_The publication of an American diary requires neither apology nor
explanation, especially when it is more a record than a criticism.
Besides, the “best people” seem to do it. I have upon my desk an old
volume entitled: “Travels in the United States, etc., during 1849 and
1850,” by the Lady Emmeline Stuart Wortly. It is dedicated with some
pomp “to the Countess of Chesterfield by her most affectionate cousin
the authoress.” By a strange coincidence we seem to have trodden the
same paths, and ofttimes our impressions are the same. Her experiences
in 1850 traveling with her little girl are in many ways not dissimilar
to mine in 1921 traveling with my little son. She describes her visits
to New York, Washington, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, etc., and then she
goes to Vera Cruz, Mexico City, Puebla, and many other places. She has
the unconscious arrogance of a genteel aristocrat; she describes the
people she meets and writes of them as “Ladies and Gentlemen” instead
of as “men and women.” For her there is no Bohemianism and she has no
perplexities about world movements. Nevertheless she expresses a deep
interest in Russia and some of her comments are not without value even
in this day._
_I think I will allow Lady Emmeline to voice in her own mid-Victorian
language some of my own opinions. Her condescension, her lack of humor
and her naiveté have a charm that I cannot compete with._
_Beginning with New York, she says, “I like the Americans more and
more, either they have improved wonderfully lately or else the
criticisms on them have been cruelly exaggerated. They are particularly
courteous and obliging; and seem, I think, amiably anxious that
foreigners should carry away a favorable impression of them. As for
me--I am determined not to be prejudiced, but to judge of them exactly
as I find them; and I shall most pertinaciously continue to praise
them (if I see no good cause to alter my present humble opinion). I
have witnessed but very few isolated cases, as yet, of the wonderful
habits so usually ascribed to them--the superior classes here have
almost always excellent manners, and a great deal of real and natural,
as well as acquired, refinement, and are often besides (which perhaps
will not be believed in fastidious England) extremely distinguishing
looking.”_
_It is written in the spirit of her day and is meant to be extremely
complimentary. It pleases me to note that I have already unconsciously
corroborated her remark that: “The Americans, I think, are a very
musically inclined people--far more naturally so, it strikes me, than
we Britishers.”_
_She tells of meeting Mr. Prescott in Boston. “Prescott is one of the
most agreeable people I have ever met with--as delightful as his own
most delightful books.--He tells me he has never visited either Mexico
or Peru. I am surprised that the interest in his own matchless works
did not impel him to go to both.”_
_I agree with her, it does indeed seem strange._
_But what really interests me is a sidetrack in which she launches
out in opinions about Russia. She writes: “There are but few Russian
visitors here in New York, it seems; but I am very much struck by
the apparent entente-cordiale that exists between Russia and the
United States. There seems an inexplicable instinct of sympathy, some
mysterious magnetism at work, which is drawing by degrees these two
mighty nations into closer contact. Napoleon, we know, prophesied
that the world, ere long, would be either Cossack or Republican.... I
cannot resist dwelling a little on this interesting subject: Russia is
certainly the grand representative of despotic principles, as the U.
S. are the representatives of democratic ones. How is it that these
antagonistic principles, embodied in these two mighty governments,
allow them to be so friendly and cordial towards one another?...
Russia and the U. S. are the two young giant nations of the world....
The Leviathans of the lands!... These two grand young nations are
strong to the race, and fresh to the glorious contest. Far off in the
future, centuries and ages beyond this present hour, is the culminating
point. What to other Nations may be work and labor, to them is but,
as it were, healthful relaxation, the exercising of their mammoth
limbs, the quickening of the mighty current of their buoyant and
bounding life-blood, the conscious enjoyment of their own inexhaustible
vitality. There is much similarity, in short, in the position of these
two vast powers.... She (Russia) has plenty of time, too, before
her--she can watch and she can wait....”_
_If Lady Emmeline had had an American mother, to help her to be just a
little less English and a little less class-conscious, she might have
evolved into quite an emancipated thinker!_
_I cannot help wishing that she, too, had kept a diary, instead of
compiling her book from letters “after adding somewhat, to give them
the usual narrative form,” as she says in the preface. Consequently
one loses many of the little details often illustrative or human that
only a daily diary can remember to record. Following her travels, I see
that at Vera Cruz she probably stayed in the same hotel, “In the great
Plaza, almost close to the fine old Cathedral.” In comparison with our
experience at Vera Cruz hers was not so very unlike. They “ran into a
Norther” which relieved them of the expected heat, but “in spite of
all our precautions in the night, our balcony-doors blew open, and my
little girl and I were almost blown away, beds and all.”_
_Her journey to Mexico City is by stage coach; “not far from this spot
is the beginning of a railroad, which, say the Americans, may perhaps
be finished in 500 years. It is intended to be carried on to Mexico.”
No doubt it would have taken 500 years, but that an English company
“butted in” and so I have been privileged less than 100 years later to
travel to Mexico on that railway. It can only be said, in comparison,
that her discomforts were more prolonged._
_Arrived in Mexico, we have a similar experience when visiting
Chapultepec Castle: “The commandant came forward and very courteously
asked if we would like to see the views from the flat roof of the
castle.... What a Paradise world we saw..., etc.” and we have both
seen the same thing, and thought the same thing, only in different
words. Lady Emmeline has a more fragrant style. She makes an effort, on
occasions, to describe scenes that surpass mere words: “But it is not,
after all, so much the scene itself, as the great and boundless story
the imagination ever lends it; for the soul once awakened, and stirred
and thrilled by the sight of that magnificent scenery, makes it ten
thousand fold more glorious....” There is much more of this._
_On her way to Puebla she describes how “we soon came in sight of
the wonderful and huge pyramid of Cholula, built by the Aztecs; it
is supposed as a Teocali. A temple to Quetzalcoatl formerly stood
on it, but now it is crowned by a Christian Chapel dedicated to the
Madonna.... With regard to this extraordinary pyramid, I think the
people who could be bold enough to become mountain-builders within
sight of those stupendous volcanoes, Popocatepetl and Iztaccíhuatl and
so many other mighty mountains, deserve much praise for their almost
sublime audacity....”_
_These were exactly my sentiments and I must thank Lady Emmeline for
having spared me the writing of my own introduction. I curtsey to her
very charming ghost and my great regret is that our paths divide. I
cannot follow her to Peru, whither she goes from Mexico; and she cannot
accompany me to Los Angeles, nor shake with me the hand of Charlie
Chaplin._