- ness. For a business land, it is amazing that people can put up with such a slovenly postal system. Of course I love New York. Who would not love a place where one has been five or six times, and has so many friends ? Could anything be more charming than to wander over the gallery of the late Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan, to be shown over the Metropolitan Museum which is fast becoming one of the first museums of the world, or the splendid Natural History Museum, by people who know all about such buildings. To be feted and feasted at beautiful restaurants or in interesting clubs, or better still, in their private houses. Homes rep- resent individuality in a way no public place can do. It was delightful to have met and been en- tertained by such people as Mr. Roosevelt, Mrs. Taft, Mr. J. P. Morgan, Mrs. O. H. P. Belmont, Mr. and Mrs. Edwin Hewitt, Mr. and Mrs. Carnegie, Mrs. Dryden Brewer, Mr. Thomas Edison, Miss Ida Tarbell, Mr. Robert Little Mackee,Mr. and Mrs. S. Untermyer,Col. and Mrs. Aldace Walker, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Walker, Miss Jeanette Gilder, Mrs. Farnam, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Curtis James, Mr. and Mrs. Adolph Ochs, Kate Douglas Wiggin (Mrs. Riggs), Mr. and Mrs. Thorn pson-Seton, Mr. and Mrs. Bleecker van 288 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Wagenen, Dr. Chas. Davenport, Mr. and Mrs. Doubleday, Mr. and Mrs. Fabian Franklin, Mrs. Henry Villard, Mrs. W. Pierson Hamilton, Mr. Edward Bulkley, Mr. Spencer Trask, Madame Grouitch, Dr. Horace Howard Furness, Jr., Mrs. Weir, Professor and Mrs. Marshall Saville, Miss Gildersleeve (Barnard College), Mr. William Mor- row, Miss Reid (Mothercraft), Mrs. Carlyle Bellairs, Mrs. Hodgson-Burnett, Dr. and Mrs. Ayer, Miss Agnes Laut, Mr. and Mrs. Alexander Drake, Mr. A. S. Frissell, Commodore Bentick, Mrs. L. H. Chapin, Mr. Louis N. Parker, Miss Laure Drake Gill, Mr. James L. Ford, Miss Annie Tweedie, Mr. and Mrs. Richard Gilder, Mr. Joseph B. Gilder, Mr. Dunlop Hopkins, Mr. David Bispham, Mr. Clifford Smyth, Dr. and Mrs. Louis L. Seaman, Mr. Herbert Carr, Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Coit, Mr. and Mrs. Johnson, Mr. and Mrs. Andre\v Miller, Judge and Mrs. Miller, Mr. and Mrs. Reiker, Mr. and Mrs. Fred Pierson, Mr. C. C. Buel, Mr. and Mrs. Oliphant, Mr. and Mrs. Elijah Sells, Mr. John Martin, Mr. Ripley Hitchcock, Mr. Frank Scott, Mr. Morgan Shepard, Mr. Edward Dodd, Mr. and Mrs. W. Carmen Roberts, Mr. and Mrs. Sawyer, Mr. John Morrow, Miss Cutting, Mrs. Curtis Demarest, Colonel Page Bryan, Mr. W. C. Reich, Mr. and Mrs. Prince, of New Jersey, Mr. and Mrs. William Baldwin. Although the homes that have kindly invited TRANSPORTATION 289 me within their portals have been representative of all that is best and cleverest in the States, I have never lost an opportunity of talking to Americans in railway cars, in street-cars (trams), in hotels ; " hoi polloi" is always interesting, and represent- ative of another phase of life, and it is from them one gets impressions. London is miles behind New York in its pro- cedure for calling cabs and carriages after enter- tainments. In London, it is a haphazard sort of performance, without order or method, except in a few cases, such as at Buckingham Palace. There a splendid system of duplicate numbers has been organised, by which the chauffeur keeps one, and the owner of the car the other. With the aid of a telephone from the Palace itself to the gates, and a megaphone, much difficulty and trouble are averted. But after the theatres the muddle in London is horrid, especially on wet nights. There are several excellent systems in America. One the telephone, and another the arrangements for calling cabs at public buildings. As one enters the theatre or concert-hall two tickets, numbered in duplicate, are given, one to the driver, and one to the owner of the car or carriage. On coming out from the building, one gives up the little slip of paper on which is printed the number sup- pose it to be " 174" to the porter, who takes it, 290 AMERICA AS I SAW IT and, in turn with other numbers, puts "174" in electric lights on a sort of sign-board hanging above the entrance to the theatre ; this is large enough to be seen by all the drivers of carriages on the rank. Therefore, there is none of that running about and yelling, so worrying after an English entertainment. If the line is particularly long, too long for all the drivers to see the electric light indicator, an attendant belonging to the theatre stands halfway down the line with a megaphone, and calls out each number loudly and lustily as it is put up ; so that the tag end of the drivers of the vehicles may hear. This works so quickly and well, that the public buildings are emptied in a twinkling. Another excellent plan is the way every play-bill has attached to it a copy of the plan of the house, on which is distinctly marked every exit, and the passages by which a certain street is reached. This diagram is compulsory since that awful fire in Chicago, when six hundred people were burned to death in twenty minutes. Why do we not also copy the Americans and warm our churches properly ? St. Patrick's Cathedral, with its lovely interior, is delightfully heated. Instead of entering with a cold shiver, and getting out as quickly as possible from a vault-like atmosphere, one revels in the beauty of the building and the warmth of the TR ANSPORTATI ON 29 1 air. Prayers are none the less efficacious for being said in comfortable surroundings, although folk bent on pilgrimage will deny the fact, as they court torture and misery as part of the penance. Where are the dogs ? One hardly ever sees a dog in the streets. Are there fewer dogs, or are they never taken out ? Constantinople has too many. New York has too few. As the streets are so crowded it is perhaps as well, and there are no dear little islands of refuge, oases on which one can feel safe and happy in the great rush of traffic. The fat, burly, Irish police force has greatly improved during the last few years, and the traffic is much better organised, the improvement in the traffic regulation being very marked. But to return to " transportation." Of course, everyone who goes to America is expected to admire the baggage check system ; but people who have had as much experience of it as I have, will cease to find the "express" so wonder- ful as it seems. It seems excellent to receive a check for baggage, and to know that it will be quite safe, even if not called for until some days later, and that any one taking the check with the num- ber on it can identify the package. But the ex- press business is not so satisfactory. For instance, when arriving in Chicago one Sunday afternoon, 292 AMERICA AS I SAW IT by the Twentieth Century Express from New York, which claims to be the finest train in the world, and probably is, with its reading-rooms, bath-rooms, paper bags to keep one's hat clean, barber, stenog- rapher, and so on, I paid the expressman who boarded the train outside Chicago three dollars, or twelve shillings, to deliver four packages. He gave me my four tickets, and assured me they would arrive that afternoon ; it was then about three o'clock. Off I drove in my friend's motor, with my hand luggage, or "grips," as Americans call them, but as there were people to dine that night, I felt a little uneasy about the delay of my big trunks with a change of raiment. Hour after hour went by ; they never came. I dined at that party in the clothes I had worn thirty-six hours before in New York. Not until eleven o'clock next morning did that "express" cart choose to bring those four boxes to the door. Of course, when they at last delivered them it was done well, and they carried them up to the rooms ; but the express system is never to be relied on for rapidity, judging from my own personal experiences. It is quite possible to wait twelve or eighteen hours for the delivery of one's baggage, "luggage" we call it. When the check system acts properly and quickly, it is excellent. CHAPTER XII AN ENGLISHWOMAN'S FIRST NIGHT ON AN AMERICAN SLEEPING-CAR "An, wait till you cross the Atlantic, then you will know what real comfort in travelling means." How often had this been said to me at home and abroad. And after that remark, I, poor soul, who had travelled pretty well all over Europe, far into regions where no sleeping-car exists, when a cart, a table, a floor, even a sack of hay beneath a tent, had been my couch, felt I knew naught of travelling until I had enjoyed a night in a United States Pullman car. Where my first night's journey at the beginning of this century was performed shall be nameless ; but since then I have spent fifty or sixty nights in American trains. Going to the hotel office, I said I wished a berth engaged for that particular night to M . "Yes, ma'am" (not "mum," if you please, but "ma'am," as in "jam") ; "upper or lower ?" "I don't understand," I falteringly replied. "Section?" he inquired. I suppose I looked stupid, for the question was repeated. "What do you mean ?" I ventured to ask. 293 294 AMERICA AS I SAW IT " Upper is above, I guess ; lower is just what it says a lower ; section is the whole thing, and costs double/' It was all very bewildering; but ultimately I ordered a "lower" ; adding, " For a woman, please." "That's all the same," replied the clerk. "We don't make no difference over here ; men and women just ride along alike." I paid three dollars (twelve shillings) and waited, with anxious anticipation, for the joys of the jour- ney, which were to reveal what real comfort and luxury during a night "on the cars" meant. It was ten o'clock at night, and dark and raining when I arrived at that splendid station, feeling very lonely and perhaps a little homesick. I sought a porter but I looked in vain. No porter was forthcoming to carry my bags. Here was a pretty position for a woman alone. So I struggled with my hand-bag, which felt appallingly heavy, and grew heavier and heavier as I staggered along the platform. My fur coat seemed to weigh a ton. At last the car came in sight ; but the door was not level with the platform oh no, not a bit of it. One had to wrestle with "grip" and coat and umbrellas, and clamber up the tall steps leading into the handsome Pullman car. Platform there was none. Oh, what a disillusion presented itself. One long car with top and bottom berths along FIRST NIGHT ON A SLEEPING-CAR 295 296 AMERICA AS I SAW IT both sides like shelves in a bookcase, before which thick, stuffy curtains were hanging, so that only a narrow passageway could be seen. A coloured man (or "porter," as he is called), in a neat white suit, was a very black negro, whose white teeth and eyes seemed to gleam unnaturally in the gas- light ; for, be it mentioned, the cars were not lighted with electric light twelve years ago. Nowadays there is a lovely idea for electric lights. By day it looks like an ornament to the car ; but one lifts the metal half-globe, and the act of moving up brings out and illuminates an electric bulb. Splendid idea. Being covered by metal all day, it is safe from harm, and yet it is there whenever it is wanted. This is a delightful innovation ; but the Pullman sleeper itself remains as terrible as ever. It has become an American institution, and America is very conservative in many ways. "Here is your lower" said the darky, pulling back the curtain, and revealing a small, dark hole like a berth in a cabin at sea, only it was pitch black to look into. "And who is going above ?" I anxiously en- quired, seeing a bed was arranged just on top. "Can't tell, till he conies along." "He? Do you suppose it is a he?" I asked. "My berth was for a lady; surely, although the car itself is 'mixed/ they manage to put a woman above a woman." FIRST NIGHT ON A SLEEPING-CAR 297 He grinned and showed his white teeth, which had probably never seen a tooth-brush, and were yet more beautiful a hundred fold than white people's teeth so carefully tended. Civilisation has ruined our teeth ; iced-water and heated rooms have destroyed those of Americans, whose mouths are often veritable gold-mines of mechanical art ; but the darky's, in spite of sucking sugar-cane, are usually beautiful. All the berths were sold. An awful man went to the cubby-hole above me. I saw the shape of his feet and the holes in his socks as he clambered up. Judging from the snores from above later in the night the "upper" (who, be it understood, was only three feet from me) was very much a man, if not two men. How people do snore in sleepers. There are cars for babies in some lands, surely "cars for snorers" would be a great benefit to the ordinary traveller. Let me commend the sug- gestion to the railway companies. It is given gratis. On to the bed I had to crawl, and there undress as best I could, piling skirt, jacket, blouse, hat, coat, and shoes, and bag, all down to the bottom end of the berth. Could anything be more un- comfortable. But this is America's "civilisation," and every one must dress and undress sitting on his bed, where, in the older cars "Out West," there is 298 AMERICA AS I SAW IT not always room even to sit upright, and many are the awful thumps my poor cranium has suffered in consequence. The process resembles a miner lying on his back, picking for coal. The passengers who cannot manage to disrobe on a shelf, so to speak, must undress in the passage under public gaze, which they sometimes do unblushingly. One simply would not dare to retail some of the sights seen in American cars. Some people un- dress entirely, especially men ; women seem, on the whole, to be a little more self-respecting. These men with hair on end, blue chins, and bleary eyes, walk about in pyjamas, or, worse still, unfastened garments and loose-hanging braces collarless, shoeless, anyhow, at any hour of the night or morning. An uncombed, unshaven male being should never show himself to man or beast, and certainly not to woman. He is not pretty to look upon. They have my sympathy, however. How is one to dress on a shelf, six feet four inches long and four feet wide ? One cannot stand up ; one cannot dress sitting. The experiment is a Chinese puzzle, and the solution has not yet been found. Of its kind the Pullman is as good as it can be but it should not be ; that is all but to lose one's temper is to lose one's self-respect. At last I was undressed, more or less, a good FIRST NIGHT ON A SLEEPING-CAR 299 deal less than more, and, rolling myself up in the sheets, prepared for a night's rest. The bed was really comfortable ; they usually are, but after a while I felt unpleasantly hot. These beds cannot be praised too highly in themselves ; they are much wider than any ship's bunks, they are softer, and the pillows are comfort- able. If only big liners could have such comfort- able beds, stiff necks and aching limbs would not be as frequent at sea. On the ocean one has too much air sometimes ; in one of these cars one never has enough. So the traveller is seldom happy at night. It seemed very oppressive, and at last in des- peration, I pushed back the stuffy green curtains. Men and women, darky porters and ticket col- lectors, passed continually up and down, up and down, all through the heated night, and each in turn, surprised to find curtains open, pushed them to. Every time the train stopped it did so with a jerk, and my man above snored louder and louder, until it became a veritable roar, gently echoed from further down the car. I was nearly asphyxiated with the heat, and felt I was spending the night in a Turkish bath ; but open the window I could not. The atmosphere was stupendous. Twenty-four persons slept in that car, heated artificially to seventy-two degrees all night. Having slept badly, with stops and bumps and 300 AMERICA AS I SAW IT thumps and noises of every inconceivable kind, toward morning I dozed ; but was soon awakened by the score of people in the car beginning to get up. Opposite me was an old man, who performed most of his toilet in the passage. I closed my curtain ; but as he pulled on his garments, his huge form bulged over my way. At last, I got up, on the darky's kindly advice, and with skirt and bodice, sponge and comb, departed to dress. The little toilet-room was already full ; but I was only buy- ing another experience as I stood half dressed in the passage waiting, sponge in hand, and later learnt never to leave my couch until the porter told me the boxlike chamber was free. The dressing-room size six feet by six emptied at last, but I had not been there long when another woman arrived. We managed as cheerily as we could. The door burst open and a third female, by a huge train-jerk, was landed into the arms of my companion. Three of us in the space of a dining-room table struggled to dress. Clean ? Tidy ? No, of course not ; one is never either on a Pullman car that is what is so horrible about these journeys of five days and nights. When I got back to the car, my bed was still unmade. I called the darky. "Gentleman won't get up," he said (signifying the bunk above mine). "Where can I sit then ?" FIRST NIGHT ON A SLEEPING-CAR 301 WELL \VELL!! JUST LIKE IT IN THE OLDEN IMS) By permission of the New York Times. As TERRIBLE AS EVER 302 AMERICA AS I SAW IT "Guess I don't know, Miss/' (Anyone is called "Miss.") "Is the drawing-room car empty ?" "No ; sold, every corner engaged." "What shall I do?" "Guess I don't know." He didn't, for there was no possible extra seat to pull down or unfold, and I had to stand in the passage for an hour till the breakfast car joined us. The dexterity of the porter in making beds is wondrous -- truly, to my mind one of the most wonderful things in all America, and only surpassed by my surprise that everyone does not die of pestilence. Think of the germs, the skin diseases, the "everything" packed away snug and warm in those sleeping-cars, and never, never aired. "It was awfully hot last night," I exclaimed to the darky as we stood in the passage. "Why didn't you ring, ma'am, and I could have opened your window ?" Ring? Why, greenhorn that I was, I did not know there was a bell to every berth ; neither did I know the awful heat was artificial, and that most cars are cooked up to somewhere near boiling-point. Time showed me the virtues and drawbacks of these cars. They are very big and airy by day, and far superior to European ones ; but they are hot and stuffy by night. They run smoothly, and the restaurants attached are often wonderfully FIRST NIGHT ON A SLEEPING-CAR 303 good ; but I do think they might easily be made more agreeable for women at night. Suppose a girl takes a berth, why not let her declare her sex and be allotted a bed next to the ladies' toilet ; likewise in the case of a man, and so work towards the middle. Once everybody was settled for the night a dividing curtain could be dropped across the car, with the men at one end and the women at the other. Each individual stuffy curtain could then be done away with, and people might sleep in fresher air, and even dress in the passage, if the dividing curtain across the passage were down, provided no one passed except the porter. Joy of joys, the darky may condescend to blacken one's shoes. So in an ecstasy of pleasure at the prospect at last of a smart, shiny pair of brown shoes, we hand them over to his care. He does clean them ; but they are brown and his rag is black, so they are returned to us almost the same hue as the gentleman himself. One sits comfortably down in a day parlour-car, begging a little rest after the acrobatic feats of dressing, and sighs with relief that the perils of the night are over. Soon one is reminded of a mutton chop sizzling in a frying-pan. The chop gets hotter and hotter, more and more cooked, and at last the fire burning below is so great the chop jumps about in the fry- 304 AMERICA AS I SAW IT ing-pan. We jump off our seat. What can it be ? Is there a fire below ? Are the wheels ablaze ? What can have happened ? Nothing ; it is merely the usual heating arrangement by which one sits on a hot seat, and has heat crawling up one's spine until Hades must be a joke by comparison. A lady one day lost a ring. After hours of fruit- less search, lasting nearly all day, it was found in the spittoon which decorates, or divides, every two seats in every car throughout the length and breadth of America. The spittoon is an Ameri- can institution. It isn't as much used as it was ; but it is a bulwark of the Constitution, so there it still remains. The joys of travel in a private car cannot be surpassed, but only one person in a million in America has a private car. It was my good fortune to enjoy this luxury with Colonel Aldace Walker, chairman (at that time) of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad ; also with Mr. Lorenzo Johnson of the Mexican In- ternational Railway, and Sir Weetman Pearson (now Lord Cowdray) at Tehuantepec. This spelt luxury, for chairmen of railways make their journeys in royal state. No wonder, poor souls, for they are continually "out on the road," and they want some comfort ; but those are things apart, and the ordinary car shelters the ordinary people who in tens of thousands go on for FIRST NIGHT ON A SLEEPING-CAR 305 years and years, enduring the same thing every night. A bedroom to oneself, a drawing-room, a dining-room, a cook for our party, a glass end to the carriage called an "observation car" with a little balcony built on delightful to sit in when not too dusty ; but on single-track lines with- out proper ballast the dust is sucked up by the train and often well-nigh unendurable : this is what a private car means as well as a bath on board, and a library of books. In fact, it is an unspeakable joy, just as refined and peaceful and pleasant as a public car is vulgar and noisy, and at night airless and detestable. They say there is only one class of travel, and that at two cents or a penny a mile, in America. That is not true. There are four classes ; for the first, one pays for an extra parlour-car ticket ; in the second (which is really the ordinary mode) one travels in a "day coach/ 5 where less well-endowed people spend days and nights sitting straight up- right ; and there is an emigrant waggon. Be- sides these three classes, there is yet another, viz. a train de luxe, such as that in which one travels a thousand miles between New York and Chicago, a journey which cost me forty dollars, or eight pounds. It is a marvellous train, and in the summer months only takes eighteen hours to run that long distance. There is class distinction in America ; but it is not always in the right place. 306 AMERICA AS I SAW IT The East is jealous of the West, and the West is jealous of the East, and the New Yorker says to the stranger : "Why do you go to Chicago ?" "What on earth did you ever go to St. Louis for?" "What possible attraction could there have been in Kansas City ?" The Bostonian thinks Boston represents the whole United States. At odd intervals during the last twelve years I have met people of this city, and their first remark has been : - "Have you been to Boston ?" "No." " "What ! not been to Boston ? Why, you don't know America." To which I have mildly replied : "I have travelled a great many thousand miles on your continent." "Ah, but you have never been to Boston !" they have exclaimed in disdain. Cruel, isn't it ? to have crossed a great tract of Canada ; to have travelled from Niagara to Chicago ; from St. Louis to Kansas ; to El Paso ; right through Mexico as far as Tehuantepec (the rival of Panama in Trans-Atlantic-Pacific transportation, up till now) ; to have been to Galveston immediately after the great storm that swept that city away, FIRST NIGHT ON A SLEEPING-CAR 307 to have peeped into the darky markets of New Orleans ; to have enjoyed the hospitality of the White House and Embassies in Washington ; to have stayed with the great Shakespearian scholar of America in Philadelphia, to have spent delightful weeks in New York ; and to have done all this on three different occasions, and then to be turned down as knowing nothing of the United States because of a sinful omission in not having been to Boston ! But I am going to Boston. In fact, I have crossed the Atlantic on purpose to do so. How could anyone die happy with such a sin of omis- sion lying heavily on her conscience ? CHAPTER XIII THE OTHER AMERICA (Busy BOSTON.) IN Boston every second person seems to write, or their grandfather did, or their great-grand- mother. There is something very lovable in Boston. People have time to love, and be loved. Their souls and their brains are of more value than their dollars. They don't talk of dollars ; they don't introduce you to : "Mrs. Jones as valuable so much." but to : - "Mrs. Jones who writes on Browning." There is a busy air about Boston. Somehow one is reminded of a dear little old lady in mittens and a beautiful lace cap, redolent of lavender, a dear tidy, neat little old lady, with a dust-pan and broom, always dusting and cataloguing her prized books, and polishing her much-loved china. Young people think of the future, middle-aged folk live in the present, and old people hark back to the past. Busy Boston ! It is altogether another world, another America. 308 THE OTHER AMERICA 309 The people have soft, gentle voices, and soft, gentle ways. There is a "down-town," where vast liners acquire or disgorge cargoes of human or other freight, but "down-town" stays down town and leaves its money-making jargon behind. There is consider- able wealth, much of which is disbursed to en- courage music, art, and literature, in fact every- thing noble and inspiring, and wealth forgets wool and lumber, dollars and finance, in its hours of leisure. There are delightful old streets and houses. There are homes, where people really live, instead of being merely a number in an hotel. Boston makes the stranger feel he is living, and is one of a large family party. Boston is comfortable and cosy. It is a city of crooked roads and straight deeds. The old Puritan blood keeps the Sabbath more strictly than in Great Britain. Its own people are conservative, gentle, refined, and gracious ; but an enormous alien population is dumping down, and some fifty thousand Italians are in their midst. Little Italy is planted in Eng- lish Boston, on American soil. New England is very like old England in many ways. The Britisher feels at home, and although he does not find Boston brown bread, Boston beans, or Boston plum cake (neatly done up in silver paper) anywhere in Boston itself, he does find real English muffins. 3 io AMERICA AS I SAW IT The post brought me a letter one day which ran : "11/27/12 "Boston mass "Madam i see by the Boston Post that you are in Boston I would like two no if you are the Lady Mrs alec tweedie that was in D and Em Sutherland Shire Scotland if you are i would like two tell you who i am you remember J C of Em that was taking you out in the Small Boat for fishing you remember the Boat you have Christen Alec Tweedie in Em i like to tell you who i am J C the Baker from Em and i am married and living at No Larking Street and still at the Baking and Making muffins at J. J. & B. S. and i hope you will have a good time over hear your Trully, "J C " What memories that letter awakened from the Highlander whose real language was Gaelic. How well I remembered the "boatie" that bears my name, an account of the "Baptisement" of which is given fully in "Thirteen Years of a Busy Woman's Life." There is a delightful peace about Boston. Its twisted streets and picturesque angles are a joy. For once one is rid of blocks and numbers. For once there is individuality. The streets are called by names in alphabetical order : Arlington, Boyls- ton, and so on. In New York the streets cross at right angles, beginning a mile up-town, and going to looth or 1 5oth street with cross numbers. The avenues run north and south. THE OTHER AMERICA Drawn by Louis A. Holman. THE ATHENAEUM, BOSTON 312 AMERICA AS I SAW IT In Washington, the streets running east and west are known by the letters of the alphabet, for instance, A, B, C, and D, while those crossing north and south are known by numbers. The great avenues, which add to its beauty, cross diagonally. One of my Boston pilgrimages was to the Library to see the pictures by my old friends, Abbey and Sargent. Abbey's are fine and strong and interest- ing. Sargent's are unfinished and somewhat in- volved too full of detail. Sargent, who is un- doubtedly the greatest portrait painter of his day, has, alas, given up portraits for the present, and is enjoying a riot of sunlight. He has been travel- ling for the last year or two, revelling in sunbeam flashes in orchards, sunlight effects on wood or stone, sun on every side, and his canvasses, though small, have been ablaze with gorgeous colouring. His frescoes in Boston are, however, disappointing. In the Library, sadly must it be owned, by far the best pictures in the building are by a French-speak- ing man, Puvis deChavannes whose decorative work on the stairs is excellent. It tones with the marble, it is subdued in scheme. It is everything decora- tion should be, and yet many of his canvasses seen in Paris have not appealed to me at all ; he is certainly a master of decoration. Boston State House has a golden roof like the Capitol in Washington and the churches in Mos- THE OTHER AMERICA 313 cow and Mexico City. The interior is fine. Tudor roses figure in the ornamentation on every side, reminiscent of the days of English sway. There are trees in the boulevards and avenues, and the city is built on piles like Chicago. How America does love to reclaim swampy land, and build houses on this man-made structure, as if there was not enough and more than enough --land in that vast country to plant a house on a firm natural foundation. These towns built on sand cannot have subways in the future like New York on its bed of rock. There, on a little hill where the English soldiers once encamped, stands a churchyard. Below is the river. Great liners lap its banks, children's playgrounds and open-air gymnasiums adjoin the wharves and markets of this great commercial city, which has rapidly developed into one of the vast centres of immigration. As one stands in that peaceful little churchyard, peeping round a sky-scraper towards Bunker Hill, one is struck by the number of small American flags ornamenting the graves. Each flag represents the burial ground of some American soldier, more often than not bearing a purely British name. The irony of time. The paradox of years. Soft fog, from smoke and sea, dimmed the sight of Bunker Hill, yet here at last was a spot where the English be- haved themselves somewhat creditably ; for once 314 AMERICA AS I SAW IT the visitor as she looked towards Bunker Hill could murmur in soft tones : "Where were we beaten and how many thousand English were put to flight by a handful of Ameri- cans ?" And for the first time, a puzzled expression took the place of a ready reply. Boston has a particular and unique gem in her diadem. A certain lady was left a fortune. She had great love for art, great appreciation of the beautiful, and great gifts of discernment. She was about forty years of age. Her mind was ripe ; a woman in her prime, she decided that beautiful things gave her more real pleasure than mere dol- lars, and determined to spend her fortune in making a lovely, refined, and artistic home. She lived in Europe for several summers, and returned to Amer- ica for the winter. She scoured Italy, and in ten years that woman, unaided and alone, had made one of the most famous private art collections in America. All honour to this quiet, gentle little lady. Having secured her treasures she erected a house to cover them. The exterior is built in a severe style of Italian architecture ; some might call it dull. Inside it is a revelation. It has a covered-in patio with Roman fountains, Italian pillars, palms, and roses ; every capital is different, THE OTHER AMERICA 315 every stone reminds her of some secret joy. There are famous pictures of the Early Italian School and some Dutch paintings. Several of them are world-renowned. Quite lately the custom duty on works of art over twenty years old was taken off in America ; but unfortunately this artistic woman was not as lucky as the late Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan, and had to pay duty on all her treasures, and real treasures many of them are. If Americans like to say : "Mrs. Eddy was the greatest, yes, the real greatest woman of America," I would agree with them. Not being a Christian Scientist, seeing much evil in the world, and far too much sickness to believe her ethics, I look on quite dispassionately and rather critically at one of the great movements of the day. Greater than the Salvation Army with its world-wide repute because noise, music, thunder, brawl, all appeal to and often elevate the submerged tenth, Mrs. Eddy had none of these arguments. She was not even a man. She began before women had made the position they now have for themselves, and she aimed at the luxurious, self-centred rich, and caught them in her casting- net, i The gentle little woman rearranged the Bible, 316 AMERICA AS I SAW IT and called it Christian Science, and herself its author. She started her preaching about 1890, in her First Little Church in Boston. This quiet edifice is still there. It holds about a thousand people and is used for a Sunday School. The great big New Mother Church, with its five thousand seats, joins on. From the street they both look like a colossal chemical tube the larger Mother Church appearing like the vacuum, the smaller church the stem. Architecturally, there is no connection between them. The Mother Church is large, imposing, simple. Inside it is all white stone except the golden pipes of the organ and the tiny dashes of cheery red velvet on the three desks of the male and female readers and the female vocalist. The service is simple, dignified, and reposeful, and the singing is beautiful. Every seat is free. Every seat was full, but I did not see a poor person in all that vast audience. Not one of the fifty thousand Italians in Boston was there ; no one, in fact, who was not well-to-do, very well-to-do, one might say, judging by the sables and ostrich plumes and wealth of attire. That one fragile woman, alone and unaided, preached a religion that numbers millions of adherents. Is not that amazing ? She died at the age of eighty-seven. She was small and frail with a high colour; active in mind and THE OTHER AMERICA 317 body, and a very good business woman ; when she died, she left over half a million sterling. She had had three husbands and left one son ; another adopted son is a doctor. In the small church in early days she herself preached. The inherent power of the woman and her strength were shown by the fact, that for years, all the later years of her life, she personally did nothing, and yet she kept her hold on her public and enlarged her flock. Now that she is dead the vast administra- tion she left behind is carrying on her doctrines ; her books and her newspapers are selling with equal success. For years she lived in retirement with a royal retinue of twenty persons in a beauti- ful and expensive home near Boston. Such far- reaching influence as she exerted may well qualify her to be called the greatest woman of America, and perhaps the greatest woman of her day. Mrs. Eddy was a power, all honour to her. Boston has many pretty little ways. Once a writer was invited to a luncheon. She was a stranger in the town and almost a stranger to her hostess, although both had many mutual friends. The hostess was Mrs. Alexander Martin. When the party filed into the luncheon room, the table was found to be laid for fourteen, and on everyone's plate was a large red box, prettily covered in scarlet-coloured ribbon, to which each guest's 3i8 AMERICA AS I SAW IT name was attached. The flowers were red ; the candle shades were red ; it was a delightfully warm cheery scene. When the boxes were looked into, each one proved to contain a book, the latest book of the guest for whom the party was given, and who was naturally somewhat overpowered. "I thought each of my friends would like this little memento," said the hostess, "and I am going to ask you to sign the copies and add the date to them." Was ever prettier compliment paid to anyone ? A dozen copies of "Thirteen Years," which ran into four editions in six months, was the volume. At other functions in Chicago and New York the book was given as bridge prizes, another pretty compliment to its author. As I said before, American women are always thinking of nice little things to do, pretty little acts of courtesy to one another, and especially to strangers. The people of Boston were particularly kind and hospitable. I lunched and dined and tea-ed and theatred and opera-ed with Mrs. Jack Gardner, Mrs. Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Mrs. Alexander Martin, Mr. Nathan Haskell Dole, Mrs. Dexter, Mrs. Margaret Deland, President Lowell of Har- vard, Miss Helen Clark, Mrs. Dreyfus, Mr. Sam Elder, Mr. and Mrs. Scofield, Miss Caroline Ticknor, Miss Helen Samborn, Mrs. May Wright Sewall, Miss Laura Drake Gill, Professor Bates, THE OTHER AMERICA 319 Miss Helen Reed, Mrs. C. H. Bond, Mr. H. Jenkins of Little, Brown, & Co. Alas, one of the most brilliant of these many brilliant friends has passed away, Lilian Shuman Dreyfus. She was a woman of rare gifts and gentle ways. I was in Boston for the great national fete. It really was rather amusing to ask some ordinary persons what they thought of Thanksgiving Day. Number One replied, "Something to do with Pilgrim Fathers, but I don't know what/' Number Two answered, "Thanksgiving ? Guess it's for getting rid of English rule." Number Three vouchsafed that "he had no idea." Number Four, an hotel porter, answered, "Thanksgiving for the birth of Christ." This is not so strange as it seems when one con- siders that of the population of the United States seventy-five per cent are not of American origin. But whether American-born or not, they all par- ticipate in the joys of feasting. Thanksgiving Day ! All America was eating turkey, bathing in cran- berry sauce, and revelling in mince pies, plum- puddings, nuts, and raisins ; traditional fare of rejoicing introduced into the Western Continent by the English. 320 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Once I was in the train on Thanksgiving Day, running along the shores of the Mississippi ; eight years later (1912) I was in Boston. Snow a foot deep had covered the ground in Montreal as we sleighed to the station to the tune of jingling bells beneath a glorious moon to arrive one hot, sunny November day~in Boston. But two mornings later the snow had followed us south, and watery mush fell from the sky as I gazed from my window. Hospitality was rife. Lunches and dinners prevailed ; but Thanksgiving Day is a day of family rejoicing, and the stranger within the gates of the city who was being so royally enter- tained on other days was forgotten. It was a delightful time of restfulness. The bells rang for church. I went not. Motors, carriages, and horse cabs plied to gay gatherings in the snow, while I had my first day's real rest since landing, many weeks before, on American shores. And what was Boston doing ? Its paper said, "Wintry gales add zest to Thanksgiving" ; so even a sixty-mile-an-hour gale, raging on the coast, did not damp her ardour. Feasting and merrymaking prevailed in the homes. Special church services were going on in every denomination. Charitable societies were feeding blacks and whites, Christians and pagans, but the greatest excitement of all prevailed in the football field. It always does in the States. THE OTHER AMERICA 321 Drawn by Louis A. Holman. THE OLD SOUTH CHURCH, BOSTON 322 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Christmas Day feasting and revelry in England is forestalled nearly a month by Thanksgiving Day in America ; you see, they must be ahead of dear sleepy old England, so they eat their turkey, with chestnut stuffing, cranberry sauce, mince pies, almonds, and raisins for Thanksgiving, and only repeat the dose in a mild form at Christmas. Baskets of food were handed out to three thousand poor, and the jailbirds were not for- gotten. Sailors on battle-ships were fed. Nuns held high revel. Hospitals were treated. Every man, woman, and child in Boston made merry and jubilated over his annual rejoicing instituted by folk from Great Britain. And a representative of Great Britain sat alone and pondered, while great snowflakes fell from above, and lay thickly upon the trees and on the ground. The real origin of Thanksgiving Day came from the Pilgrims at Plymouth, near Boston. They had a terrible time, and in 1621, after their first good harvest, they offered up prayers of thanksgiving. Gradually this idea spread, and it has become a universal holiday since President Lincoln fixed the date on the fourth Thursday in November, in 1864. It is now a national institution ; but in New England probably it is more particularly a family reunion than in any other part of America. Morals are largely a matter of geography. Feast days and religious beliefs are the same. While THE OTHER AMERICA 323 all Boston was feting and feasting and making merry, an Englishwoman sat alone in the spacious College Club. No one wanted a stranger in their family circle, and so she sat alone in that vast triple drawing-room before a wood fire, sipping tea and thinking. How strange it all seemed. This day means nothing in old England. Our bank holiday means nothing to America. Every now and then the darky porter came in to ask if I wanted anything. I let him sharpen a pencil. He went away. Later he came back. I thanked him ; but I did not want anything. Later he returned again. "Can I do anything for you, m'arm ?" he asked. Verily that darky of pearly teeth seemed to be sorry for my loneliness and apparently wanted to cheer me. Being alone does not necessarily mean one is lonely. I am never less alone than when alone. Imagination conjures up interesting company, and 'tis a dull dog truly that suffers ennui. And while Boston was making merry, fire was aflame. Fires are so constant and so important, that they are reported daily in the press, as follows : 3 24 AMERICA AS I SAW IT YESTERDAY'S FIRES Box Time A.M. I 2123 3 : 3933 Garden street ; Harry R. Pollock $50 126 4 : 02 343 E street, South Bos- ton; Charles Jienuslim- iscy $25 P.M. 453 12:30549 Main street, Charlestown ; Edward V. Murphy Slight 20 3:00119 Stamford street; Edie Eufrena $300 1489 3 : 10 Fire in Dedham. 78 4 : 01 48 Sharon street ; Ruth Wilds $10 488 4:3060 Lawrence street; Charlestown; Jamieson Bros None 219 5 : 00 Longwood and Hunting- ton avenue ; grass fire. . 70 6:30 117 Union Park street; Mary Hagerty None 65 6 : 45 False alarm. 465 6:5298 Cambridge street; Charles C. Neal $15 * 11:15715 South street, Ja- maica Plain ; Harry Small $200 231 11 :46 9 Williams street, Rox- bury ; Jones & Farrell and others $800 * Still alarm. Why in London have we no such delightful scheme as the Century Club ? Every Saturday at one o'clock as many members as can find seats, viz. fifty or sixty, pay their fee and join the round tables, where plain-living and high-thinking reign. Any visitor of note to Boston is invited, and it was my privilege to be there the same day as Baroness von Ziittner, with whom it will be remembered I stayed at the Chatfield Taylors at Lake Forest. It was Bohemian in its best sense. It had no THE OTHER AMERICA 325 pretence ; cold beef and coffee, ice-cream and crackers ; but we all loved it, and personally I wished there were more of that sort of thing in America, where the rich feasting which prevails might make even a Roman emperor blush. The club was established to promote a finer public spirit and a better social order ; and grateful indeed I was to that entertaining Boston ency- clopaedia of men, manners, and matters Mr. Nathan Haskell Dole for entertaining me there. Boston, once the home of all the learning of the States, as Edinburgh was to Scotland, is changing its character. There are still Societies of Art and Literature and Music ; but culture is being swamped somewhat by the influx of foreigners. Boston has its Toy Theatre with one hundred and fifty seats, where delightful entertainments are given, and where I enjoyed a literary tea- party with George Arliss, the actor; its great library, where they flattered me by showing me my own books neatly catalogued ; its opera, where beautiful women and beautiful music were en- chanting. Boston has its Symphony Concerts ; its Christian Science Church ; its endless religions, and fads, and cures, even to the striking of a musical chord to remove a wart on the nose. 326 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Then again Harvard returns to one's memory as a scene of peace ; delightful red brick buildings, and a square filled with dead trees. One recalls genial and courteous President Lowell, virile American students, and near by five hundred women at RadclifTe. Professors and students should be continually exchanged between England and America. Heredity does count. We may sometimes pick a genius out of the gutter, but genius and a trained mind together produce fine material indeed. Look at the Lowell family. President Lowell, its descendant, was very keen on the fact that the med- ical school at Harvard was busy with a cure for infant paralysis and the whooping-cough germ. Speaking of Ambassador Bryce he said : "He has done more to cement the friendship of the two countries than England knows." It is interesting to remember in connection with Harvard that its founder, John Harvard, was born at the time of Shakespeare and in the same small town of Stratford-on-Avon. He left England as an undergraduate of Cambridge ; but the love of learning was already acquired, and far, far away it bore fruit. This Englishman founded the first college in the New World about three hundred years ago. America seems to forget she has had a university for three hundred years, or she could not so incessantly inform us of THE OTHER AMERICA 327 her infantile precocity. We hardly think of Shakespeare as a modern product, nor do we excuse his talents on that score. Harvard is a great bond of union between the two lands, a fact not sufficiently known, or appreciated, although America has produced three great historians in Parkman, Motley, and Prescott. It is impossible to mention all the delightful people I met in Boston. One of them was Mrs. Margaret Deland, whose reputation as a novelist is world-wide. In the simplest, most artistic of drawing-rooms, with shining parquet floors and rampant tigers in tapestry on the wall, sat this kindly, lovable woman. A huge, long-haired Scotch sheep-dog was sitting beside her on the sofa, while she dispensed tea a real English tea and cakes and chatted delightfully on all possible subjects. Margaret Deland is a big woman with all the true womanly instincts, even to learning bridge to please her husband. The hand of good fellowship is never lacking. People invite strangers to their homes, they show them all they have, they tell them all they know, they give up their time and their motors, or walk them about and explain things ; in fact, the gracious kindliness and thoughtful helpfulness of the American is invigorating and delightful. 328 AMERICA AS I SAW IT One of the nice things they do is to lend their motors ; nothing is kinder. It is difficult to find one's way about in a new city, and one can see twice as much if guided by a friend. In every town I visited, with one exception, someone offered to put a motor at my disposal. That one excep- tion, unfortunately, was New York ; and it really was unfortunate, as it is by far the most difficult city in which to get about, and to the "alien " almost impossible. By the bye, it is not necessary to feed the stranger, or even to house the stranger ; but to take the stranger somewhere, and personally show him something, is the greatest kindness and of far more real value than many people realise. Both men and women are charming in this respect. Naturally one sees more women, as men are never visible till the evening meal, and not always then ; so one repeats at odd intervals all day, "Where are the men ?" I've been to Boston. Yes, at last I have reached my American Mecca. After three visits of about three months each in the United States, I have seen Boston ; so no longer can Americans twit me for knowing "nothing" of the country. I am satisfied. Boston I saw, and Boston con- quered me. Stay. THE OTHER AMERICA 329 "I beg your pardon," says someone in my ear. "But you have not been to " "Oh, yes, I have. I have been to Boston," I reply eagerly. "But have you been to California ?" "Cal- -?" I stammer. "Yes have you been to California ?" persists the interrogator. "No, I have not only to Texas and Arizona and New Mexico and Missouri and - "But you have not been to California ?" "No, I have not," I am obliged to confess. "Oh, then you don't know anything of America," is the reply. Collapse of the writer. She must return again to see California before she dies, or remain entirely ignorant of America from the Southern Argentine to beyond the St. Lawrence, all of which she knows a little, although she has dared to omit California. CHAPTER XIV MANNERS AND CUSTOMS WE have to concede many things to the Ameri- cans, but we cannot concede manners. In this particular line Europe can give them points. It is a case of generations of manners versus cosmopolitan conglomeration of habit. The polite- ness of London is lost in the hustle of New York, although that hustle is much overrated, and often merely an excuse for abruptness of manner. There is a certain calm dignity, a gentle repose of manner common in Europe, which is lacking in America, where many people have not yet learned to be quite sure of themselves, nor grown quite ac- customed to their new position, although American adaptability is a thing to wonder at and admire. How well their daughters learn to be European Duchesses. But at home, in their own environ- ment, it is more difficult to attain perfection of manner, because there is no standard to go by, no Queen to copy in the matter of courtesy, no King to follow as an example of stateliness, how- ever much Americans may deride the figure-head of royalty. I once took a delightful woman to see 330 MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 331 Queen Mary open a public building. When Her Majesty had passed us my American friend turned to me with tears in her eyes and said : " Most impressive ; there is something in royalty after all!" There are a good many little differences in cus- tom to be noticed between England and America, more especially in the middle class ; sometimes to the advantage of one, sometimes to the advantage of the other. In England, when people are introduced, they smile, bow, and one or the other starts to talk on any subject uppermost in the mind. In America, they immediately repeat the name of the stranger who has been presented to them, saying : "Mrs. Jones, delighted to meet you," while the other replies :- "Mrs. Smith, delighted to meet you." This "delighted to meet you" is a regular formula, and a pretty one, too, while the idea of repeating the name is really clever, and shows that the introducer has managed to pronounce it sufficiently distinctly for the friends to catch, which is more than can be said for most introduc- tions in England. No two Americans can con- verse happily for one moment unless they know one another's exact names; they will even say, "What name, please?" Not that the name means anything to either of them ; but because 332 AMERICA AS I SAW IT they must be introduced, or introduce them- selves. Tips and railway porters are universal in Britain. Both were unknown in America until quite recently ; indeed, it is amazing the difference I saw on my return after an absence of a few years, to find darky porters, and good ones, too, had been added at the principal railway stations, and also to notice how every one now expects to be tipped. Even an Atlantic stewardess cannot get an apple for a passenger without her tipping the ship's fruitman during every voyage. Tips within tips, truly. Of course, it is the fashion in England for pro- fessional beauties as well as people of eminence to see their names constantly in the newspapers, but in America there is a perfect craze to appear in print. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry craves to see his doings described, not only when passed, but even in advance. The guests he is going to have to dinner, and what his wife is going to wear. And as for the women's photographs in the Press, they appear with never failing regularity, and they all look the same age. Various relics of the past remain in this demo- cratic land. For instance, a man speaks of his wife as "Mrs. Smith," and she of her husband as "Mr. Smith." They never say " my wife " nor " my husband," terms which they appear to think are MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 333 334 AMERICA AS I SAW IT like "my dog," or "my house," and have reference to a chattel, in fact. Nor do they refer to each other as "Mary," or "Tom," but concentrate all the deferential respect of America into this one formal nomenclature. Our nobility talk of one an- other in the same way ; but nobility go still further, and the lady addresses her husband by whatever his title may be without the aristocratic prefix at all. Americans often use the terms "Ma'am" and "Sir" to friends and equals, just as those terms are used to Royalty in Great Britain. Another American expression is "Sister." A man will say, "Take my arm, sister," across a bad bit of road ; it is a term of protection and kindliness. The American is never unconventional. The most fashionable spot is his Mecca ; to be more exact, his god. From the make of his shoes to the pattern of his garments, in one and all, his chief desire is "to be correct." There is a certain type of American woman to whom the desire to do the right thing seems to be a perfect nightmare. She is constantly wondering who should be helped first at table, who should take precedence at dinner, whether she should keep her gloves on or not ; and takes refuge in endless books on etiquette. There are other books on "Letter-writing" "How to entertain," and endless questions not yet settled by rule of thumb in the New World, MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 335 where the manners of both men and women are founded on Old-world traditions, some descended from the early settlers. In America the women are more free than in England and the men are more polite when they know how to be but, of course, there are so many grades, only the ones at the top have learnt social courtesy, and the lower orders of men are more rude and uncouth than the women. While the young married woman has the best of times in Europe, she takes a back seat in America, having had her fling as a girl ; for girls are considered before everyone in the States. The girls positively rule the homes. Boundless hospitality exists in America. Stran- gers are warmly welcomed, entertained, and made happy ; while men are constantly sending flowers, candies, or books to ladies, and doing pretty little courtesies of that kind. The love of sweet things is so great, from candies to ice-creams, that even the stamps are sugared ! The contrast between "society" in London and New York is not so great as many suppose. There are more low dresses and diamond tiaras in London, and more smart-looking, tidy women in New York ; more beards in London and more clean-shaven faces in Manhattan. There are larger hotels in New York, and bigger shops ; there are prominent red pillar-boxes in London and smaller hidden green 336 AMERICA AS I SAW IT ones in the city on the island ; but these things are small details. In the main, both cities are much alike, and the men and women behave in much the same way. We have no street to compare with Fifth Avenue, and they have no park to compare with Regent's Park; but we drive out and dine out just the same ; we eat and think and dress and read just the same, or any way so much alike, we seem to be one big family party, which is just as it should be. Society is becoming more and more alike, but society does not represent a nation. It is, after all, only an item. The stronger this chain is made, the better for the whole world. The English- speaking race dominates. Look at the States and Canada in the West, Great Britain, South Africa ; in the East, India, Australia, and New Zealand ; to say nothing of the English-speaking people scattered all over the world. Do these millions not constitute a colossal strength and power ? and is it not there- fore right they should understand each other, sympathise, and take that same interest in each other's doings which exists between the members of any large family. Every European hotel has a bedroom bell. Above it is a little card denoting how many times to ring for the waiter, the maid, or the boots ; even in Egypt the Arab is available. In America From The New New York. NEW YORK IN RAIN (PARK AVENUE) Drawn by Joseph Pennell. MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 337 there are no bells, and the " bell-boy " is becoming extinct ; formerly he was called upon for everything. A certain lady married to an American who had just landed in a New York hotel, had not ordered a room with a bath, because she did not know the necessity of that extravagance. She looked about for the bell in vain. She wanted hot water to wash. She opened her door and called. She waited. No one passed. At last in her dress- ing-gown (wrapper) she sallied forth. At the far end of a long passage she heard the sound of drip- ping water. There she saw a servant and near her were jugs. "Can I have some hot water, please?" she smilingly asked. "There's the tap and there's a can," was the reply. The English lady was surprised. " I would like some hot water every morning at half past seven, and in the evening at six, please." "Fetch it yourself, then." Collapse of the stranger, who had no idea that the telephone beside her bed was to be used for every conceivable purpose, even for the supply of hot water, and her personal request had there- fore been resented. Some people are beginning to think they should play for six days of the week and only work on the seventh. Nowadays, after many telephones and much 338 AMERICA AS I SAW IT perturbation an off-hand American or Irish woman arrives. Every servant is better than her mis- tress, so she "kindly condescends" to hook one's blouse or fasten one's evening dress. Of course we women are fools to wear such unut- terably inconvenient clothing, and to exist without a single pocket, while the ordinary man has sixteen. We are fools, and we suffer badly for our folly. It is equally unavailing to wish one's hot-water bottle filled, or to have one's boots cleaned, both being unobtainable luxuries ; British women would call them necessities. There are beautiful boots and shoes in America ; but no one in the house to clean them. With luck, ice-water may be procured in the midnight hours of the coldest night another American paradox. It is a land of topsy-turvy- dom. Does the American traveller ever oversleep him- self ? If so, heaven help him. It is utterly unavailing to ask to be called at a certain hour. The office clerk looks aghast, and if he smilingly promises that the traveller shall be aroused, his underling conveniently forgets. One either wakes oneself, or sleeps on unheeded, and forgotten. No one is called in the ordinary way. No blinds are drawn. No bath water run in. No early cup MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 339 of tea tempts one from one's bed, except in multi- millionaires' homes, in the length and breadth of America. There are millionaires who have "emi- grated" to other lands sufficiently often to pick up their ways of comfort. Even in small homes in England we are called at seven or eight ; we women get a cup of tea, our blinds are drawn with a smiling "Good-morning, Madam," our bath is run in, the towels are put in place, our cleaned boots are put out, and often we are asked which dress we will wear, and it is neatly laid out for use. But then England has been the land of domestic comfort, and it will be a bad day for rich and poor alike, if it ever becomes a land of mob rule. America, as far as comfort is concerned, is only fitted for the rich. Invitations were issued for a card-party at two o'clock, and at two o'clock punctually a stream of smart ladies entered the house. The door was opened by a darky butler, and the visitors were ushered upstairs to take off their cloaks. The chrysalis unfurled, and out came the feminine butterfly in all her glory. Light silks, white foulards, and painted muslins on an October day were made transparently open at the neck. Light hats and white plumes nodded from every head ; veritable garden-party attire all these women wore, and wondrous smart they looked. 340 AMERICA AS I SAW IT There is no doubt about it, American dames dress extremely well. Evening dress in England is far more in vogue and while women in the States are far better dressed on the whole from breakfast till dinner-time than Europeans, thereafter they fail, and the Englishwoman romps ahead. More people have private cars in England than in America, so while we go out to dine in our car or taxi, Americans go by tram, train, or hansom, which last is still in vogue although almost ob- solete in London. A cloak-room, therefore, is a queer sight ; long, dark cloaks are doffed, shawls and hats discarded, overshoes slipped off. The women have learnt how to pin up their skirts and manage to hide their evening clothes to perfection, but still this awful tram or train business means that American women do not look so smart in the evening as Britishers. But to return to the card-party. Every blind in the house was drawn down as usual at two o'clock, and all the electric lights were turned on. Perhaps it was thought more respectable to begin card-playing in an illumination which at least savoured of the evening. The game was auction bridge. Six tables of four women each meant twenty-four ladies, to say nothing of the handful of onlookers. They sat at small, square tables, made on trestles ex- pressly for the purpose, and the chairs were narrow. MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 341 On every table, covered with its tightly stretched, daintily embroidered white linen cloth, a dish of American candies reposed, and before the afternoon was "through," as our Western sisters would say, the candies had all disappeared. For nearly two hours the game proceeded, played in a most serious manner ; then darky waiters came in, cleared the cards and the glasses in which orange punch had been served, and laid the table-cloths for other and more substantial refreshments. Chicken salad at four o'clock, with hot buttered rolls and cups of coffee, were followed by ice- creams and cakes, and of course the inevitable punch. Then the scores were totalled up, amid much amusement and good-natured chaff, and then the three prizes were given and valuable and tasteful prizes they were too with almost as much formality as at a school function. The women all seemed to be in the best of tem- pers, were all good friends, and took as much trouble to amuse one another as though each woman was flirting with a man. How quaint it is to hear people talk of "Mary's beau," and "Annie's many beaux," merely meaning her male chums. One delicious thing. It is seldom necessary to talk. They love talking, and will talk on and on, and will never notice if their visitor is silent. They 342 AMERICA AS I SAW IT love to talk, or if not talking, they will ask ques- tions ; but the stranger will not otherwise get in a word edgeways. No stranger foreigners, we British are called is ever allowed to tell a story, or talk according to our idea of being entertaining. There is no con- versation, the talking is all on one side. We must lecture, answer questions, or be silent. Dinner- table conversation is entirely monopolised by the family party. The stranger is usually mum. He is not encouraged to vouchsafe any opinion unless asked a direct question. He hears his own coun- try discussed, but he is not asked to correct any possible errors. His host's party is perfectly happy and jolly among its own members, and his surest route to popularity is to hold his tongue. The raconteur, so valued in Europe, is unknown in the States. Bridge entertainments, theatre parties, or any- thing to evade an evening where the hostess wonders how she will entertain her friends ; never realising that if her friends are worth their salt, they will entertain one another. Unfortunately there are people all over the world who talk big. They have a superficial knowledge of things, and certain trite quotations from Goethe, Nietzsche, Strindberg, Ibsen, Shaw, La Bruyere, or d'Annunzio. They really know little about any of them beyond their names ; but they think by MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 343 continually quoting them or dragging those names in with a query, such as "What do you think of Strindberg ?" or "Don't you remember in Ibsen's 'Doll's House' ?" or "I approve of Nietzsche's philosophy," they will impress their hearers by their profundity. They often do so, because we are seldom quick enough to gauge that shallow waters have a good deal of glint on the surface. Twice I went to dances ; I love a good waltz. Even an elderly scribe can dance because if one has skated or danced or ridden much, at any time, one never forgets how to do it. So, although I seldom go to a ball nowadays, I can enter into the fun, and enjoy myself. Accordingly, to two parties I went, particularly anxious to see American dancing. At a certain ball in England, an old servant watched the proceedings from an upper gallery. The next morning she asked her young lady, who was the debutante, what a certain dance she had seen could be. "Oh, that was the Kitchen Lancers." "Lancers it may be, Miss Jean, but no one in the kitchen would dance in that vulgar way," retorted the maid. I feel much the same about the "bunny hug" and the "turkey trot " and other zoological dances. Dear old darkies footing out the beams in a slow roily, leisurely way to their own droning tune 344 AMERICA AS I SAW IT are quite charming, but that respectable white people can call such a performance a dance, is deplorable. To see young men and women with their arms round one another's necks, their bodies closely pressed together, performing indecent antics to the delirious strains of music is a sad spectacle. To see middle-aged men and women, the women's legs showing through split skits, or too tight skirts and no petticoats, wobbling about like over- fed turkeys in tight embrace, is disgusting. The bodily contortions remind one of saints on early stained-glass windows, and the faces resemble martyrs at the stake. Thank heaven, when these American dances started in a mild form in Lon- don, good society vetoed them from the drawing- rooms. The English hostess was right. They are vulgar, suggestive, and not even artistic to look upon. While we clamoured for rag-time America sought our serious drama. Novelty helps existence ; but novelty that is retrograde is better left alone. Outside these childishly grotesque and inartistic performances the men and women of America dance extremely well, and since the Russian invasion step dancing is quite a feature. Tolstoi by the bye wrote a book that made one shudder at the insult to all that is beautiful in music. "Turkey trots" and "bunny hugs" make one MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 345 r i By permission of the New York Times. IN LONDON GOOD SOCIETY VETOED THEM FROM THE DRAWING-ROOMS 346 AMERICA AS I SAW IT sorry for Terpsichore. Such dancing is not poetic, and yet when he chooses, the American dances beautifully. To get into the "best Society" in New York, one must be both conventional and normal. Every spark of genius is taboo. Every mental novelty is looked on askance, and conventionality has full swing. The Bohemian set try to throw off the thraldom and exaggerate the unconventional until they become too unrestrained. To wit, the "bunny hug" and the "freak" parties. The bunnies should now return to their warrens, and the turkeys to the farmyard ; neither are fit for the ballroom. The most modern idea is for the guests at a ball to remain to breakfast. The dance begins late, refreshments are served all through the night, but by breakfast time a good solid meal is required. As no servants can be expected to serve a new meal in the early hours after an all-night entertain- ment, these swell New Yorkers repair in battalions to Sherry's, and there enjoy their breakfast in their dishevelled garb. If this continues, private house balls will discontinue. Guests will dine, dance, sup, dance again, and breakfast at an hotel. Madrid and Berlin never appear to go to bed. Does New York wish to follow suit ? CHAPTER XV NIAGARA UP-TO-DATE God's Work, Man's Slave. Even Niagara is up-to-date. THE Philistine is doing his best to ruin one of God's greatest works, but luckily he cannot suc- ceed. He has written his name in letters of shame on seats in the public parks on each side of Niagara's stupendous Falls ; he has scrawled his hideous hieroglyphics on rocks at every point of view; he has even put up advertisements hard by, exploiting pills and powders and soaps and shams ; he has erected large chimneys and hideous factories below the Falls ; but, in spite of all, he cannot spoil Niagara. He has tried hard, this up-to-date advertiser, but he has failed as yet to ruin one of Nature's triumphs. We crossed by boat from Toronto on the Cana- dian side to Lewiston. It is only two and a half hours' steam over the narrowest part of Lake Ontario ; nevertheless quite a number of people managed to be uncomfortably ill, and certainly we did pitch a little, in spite of the barrels of sand 347 348 AMERICA AS I SAW IT kept for the purpose that were rolled from side to side by boys to steady our ship. The United States Custom-house officer was on board, and "Oh, my !" as our Canadian friends exclaimed, "he did just rout!" He searched rigorously; even small hand-bags were denuded of every bottle and packet for inspection, so particular are the authori- ties in these matters. Leaving the lake at "Niagara on the Lake," we had a pleasant seven miles' run up the river to Lewiston, where the electric tram awaited us. This calm, pretty, reposeful Niagara River is the outlet of several enormous lakes which divide parts of America from Canada. Though near the foot of the great Falls, it looked so quiet and peaceful that we experienced much difficulty in realising that those thousands of miles of lakes, and those great cataracts, could be emptying themselves through this comparatively small river into the sea. It was early in October ; the hotels were shutting up for the winter, the boats making their last passages, and yet the hundreds and hundreds of wooden baskets, full of peaches, grapes, green- gages, apples, and pears, which carpeted the wharf, all grown near Niagara, hardly suggested winter, but rather warm summer weather, which indeed it was, for the thermometer stood at 78 in the shade. It is a wonderful tram-car journey, that gorge line some seven miles long from Lewiston to NIAGARA UP-TO-DATE 349 Niagara Falls, built so close to the edge that often the rails are barely two feet from the side of a cliff dropping sheer down some twenty to forty feet, with a cataract or whirlpool swirling away below. On our left the cliff rose perpendicularly some two hundred or three hundred feet. As we neared the village of Niagara Falls the road became more and more beautiful ; and a huge rock here, a cave there, added grandeur to the scene. At the whirlpool we drew up for a moment ; it seemed almost like a small lake, so completely was it shut in, but the waters were comparatively calm as they swirled round and round in endless rotation. Here was the very representation of the proverb, "Still waters run deep"; many hun- dreds of feet deep is this whirlpool, yet a barrel will continue turning round and round for days upon its surface. Several mad attempts, such as those of Captain Webb and Captain Boynton, and various wild efforts in barrels, have been made to descend from the rapids above and cross this whirlpool ; but almost every case has proved certain suicide. The people who look on, and so encourage such exploits, ought to be heartily ashamed of their morbid love of excitement. It is an awful thing to think that human beings will pay to stare at a man literally risking his own life and courting 350 AMERICA AS I SAW IT death, for the sake of a possible handful of gold ; but they will do so, to the shame of every country alike, whenever they get the chance, so great is the craving for the gruesome. The Whirlpool rapids are wonderful, and far more turbulent than the whirlpool itself. They are naturally at the narrowest part of the river, which is there spanned by two splendid railway bridges. In the course of one mile the rapids make a drop of over a hundred feet as the waves froth and foam and swirl over one another. Strangely enough, not only does the water look like the waves of the ocean beating upon the land in a storm, but there is almost a sea smell in the air, although the water is really fresh. A green, seaweedlike growth covers the rocks, and perhaps the smell may proceed from that ; in any case, it is distinctly noticeable. The clock struck six as we left the hotel at "Niagara" on the American side, and wandered forth for our first peep at the Falls before dinner. We passed through Prospect Park, heard the swirl of the upper rapids, realised that evening was drawing in with the strange rapidity it does in these climes ; and then all in a moment we seemed to stand on the very brink of the American Fall itself. This was Niagara. This mystic veil shrouded the widest, noblest waterfall of the world ; for though report says the Victoria Falls on the NIAGARA UP-TO-DATE 351 Zambezi are just as fine, it is in their height that their wonder lies. We heard the rush, and stood still. It was a wonderful sensation suddenly to find oneself near enough to the edge of the flow to be able to touch the water with an umbrella, as it took its dive of a hundred and fifty feet into the seething cauldron of froth and spray below. It is absolutely impossible to give any idea of the magnitude of volume of that water, which, as we saw it, in the short twilight and quickly gather- ing darkness of night, seemed weird in its vastness, and eerie in its grey-blue opalescent charm. The great Canadian Horseshoe Fall, by far the grander of the two, was lost in spray and evening mists. Verily, a scene of poetry and romance ; and yet of strength withal, for the power of that force is stupendous. It seemed unreal, untrue, half hidden by a mist of watery crystals and covered by a veil of darkness. Grey clouds descended to meet the ascending foam ; all seemed unfathomable, weird, and strange ; a hazy moon rose rapidly in the sky and we shuddered as we thought of the horrors of a pouring wet day on the morrow, which indeed seemed imminent after such a grey, misty, autumn evening. Next morning, however, all was changed ; the watery moon had given place to gorgeous sun, 352 AMERICA AS I SAW IT the grey clouds had dispersed, and the heavens were blue, a vast expanse of cobalt blue. When we reached Prospect Point a little after breakfast, it seemed impossible that the wild, ethereal, Brocken- like effect could have been followed by such a glorious Indian-summer day. We saw more than on the previous evening ; we saw everything clear and sharp and distinct ; we loved the rainbows chasing each other in the spray ; but the charm and the poetry had gone. Niagara in the glare of the day was disappointing, and we longed for the evening again. We longed for the mist to hide those hideous advertisements which hit us and hurt us. But we had not time to dally, for a day and a half is little enough at Niagara ; so into a wonderful electric railway shoot we went, and in a few seconds were whirled down below the cliffs, and into the little steamer known as the Maid of the Mist, which goes right up to the very Falls themselves. We took off our hats and, putting on mackintosh coats and head coverings, sat boldly on deck. The spray from the Falls is more wetting than a really steady downpour of rain, for it comes not merely from above and the sides, but rises up from below ; it comes from everywhere, in fact, and the drops of water simply poured down our noses. But it was worth going through such an experience, although, when we really turned round under the NIAGARA UP-TO-DATE 353 Horseshoe Falls on the Canadian side, the feeling of bobbing about in a cockle-shell on a whirlpool was rather ghastly, and we all had to hold tight to keep our seats on the deck at all, so tremendous is the force of the water across which this little craft ventures. The spot known as Rock of Ages forms a perfect picture. The rugged brown grandeur of the stones, the white frothy spray, and the green and blue hues of the water, with the sun shining through, made a scene such as no artist's brush could ever catch in feeling, colour, or force. The sublimest works of nature can never really be reproduced by art ; for, at its best, art cannot depict fleeting sentiment, ever changing beauty. Every cloud, every sunbeam, alters the scene on which it falls, as every thought changes the expression of a face. Pictures, much as we love them, can only express one phase ; they cannot represent all. It was a short trip, though an extremely interest- ing one ; and we left our boat on the Canadian side to drive along the park and go under the Horse- shoe Fall, so as to obtain an idea of the water from below. The Canadian side is certainly the best from which to see Niagara Falls ; the views are better, the park is better; nature is left more to herself; and is not disfigured by such enormous hotels with rows and rows of straight, ugly windows. 354 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Having driven along the top of the cliff, we arranged to go below the Falls. "Will the lady step into that room ?" asked an attendant, which the lady accordingly did. "You must take off nearly all your things and put on these mackintosh trousers, coat, and helmet," was the next mandate. We mildly re- monstrated, but remonstrance was of no use ; the woman assured us we should be wet to the skin unless we did as she bid us, and subsequent experiences proved that she was right. The black trousers were large and baggy, of the peg-top order, and about as thick as a coach- man's driving apron. The attendant tied them in at the knees with white tape to keep them off the ground, for they seemed to have been made for a woman at least six feet six inches in height. Goloshes so loved by The Private Secretary and by all Americans were next adjusted from a row which contained some hundreds of pairs, re- minding us of Ibsen's hall in Christiania, where we saw goloshes standing in rows one snowy winter ; then the coat was fixed, and the headgear, after putting a towel round the throat, was strapped on. What a sight. What sights, indeed, we all looked ! Then out into the sunshine we went, men and women seeming exactly alike, and yet each more hideous than the other. We laughed and chatted, got into the lift, and were whirled NIAGARA UP-TO-DATE 355 below, to walk along a small wooden pathway with occasional staircases, all very slippery, and, to our thinking, not over substantial. It became wetter and wetter under foot and more drenching from above as we proceeded, and we soon realised the good lady was right ; no ordinary clothing could have withstood a millionth part of the spray of Niagara. We paused almost in front of a branch of the Fall and tried to look up ; but so blinding was the whirlwind of spray that we could hardly see. The cavern was washed out by the wash of ages. A huge sheet of water, a stupendous curtain of force, so thick that its transparent drops were massed into a translucent wall, fell beside us. It was so thick, so dense, so immense that we could barely see the beams of light through that massive veil of water. The spray filled our eyes, hung upon our lashes, ran down our noses until we tried to gasp out that we had seen enough ; and gladly turned away. The sound was deafening ; we could not hear one another speak. The spray was too great to allow us to see anything, and yet this was only a small branch of the Falls themselves. It gave a wonder- ful idea of what the hourly, weekly, monthly, yearly overflow of those Falls, which Goat Island divides, must be. 356 AMERICA AS I SAW IT "Please walk this way," said our guide, and into a long, dark passage, with a tiny gleam of light at the end, we went. So great is the force of the fall that it flows outwards many feet from the rocks themselves, and enables people actually to stand under the arch of water in comparative comfort. On looking up there seems a veritable roof of water through which the sun shines ; on our right was the grey rock over which the water rushes, while on our left was a wall of water, falling into the seething pool far away below. Niagara is worth travelling many hundreds of miles to see ; its power, its strength, its force, teach a sermon far deeper and more lasting than the best of sermons, or the finest books of man. Even the most frivolous must pause and think before such a masterpiece of majestic Beauty and Power. It is devoutly to be hoped that the material gain to the industrial undertakings in the neighbourhood will not be allowed to destroy one of the greatest, most forceful, and most awe-inspiring sights of the world. There is only one Niagara ; Canada and the States may well be proud of their possession, and ought to guard such a treasure from the clutches of the speculator. CHAPTER XVI A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK MORAL conventionality is the outcome of public philosophy. The Mississippi Negro is a remarkable type. "Gentleman" he would call himself, for all darkies are "ladies" and "gentlemen," and their em- ployers "men" and "women." They have strange and wonderful ways, and their customs are most interesting. They seem to value human life as they would that of a dog. When I visited the darky prison in New Orleans, among the folk who were waiting trial were nearly thirty who had been arrested for murder, the youngest of whom was a nice-looking boy of fifteen. Nig- gers shoot or stick one another on the slightest provocation, and consider the successful man in such a squabble quite a hero. But they have their gayer moments, and a "cake walk" is one of them. The Highlander has his reel, the Irishman his jig, the Indian his nautch dance, the Argentina his tango, and the American darky his cake walk. The origin of the term "cake walk" seems some- 357 3S8 AMERICA AS I SAW IT what obscure. Many folks affirm, however, that in the old slave days, the best performer was given a cake as a reward, the common expression, "He takes the cake," originating from this institution. The cake is now rarely a prize at these amusing entertainments, but fortunately the dance sur- vives. It was in New Orleans that I first saw a cake walk, that delightfully quaint old French town, with its green-shuttered houses and balconies, its ill-paved roads, and its open street drains, where a passer-by often has to jump over an open gutter, like a small river, in order to reach the high footpath at all. There are many more blacks than whites, and it is this dark population which so often causes trouble, although it is not as bad as Barbados, where there are seven blacks to one white, or as, at Bahia, in Brazil, where eighty per cent of the people are negro. New Orleans is, of course, a famous port ; but it is more than that, there is an Old-world air about it, and it is delightfully picturesque. It is most amusing to watch the jet-black porters on the wharves handling the snow-white cotton, which comes down the Mississippi in shiploads for exportation. The vessels that bring it are the funniest things imaginable; they are generally flat-bottomed, and at the back is an enormous wheel or paddle, the entire width of the ship itself. A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 359 Drawn by Vernon Howe Bailey. A SOUTHERN HOMESTEAD 360 AMERICA AS I SAW IT The darkies work on the quay all the week, and on Sundays enjoy themselves. Some thirty or forty of them were assembled in a large square, ready for a cake walk, and as we approached, they were enjoying their Sunday afternoon festivities. Some of the folks were leaning against the wall, others lying on the pave- ment, some were sitting on their heels, in that curious way they have ; but one and all seemed bent on enjoyment, and chatted and laughed merrily. Two men, one in a green flannel shirt, the other in a red one almost faded to pink, were performing a cake walk in the middle. They were the real African nigger type, with huge lips, lovely teeth, wide nostrils, and crisp, frizzy hair, like astrakhan, but there was an artistic touch about them, displayed in their love of beautiful colours, and something really graceful about the movements of these children of nature. They would bow to each other, quite low salaams, and then join in a slow measured waltz. They would catch one another by the shoulders or hands, and perambu- late and wriggle, often with bent knees, through the onlookers, waving a stick the while, as an Irish- man would his shillelagh. They twisted their bodies into all kinds of queer shapes, but so slowly and gracefully that it was a pleasure to watch them. Then a woman joined the two men : she was fat, A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 361 but like the others was imbued with the poetry of motion. They all danced in measured time some sort of minuet, the onlookers clapping an accompaniment to the fiddler's tune as the old blind, white-haired musician played away, sitting on an inverted pail. One trio after another took part in the cake walk, and the set that received the most acclamation claimed the prize. A dancing lady's hair was particularly interest- ing, although it subsequently proved to be a common style of head-dress. The hair of a nigger is so tightly curled up, that it is almost impossible to comb it ; therein originates the style of dressing. Her scalp was divided by seven partings, one down the middle, and three down each side. Each little bunch of short hair was carefully combed, screwed up as tight as it would go, and tied with a red ribbon, the hair above the knot being cut off quite close. The result was extraordinary. Fancy sleeping on eight knobs ! Imagine any- thing more unbecoming than this screwed-up style of head-dress, which, report says, takes so long to comb out, it is often not redone for a year. The women are not beautiful ; their only claim to that title being their lovely teeth. This lady dancer wore a pink cotton gown, and round her neck a green scarf, which toned so ex- actly with the pink, that it might have been chosen by Botticelli instead of a Mississippi mammy. 362 AMERICA AS I SAW IT She was quite shy when we complimented her, actually covered her face with her hands, and blushed, if such a dark skin could blush. Many white women who make dancing a profession, would give a good deal to possess the grace of this stout black woman, who moved her arms and her hands, and swayed her body as to the manner born. The modern drawing-room attempt at turkey trots is vulgar and hideous in comparison with this native grace. There is no doubt that, though not physically strong, these darkies are often splendidly developed men and women, tall of stature, and extremely graceful, but they have one great failing, they will tell a lie as soon as look at you, and they love to steal small things - your stockings are their stockings, your handker- chiefs are their handkerchiefs, in their eyes, and they tell you so ; they seldom rob on a large scale. A sin is a sin ; but when it is simply and humbly acknowledged, it earns forgiveness. Once in a private railway car, a funny little incident happened with a darky. He was of Portuguese origin, and hardly understood English. He brought some hot water about seven o'clock in the morning, and proceeded to draw up the blinds. "It is very foggy," I said, wishing to be friendly. "Boggy, no boggy, me know no boggy," and he looked sadly perplexed. A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 363 "It is misty," I said in further explanation. "Oh, yes, ma'am; misty, yes, misty/' and, nodding his head, away he went. A few minutes later he returned with a tray, a bottle, and a glass. He imagined whisky was the subject of conversation, and produced it tri- umphantly at seven A.M. ! The bulk of the negroes are English speaking, and have the most beautifully soft musical voices ; but round New Orleans most of the darkies are French, and it seems as strange to hear these black folk talking French, as it is to see them with curly white hair. A boxing-match was another amusing sight. A couple of tin pails were turned upside down for the combatants to sit upon, old sacks being spread below as carpets. The two men solemnly proceeded to take off their boots ; then one, in a striped shirt, and wearing no stockings not even rags bound round his feet, as the Finlander or Italian so often does boxed in bare feet, though the other gentleman wore socks. Each had his second, and the surrounding crowd was betting on the result. Everything was done in the most businesslike way. Dollar bills pieces of paper each worth about four shillings were used, and the bills ran up to eight or ten dollars. A couple of pounds for a darky to bet is no mean sum, and shows how well off they are. 364 AMERICA AS I SAW IT They dearly love a gamble, and dice-throwing is their great game. Somehow they always remind one of children. It seems impossible to believe they are grown-up men and women, disporting themselves in such childish fashion. What a strange person the negro really is. He makes a first-class servant. A darky cook is excellent, and a butler efficient. He is often faith- ful ; many of the old slaves and their children are working to-day on the same plantations on which they were reared in bondage ; and if he takes a fancy to his employers, he will literally lay down his life for them. Everyone, however, who has anything to do with darkies, invariably speaks of them as childish, with undeveloped minds and irresponsible ways. If they are put in a position of real authority, they lose their head, become ar- rogant and unbearable, and often terribly cruel to those beneath them. They seem to have been born to serve, and not to command, as may be realised from the episodes in Putumayo. But even the black man is waking up to his own inportance. He has taken to pince-nez, like the rest of America, and he may some day be disturbed by his blood pressure, although his skin is so swarthy it is difficult to believe his blood is really red ; but it is. It strikes a stranger as most extraordinary to A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 365 see tram-cars and railway carriages labelled "Blacks," or "Whites." Yet such are universal in the Southern States. The different races are forbidden by law to intermarry, in some of the American states, and, as already mentioned, cus- tom prevents their even travelling together. Often quite a pale person gets into a Jim Crow car, and one wonders why, until the stranger is told : "He knows he has black blood and takes his place accordingly. His children may all be quite black." Only a few days before I reached New Orleans there had been a deadly shooting affray between whites and blacks. People may shrug their shoul- ders in disbelief, but the United States have a very great problem before them, and one which may cost them more lives than the Philippines : that is the increase in numbers and strength of the negro population. In that splendid modern city Washington, every third or fourth person is coloured. They are often rich and well-to-do, and are driven about in their own carriages and cars by white men, and their homes, both rich and poor, are dovetailed in between the finest dwellings. As one travels farther south, one finds that though the negroes may be less rich, they are more numerous, and it is in this enormous uneducated population that the danger lies. 366 AMERICA AS I SAW IT There are over a hundred thousand coloured folk in New Orleans alone, many of whom of the lowest possible type are employed on the docks. A hundred thousand persons compose an army, a far larger army than America herself can put in the field ; for she can only number about thirty thousand. Although whites and blacks generally live peace- ably together, there is sometimes a smouldering fire below, and when once roused, these race riots are difficult to deal with, and mean mischief. The darky is jovial and childish when at play, but he is dangerous and cruel when roused. He has given us cake walks, turkey trots, per- haps rag-time, and certainly coon songs. He is a study in himself, and his status is one of the most intricate questions of the future. The paler his skin, the more high bred and aris- tocratic he considers himself. What a wonderful problem would be unfolded if the blacks and the whites were encouraged to marry. The whites are the stronger and longer lived, the blacks the most prolific. Suppose those blondes from Scandinavia and the frizzy- headed, thick-lipped blacks from Africa all inter- married what would the result be in a hundred years ? Would a yellow-skinned, grey-coloured race people America ? It would indeed be a great study of colour, capacity, racial char- A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 367 368 AMERICA AS I SAW IT acteristics, and all the rest of it. But horrible thought would the result be a success ? Intermarriage of black and white often ends in consumption and other diseases, especially in the second generation. According to the theories of Abbe Mendel, when breeding fowls of two kinds, about fifty per cent show the mixed blood, and twenty-five per cent follow each parent, and even then certain dormant characteristics reappear in the fourth and fifth generation. How would this apply to the blacks and the whites ? Perhaps, then, it would only be necessary to have one form of tram-car, and that might be grey. The black population is enormous. Will it end in a race war ? To-day there are pro- fessors in the land who are suggesting that the only possible solution of this great problem is the absorption of the black race by the whites ; to encourage, in fact, matrimony between the two races. Will it work like the hens ? In twelve years they have made vast strides. In 1900, I never saw a darky except in some sub- servient post as railway porter, restaurant waiter, domestic servant, boot-cleaner, street- sweeper, or something of that kind. It is a terrible thing to be born with a curse upon one's head ; and really, it seems to the on- looker that the darky opens his eyes on this land A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 369 of promise to be handicapped at every turn. America has not yet solved this great problem for herself. Twelve years ago marriage between the blacks and whites was denounced in horror, and such is still the case in many states, although a famous boxer married twice, and each time was allowed to espouse a white girl. In 1904, a diamond-blazoned individual trav- elled in the Twentieth Century Express to the West, much to the amazement of an American am- bassador who was kindly looking after me on that trip. He was furious. He fretted and fumed ; the coloured gentleman had paid for his ticket, he could probably have bought us all out ; he stuck to his guns. He did not, however, come to dine, but was served by a fellow-darky in the car while we were in the restaurant. He slept in the berth next to me, in spite of all the protests of the American ambassador. In 1912 these people were everywhere. At a Club one day I was having a chat with the hall porter, a pleasant, smiling youth with the most delightful manners possible ; but he was black as a coal and his head as curly as a door-mat. "I'm learning law," he said. "Learning law ?" "Yes, m'arm, I'm going to be a lawyer, and I'm making the money at the Club, so as to study. I'm off every evening at eight, and then my real 2B 370 AMERICA AS I SAW IT work begins. This ain't no work ; it's just fun." That is the modern darky. These coloured people are queer folk. They are so insolent one wants to knock them down, even a woman feels like that ; or they are so polite one feels it is a joy to be waited on by them. People say they assimilate the ways of those about them, and a master can be judged by the manners of his servant. A good darky is a joy, a bad one wants kicking for his insolence. In one of the best hotels in America I asked the hall porter the way to a certain house. "Walk along two blocks and turn west." "Which is west ?" I ventured to ask. "West is west," he surlily replied, all the time keeping a long lighted cigar between his teeth. "I am a stranger, and would be much obliged if you would explain whether I am to go left or right." "Left," he insolently snorted, and puffed a great whiff of smoke into my face. That man wanted kicking. Then again I have known them perfectly de- lightful, especially when a white man was in sight. These children of nature have an amusing way of calling everyone "miss," and when there hap- pens to be a mother and daughter in the same es- tablishment, they will say "Miss Smith, m'arm," or "Miss Smith, miss." A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 371 It is very curious how not only the darkies but other people mix their grammar and use quaint words. For example, "Did you sleep good?" "I feel good" (well). "She made good" (meaning "she has been a success"). "He is shovelling coal" (meaning that he has died and gone to Hades). "She sat down and buzzed to me." "It is way down town." "It stuck way out." "He has a lovely disposition." "Throwing bouquets at themselves " (blowing their own trumpets). "Movies" (another title for cinematographs). "I'll send a porter right back here." "Come on back right here." "I don't think he is coming any." One wonders why "any" should stand at the end of the sentence. A house "to let" is called "for rent" or in Scotland "to feu." "You can't squelch him" is American slang for "shut him up." The white man who lives beside the black man it matters not in what country always re- fuses to assimilate with the lower race. It is so in Africa ; it is so in the West Indies ; it is so in the United States. 372 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Coloured people are terribly superstitious. At the time of the awful Galveston storm, September, 1900, when more than eight thousand human beings met their death in a few hours, perishing cruelly by wind and wave, the dark population was petrified. Above the altar of St. Mary's Cathe- dral was a large wooden crucifix. The storm had torn down the wall behind it, but in some wonder- ful manner the enormous cross, when falling out- wards, was caught, and hung there at an angle of forty-five degrees, a weird illustration of the lower- ing of the cross which the black thought an evil omen. I was in Galveston a few weeks later, and saw and heard many terrible tales. One darky, tell- ing me how he left the death-stricken town, said : - "Oh my, it was like getting out of hell !" And his simile was suggestive. It is interesting to hear the old mammy sing- ing to her baby at a street corner, or to watch her down on the wharf waiting with her picka- ninnies to give her husband his dinner. The little black children gambol and frolic like young lambs, and the mother croons away at her quaint old coon songs. There is something particularly melodious about their voices, and yet there is at the same time a sad ring in their intonation. Look at their coon songs, first introduced into London by that inimitable actor, Brandon Thomas, A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 373 whose name is best known as the author of "Charley's Aunt." They sing on all possible occasions, and are very fond of music in every form. They beat music out of an old tin can or a riddle at a cake walk. There is no doubt about it that darky blood is musical, though it has not produced any great musician, with the exception of the late Coleridge Taylor, whose works have been given at festivals all over the world, and yet died such a poor man. So badly the Arts are paid. He might have made more with a hawker's barrow. "I must take you to Begue's," exclaimed a friend in New Orleans. "And what may Begue's be ?" I enquired, of course imagining that it was some quaint building in that charming old Creole city, but it proved to be nothing of the kind. "It is an eating-house," was the reply, "or rather, as it would doubtless prefer to be called nowadays, a restaurant." The great meal of the week is on Sunday at twelve o'clock, and so popular has this dejeuner become that one has to procure seats some days in advance. We arrived in a back street, and entered a small and by no means inviting doorway. It is quite near that attractive old French market which 374 AMERICA AS I SAW IT is certainly one of the chief charms of New Orleans. Up a curious wooden stairway we tumbled, into a dining-room. There was nothing imposing about it; a frugal place, truly, to which the term eating-house seemed quite appropriate, but despite its extreme simplicity everything was clean. At one long table people were seated, and immediately at the back was the kitchen from which most savoury odours emanated. So near was it that we could hear everything cooking, and the fried food literally hopped from the pan on to the plates before us. It reminded me of the sanded floor of the famous "Cheshire Cheese" in Fleet Street, but the old Creole dining-room was still more primitive. A fat, comfortable woman in a blue print dress and large white apron at once stepped forward ; this was the renowned Madame Begue. By birth German, the good Hausfrau had studied the culinary art from her early days. Married to a Frenchman who was evidently an epicure, she and her husband by their united efforts made one of the most famous little eating-houses in the world. Madame Begue knew my companion, she was acquainted with everyone of note inNewOrleans, and in the most delightful effusive fashion shook hands with him, and at once took me to her A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 375 Drawn by Vernon Howe Bailey. AN OLD SOUTHERN CHURCH 376 AMERICA AS I SAW IT heart, so to speak, because I could talk German. She. then proudly showed me her kitchen, which was quite a small place, chiefly composed of stove, but the brass pots shone so brilliantly, the lettuces looked so bright and green, the tomatoes so red, and everything was so well kept and orderly that the visit to the kitchen was appetising in itself. Man has ever been the slave of his stomach, but since the days of epicurean Rome surely no calves' liver was ever so well cooked as in that Creole kitchen. I still cherish its memory, and am ap- parently not alone in that opinion, for a would-be poet has written the following verses in Madame's visitors' book : - New York is noted for her bridge, Ohio for her river, Edison for electric lights, But Madame B. for liver. But then this dish is Madame Begue's great specialty. Eugene Field, the American poet, wrote in that famous book : I'm very proud to testify The happiest of my days, Is March n, '95, At Breakfast at Begue's. After we were seated there was a great silence ; we almost felt as if we were in church. No one A MISSISSIPPI DARKY CAKE WALK 377 spoke above a whisper ; an air of expectation seized upon the guests. Suddenly a shrill whistle which almost made us jump from our seats rent the air. What was it ? Could it be a fire alarm or a negro rising ? It was nothing so troublesome ; merely the call of the maitre d? hotel to announce that the dejeuner was about to be served. Every course was heralded in the same weird fashion. Sweetbread omelette and red snapper fish served with tomato sauce were wonderful, to say nothing of those stewed prawns which, in New Orleans, are four or five inches long. "Mine host," in a white hat, with a white apron covering his ponderous form, was the butler, as- sisted by a couple of garqons, and after each course he came to enquire solicitously : "Madame, est-elle contente ?" He was very fat and very good-natured, this smiling Frenchman, who found the plates so hot he could hardly hold them, and the little room was so small that when we were all seated there was not much room for Monsieur to pass behind his customers. Bottles of red wine stood down the centre of the table, and were included in the menu in truly French fashion. The Begues could fill their dining-room over and over again every day, but thirty is their maximum ; they can cook for and superintend that number themselves, and no offer 378 AMERICA AS I SAW IT of gold will tempt them to increase their gains or renounce their personal attention. Formerly this old place was the dining haunt of ships' captains and wharfmen, and so it is still on week-days ; but on Sundays it is the fashionable resort, and the swells of New Orleans and visitors from afar clamour for seats at that cheap and hospitable board. The simplicity of the whole thing had a great charm, and the fact of being so near the kitchen meant that everything was served absolutely hot ; but it was very funny to see the dear old fat lady appear at the kitchen door after every course was served, pan in hand, sleeves rolled up to the elbow, just to smile on everyone and receive their ap- probation before embarking on her next dish. Inside the kitchen old darky women were wash- ing plates. CHAPTER XVII PRAIRIE PEEPS MANY horsey things are exciting, but a drive behind a pair of smart American trotters will easily hold its own. "Sit tight, say nothing, and I will make them spin," said my host. And he did. It was a glorious autumn day, and that wonder- ful river, the Hudson, was Jooking its best. The gold and yellow of the trees, deepening into dark- est russet browns, the glorious reds of the sugar maples cannot be understood until they are seen, for verily, they are scarlet, cardinal red, or orange. The vivid green of other leaves, the high rocky headlands, the wide expanse of water, its small craft, barges, and bigger river steamers, all tend to make the Hudson attractive in what our Ameri- can friends call the "Fall." They are right; it is the Fall, as the carpet of leaves lying on the ground testifies. Somehow, I was reminded of the wilder parts of Scotland certainly not the heather and the pine, or even the bracken they were missing. The beautiful colouring, the crisp 379 3 So AMERICA AS I SAW IT feeling in the air, and the bright sky overhead were there ; only all more golden and more red, more vivid in hue. Running along the east bank of the river, where the rocks are not perpendicular, as they are on the other side (which is known as the Palisades), is a roadway, and here we went for our spin. Houses dot the lawns along the Hudson River, almost from New York to Albany, for it is a famous summer resort, and some of those houses are veritable palaces, owned by the rich millionaires of Yankee-land. My host's portico possessed a double staircase which, curving down on either side to the carriage drive, ended opposite the porch door in a platform about three feet high, falling sheer. This ar- rangement is for getting into buggies or dogcarts, and by its means the occupant is not obliged to step up or down at all, but simply walks from the stone platform into the vehicle itself. These American buggies are something peculiar to the country. They are so light and fragile to look upon, that one is amazed they do not fall to pieces, especially after a drive behind the famous trotters. The spindle wheels, of which there are four, have india-rubber tyres. The little seat is so small, it seems impossible that two grown people can occupy the same, while there is no place for a man behind, but a dear collie dog did scramble in, and by some wonderful proficiency PRAIRIE PEEPS 381 in the art of balance, kept his place till our return. Like ourselves, he evidently enjoyed the excitement, because as soon as the trotters came to the door, he jumped up behind, and was always most woebegone if told to come down, although his position, clinging on at the back, could hardly have been an enviable one. Before us was a small splash-board, and in front of that again, a netted metal guard to keep back the mud ; it was really something like the guard I have sat behind in Norway, when sledging, to hold back the snow : these help to keep one clean, but are in no way efficient, as I soon learnt to my cost, by a big lump of mud getting into my eye. The horses wear very little harness, no collar at all ; a strap for a breastplate, and instead of the bearing reins, they have another strap from the top of the head to the withers. This is to give the driver some purchase over them ; without it they would become utterly uncontrollable, and to help him in such an emergency, he has a couple of loops on the reins, through which he can pass his hands, and thereby gain still greater power in holding in the excited steeds. Once started off at their full pace, trotters cannot easily be pulled up ; therein lies the danger. A pair of good trotters will cost as much as five thousand dollars ; so, as can readily be understood, they are a luxury. They certainly do not look 382 AMERICA AS I SAW IT worth their value, for they are a weedy lot in ap- pearance ; having long legs, long bodies, long necks, long tails, they seem composed of extremities, with very little body of a horse at all. The fact is, they are all muscle, and although so thin to look upon (they are a small stamp of horse from Ken- tucky) manage to eat more than any other breed. Being comfortably tucked up with a rug in the buggy, and a golf cape to keep away the mud, we started. A minute or two, and we were out of the grounds on the Hudson River road. Away we spun. A good deal more is done in the manage- ment of these trotters, by word of mouth, than by the reins, and so splendidly are these animals trained that they obey, not instantly (for that is impossible with the pace), but gradually. To give some idea of the lightning speed at which a trotter can go, a mile has often been done in two minutes and four seconds along the "speedway," a drive outside New York, lying a little beyond Central Park. So wild a career as this, however, cannot be kept up, although a pair such as my host was handling would accomplish sixteen or eighteen miles an hour quite easily. Think of it ! Eigh- teen miles an hour behind a pair of horses. Of course, action is out of the question. They have no time for that sort of thing. They simply go, and one feels that they are going so fast it would be impossible to pull up in an emergency. Every PRAIRIE PEEPS 383 muscle in their bodies seems to work ; they have barely time to switch their tails as they tear along. It is a curious thing that in so great a sporting country as England fast trotters have never really been established, for England is the home of all sport, and the originator of most ; but in this par- ticular case the honour belongs to America, and its means of perfection also. Of course, the horses are trained, but they are always the descendants of trotters to begin with, and are at their best from four to nine years of age. Much depends on their speed, but much more on their lungs, for a horse which is not sound in the wind could never be trained to become a trotter at all. On we flew past Yonkers, and through Irvington, the leaves falling from the trees like a veritable shower of gold, as the wind swept up the river. Who will deny that it was exciting ? But some- how, in spite of the pleasure and the novelty, I felt that it was a terrible strain on the animals them- selves. The jar of coming down upon the hard roadway at such a pace must be felt by them, and it cannot be good to tear along at such speed, although their condition was so perfect that they were, as I said before, without one superfluous ounce of flesh on their bodies, and they hardly turned a hair. When we reached home, the dear old collie dog was still hanging on behind, and the trotters did not 384 AMERICA AS I SAW IT look any the worse for their spin. There was no froth about their mouths, nor were their coats even damp, and they went off cheerfully to the stable, to be thoroughly well rubbed and blanketed. America is to be congratulated upon her trotters, and an hour behind a smart pair of them is an ex- perience worth remembering. While writing of horses it may be as well to tell a little story that happened to the writer : One day, in New York, I was on Fifth Avenue, the only quiet, peaceable street in all that vast city, for it is not riddled with tram-car lines or overhead railways, and therefore one can cross the road without peril to life. It began to rain ; I had no umbrella, and alas, was wearing my best hat. Every woman will sympathise, for we all treasure in our hearts the possession of a best hat. Stand- ing in the doorway of a druggist's shop for some minutes, I watched the rain descending steadily, and there being no omnibus and no sign of one, I decided I should have to be extravagant and in New York it is a veritable extravagance and take a hansom home. Now, be it understood, a drug-store is not like ours in England ; for, while one counter is given up to drugs, the other sells "soft drinks." Is this arrangement prophetic? Do they drink too many iced concoctions on the one side and require physic on the other ? Anyway, the druggist seems to do a thriving trade, and both PRAIRIE PEEPS 385 branches prosper. Going up to a man at the iced- drinks counter, I ventured to ask : " Do you think I could possibly get a hansom cab ?" He looked at me, and, seizing a tumbler in his hand, "No, ma'am/' he said, "but I can mix you a horse's neck." He thought I was mad, and I thought he was rude, but after all it was nothing ; for one of the soft drinks in America is called a "horse's neck," and, as I subsequently found, is extremely good. It is composed of ginger ale with the entire rind of a lemon, and well iced, and as the man thought my "hansom cab," was a drink, he imagined a "horse's neck" would do quite as well. "Where are you going to, next ?" a friend asked one day. "Coss. Cobb. Conn." "Where ?" "Coss. Cobb. Conn.," was my reply. "What do you mean ?" "What I say. " Wyndy Goul." Coss. Cobb. Conn." The interrogator looked surprised. But the address was correct, and my host and hostess were the author of "Wild Animals I Have Known," Ernest Thompson-Seton, and his brilliant wife. Born in England, he was taken to America by his father at the age of six, and then sent 2C 386 AMERICA AS I SAW IT back to the land of his birth to be educated. He rambled, and tried his hand at many things. Then he began to lecture. I was at one of his early lectures in the Carnegie Hall, New York, in October, 1900. Mark Twain was beside me, and we went on to the platform afterwards. It was not much of a lec- ture ; the hall was not very full, and the hero was just feeling his way. He has given hundreds, almost thousands of lectures since then, all over England and America, and his name is known to every boy and girl who loves animals. Thompson- Seton's success has come. Mark Twain (Mr. Clemens) was a curious per- sonality. I only saw him once or twice, but I always felt he owed far more to his wife than the world knew. After her death he never wrote another successful work. He chaffed Americans, and they loved him ; but then he lived mostly abroad, so he did not have to explain personally what he meant by his little jokes. Mr. Seton's " Wyndy Goul " is a home after the hunter's own heart. Thirty miles northeast of New York, the house stands on a small hill in a wood. It is an artistic place, with large open fire- places and bearskins on the floors ; but the walks around are the chief joy. It was a few days before Christmas when I was there ; four or five inches of ice covered the lake ; but the sun shone, and when the wind dropped at PRAIRIE PEEPS 387 sundown, it seemed more like September than December. Mr. Seton has many hobbies ; one is his skunk yard, where he is breeding these queer little black furry beasts experimentally; the last thing at night, however cold or wet, he went out to feed and look after the welfare of his young families. There is far more of the artist than the hunter in the appearance of the "Chief Scout of America." He is tall and thin, with dark hair, and penetrating dark eyes shaded by gold-rimmed glasses. It is a benevolent face, and one sees the gentle nature that turned its back on hunting big game, preferring to study the animals' habits in the wild, and then to paint or lecture about them, rather than shoot them. That charming home, that motor-car, that little flat in New York, all the luxury and comfort, are earned by the fertile brain of this artist-writer of English origin and American habitation. Mr. Seton is casual by nature, not to say a wee bit untidy ; he can himself find what he wants in his big workroom, but to anyone else it is a chaos of skins and pictures, books or Indian dresses, stuffed birds or native beadwork ; just a hunter's hodge-podge. An excellent picture by Zorn of Mrs. Seton in her ride-astride dress stands on an easel. It re- minded me of my first ride astride as a girl in 388 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Iceland in 1886, and of the many thousands of miles I have traversed in that fashion since then. She has accompanied her husband on his rambles, and a big moose head in the dining-room fell to her rifle. Just a short motor trip from the Thompson- Setons' home is a very wonderful place called Indian Harbor. The whole of Greenwich is famous for its beautiful homes. In fact it shelters many mil- lionaires and multi-millionaires along the length of its shore from New York to Boston. Indian Harbor which was built by Commodore E. C. Benedict, the banker might be Amalfi, and as it appeared a few days before Christmas, with the sun shining upon the water, Long Island in the dis- tance, and its beautiful Italian pergolas and the wonderful colouring of the clear sky, one felt it might have been Italy on a winter's day, instead of Connecticut. Few American women have travelled as much about their own country as the writer. Many of them have never been outside their own state. I have spent days and nights going from one end of the United States to another, although I have not been farther west than Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas, or El Paso. What contrasts the vast territory of the States presents. Compare the concentrated, overpacked PRAIRIE PEEPS 389 capsules of human life in New York with the diluted medicine draught in Texas, where the population is so meagre and widely dispersed that it is difficult to find a trace of the medicine at all. One hails with joy that delightfully interesting old pseudo- Spanish town San Antonio. Think of those miles and miles, and hundreds of miles of bleak, barren lands in Texas and Arizona. Sand, sand, nothing but sand, without a blade of grass pretending to grow and like a desert waste, never a tree sel- dom a shrub only cactus here and there for the beasts. Parts of the Argentine are quite as hideous, but there the land will grow anything, and yield five crops a year of alfalfa. There are still millions of acres of undeveloped land --land not yet homogeneously settled; but how are the people to be established in the coun- try when they prefer the squalor of the towns ? Think of the ugly little frame houses all made to one pattern, like children's Noah's Arks, and quite as weirdly painted, that may be found miles and miles apart. Some green, with great, gaunt white-rimmed eyes or windows ; some with death- like apertures marked out in red. Tin roof, wooden roof, some balcony, no balcony ; all young, raw, square ; some cosy, some drear. Such are the homes often to be seen on the prairie, no flowers, no gardens, no creepers growing up those naked walls, just hideous, hideous, hideous in 390 AMERICA AS I SAW IT which men, women, and children grind out their existence. That wooden buildings are allowed in towns in the promiscuous way they are is surprising. Ex- cept in the heart of the city any sort of wooden shanty seems permissible, and yet one fire can sweep away acres of these Noah's Ark playhouses. Municipal councils appear as indifferent to the pub- lic good as sleeping car managers are to the hy- gienic condition of travellers. One reads " Destruction of City by Fire," and in England we think of some fine city like Milan, or Barcelona, Hamburg, or Edinburgh, being swept away in a few hours ; but we need not weep ; it is more a subject for rejoicing. It means the sweep- ing away of ugly yellow, green, or red, wooden houses, built anyhow, in a hurry, and tumbled out on the world in the same kindly fashion that they are swept off again by flame. These hideous little frame towns are spread all over America. Thirty years ago, Denver was one of them. Now, it is a fine city. Although the big cities begin to build stone houses, the small towns are all "prairie ", and on prairie nothing else but a wooden homestead is known. Everyone rises at daybreak and goes to bed when it is dark, to save oil. The men are away in the saddle all day. It From The New New York. A DOWNTOWN CANON IN NEW YORK Drawn by Joseph Pennell. PRAIRIE PEEPS 391 sounds so lovely, but ten or twelve hours of saddle work is mighty monotonous, and old ranch horses are not exciting. I've done it all myself, and galloped across the open prairies after the wild bulls when they were being caught for the ring. They " round up cattle," count them again and again, brand them every year, make and mend corrals incessantly, go to market to buy or sell, and shoot something for the pot when chance offers. Anyway, the men have some diversion, some change of scene in the monotony of prairie life, even if they return home at dusk, bodily ex- hausted from the open air in this wild, healthy, unsettled, unintellectual ranch life. Far-sighted people don't look for trouble. But what of the women ? My heart aches when I think of the women I have seen tens of miles from anywhere gently born, daintily reared, strong, beautiful young American and English women, who have left their paternal homes, in which they have been surrounded by all the wealth and re- finement of life, young girls who have gone off drawn by the glamour of love to drag out this weary lonesome life, where they become nothing but charwomen. The post comes once a week or less. Intellectual interest does not exist. Neighbours are seldom seen. Roads there are none, although the advent of motor-cars has brought people somewhat more together than formerly ; but it is 392 AMERICA AS I SAW IT a drear, lonesome life for a gentlewoman, and one that no man should lightly ask her to undertake. Glorious sunsets, an occasional mirage, the ever- lasting croak of the grasshopper, and the weird wild cry of the coyote at night, are the music in the silence of this life. The picturesque cowboy is no more, except in Mexico ; the danger to life has practically passed, adventures seldom occur, and only dull monotony remains on the ranch, where the life of the prairie makes some characters and mars others. It is always a toss-up. A ranch near a town is different ; but few ranches are near towns, and then the loneliness and isola- tion for the woman is well-nigh intolerable. To read, continue her music or her singing, to keep her home even clean after the ravages of a dust- storm, all require heroic effort, where the daily routine of washing and mending, or cooking and scrubbing, wears her out bodily before the evening arrives. Only the strongest should attempt it ; only a philosopher can endure it in contentment. The women on the ranches are often real heroines. They strive to make the home civilised, they en- deavour to keep it pretty and refined against enor- mous odds. And the ranches without a woman soon show to what depths of ruffianism men can descend in appearance though not in heart if there is no woman to keep them up to the mark. PRAIRIE PEEPS 393 Ranch life is for young blood, for the youth with- out ambition, and the wild young animal. It is not for a cultured woman. She pines away in the cage, or throws her culture to the winds, and be- comes "one of them." I remember a girl and three brothers. They had come out [from a Lincolnshire parsonage ; first, two brothers, and later the sister, and the youngest brother, when the home was dismantled. "I do all I can," she said ; "I try to keep up my music, and in return I insist that one night a week we shall all dress for dinner, and have a musical evening. I won't let the boys forget to be gentle- men, but they are so tired we are all so tired, we can't do it often. But at Christmas and on birth- days, and on Sunday nights, we all dress up smart, and have a little social evening ; then whenever a friend is handy we ask him to join us. It is an effort," she continued, "but it is worth it." Slack ways which some men think a joke, some women think an insult. Courtesy in a man is a great gift. I said men become uncouth. They don't shave - why should they ? They let their hair grow long ; why not ? there is no one to cut it. They cease to wear linen collars, because there is nobody to wash or iron them. Besides, they wear out quickly and there is no shop from which they can replace them. College men lead these lives. They become 394 AMERICA AS I SAW IT wild men of the woods to look upon, and some for amusement merely go to the nearest town to spend their time in the saloons, and let themselves go - but there are others, God bless them, who become more and more idealistic, more chivalrous, more manly, and when they meet a woman, treat her as a queen. I have met such men ; their hearts ache, but they nurse their ideals. To such men, such re- fined natures, ranch life is hell. They are veritable heroes, for they cling to all that is best. It is a hard life, with poor pay, and they just rot away and die. The far-away sound of the engine and the bell, as the locomotive draws her heavy load of Pullman cars or freight waggons across the desert, is the only sound of life, as the two trains a day pass over the prairie. Ranch life is romantic in books : but it so often leads to nothing save emptiness of pocket and lone- liness of soul. It is really a necessity that houses should be built of wood on the prairie, because bricks or concrete are unprocurable though wood was once cheap. Yes, was once; yes, once, hence wooden fences and wooden houses, but the forests have been cut down, and nothing has been planted instead, so wire fencing is employed to-day. Frame houses them- selves have become more expensive, and every form of wooden decoration and porch is therefore tabooed. PRAIRIE PEEPS 395 Men cut the trees down ruthlessly. Someone said they used four hundred and fifty feet of lum- ber a year per inhabitant in the United States, as against sixty feet in Europe. As they are tearing down at this pace, and four fifths of the timber in the States is in private hands, it is about time for the Government to intervene, and see that the rainfall and climate of the country is properly protected through its timber. In Switzerland and France the handling of private forest lands is pro- tected by the State, so that the individual may not injure the public welfare. America will have to do the same. Wake up, Brother Jonathan ; you are napping again, and letting single individuals go to sleep at your expense. It is rather amusing to hear the Americans talk about their woods and forests. As a rule, these "forests" do not contain trees in our sense of the word, but merely saplings. We should not even call them woods. They are just wild plantations, the average trees of these forests being, perhaps, a foot in circumference, except, of course, in the wondrous Yellowstone Park or such districts. Another term which the Britisher might con- sider misapplied is "hunting the duck and shooting the fox." When a man goes out duck shooting, he calls it hunting, and strange as it may appear, the fox is not hunted or chased in America, except in Virginia, but battalions of people sally forth 396 AMERICA AS I SAW IT with a certain number of dogs, each gun being stationed at some particular point, and as the dogs chase the fox before them, the man shoots it with the gun. So they call it "shooting the fox, and hunting the duck". "I am going hunting," is a remark one con- stantly hears'm England ; it conveys the impression of Monsieur Reynard and a pack of hounds. But "I am going hunting," means nothing of the kind in America. It means shooting with a gun, or, as the Americans call it, "a hunting gun". They take a hunting dog with them, not a pointer or a setter, and apparently the most usual way of en- joying the sport is to join a "Hunting and Fishing Club ", which raises pheasants for its members, ensuring to each so many days' sport. It is not uncommon to pass posts on which are the words, "Hunting forbidden" (meaning shooting), with the same notice written below in Italian, " Evietate cacciare" These Italian words indicate the enormous influx of those people into the coun- try, showing that they are sufficiently numerous to necessitate warnings in their native lingo. On the electric railways similar notices may also be found in Italian not to touch the "live" rail. Travelling through the country in America, where the dis- tances are so vast, is often like travelling in a wilderness. Travelling in Britain, where the dis- tances are so small, is like one continuous garden. PRAIRIE PEEPS 397 Across the Atlantic one misses the parks and country-seats ; one misses those dear little thatched cottages, alas, so rapidly disappearing from our midst, just as the gamekeeper's velveteen jacket has already vanished. Almost every inch of England, Germany, France, and Austria is cultivated. Tens of thousands of miles in America are uncultivated. The soil would not yield anything. Cattle can barely keep alive upon it, and four or five acres of grass are often required for each beast. Change is recreation, and it is a change and a recreation to leave the overstocked, overculti- vated lands of Europe, for the understocked, under- cultivated prairies of the Western States. How many good people there are in the world, and how few interesting ones, is a reflection driven home with the force of a sledge-hammer, in the wilds. Goodness is so often negative. One can behave disgracefully, too, in a negative way, by not doing or saying the right thing at the right moment. Is there any city anywhere that decreases in size ? Wherever one goes in Europe, Asia, Africa, or America, every township seems to have grown enormously in ten years. All these new people are not born there ; many of them have come from the land. The land itself must be made more attrac- tive, it must render better payment eventually, or 398 AMERICA AS I SAW IT it will only be inhabited by the weak-brained, strong-bodied, animal man and woman, while the towns will increasingly call for the brighter minds, the intellectual pushers, who gradually deteriorate and fall out in the struggle for bread, that goes on unceasingly in the life of a vast city. Prac- tically all cities grow. We, who live in any particular town, think it grows faster, and better, and greater than any other city all the world over. Nothing is so big that some place is not bigger in some way or other. Each land, each city, each nation, has its good and its bad. The great thing is to learn toleration, and acquire the art of gentle comparison and emulation. Talking of cities, St. Louis wafts two recollections to my mind : a blizzard and an exhibition. An American blizzard once experienced will never be forgotten. The wind was so awful, the snow was so blinding, the hurly-burly was so hideous, that it was almost impossible to enter the hotel through double sets of doors. A great strong por- ter hauled me from the cab, and holding me by the arm, ran me into the hostelry. American weather is certainly extreme. It is extremely beautiful, clear, bright, invigorating ; or it is extremely bad, and blizzards and rains, as the Irishman would say, "like the very devil". Dare it be acknowledged that an Englishwoman passed through St. Louis when the Exhibition was PRAIRIE PEEPS 399 in full fling, and did not get out of her car to look at it ? One exhibition is much the same as another, and having seen two or three in Paris and London, being also alone, on a six days and six nights con- tinuous travel from Chicago to Mexico, I was con- tent to look at the buildings from the train in the early morning light, and I probably have the hon- our of being the only lunatic who passed through the "greatest Exhibition in the World," -for, of course, being in America, it must have been the greatest, and did not descend from her car. When I returned, St. Louis treated me to a bliz- zard as a punishment. Kansas City was kinder. The sun shone, and Kansas City is going fast ahead. In 1900, Houston, Texas, was an awful spot, but even such an uninviting place as Houston is now a thriving inland cotton port ; just as Galveston is to-day shipping hundreds of thousands of bales of cotton yearly, for Galveston rebuilt its hideous wooden houses, and is flourishing again. The Mississippi valley is a wonderful place. I remember that great wide river with its curious boats laden with cotton, and the darkies handling the bales. So few of us realise that the Mississippi River is navigable for two thousand five hundred miles, and that its tributaries drain over forty per cent of the United States, while the waters from thirty states are pouring into its lower reaches. 400 AMERICA AS I SAW IT It is this vastness of America that is so amazing, this great size, this great wealth of water power and water transport, that impress the stranger. We appreciate it all until we are told "it is the biggest in the world ". Painting the lily spoils the flower. CHAPTER XVIII WONDERFUL WASHINGTON OF course the United States, being "the greatest place on God's earth", and its President, "the greatest power in the world ", according to the idea of most Americans, it would be mighty presump- tuous to suggest that so large a country is badly handicapped by such a short term of office. It appears to the "foreigner" that for the first year the new President is busy giving office to his numerous friends and followers, and generally find- ing his way about. The second and third years he begins to stand on his own feet, so to speak, and the fourth year he spends his time in struggling hard to keep on them. So that at the end of four years, when he is of the most value to his country, he has to go. Therefore, only about half the time of his office really counts. From Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, the country is upheaved every four years. There is a sort of " general post " ; even Judges except those splendid men in the United States Supreme Court go out of office. Is this unrest, this in- stability, good for any land ; does it lead to honesty or discourage place seekers ? 2D 401 402 AMERICA AS I SAW IT The entire regime, even the servants at the White House, are changed. Black domestics suc- ceed white domestics, and even Mrs. President has to put her house in order, instead of its being kept going like a large, well-organised hotel in which Mr. and Mrs. President become the principal guests for the short term of four years. No, out go the servants, out goes the organisa- tion ; everything must be new, everything strange ; every experiment has to be gone through over again both by the head of the administration and his spouse. For instance, the Roosevelts had white servants. The Tafts had black ones, and so on. A presidentship of seven years' duration might promote more restfulness and would probably give better results ; at least, so thinks an alien. The Lord Mayor of London steps into a ready- made establishment. The servants (except his own private ones) belong to the Mansion House where plate, linen, silver, secretaries, and regula- tions are all ready waiting ; so neither the Lord Mayor nor the Lady Mayoress has to bother with such details. Not so at the White House ; there all is change, everlasting change and experiment. Why do people abuse that White House ? The White House, so often ridiculed, is really a very charming place ; or rather it appears even more WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 43 I THE-RE. ARE NO COW BOX S THERE IS NO POLICE Pj TYRANNY _ r 1 THE^EARE HARDLV ANY DEATHS ON TTHt RX3TBAL-L. FlEl-O THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH PEOPLE. HURT AT ,5^1 Crattfw by W. K. Hasdden. Reproduced by permission of the London Dally Mirror. WHY AMERICANS FIND LONDON DULL 404 AMERICA AS I SAW IT charming than it is because it is set back in a small park, and the double carriage drive and the trees show off its Greek stone pillars to advan- tage. It has a frontage about one third of that of Buckingham Palace, but is without the courtyards at the back ; and it is just the nice large com- fortable handsome house of a private gentleman. It is not regal, although the two tall darky butlers, who fling back the doors, give an air of regality to the scene ; and the suites of rooms are imposing enough when Mrs. President dispenses tea before a large open log-fire. Portraits of former Presidents by indifferent artists do not add aesthetically to the rooms, though they are, no doubt, of great interest to the people. The Lord Mayor of London and the President of Mexico receive about the same income, viz. ten thousand pounds ($50,000) a year. The President of the United States now receives nearly double that sum. Even this is not a fortune to work on, as they are often poor men, and they have many calls on their money, while public entertaining swallows much of the income. General Diaz lived at his simple castle on the rock of Chapultepec, or his private home at Cadena Street, like a dignified citizen. He had a guard of soldiers, it is true, and aides-de-camp, but his life was unobtrusive, and he often walked or rode WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 405 alone in the streets. After thirty-five years of office, he left his country a very poor man. The Lord Mayor of London has no soldier guard, but he also is a private individual, and the fine old Mansion House run for him while he controls our City limits he tenants for a year only. The poor President of the United States of America is head of nearly a hundred millions of people, and in such a short spell of office, he never gets time to settle down. His home is quite in keeping with his means, and now that it is all done up in fine Georgian style inside, it is a very charming home, too. The rooms display good taste, dignity, and space. Whoever re-decorated them is certainly to be congratulated on having banished those awful yellow brocades of Mr. Roosevelt's day. I like the White House both inside and out. Several attempts have been made to turn this Presidential Residence into a sort of Royal Palace ; and women have been known to curtsey to the President as though he were Royalty. Invita- tions from the White House are seldom refused, being considered in the light of a royal command ; but all this is rather absurd in a Republic, which should be Republican in this respect above all things. After a very pleasant chat with two suc- cessive Presidents, I cannot imagine anybody less likely to desire a woman's curtsey. Both were 406 AMERICA AS I SAW IT delightfully hearty, frank, impetuous, enthusiastic men, to whom conventionality must have been a bore almost beyond endurance, and yet there are those in Washington who want to tie up Society in all the red tape of Court life. Society in Washington is delightful ; but it is very rigid, although it is sometimes asked to accept some strange folk among the diplomatic circles. It is difficult to draw comparisons between Society in England and America. The best is always the best in every land, and so much like its neighbour, that there is little to choose between either. Personally I had a lovely time, thanks to the kindness of the President and Mrs. Taft, Ex- President Roosevelt, the British Ambassador and Mrs. Bryce, the Attorney-General and Mrs. Wicker- sham, the Speaker and Mrs. Champ Clark, Major and Mrs. Sydney Cloman, Captain and Mrs. Gib- bons (Annapolis), Captain and Mrs. Simpson, Hon. John Barrett, Hon. Charles and Mrs. Fairbanks, the late Hon. John and Mrs. Hay, Mr. and Mrs. Allerton Cushman, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Willert (of the London Times), Major Leonard, Mr. and Mrs. Harold Walker, Mrs. Ely, Mr. and Mrs. Arsene Pujo, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Carter, Professor Willis Moore, Mr. John Griffiths the brilliant American Consul- General in London and his wife, Senor Algarra, WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 407 Mr. Maurice Low, Mr. and Mrs. George Becker, Madame O'Kabe. The best Society in America is to be found in Washington, the most cosmopolitan and beautiful city in the States. Of course, Boston claims to be the intellectual centre, just as Washington aspires to harbour the elite of Society. It is a social world a world literally ; for every nationality is rep- resented among the Embassies, and thus it ceases to be American, and is thoroughly cosmopolitan. There are no great business concerns, there is no gambling as in Wall Street or in the Pit ; nearly everyone living there has a government salary or belongs to a profession. There is great wealth, too, because the western millionaires have bought or built vast homes in Washington, and go there for the season. Many of them have bought them- selves into Congress, too ; for politics in America are not all they should be as regards bribery and corruption. Speaking roughly, Washington Society is dis- tinctly political. It has not any great salon, nor any woman who is a leader, although nearly all the women there are interested in politics ; and it is in every way a political centre, just as Boston is unmistakably literary. Then again New York and Chicago are distinctly business strongholds. Both have a flavouring of art and literature which has progressed rapidly within the 4 o8 AMERICA AS I SAW IT last few years, but business predominates, and politics are in the background. It seems so strange that no American woman has so far been able to form a salon. In the seven- teenth and eighteenth centuries, in England and France, salons were at their height. In the nine- teenth century they lingered on in England, though in France they fell with the Empire. In London, in Edinburgh, in Dublin, and some smaller towns there are women to-day who by sheer individuality attract people to their homes. It is easy enough for the rich to open a restau- rant ; but it requires less food and more brains to maintain a salon. There are women in London - great political leaders who entertain lavishly, and there are women with small homes where every- body who is anybody can be met. The moment anyone who is no one frequents a house, someone who is someone ceases to go. Over the tea cups, diplomats, authors, painters, actors, men and women of brains, can be found in those drawing-rooms. Large subjects are dis- cussed in small salons. England and Germany are producing the greatest thinkers of the day, but in the matter of salons Germany is far behind, be- cause her women are not yet as advanced as the women of England or America. America ought to have her salons; but she has not. Why ? WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 409 A smiling welcome from a good hostess, useful introductions between suitable people, a little trouble and much tact, and the thing is done, pro- vided the men cooperate. In America, till now, the men have failed to do so. The bulk of the people, the mass, take no in- terest whatever in politics. They are far, far less concerned in them than Europeans, and people who are keen, are keen over a dozen different things. They ran three distinct candidates for the Presi- dency in 1912, and several hundreds of under-men for subordinate posts. Everyone seemed to have a different opinion on every subject, and on every individual. There is certainly little concentration and much indifference. The British workingman is far more alive to the government of his country and himself than the American. There is a curious resemblance between Mr. Taft of the Republican platform and Mr. Roose- velt of the Progressive one. Both men have a sense of humour in their speeches, they have twinkling eyes, prominent noses, double chins, broad fore- heads, and are of heavy bulk ; in fact, the physical resemblance between these two men is quite strik- ing. Whether the atmosphere of the White House influences its Presidents the writer knows not, but they both have the same geniality, the same cheer- 410 AMERICA AS I SAW IT fulness, the same jolly, hail-fellow-well-met manner that is so pleasing to the stranger. They are neither of them orators, but both are forceful speakers. They take their audience into their confidence and proceed to have a little friendly cheerful chat. Their minds are quick and their words ready. They both speak with broad American accents, and again we must repeat that in method, style, and looks, on the platform there is a strange likeness between these two men who were once such friends, and later such bitter en- emies. It is mighty hard to climb the little stool of repentance. Speaking of Roosevelt, a man once said to me :- "He is a demigod with only one idea, and that one idea is himself. He is wrapped in egoism, and that egoism is Roosevelt. He is undoubtedly a humanitarian, but his ideals are lost in the Ego which blinds him. He is the greatest psychological study of the age. He was the autocrat of the White House, and its demigod. He may come up again for election with only his own individ- uality and personality for his party. The Pro- gressive party is merely another spelling for the word 'Roosevelt." Another time I asked a darky what he thought of Mr. Roosevelt. "I never knew any man make WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 411 so many soap-suds and do so little washing/' was his reply. "Roosevelt is dangerous because Roosevelt is able," said a third. Another man called him "the boy President, because he is so irresponsible, ingenuous, and has the enthusiasm of youth. He has never probably earned a dollar in his life, and, it is said, was the first President from Washington onwards, who was not a man of affairs." "Roosevelt has awakened every conscience in the United States except his own," said a woman. Everyone had something to say about him in 1912; and he certainly was deeply beloved by many and cordially hated by some. If the conversation could evade blood pressure, it invariably turned to Mr. Roosevelt. "Wilson, of course, is a well-equipped scholar," some one remarked, "but he must remember our President is only one of a group. The Cabinet settles the policy of the party, and whether Mr. Wilson's Cabinet will uphold all Mr. Wilson's ideas remains to be seen." Philosophical politics are extinguished by De- mocracy. And what shall a stranger say of the latest ex- periment in Presidents ? Woodrow Wilson is an educator, scholar, thinker, historian, a student of man and of man's living 412 AMERICA AS I SAW IT conditions. At Princeton University he was a leader and director of college boys. Will he be able to lead and direct the grown-up boys of America ? It was Whittier, was it not, who wrote "that men are only grown-up boys." It is interesting to note that Woodrow Wilson was the first man to be made President of the United States, who, up to the moment of his inau- guration, was universally known and referred to as "Doctor," this title being in recognition of his scholarly attainments. This in itself was a unique and eloquent circumstance, flattering to the country. It is indicative of a desire on the part of the United States to select as their chief magistrate, a man not only sound of character, clever of purpose, and of resolute courage, but signally known for his mental attainments and culture, in striking contrast to past presidential selections from soldiers, lawyers, and politicians. All Europe applauded, and regard- less of the policies or the politics of the man chosen, congratulated the States on the type of man now elected to such high office. It would seem as though certain high perhaps new standards of presidential qualifications had been set, and that in the selection of Dr. Wilson for the office these standards have been fully met. Honest, strong in spirit and mentality, he is WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 413 without the practical experience of a statesman. True, but will that prove a disadvantage ? The President of to-day, by title "doctor," is expected to decide upon the exact nature of national dis- orders, ascertain the proper treatment, or opera- tion, necessary to bring about the cure, and finally to put into effect the treatment or operation required. This is the Herculean task which confronts the new, "scholar President." All doctors like to prescribe, and with his splen- did preparation, courage, newly acquired power, and the pressure of the Democratic party with its demands and howls for change and reform, will he be able to resist the temptation to try and set things right too quickly by special treatment ? Or will he be wise enough, strong enough, big enough, to realise that he must work through the people, all the people, big and little, rich and poor, powerful or weak, rather than by means of drastic legislation, in order to effect a substantial and last- ing improvement in the existing national evils of to-day. Dr. Woodrow Wilson made a wonderful appeal to business men after his election, and before tak- ing up office. He asked for their cooperation and honest counsel. He spoke the words of a statesman pleading for justice, and asking for assistance they were not the words of a demagogue. "We must see to it that the business of the 4H AMERICA AS I SAW IT United States is set absolutely free of every feature of monopoly." Again he said : "Life is a little thing. Life lasts only a little while, and if it goes out lighted by the torch of glory, it is better than if it had lasted upon a dull level a thousand years." In that speech made in Chicago in January, 1913, on business, President-Elect Wilson appealed directly to the managers of big business interests for their support in the work of the nation which he was so soon to undertake. This was gratifying and leads one to believe that, in spite of the great power placed in his hands, the tremendous pressure of his party, and the temptation to effect an im- mediate cure, the good " Doctor" will be sagacious enough to move slowly and with caution, enlisting the sympathy and assistance of the "big interests" as well as the small, with the probability of arriving at his goal. May his hard hits at big corporations awaken individualism and enterprise again. The tariffs enable monopolists to organise, and it is the tariff he singles out for attack. May good fortune go with him. Next to Dr. Woodrow Wilson comes William Jennings Bryan, now Secretary of State. There is no doubt that Bryan is strong and forceful. I was very much struck by the fact when I heard him speak in Madison Square, where WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 415 he walked from one platform to another to deliver his addresses to the greatest possible number of people. But it was a curious thingfor a Secretary of State to make his first speech to show how another country viz. England should govern Ireland. What a contrast ! One day to see all the pageant and display of the opening of the Houses of Parliament in Ottawa by His Royal Highness the Duke of Connaught, and hear his splendid reading of the Speech from the Throne ; and twelve days later, to hear Mr. Taft's speech read in Washington. Luck brought me to Ottawa on November 21, 1912. On that day the Parliament of King George V was opened by his Representative and Uncle at the Senate House in that town. I suppose I had not thought much about it be- fore, and, therefore, it came as a surprise that any- thing so regal, so impressive, so redolent of London itself, could be possible outside the capital of the Empire. It chanced to be a beautiful day. The snow had gone, the sun was shining brilliantly, the whole air was gay. The Senate Chamber is about the same size as our House of Lords ; and is also covered in red. At the end, on the dai's, almost a facsimile, though not quite so grand as that at Westminster, were the Chairs of State, on which the Duke and Duchess of Connaught sat during the 416 AMERICA AS I SAW IT ceremony ; for His Royal Highness read his Speech from the Throne sitting, although he raised his plumed hat every time he addressed the "Gentle- men of the Senate" or the "Gentlemen of the House of Commons." On the " floor of the House " sat the officials with their wives, in full evening dress, at half-past two in the afternoon. One might have been in London ; the women were so well gowned, they were so pretty, their manners so nice, and the general air of every- thing was so smart. I had no idea there was so much wealth, or so much similarity to a great Eng- lish function, to be seen in Canada. The entrance of the Royal people was regal. The Duchess rested her hand on that of the Duke in exactly the same way as the Queen of England rests her hand on that of the King, as she proceeds with dignified step along the Royal Gallery to the House of Lords. I have several times seen this function from the former, though not being a Peeress, I have not had the honour of witnessing the rest of the ceremony in the House of Lords itself, where only Peers or Peeresses or officials have seats. The Duchess's train was carried by two pages in royal red, and the cortege was heralded, although the real heralds were not there, and followed by the various members of the suite. She was smiling bravely although only just off a bed of sickness. How brave royalty are. WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 417 It was certainly impressive. Two things, how- ever, struck me as lacking. One, the depth of the obeisance of the ladies ; in Great Britain we curtsey much lower to Royalty. The second thing was the entrance of both men and women to their seats after the proceedings had begun. This seemed to show a little want of respect. Just as people are shut out at concerts during the performance of the music, surely the same should apply to all those who are not in their seats at the appointed time for a State ceremony. That, and a murmur of voices during the proceedings, showed an absence of eti- quette even good manners. Otherwise the whole proceeding was impressive ; the interest of the people, the crowds who had flocked to enjoy the spectacle from the galleries and also outside, the delightful tones in which His Royal Highness read his Speech, the calm, manly dignity of his bearing, and also his charming pronunciation when he repeated the entire Speech from the Throne, word for word, in the French language. It seems that the Duchess of Connaught is an excellent French scholar, and speaks that language almost like a native. The Governor-general is not quite so fluent, but his accent is extraordinarily good, especially so for an Englishman. It was a very gay scene, very pretty, and very dignified. With the punctuality of Kings, their Royal Highnesses arrived at the exact moment, and 2E 4 i 8 AMERICA AS I SAW IT everything was done to time. What a pity it is that there is not a little more reverence in the United States. There is no doubt a pageant impresses, demands respect, and is a very good thing for everybody. Besides, in the heart of hearts of every man and woman, pageantry and display are loved. We all love pageants ; we all love show, just as we have within our inmost hearts some hankering after religion, some faint tinge of superstition, and some form of ideal. We may pretend to be prosaic, we may like to be thought materialistic ; yet in some degree or other we are all idealists, dreamers, and lovers of the beautiful. Shyness often prevents our better instincts hav- ing full play. We strangle what is best in us. Twelve days after that royal function in Ottawa, I was present when Congress met at Washington. The President does not sit in the House. He holds Cabinet meetings at the White House. Mr. Taft's message to Congress was read, in a dull, monotonous voice. No one seemed to listen ; the reader appeared desirous of scrambling through as quickly as possible. Anything more unimpressive cannot be imagined. 1 1 April 8, 1913, Dr. Wilson threw down all precedent and read his own address in the Lower Chamber. He mounted the rostrum with his Vice President and Mr. Champ Clark on either side. Much cheering, and then a complete and stately silence, while he read the shortest speech ever given to Congress from a President. WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 419 Some points from Mr. Taft's last Message Reviewing Foreign Relations and the New Diplo- macy were as follows : "Declares United States' foreign policy should be raised above partisanship, and that this Government should present a united front to the world in conducting its foreign relations. "Points to reorganisation of State Department as a big step forward in strengthening our diplomatic resources. "Renews recommendations for legislation making perma- nent the merit system in the Diplomatic and Consular Service. "Wants Government-owned buildings for residences and offices of our diplomatic officials. "Reviews triumphs of United States' mediation, and expresses regret over failure of two arbitration treaties. "Discusses relations with China, and with Central and South American Republics, and Knox's recent journey of good-will. "Cities' increase of foreign trade as result of new diplo- macy. "Reviews claims and fisheries arbitration with Great Britain. "Says United States has maintained neutrality in con- nection with two wars in the Near East. "Urges merchant marine and American banks and news- papers in other fields as means of stimulating commercial activity with foreign countries. "Declares opening of Panama canal will work a new era in our international life, and this nation must meet the situa- tion in a manner befitting its high ideals." Anything more tame than the opening of that Congress, December, 1912, it would be impossible to imagine. 420 AMERICA AS I SAW IT The country had been in a turmoil for months. The boiling bubbles had cooled by election night when Woodrow Wilson gained the seat, and all interest in the party leaving office was as dead as a herring within twenty-four hours. Congress met within a month after election. Mr. Taft was still President, and poor Mr. Taft and his fol- lowing had to remain in power, without power so to speak, all December, January, and February, until the new regime stepped into office in March. The whole thing was like a coach without a driver. It was moribund. There was no bubbling en- thusiasm, nor even life. There was a general air of carelessness, a go-as-you-please attitude. This Republican party had been strenuous for sixteen years. It had nothing to lose now and everything to gain, when once really in opposition. The Democrats had come into power. They would take up complete possession with the new President four months later ; the tension would then begin. It is often easier to gain a reputation than to hold one. "Will the much-talked-of tariff revision come into effect ? "What about anti-trust legislation ? "The restrictions of immigration ? "Will intoxicants be allowed in dry territory ? "Will six-year Presidents without chance of reelection be passed ? I - i WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 421 Drawn by W. K. Haselden. Reproduced by permission of the London Daily Mirror. WHAT AN AMERICAN CANDIDATE HAS TO SPEAK AGAINST 422 AMERICA AS I SAW IT "Will income taxes be introduced and even sal- aries be taxed ?" All these things had been shrieked loudly from end to end of the States for months, and yet at the opening of Congress there did not seem to be a single man present whose voice could speak above a whisper. An hour and a half after the opening of Congress a strange thing happened. A great and impor- tant, and at the same time a curious, case came on : a Federal Judge was tried by the Senate, which organised itself into a Court of Impeachment after the opening ceremony. He had been impeached by the House of Representatives. A crowd filled the galleries to see such an unusual spectacle as a Judge on trial charged with grave offences render- ing him unfit to hold office. It was only the ninth time in the history of the Republic that such a thing had happened. Solemnly the Judge marched in with a host of Counsel. Everyone had to be sworn. Every- one looked very solemn ; but the proceedings were long-drawn out and lasted many weary days - the subjects varying from railroads to land sales, coal, loans, promissory notes, and other technical things. All America was agog with interest. The Judge and his solicitors and friends sat in a row in front of the House, the Speaker being in the chair. WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 423 To my mind, and I was only a bird of passage, Mr. Elihu Root was far the most important poli- tician I saw in Washington. Tall, thin, grey, he impressed me deeply as he stood fighting the Panama tolls, appealing to the nation to stand by their treaty and keep their promise to Great Britain. Mr. Choate, one of the most able am- bassadors America ever sent to the Court of St. James, took the same stand. Mr. Roosevelt said apropos of this, "A promise to arbitrate is worthless unless we mean to keep it on the precise occasions when it is unpleasant for us to do so/' "Will international arbitration be the end of war?" one asks oneself again and again. Ah Quien sabe? I was kindly invited to luncheon by Speaker and Mrs. Champ Clark. Mr. Champ Clark, it will be remembered, was nearly made President of the United States. He took me to the Speaker's gallery, and left me with his wife to see the proceedings opened. It was interesting to hear a debate in Congress. The chamber is much larger than our House of Commons, and every man not only has a seat, but a little desk. 1 In this House there are only four hundred and thirty-five members ; in the Upper House (Senate) there are ninety-six. The Senate is about the same size as the House of Lords, and there is ample room 1 Benches have since been substituted for the desks. 424 AMERICA AS I SAW IT for many more senators. But Congress has fewer representatives than our House of Commons, where there are six hundred and seventy members, if I mistake not ; our floor space is limited, for there is no room for these men all to get a seat at the same time, and they have no desks. We are over-represented ; America is under- represented. In Great Britain every thirteen or fourteen thousand people have a representative ; in America every two hundred and fifty thousand people have a member. There is a certain everyday calm dignity in the House of Commons (except when they forget themselves and have a vulgar and distressing row) that does not exist in the American House. All British members sit down or loll in their seats, except when they are actually speaking. In Washington they seem to wander about most of the time, sit and dangle their legs, or lean on the desks ; messenger boys ply to and fro ; in fact there is so much hubbub going on, on the floor, that it is almost impossible to hear what any speaker is saying. It is a very go-as-you-please affair, but they are never so rude as to boo any one down. The authorities are very polite to the general public. There are splendid galleries for the people, large and comfortable, and women take their seats therein among the men. They are treated as ordinary human beings and not like wild beasts, WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 425 relegated or hidden away behind a wooden cage, as in our House of Commons ; nor put in a pen where they cannot see, as in the House of Lords. British women do much political work ; they do it because they are interested, and keen, and often speak well, and yet are treated politically as of no account. American women rarely do any political work at all and yet are welcomed as human beings. There was a constant murmur from the gallery, which combined with the ceaseless moving about downstairs, the incessant chatting among themselves, the nonchalant air of the members, and the general want of attention does not give a dignified picture, nor impress one with the idea that the laws of a vast continent are being made by these restless gentlemen. The proceedings, which last generally from twelve o'clock till five, begin in the same way as ours, with a prayer, and the pastor in this case was blind. We once had a blind Postmaster-General in the House of Com- mons and his widow, Mrs. Henry Fawcett, is our most esteemed suffrage leader ; Washington has a blind chaplain in Congress. After an hour's debate, very little of which I was able to hear, we went to the Speaker's private room ; a fine, big, comfortable abode, with de- lightful easy-chairs and a beautiful view. Then we proceeded downstairs to his dining-room, where twenty of us enjoyed his hospitality at 426 AMERICA AS I SAW IT luncheon. The porcelain made me feel partic- ularly at home as it was prettily decorated with Scotch thistles. A predecessor in office had been a Scotchman, and had left his mark upon the china. All the china in the House of Commons in England is decorated with the arms of West- minster in the form of a portcullis. Mr. Champ (short for Beauchamp) Clark has a wonderful head, white hair, a fine nose, and strong mouth. In fact, his head is very striking. He would have made a splendid ornament to the presidential chair, and is much more dignified and quieter in manner than Mr. Roosevelt or Mr. Taft. The United States pay their members of the House of Representatives $7500 a year, or about 1500 a year. Alas and alack, we now pay our English members four hundred pounds per an- num, and with the advent of paid politics the whole tone of our House has changed. Corrupt practices creep in with paid politics. Instead of men giving up their lives to their country and studying political economy and history with the ob- ject of going into Parliament, instead of the House being filled by some of the best and most cultured brains of the country and with disinterested patri- otic men, we shall now have members to whom four hundred pounds a year is a fortune, and the whole tone of the House of Commons will be altered. At the present moment there are no darky WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 427 members in the House of Representatives, but there have been on different occasions. It is strange that more have not been able to gain ad- mittance, but then there are few brains equal to Booker Washington's among their number, al- though their status is considerably improved since Mr. Roosevelt invited that gentleman to luncheon with him at the White House. When anything is to be put to the vote in Con- gress, it is often settled viva voce by the members standing and being counted by the Speaker ; but when there is any uncertainty as to the result, or too large a number of members for this proceeding are present, there is a roll call and the members answer to their names "Aye" or "No." In England, only members of the Cabinet and secretaries have a room to themselves, but in Wash- ington every member of Congress (both Houses) has his own private study. It is really a neces- sity because many of these men live three or four days' journey away from the capital, and conse- quently during the session at Washington they must have somewhere to keep their papers and do their work. Thus it is that they are allowed these charming workshops. How different : the calm, quiet dignity of the opening of the Canadian Parliament by the uncle of a Royal King, and the indifference and go-as-you-please reading of the Speech of the 428 AMERICA AS I SAW IT President of the United States at Washington ; and then the absolutely callous indifference to duty in the Argentine. Ten weeks later still I was in Buenos Ayres (February 18, 1913). It was a great day, be- cause it was the last possible moment for a ratifi- cation of an important convention with Italy, and a Special Ambassador had already sailed for Europe. A few minutes before four o'clock the British Minister (Sir Reginald Tower) and I drove up to the palace of marble. The Buenos Ayres Congress Hall, called Camera de Congresso, is to my mind the most beautiful modern building I have ever seen. It is not as big as the Capitol at Washington, nor as wonderful in design as the House of Commons in London. But it is white and clean and majestic. It is dignified, and exactly suited to a warm cli- mate and brilliant sun. That mysterious little ticket which diplomatists carry soon gained admission to the special box ; but lo, the Chamber of Deputies was empty. There were the dark red leather seats, unoc- cupied. Every little table had a palm-leaf fan resting on the blotting-pad, but no one was sipping tea, which is the custom, it seems. The mo- ment a man rises to speak, he is given tea. The public sit in boxes; several of them had occupants. The press was ready; but the floor WONDERFUL WASHINGTON 429 of the House was empty. For weeks they had been trying to get a quorum. Day after day whips had been issued far and wide, to some of the highest-paid members of Parliament in the world, requesting them to do their duty. These men receive 1500 a year each, but they were too busy bathing and gambling at Mar del Plata, their great South American watering-place, or attend- ing to their estancias, to return to attend to their public work. It was indeed a comic situation. Neither patriotism, telegraphic whips, shame of drawing a salary for nothing, or threats of force could collect a quorum of fifty-one members out of a hundred and twenty. Dr. Palacios moved that the police should fetch the absentees. He spoke of national disgrace, that the honour of the country was compromised, and so on. There we sat. No one did anything. Nothing happened, and so a great national question was left alone. It really seemed a childish affair in a House of such exquisite beauty. CHAPTER XIX HETEROGENEOUS BUT to return to our mutton, which in this case is Washington, a funny little incident is perhaps worth relating. The town was for a long time perturbed where to place a very important statue. Much discus- sion took place, because it was to emphasise the glory of the whole American nation. At last a tiny plot of land was decided upon. A vast con- course of people were bidden to the unveiling, and among them the late British Ambassador, Mr. Bryce. Since the English were driven out of the States in the eighteenth century, the only inch of land we possess as our very own is the Embassy at Wash- ington. Gaily stepping down from the tram-car at the gates of Britain's only terra firma possession, my attention was arrested by the statue of a man op- posite, with a pen in his hand. When our Ambassador entered the drawing- room, I exclaimed : "Why, Mr. Bryce, you have a grand new statue here since my last visit. " 430 HETEROGENEOUS 431 He laughed. "Who is it ?" "That statue is placed there," and he chuckled, "to ennoble the gentleman who signed the Dec- laration of Independence." So that small spot, exactly opposite our Em- bassy, the city had chosen for the erection of the statue commemorating our defeat ! It was a comical idea to place it immediately facing the only bit of territory remaining to us ; and stranger still to invite the Ambassador from Great Britain to assist at the opening ceremony. Americans can have little sense of humour. "Did you go?" "Yes, of course; I went to their rejoicing to show there was no animosity. The Americans often ask me to go to dinner celebrations of some victory they gained over us, and it is always most good-natured and amusing. All personal feeling in the matter is dead." Some countries would make war over a smaller episode. We are wiser. We planted our lan- guage and our names. The British impress on America is indelible. Great Britain may be proud of her Embassy at Washington. It is a noble home of red brick, not far short of the White House itself. Up a flight of stone steps one enters a fine hall with a staircase facing the door, and where this 432 AMERICA AS I SAW IT stair branches off to the right and left, a life-size portrait of Queen Victoria smiles upon the guests. There are fine reception rooms and a good ball- room ; in fact, it is an imposing Embassy, although inconveniently old-fashioned in many ways. In spite of America sending us her best men as her Ambassadors, she does not, as previously men- tioned, provide them with free quarters in London. If her representative is poor, he is obliged to live in some cheap district ; if, perchance, he should be a millionaire, he can rent a "Dorchester House," and pay for it out of his own purse, as his salary is ridiculously small. We train our diplomats in political economy, history, and languages from boyhood, and their zenith is an Ambassadorship, but America picks out a good businesslike man who seems suitable for the post. In the case of Mr. Bryce, however, who is a lawyer, a politician, and, above all, the writer of the "American Commonwealth," Great Britain laid aside her rule, and he was chosen for Washington. For six years he ably filled the post, and endeared himself to the country to which he was sent as Ambassador, by his scholarly ways, and amusing and witty speeches. If such a thing exists as transmigration of souls, Mr. Bryce must have lived in America in a previous existence, so much in sympathy is he with the American people. HETEROGENEOUS 433 My old friend somewhat resembles Mr. Car- negie in appearance ; both are small, wear closely clipped grey beards, both are young for their years, full of life and vitality, but there the likeness ends. Mr. Bryce is a great scholar; he has read enor- mously, travelled widely, is quick and tempera- mental, and has one of the most retentive mem- ories I have ever come across. He appears to have forgotten nothing in his long and busy life. Like Lord Justice Fletcher Moulton, he can join in any conversation, in an intelligent manner, ranging from Honolulu to-day, the spectrum of the theodolite, to China and Confucius of the past, Fiji of to-morrow, or the earliest inhabitants of Mexico. A memory of that kind is one of God's greatest gifts, and rare indeed. The Bryces lived a quiet and simple home life, except when they entertained on Monday nights ; and the Ambassador thoroughly enjoyed his lunch- eons of Spanish mackerel, followed by his British pipe and coffee, chatting meanwhile to a friend ; he is always then at his best. Mr. Bryce is a great man in many ways. He is not only pos- sessed of much learning but has proved himself a diplomatist, and has a cheery, frank, and pleasant manner, and has an able helpmate in his wife. There was great excitement in Washington during my visit just before Christmas, 1912, about the Banking and Currency Committee. 2F 434 AMERICA AS I SAW IT The first Trust in America was the Havemeyer Trust in 1889. It seemed an extraordinary thing that, by 1912, five or six men in the United States were juggling with more money than the entire Government had at its disposal. The control exercised by these men had become so colossal that a great agitation had arisen against this monopoly of finance. Hence the enquiry. Mr. Arsene Pujo was the Chairman, a de- lightful Southerner from New Orleans, who spoke fluent French, and retailed quaint stories of darkies remembered from his youth. It was no light post to be chosen Chairman of such a Com- mittee, and to have the greatest financiers of America in the box. This tremendous enquiry into the money trusts was held in a small room in the House of Repre- sentatives. Around its table sat the Chairman, Mr. Pujo; the Government's Counsel (Mr. Samuel Untermyer), and the men who were, so to speak, in the witness-box. The only person al- lowed to ask questions was the Counsel, and the one object of the Government he represented was to break down the enormous Trust embracing about a hundred and thirty-four companies, and to make it in future impossible for the whole country to be ruled by a handful of financiers. ' I hate money. HETEROGENEOUS 435 Drawn by Frances E. Jones. A BIT OF OLD NEW ORLEANS 436 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Money is not my god ; money so often leads to jealousy, to juggling, and to dishonesty ; we must have enough for our requirements, but personally I prefer a more modest sum to tens of thousands of dollars a year, when one sees how most of it is made and spent. Is money worth all the scramble that Americans go through for its attainment ? "No, a thousand times No," say I ; and yet "what is the good of having money if one may not talk about it ?" says the American. On October 24, 1912, when I was sitting in the wonderful library of Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan, he told me the last of his treasures, the miniature collection, was on the high seas on its way to the States. Think of what the people of Great Britain lost ! After his death his son insured the collection for twenty-three million dollars. But for our exorbitant death duties, which Mr. Morgan dare not face, we might have had, anyway, part of these treasures. That was only fair. Many of them were collected in England, and were housed for years in London at Princes Gate, or loaned to our museums. We were foolish enough to let them go. Amer- ica was ungrateful enough to haggle over their acceptance by not conceding at once to Mr. Mor- HETEROGENEOUS 437 gan's wish that the Metropolitan Museum should build a special wing. When he was dead, and not till then, they at once voted the money. He died not knowing the ultimate destination of his treasures. Mr. Morgan was a man of medium height, with the most strangely piercing eyes a man one would have noticed anywhere. Besides being a genius at finance, Mr. Morgan helped his country over many stiles ; he not only appreciated Art, but really understood it. Sir William Agnew once told me what exquisite taste Mr. Morgan had, when we were all three sitting together at Princes Gate ; and Dr. Williamson, the compiler of those beautiful Morgan catalogues, once said, "He hardly ever makes a mistake." His library in New York is built quite separate from his house, and consists of about three rooms and a large marble hall. One enters by fine bronze doors, and on the right is the main library --a very large room, but a very, very small library in size when compared to Lord Acton's famous room at Bridgenorth. It has a gallery, and all the walls are lined with books ; no glass on the bookcases ; but brass cross-pat- terned wires cover the precious volumes, and lock them away safely. Old Italian chairs, cardi- nals' chairs, stand in rows ; fine tables have cases of treasures upon them ; jewelled books of 438 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Charles V ; Byzantine gold ornaments ; Egyptian treasures ; and an olla podrida. On the left was his own "sanctum" wherein he sat. Its famous ceiling came wholesale from Italy; the glass in all the windows is "remade," he said; "all old bits, remodelled and refitted into a whole." Soft red Italian damask covered the walls, soft velvet covered the sofas ; Memling pictures, old Limoges enamels, lustre plates, pre- cious bronzes, all and everything beautiful, stood on the book shelves, which were about four to six feet from the floor. Off this room was the Holy of Holies ; this was locked off, and contained the original Mss. of Scott, Meredith, Milton, and the exquisite small illuminated volume of Benvenuto Cellini. Galileo was persecuted in the sixteenth century for his scientific discoveries, and another Italian, Torricelli, a few years later made a barometer and thermometer ; little did either of them dream of the vast results to follow. A hundred years later Benjamin Franklin, among many other things, first saw the possibility of locating and predicting storms ; one wonders if he ever vaguely had visions of the perfection we are nearing to-day. "May I introduce you to the clerk of the weather ?" a woman laughingly asked. HETEROGENEOUS 439 "Delighted," I replied. "He is a gentleman to whom I should like to give a bit of my mind occasionally." Before me stood a pleasant-faced man with grey hair. This was Professor Willis Moore, Chief of the United States Weather Bureau at Washington, and one of the most interesting men I met in America. For sixteen years he has looked after this department, which has grown and grown, until to-day two hundred clerks are em- ployed in Washington, and two thousand officials elsewhere at a couple of hundred observation sta- tions scattered through the country. We at home are indebted to this Weather Bureau ; for as most of the storms travel from the west to the east, it is this Bureau which forecasts wind, rain, snow, or heat upon our shores. At ten o'clock every morning all the observa- tions in the world have arrived at this office, and an hour or so later this information, classified and compressed, has been sent by rural telephone to five million farmers in the United States. What will be the end of all this ? It really seems that these observations, made now so scien- tifically in every land, will one day enable us to foretell, not merely a week ahead, as they do to- day, but a month, or perhaps a whole season. That will be the agriculturists' and shippers' millennium. The farmer will know when to plant 440 AMERICA AS I SAW IT the seed ; the shipper will be certain when his vessel should leave port, and what route she should take. One has to pause and wonder what the end of all these inventions is to be. No single brain can assimilate a hundredth part of their number. Are we all to become specialists in a hundred years' time in one particular line, and know nothing whatever of the multiple sciences around us ? This is an age of specialisation, and with the enor- mous advancement of knowledge even specialisa- tion has its own branches, and tends to presup- pose that our brains will become lopsided, or at least confined to some particular line of work. It really seems as if all the " education " that is necessary to-day is reading, writing, and arithmetic. Those rudiments all must learn. But from that moment each boy and girl should specialise. There is no time to make a lumber-room of one's brain. Technical training should commence at once along whatever line the child wishes ulti- mately to develop ; this should be followed by more profound learning towards the chosen career. Such " education " would have its faults, it would be narrow, but life is becoming so complex educa- tion must of necessity become focussed. The per- sonal instinct of the individual will have to find its own vent, in its own way, in its own leisure. Little kites are nowadays sent up into space, HETEROGENEOUS 441 alone, but aided by science, for they contain in- struments that test the atmospheric pressure, and register the height to which they ascend ; and they return to earth with the results of their investigations. Where will it all end ? Will Marconi's amazing developments prevent all disaster at sea by telling captains how to alter their course to avoid the elements ? Shall we prevent every disease by inoculation ? All these things, and more, are being perfected year by year through the vast strides of Science. How much we all owe to her labourers, and yet how ill their toil is rewarded either by honour or gold. After a third visit to Washington, I feel that if I were going to live in the States, Washington would be my choice. It is the playground of American Society, the working home of American politics. In twelve years it has grown enormously ; not like Chicago, in a business, bustling way, but socially, grown in fine homes, splendid man- sions, and cosmopolitan life, in its best sense. Everyone wears evening dress. People dine at eight o'clock instead of at seven. All languages are spoken by the diplomatic world, and Wash- ington is like London, Paris, Berlin, or St. Peters- burg in its social atmosphere. Society fluctuates 442 AMERICA AS I SAW IT as diplomatic society must ; but there are always big brains and large ideas to be found in Washing- ton. Boston is a city of ideals ; Washington, a city of ideas ; Chicago, a city of force ; New York, a city of dollars. It was a stroke of luck that Captain Gibbons, who had been Naval Attache in London, should be the Superintendent of the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in the winter of 1912 ; and very pleasant were the two days I passed there, with him and his wife, in their lovely home. What a world it is --that small naval city within stone walls. To the sound of martial music one is awakened in the morning, as the midshipmen march past in battalions to their work. These youths seem to have an excellent time. They are kept very hard at work ; and the United States has taken a lesson from our British men by insisting on physical culture and physical exercise, and these boys must either have games and extra drill, or take long walks under super- vision every day. Naturally they do not care for the latter. There are something like one hundred and fifty professors at Annapolis, and delightful men many of them seemed to be. It is a veritable colony ; for those who are married live in de- tached houses of their own. HETEROGENEOUS 443 One great feature at the time of my visit was the hydroplane practice when these machines were trundled to the water, from which they took their flight. Unfortunately the wind was so high during my actual stay, that they could not rise ; but it is part of the educational system that some of these middies should learn to fly. Looking back across the Severn, the gold roof of the little church reminded one of Russia, and one's thoughts wandered back to that magnificent Greek cathedral, built by the sailors' pence, at Kronstadt on the Neva, as an offering and prayer for their safety at sea. Is it merely chance that we hear so much more about the United States Navy than formerly, or is it becoming an important factor in the world ? Officers of both services seem more to the fore than they used to be ; and yet there are only about thirty thousand soldiers among a hundred million people. The Navy, on the other hand, is becoming very efficient. England has the largest Navy in the world ; France the second ; and the United States the third. We take our boys at twelve, keep them at Osborne for two years and two years more at Dartmouth. After six months on a training ship we send them to sea. Up to that time their parents pay for their education. 444 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Annapolis is the one Naval Academy in the United States. It houses seven hundred and fifty boys (and has room for one thousand) ; it takes them in between the ages of sixteen and twenty, keeps them at work, and very hard work, too, for four years, with only one month's holiday in the year. They get good wages from the first. During this naval course they go for three months each year to sea, generally on a battle-ship with the Atlantic Fleet ; then on leaving the Academy, they get their commission as ensigns, and go off to sea often for seven or eight years without a break. Which country's system is the best can only be shown by subsequent trial in warfare. Luckily these two English-speaking Navies are the best of friends, and always ought to be. But that it should be so is amazing, considering the way American children are still fed on the "cruelties of British rule," and enjoy everlasting feasting and rejoicing over every British defeat, their greatest annual holiday being in commemoration of freeing themselves from the yoke of America's best friend. We have none of these feelings in England. We teach our children to respect and admire the younger land, and foster good feeling with Brother Jonathan. We cannot be united again by law, but every bond of friendship should be tightened, every link of brotherhood strengthened. English is becoming the language of the world, and we all HETEROGENEOUS 445 Drawn by Verntn Howe Bailey. A. HOTEL IN THE SOUTH 446 AMERICA AS I SAW IT originally come from the same stem. In spite of Annapolis being on the Severn, with a Queen Anne church and English names everywhere, the very first thing I was shown was the Royal Standard - taken, of course, from our poor troops and other English flags, all of which were being most wonderfully restored for the Naval Academy of America by an English woman. We seem to have sent out an extraordinary number of flags with our army, and to have scattered them about in a most promiscuous manner, judging by their display in the States. We have had one hundred years of peace between all English-speaking peoples. Let us shake hands across the seas and vow that peace shall never again be broken. It is a hundred years since the treaty of Ghent ended the last war between Britain and the United States. All the old subjects of dispute have gone. A large family is reunited. What a dear old town Annapolis is. One hundred years ago it was bigger than New York, to-day it is a baby in comparison. Within its confines stands the delightful little red brick house with its two or three rooms, the first public building in Maryland. There are lots of houses of the old colonial archi- tecture with the slave wings on either side, for Maryland was a hotbed of slavery. HETEROGENEOUS 447 J Tis an old-world town Annapolis ; with its funny buggies plying the streets, and strange carts with great heavy lumbering oxen, neither as fine nor as handsome as those of Spain or Portugal, where ox-drawn carts are such a feature. 'Tis a town resonant of colonial days, which, while they ended in 1776, have left their dignified imprint till now. One sees it in the architecture, the social life, the politeness of the people, and even in the gardens. Old England's influence is still strongly marked three thousand miles away in New England, in Virginia, in Carolina, and in Maryland. We are one people. Only twenty miles divide us from France, to which we ought, of course, to be joined by a tunnel, and yet how different are the two races, and the languages. CHAPTER XX CHRISTMAS AND EDISON CHRISTMAS EVE of 1912 was white. Seven or eight inches of snow had fallen in New York in a few hours, and were lying thick by half-past nine, when I struggled to get over to Orange to see the world-famous Thomas Edison. It was my only chance. Just sixty hours remained before embarking for the Argentine and twenty- four of those were Christmas. "Now or never," I said to myself. "Snow or no snow. It is to be." The greatest man in America is probably Thomas Edison. In the line of Applied Science he is the greatest man of the age. Nobody made such a world-wide reputation for his inventions in the last generation as this man of Dutch and Scotch descent, a quiet, unassuming person, as all great workers are. Telephones (which he perfected), the phonograph, and its offshoot, the gramophone, have entered palaces and cottages ; from prince to peasant everybody knows the inventions of Thomas Edison. He was the first man to reproduce sound. 448 CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 449 Naturally I wanted to meet this representative of Applied Science ; and, hermit though he is, he kindly acceded to my wish. Some men's reputations die with them, others are only born after death. Edison has been fully appreciated during his life, and will be remembered by posterity. "It will take you an hour to reach Orange/' Mr. Edison had written ; but he had reckoned without the snow. It took me three hours before I stood in his library. New York was paralysed. Little or no attempt had been made to tackle the snow fall, although the Clerk of the Weather had predicted its advent. Great flakes darkened the air as I came out of a Fifth Avenue house. Taxis there were none. I waited under falling sheets of snow at the street corner for that joyful "'bus" in which no one is allowed to strap-hang, and civilisation and peace reign for fivepence the journey. No 'bus came. Everything was hung up. After a bargain with the darky on the box of a hansom, we started off for 23d Street to catch the ferry. I had been lent a pair of rubbers (goloshes), at which I had rather scoffed when leaving the house, but I soon found that even "gums" could not keep out the snow, which at Orange was eighteen inches thick, and before I got back to New York in the afternoon, it was piled three or four feet deep 2G 450 AMERICA AS I SAW IT in some parts of the city, so even wading boots would have barely kept one dry. What a drive ! Trams held up, motors in snow- drifts, carts stuck, fallen horses on every side, truly a hideous day. At last we reached 23d Street Ferry, only to find there was no chance of catching the train to Orange on the other side of the Hudson. Even the ferry-boat was late be- cause of fog and sleet. It is a horrible journey at the best of times to be always catching ferry- boats ; for although two lines of rails have tunnel connection with Manhattan since the century began, those two lines do not go everywhere, and the ferry is still a great factor in circulating the traffic. Once on board we plodded across through fog and sleet. The boat was full, more with parcels than people, -- because every single person seemed to be carrying a dozen Christmas gifts. Arrived at Hoboken, of course I had to wait ; every con- nection was disconnected, and the sleet was cold and dreary. Should I give it up. Dare I go on, on such a day ? Why, of course I would go on. What was present discomfort to the likely pleasures to come. Half an hour of train journey through blinding snow in an overheated "day coach" landed me at Orange. Time was getting on. I almost turned CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 451 back, even then, the day was so terrible, but I hate not to keep an appointment at any time, more especially when it is with such a busy man as Edison. Carriage ? Cab ? Taxi ? No, there was noth- ing. And what was worse, the passengers had to step into more than a foot of snow between the train and the road ; there was no platform and no sheltering roof where the train stopped at Orange, New Jersey. An Irish bobby at the corner of Main Street took compassion on me. "It's a bit hard on strangers," he said, "who don't know their way about. Just you stand in the doorway of that store, and when a street-car comes along, I'll let you know ; but they are running very irregular." Twenty minutes passed. Everyone was grum- bling ; not that that was any good --the snow merely smiled, and fell the faster. The street- car came at last and deposited me at the great works. Mr. Meadowcroft, Edison's assistant, wel- comed me in the large, airy, light library, where photographs of old friends like Lord Kelvin, Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Roosevelt, Huxley, Baron Justus von Liebig (my godfather), and others smiled down from the walls. In the middle of the room was Edison's desk, a yellow, pinewood, ordinary sort of American 452 AMERICA AS I SAW IT roll-topped desk, with every paper neatly arranged and scrupulously pigeonholed. It was such a tidy desk for such an erratic man. There was nothing grand, or imposing, or even workmanlike about this library; many private houses have far finer ones. But tucked away in one of the alcoves between the bookcases was a small trestle bed a mighty simple sort of a bed, a comfortless sort of arrangement at the best ; and on this small couch this giant among workers throws himself when utterly worn out, and snatches an hour or two of sleep. In this workmanlike rather than beautiful library is a model of his concrete-house scheme. It will cost a fifth of the price of ordinary houses and be fireproof and vermin proof; and will be made in an iron mould riveted together. In fact, two tin jelly moulds one inside the other will give some idea of the scheme. In this way a dupli- cate house within a house, a space of a few inches being left between the two, will be joined together ; bath, sink, everything, including the chimneys, will be on the moulds. Into this model the con- crete will be poured through the chimney-stacks. "I'll make a concrete house in six hours, and in four or five days it will be dry, and you can live in it in a week," said Edison when I met him. "Sixty per cent of the plant is ready, and I'm going to complete the rest shortly. In Holland CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 453 they are already making such houses, but they take two days about it/' "That does not seem much waste of time, when one is going to live in it all one's life," I remarked. He laughed. "They will be especially useful in industrial communities," he continued, "where the frame mould can be moved from one site to another, and a whole town run up quickly." Edison is more an investigator than a scientist. He does not come into the sphere of pure scientists like Lord Kelvin, Professor J. J. Thomson, Pro- fessor Henry, or Sir William Ramsay, men who are all fully equipped with physics, mathematics, and chemistry, the fundamental knowledge re- quired for pure science, but Edison is a scientific investigator, and above all an inventor. As a boy he was a telegraph operator. He had many weary hours of waiting, when he had to be at his post, and yet had nothing to do ; and he realised that he might go to sleep if only he could be sure of waking up at the right moment. He invented an alarum clock to help himself, and incidentally it has helped the world. This youth gradually pushed himself forward till to-day he is at the head of five thousand men and has a huge financial company behind his back. He has a whole chemical experimental laboratory, wherein he produced his Edison storage battery. 454 AMERICA AS I SAW IT He has fifteen high-class chemists constantly at work, and if an investigation does not succeed : "Try it a hundred times then, in different for- mulae, and bring me the result," isf his reply. He has lavishly squandered money in experiments. He is himself all over the place. He knows his men ; quarrels with them, makes it up again ; calls them Tom or John or Bill, and withal remains just the same simple man as ever. Having seen the library and peeped at the shops, where thousands of men were just going off to their dinners, we went up some queer back stairs to a sort of factory at the top of the house. In the outer hall various young mechanics were working at gramophones. Several songs were going on at the same time, so the sound was some- what discordant. In a smaller room beyond stood an ordinary mahogany-enclosed gramophone. Bending over it was a young man attending to the cylinders, while an elderly one sat on a common wooden chair beside it. The latter was holding his right hand to his ear, which was circled by his thumb and first finger, while the little finger was against the wood of the gramophone. The reason of this was to help transmit the sound to the ear. He did not hear us enter ; he was intent on the song and kept his head closely glued to the machine. CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 455 At the end of the verse the grey-headed man straightened himself: "Rotten, rotten !" he exclaimed. This was Thomas Edison, and he was trying to get rid of the buzzing sound in gramophones. A man of medium height, quietly dressed in a blue serge suit. His eyes are blue, cheery, hopeful, and at moments thoughtful ; they are his most characteristic point, and he has a fresh complexion with long unruly grey, in fact almost white, hair. Edison has not such a fine head as Hiram Maxim, Ibsen, Bjornson, or Savonoff, but he has the same blunted tops to his fingers that I have so often noticed in inventors. He is not commanding in appearance. He is, in fact, a kindly, clever, easy- mannered man who would not excite curiosity in any way. Although so absorbed by work, he is not one-sided, as I soon learnt ; he reads his paper with avidity, and has positive ideas on the busy questions of the day. So Edison is a man of parts as well as of concentration. Edison did not look his age, viz. sixty-six (born 1847). He looked ten years younger than that, and when asked how he was, he danced round like a boy and replied, "Splendid," and brightly remarked he might think of retiring at ninety. He has a frank smile and cheerful manner when he comes down to earth ; more often he lives in the clouds. 456 AMERICA AS I SAW IT And why his ear so close to the gramophone ? Ah, why ? Because like another great American the late Horace Howard Furness he is very deaf. He does not hear one word that is not spoken right into his ear. This may be a blessing in disguise, as it enables him to concentrate his thoughts without outside distraction. "I saw photos of many old friends in your library," I said. "Lord Kelvin" He laughed. "Poor Kelvin. The last time he stayed with me he had toothache ; it refused to go, so he took to champagne." "By whose prescription ?" "Oh, his own. I never drink anything ; but we keep stuff up at the house for those who do, and Kelvin cured his toothache by my champagne." "Have you no vices ?" I laughed. " I smoke." Edison has always been an amazing worker. Twenty hours on end day after day do not wear him out, and he has been known to go for sixty hours without sleep. In 1911, when he was deeply interested in his disc phonograph, he actually worked straight on end for six weeks. His house was barely seven minutes away by motor, and yet he only went home four times during that period just to bring back a fresh supply of clothing, and to see his family ; CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 457 and he seldom slept more than two hours in the twenty-four. His men had to work in relays, but he never relaxed himself. Mrs. Edison tries to insist that he should go home every day to his meals ; but when he is absorbed, he cannot be dragged from his work. His assistants take in trays of food, but if they leave them beside him, there they remain ; so he has to be stood over and cajoled, and coaxed to eat, and watched like a child. " He's a devil to work," said one of his men. He has two boys by his second marriage ; the elder is at college. The second boy, who is seven years younger, bears an exact physical resemblance to Edison. When the great inventor starts his night seances, poor Mrs. Edison is informed by telephone that "he is so busy she must not expect him," and it is quite a business to manage for people to be about all night "accidentally on purpose," so that he should not be left alone. He would like to be alone and he often imagines he is alone and so he is, but someone is near, generally two or three of them, so that they may be on the spot if they are wanted. Edison has amazing physique or he could not work as he does, and he has an amazing brain or he could never have perfected so many inventive achievements. His Battery and Cement Houses 45 8 AMERICA AS I SAW FI are his hobbies, and the Phonograph has kept up the funds. He has practically remade the phono- graph and has now remade the gramophone, his experiments and betterments have been so in- cessant. His results are attained he says :- "By one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration." No detail is too trivial for his attention. The Kinetophone is his latest babe. It is a machine which allows moving pictures (cinemato- graph) and human voices (gramophone) to be used together, veritably a talking-motion-picture. It is the outcome of twenty-six years' work. No one has any right to say anything is impos- sible in these days. Science is standing the round world firmly on its basis. How strange it is that this deaf man should have made the most far-reaching contribution to univer- sal music of anyone in the world, and yet he is no musician. He likes a tune, but he does not under- stand classical music. W. S. Gilbert was the same. He wrote his "book" and Sullivan added the music. Gilbert's lines were full of inspiration, full of musical cadence as well as permeated with his own particular kind of wit ; but W. S. Gilbert was no musician and could not have written a bar for himself any more than Edison can. Yet both men have helped so materially to the universal enjoyment of music throughout the world. CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 459 Edison was very chatty and pleasant and friendly, and signed a large photograph on which he wrote the date (after inquiry) in a clear round hand. "I was once an office boy, and then it was I learnt how to write so that people can read it. Pity everyone doesn't write distinctly, eh ?" he said as he blotted the card. Every scientist is necessarily a philanthropist, or he could not go on. Our Government pays more money yearly for note paper than in the encouragement of science. New York under such winter snow is a pitiable sight. I never saw so many horses down in one day in my life ; they lay about in every street. On my return in the afternoon there was no foot road at all ; motors were skidding every- where ; others were held up in snow heaps. Large trucks had stuck, and the horses could not get them started again ; in fact, New York was snow-bound, and traffic was delayed in an appalling manner. Even my dear Fifth Avenue 'bus which I caught on my return became a veritable torture. I am not a nervous person ; but never, never, shall I forget that drive ; generally, a quarter of an hour is sufficient to return from the ferry to 54th Street, but we were five quarters of an hour. We swerved, we swayed, we jumped over snow-hillocks till the passengers could hardly keep their seats, 460 AMERICA AS I SAW IT and the 'bus itself could barely keep on the road ; we wondered how the springs could stand it. Seldom has a drive been more exciting. All the traffic was skidding, and it was mere luck that there were not more accidents than there really were. And this was Christmas Eve the greatest day of the year in America after Thanksgiving. Such snowon such a day was a veritable calamity. In the morning everybody seemed to be carrying parcels ; but in the evening, when New York traffic was in a worse muddle, every man and woman seemed to be literally laden with packages. What a Christmas Eve ! Monday is the fashionable day at the New York Opera House, and the night before being a Monday, I had been taken to hear the American singer, Madame Farrar in Madame Butterfly. She was excellent in the last two acts, but still a poor con- trast to that greatest of all present-day artists, Madame Destinn. It was very interesting to watch the conductor going through that opera as he does every other opera, without any score. A singer has only his own part to memorise ; but for one man to memo- rise several dozen entire operas, in which he is responsible to the fifty or sixty performers in the orchestra, and many more on the stage, is an CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 461 achievement. A thin white baton is his medium. In this he is unlike the leonine personage, Savonoff, the Russian, who uses no baton of any kind, merely his hands. The Metropolitan Opera House is fine. It is not as beautiful as the one in Paris, nor so magnifi- cent as the one in Buenos Ayres, nor so secluded as Covent Garden, where the boxes and their curtains form a dark, strong, if somewhat dingy background for our aristocracy and their diamond tiaras. In New York the boxes stand right forward till they appear like one continuous dress-circle. Every- one there and everything worn shows in that coveted "Horseshoe," the hall-mark of social success. Stop, there is another stamp of success, not so select but still very important, and that is to find one's name in "The New York Social Register." There were plenty of beautiful women in the audience. Two persons in every three seemed to be Jewish, and many spoke broken English, but they wore expensive clothes and rolled away in fine motors. It was cold but fine that night at half-past eleven when we left the Opera House. By one o'clock snow fell, and Christmas Eve was ushered in by a thick mist of falling crystals that covered New York with nearly two feet of snow. Christmas in New York is a little different from 462 AMERICA AS I SAW IT Christmas in England. I remember a delightful tea-party a few days before given by Kate Doug- las Wiggin. There were various wreaths, green wreaths, with red bows ornamenting her drawing- room. I thought they were the offerings of ad- miring friends for her play "Rebecca," but they were nothing of the kind ; they were Christmas wreaths. While we festoon the homes of England with garlands, America decorates them with wreaths. This idea of green decoration is to be seen in the windows of the Clubs on Fifth Avenue. Each large pane has a wreath made of holly, mistletoe, ground pine, or bay leaves about eighteen inches across flattened against it, and ornamented with a red ribbon bow. They look like funeral wreaths and are yet to commemorate the Birth of Christ Nativity, not Death. Another Christmas custom, but, thank Heaven, not an English one, for it comes from the more southern climes of Italy, is the crippled beggar. For a week before Christmas these people are allowed upon the New York streets to clamour for alms. Christmas is a season when everyone spends time and money buying things nobody else wants. New Yorkers do not seem to evince much foresight in their shopping ; they wait until the very last day, which, of course, puts an extra CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 463 strain upon the shop people ; and then they seek what they want at overcrowded counters in stores overheated with perspiring, struggling humanity, and say : "What a hustle Life is." It need not be, but it often is where there is no organisation. The States is a tremendous place for giving. It is bad enough with us, but really it seemed to be fifty per cent worse in New York, where the giv- ing mania is a veritable disease. To control and do away with this somewhat ruinous generosity, Miss Anne Morgan, daughter of Mr. J. Pier- pont Morgan, organised what is known as the Society for the Prevention of Useless Giving, or more popularly the " Spugs " (a word formed by the initial letters of the chief words in the title). In former years many of the shop-workers and shop-girls were often seriously involved in debt for months, by the necessity of gifts to those in more exalted positions in their places of business. It was to assist and protect these classes that the "Spugs" first banded together. The good effect of this Society was already proved in the first year of its existence, Christmas, 1912. The large stores in the States are open on Satur- day afternoons just the same as any other day during the winter months. In this land of inde- pendence, where the work-people are supposed 464 AMERICA AS I SAW IT to be so much better off, they never have half- holidays (that is, in the shops) except during three months in the year, and on Saturdays work just the same as any other day. In England, the working-classes get one afternoon a week off. If, as is the case in the poorer districts, or country villages, they are open on Saturday night for the benefit of the wage-earner, then they get Wednes- day or Thursday. We have four Bank Holidays a year, which always fall on a Monday. This means the shop people, bank clerks, and so on are free from one o'clock on Saturday until the following Tuesday morning. Such a thing is un- known in America (except Labour Day). On the whole, the British working men and women are better off in this respect than are their American neighbours. America is the land of democracy in theory. England is the land of democracy in practice. It was the most ideally Christmassy Christmas Day I ever remember. Yonkers on the Hudson wore a white garb of snow, a solid foot and a half thick. The trees were weighed down with it. It might have been Canada or Norway as the mist of early morning cleared away and the sun rose. Then as the atmos- phere grew warmer and warmer, huge hunks of snow fell from the trees ; not a breath of wind CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 465 stirred the air. Warmth permeated the atmos- phere. Blue shadows fell upon the ground. For miles one looked upon the snow-clad landscape gradually unfurling from white to green and brown, when the heat of the sun's rays uncovered the ever- greens, the hollies, and the elms, the poplars, or the ash. Not a sound stirred the air but the swish, swish of the snow as it fell from the branches. The very birds, except an occasional crow, seemed to sleep in the calm peace of that Christmas morn on the banks of the fine Hudson River. It was only the third time in all my life I had spent Christmas away from my mother and my home once at school in Germany, once in Mexico when writing a book, and now in the United States. It was the anniversary of the Birth of Christ. It was the opening of one of the most beautiful days I can remember. It was the true Dickensian Christmas. Such a contrast to the horrors of the storm of the day before. The Christmas Tree had been lighted the previous evening about half-past six, so that the babies might enjoy their toys and a game before they went to bed. It was a beautiful house, full of artistic treasures from many lands ; fine French tapestries, portraits by Shannon, sculpture, beautiful cabinets, endless 2H 466 AMERICA AS I SAW IT objets (Tart, and to make it appear " Christmassy," the Scotch gardener had decorated the oak-panelled hall with evergreens, from which fringes of smilax fell, and a hundred or more scarlet poinsettias gave a brilliant note of colour to the whole. That decoration was a triumph of floral art. The big Italian marble font in the middle of the hall added to the general effect, of course ; the quaint candelabra gave brilliancy to the scheme. It was all so refined, so artistic, so beautiful, so in keeping with the gracious dainty chatelaine and her clever husband. The tree was a real English tree, or more properly speaking a German one. And yet this one was novel, novel to me anyway ; all along its big branches were flowers and birds, roses of every hue, canaries, red-breasted dicky-birds (prob- ably robins), and each of these contained an electric light. A fire-lit tree without danger was a novelty, and the effect was charming. While we were enjoying the wonders of that beautiful home, and gazing at the sunset on the Palisades across the Hudson, the poor of New York were being entertained in Madison Square Park by a public Christmas tree. It was a pretty idea. Mrs. Herreshoff, who conceived it, felt that many people in that vast city were homeless and lonely, and did not even know what a Christmas tree looked like ; consequently, she ordered the CHRISTMAS AND EDISON 467 biggest possible fir tree, and on Christmas Eve the ceremony started. At the trumpet call from "Parsifal," the large Star of Bethlehem on the topmost pinnacle of the tree commenced to glow, getting brighter and brighter until, one by one, myriad-coloured lights began to appear upon the branches below until the tree was a blaze of glory. With the lighting of the tree itself, a huge chorus of mixed voices burst forth, singing the hymn "Holy Night," and from half-past five until midnight, band music, choruses, and songs continued to do honour to Christmas Day. Masses of people enjoyed the sight. Amongst them were many of the city's very poorest who went to see this wondrous show ; the sort of thing some of them had dreamed of, but never realised before, and there also were the rich, who came merely out of curiosity to see the people's enjoy- ment. Madison Square, in the heart of New York, is the loneliest place in all Manhattan ; on an or- dinary night there is nothing there but loneliness. The City of London, and Wall Street, New York, are two of the noisiest, busiest places in the world, and yet few people realize that at midnight, no country village is more deserted or more silent. CHAPTER XXI WHAT is IT ALL ABOUT ? AND after all, the writer asks herself: "What is it all about ?" Is this jumble of impressions of any value, is it amusing or instructive, or is it all just so many wasted words and hours ? What is it all about ? Well, it is merely the lightest possible summary of one of the greatest possible problems of the day. Just a woman's impressions of a vast country and a vast people, steering a great huge ship, manned by many nationalities, out of a sea of prejudices and conventionalities steering her for a harbour of her own making. America is no man's land, and it is every man's land. America represents nothing, and America represents everything. America is a tangled skein of possibilities. The old English blood is being swamped by the foreigner. The African nigger is multiplying. The cities are increasing at an alarming rate. The land is still crying for cultivation. There is a scarcity of cheap labour. 4 68 WHAT IS IT ALL ABOUT? 469 There are manufactories without workmen. There is a surplus of general wealth ; but there are few millionaires of sovereign value. A political experiment is still in the making. A diplomatic school has barely begun. Some ships the Great Eastern, for example have been found too large and awkward to handle in the sea, while small frigates have proved more useful. Will America break up in chunks, or go on adding new countries unto herself ? Who can tell ? But the one thing on which the whole country is agreed at the present moment is its own value; its own greatness, and the far-reaching importance of its own flag. The size of America is what amazes one. Its vastness, its great lakes which are huge inland seas ; its gigantic waterways ; its mountains ; in fact, its colossal size and immense population, not immense for its area, for it is sparsely populated, but numeri- cally immense, nearly one hundred millions is stupendous. All these are big words, adjectival exuberance, perhaps ; but it is the vastness that amazes the stranger. When every man and woman is a college graduate, what will become of the world gen- erally ? Will the man at the linotype machine write 470 AMERICA AS I SAW IT his leading articles on classics direct on the lead ? Will the dressmaker discuss the lines of the Greek goddesses, and insist on a large neck because Venus of Milo had one ? Will the chauffeur compare his car with the chariot of Athens ? Will the chef wonder whether his sheep's tongues are as good as the peacocks' tongues served to the Emperors of Rome ? Will the lady who wears false pearls compare her wondrous gems to the pearls in the vase of Cleo- patra ? Will the umbrella-maker discourse glibly of the early head-coverings of China, and talk Marco Polo to his confreres? Will the druggist deal in potions as the magicians of Catherine of Medici, and talk history ? Or will the world be so highly educated that everyone will specialise, and become mere automa- tons along his or her own lines, until their brains are atrophied, and they are glad to go back to the position from which they came, and everyone finds his own level again ? Education in the wrong place is far worse than no education at all. Everyone is not capable of being educated satisfactorily to himself or to the world, and many brains become more addled than when they started. WHAT IS IT ALL ABOUT? 471 That unrest which is the result of indiscreet education, which teaches every Jack that he is better than his master, is being felt in the States. The education there is as good (or as bad) as in Germany. The result in Germany is socialism, which is, however, held in check by a strong hand. In America this is coming. It is beginning to as- sert itself by a memorable struggle of the unlettered classes. Who is going to control that with an ever changing government ? We we people of the middle class are all subservient to someone. I am a worm in the hands of the editors, the publishers, and the public. We must of necessity be so ; every man must have someone over him : - "Order is Heaven's first law, and this confest Some are, and must be, greater than the rest." In America every man thinks himself better than his master, and says so with no unblushing in- ference of manner. The United States has three dangers, outside elements, as it were :- (1) The Negro, who is of lower intelligence, and has heretofore been controlled ; but numbers and education are strengthening his position. (2) The Roman Catholic, who, when powerful enough, controls countries and throttles individual- ism ; both policies antagonistic to the American cult. 472 AMERICA AS I SAW IT (3) The Jew has wonderful acquisitive talent, and is really gifted in all the arts ; but he has yet to win his social footing in the States. Personally I like Jews, and appreciate their great intellectual gifts. In fifty years they have entered America in millions and their numbers and their wealth are increasing hourly. Any custom that becomes a habit may develop into a curse. There are men in business who are so involved in business they cannot leave it. Younger partners and employees are dependent on them ; they have made enough money themselves, but the moral sense of duty to the men who have helped them to climb, coupled with the thraldom of the business habit, makes them neglect every human amusement and instinct. "I can't leave my business," one hears again and again ; "the only thing I love is yachting or shoot- ing (or whatever the case may be), but it comes at our busy season, and so I have to do without it." All this is a pity. Let the successful business man give his juniors a chance. Let him take his three months' holiday at the busiest season of the year. Those juniors may make mistakes, there may even be a deficit. Well, let the business man replace the two or three thousand pounds deficit so that none may suffer, and let him look upon it as so much paid for his own holiday. WHAT IS IT ALL ABOUT? 473 The juniors have bought their experience, and are not likely to repeat the mistakes. The " Boss" will have learnt to be human, learnt to enjoy life outside himself before it is too late, and done much to make a happier future for everyone concerned at the expense of a little money, which, with his accumulated fortune, is cheap at the price. We are all apt to think ourselves indispensable ; others can generally fill our place provided the op- portunity offers, and they have a little pluck and initiative. A dead man's shoes are soon filled. A living man wears his shoes far longer if he sometimes puts on his slippers. Nothing short of a surgical operation amputates some men from their office. In the first chapter the writer asked :- "Why do Americans resent all criticism ?" It is a well-known fact that while we will allow a friend, almost a stranger, to say, "I don't like that hat," and may even change it to please them, we become perfectly furious when a near relative, a brother or a sister, exclaims, "I don't like that hat!" We purse up our lips and reply : "It is no business of yours." Change it we won't, and we don't. England and America are much the same. We 474 AMERICA AS I SAW IT are brothers and sisters ; the one, being aggressively young, resents criticism and comparison ; the other is perhaps inclined, from being older and having knocked about the world, to assume an attitude of superiority. Both are wrong. Even when we resent criticism, we are often wise to weigh it carefully, and use it discreetly. The American hates British "ragging," and can- not understand British jokes, while we often fail to see the subtlety of American humour. The humour of each country is totally different. It cannot be compared. Instead of saying to anyone, "You are wrong," it is, of course, more tactful to ask, " Do you think you are right ?" Only it takes longer. A delightful American exclaimed, "We don't resent criticism, although we don't always like it ; but we do resent the spirit in which it is made." "Why ?" He didn't know why; unless it was that no country and no people have the right to criticise another. If we only did what was right in the eyes of this world, we should do nothing. Neither in an in- dividual nor a nation can one expect consistency. We are all growing more material and selfish every day. Oh for the resuscitation of ideals ! The destiny of the race is, or should be, the WHAT IS IT ALL ABOUT? 475 American ideal. The country is working out its own civilisation. The unfortunate writer has probably heaped a blazing furnace upon her head by daring to joke or compare, or to admire (even admiration is resented sometimes) a people she likes and esteems, and calls her friends, and hopes to embrace yet more warmly. If the public or the press do not accept her kind- liness of spirit, she will be more than ever con- vinced that HYPERSENSITIVENESS is THE AMERICAN SIN. *HE following pages contain advertisements of a few of the Macmillan books on kindred subjects Two Important New Books on America American Ideals : Character and Life BY HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE Cloth, 8vo. Preparing This volume is composed of lectures delivered in Japan by Mr. Mabie in the spring of 1913. A candid and yet sympathetic por- trayal of Americans and their country written by one who has for years held a high position in the American educational and liter- ary world is certain to be of peculiar interest to every citizen ot the land. Such a book is "American Ideals: Character and Life." The Soul of America BY STANTON COIT Chairman of the West London Ethical Society, formerly Head Worker of the New York University Settlement, and author of " The Message of Man," " Woman in Church and State," etc. Cloth, 12mo. Preparing This remarkable and important book is a plea for nationality or patriotism in the highest sense. It is far removed from the expanded egotism that frequently monopolizes these names. Ad- mirably written, full of ideas likely to be beneficent in influence and highly provocative of discussion, it is certain to appeal to a large constituency. THE MACMILLAN COMPANY Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New Tork New Illustrated Books of Travel, Adventure, and Description My Life with the Eskimos By VILHJALMUR STEFANSSON. Illustrated with half tone reproductions of photographs taken by the author and others. Decorated doth, 8vo. Preparing A fascinating book of description and adventure has been written by the famous traveler and explorer, who has passed years of his life within the Arctic Circle. Mr. Stefansson has had a vast amount of material upon which to draw and he has made his selection wisely. He has lived with the Eskimos for long periods; he knows their language; he has subsisted on their food; he has heard their legends; he has seen them in their daily lives as have few explorers. Consequently his remarks about this primitive and matter-of-fact people are shrewd, true and frequently amus- ing. The experiences and tales which he recounts, mirroring the hardships and the inspirations of life in a fearful but wonderful country, compose a work quite the most absorbing on it that has ever been published. Hunting the Elephant in Africa By C. H. STIGAND. With illustrations made from photographs taken by the author. With an Introduction by Col. Theodore Roosevelt. Decorated cloth, 8vo. Preparing For a period of more than thirteen years the author of this work has hunted big game in the jungles of East Africa. Here are told simply and with an attractive modesty, yet dramatically, some of his most remarkable experiences. It is an old-fashioned ani- mal hunting book with real thrills in it and revealing many new points on the habits of the beasts of a wild country. Captain Stigand is no nature fakir; his work is consequently a robust one in which is embodied the spirit of the real hunter. Colonel Roosevelt has written an introduction for the volume, which is illustrated by a number of very interesting pictures made from photographs taken by the author. PUBLISHED BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York New Illustrated Books of Travel, Adventure, and Description The Barbary Coast BY ALBERT EDWARDS Author of " Panama," " Comrade Yetta," etc. With many illustrations; decorated cloth, 12mo. Preparing Albert Edwards's "Panama: The Canal, the Country, and the People" has gone into many editions and received wide and favorable comment. Much may, therefore, be expected of this new descriptive volume, in which Mr. Edwards relates some of his remarkable and always interesting experi- ences in the states of northern Africa. Mr. Edwards does not write with a history or a book at his elbow ; what he says does not come to the reader from a second-hand knowledge. He has been in Africa himself and he writes out of his own life. A Woman Rice Planter BY PATIENCE PENNINGTON With an Introduction by Owen Wister and with nearly 100 illustrations by Alice R. Huger Smith Decorated cloth, 8vo. Preparing Here are detailed the actual experiences of a woman rice planter on her own account, as the manager of two large plantations in South Carolina. The book is all the more interesting and instructive because it is told in a charmingly simple manner, and without a trace of self-consciousness or self- assertion. Independently of the information it conveys, it has attraction for every reader by reason of that manner and as a revelation of a feminine character in which are manifested tender susceptibility and womanly sym- pathy no less than rugged courage in assuming an arduous task and in overcoming heavy practical obstacles. The narrative of the planter's life with its many responsibilities, the risks, the vexations and the cares involved in her ventures, the sagacity, skill, and indomitable persistency with which she pursued her way, make reading always interesting and frequently valu- able for its insight into a remarkable Southern home. THE MACMILLAN COMPANY Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York The " Highways and Byways " Series Highways and Byways from the St. Lawrence to Virginia BY CLIFTON JOHNSON With many illustrations made from photographs taken by the author Tourist edition, decorated cloth, ismo, $1.50 net As in the case of the other volumes in this series Mr. Johnson deals here primarily with country life especially that which is typical and picturesque. The author's trips have taken him to many characteristic and famous regions ; but always both in text and pictures he has tried to show nature as it is and to convey some of the pleasure he experienced in his intimate acquaintances with the people. There are notes giving valuable information concerning automobile routes and other facts of interest to tour- ists in general. Tourist Editions of the " South " and the " Pacific Coast " Highways and Byways of the South BY CLIFTON JOHNSON Tourist edition, illustrated, decorated cloth, izmo, $1.50 net Highways and Byways of the Pacific Coast BY CLIFTON JOHNSON Tourist edition, illustrated, decorated cloth, I2mo, $1.50 net THE MACMILLAN COMPANY Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SANTA CRUZ This book is due on the lost DATE stamped below. 50m-6,'67(H2523s8)2373 E168.T97 3 2106 00056 1594