A traveller visiting a strange land takes for granted the simpler
virtues. He notes with gratitude and without surprise the generous
practice of hospitality. He recognises that the husbandman, patiently
toiling on his farm, _adscriptus glebæ_, holds in his toil-worn hands
the destiny of his country. He knows that the excellent work done in
tranquil seclusion by men of letters and scholars will outlast the
braggart achievements of well-advertised millionaires and "prominent"
citizens. Fortunately, such virtues as these are the common inheritance
of all peoples.
They are not characteristic of this nation or of that. They belong,
like air and sunlight, to the whole civilised world. And it is not by
similarities, but by differences, that the traveller arrives at a clear
picture of a foreign land. Especially in America do the softer shades
and quieter subtleties escape the unaccustomed eye. The swift energies,
the untiring restlessness, the universal haste, obscure the amenities
of life more darkly there than elsewhere. The frank contempt of law and
blood, which receives a daily illustration, must needs take a firmer
hold of the observer than the peaceful tillage of the fields and the
silent acquisition of knowledge. America is unhappy in that she is still
making her history, not one episode of which a vigilant and lupine press
will suffer to go unrecorded. Graft and corruption stalk abroad,
public and unashamed. The concentration of vast wealth in a few pockets
results, on the one hand, in a lowering of the commercial code, on the
other, in a general diffusion of poverty, These are some of the traits
which mark America off from the other nations, and these traits none
with a sense of the picturesque can ever overlook.
Yet it is not these traits which make the deepest impression upon the
returning traveller. As he leaves the shores of America he forgets for
the moment her love of money and of boodle, he forgets her superb energy
and hunger for life, he forgets the exquisite taste shown by the most
delicately refined of her citizens. He remembers most vividly that he
is saying good-bye to the oldest land on earth. It is an irony of
experience that the inhabitants of the United States are wont to
describe themselves as a young people. They delight to excuse their
extravagances on the ground of youth. When they grow older (they tell
you) they will take another view of politics and of conduct. And the
truth is that old age long ago overtook them. America is not, never
was, young. She sprang, ready-made, from the head of a Pilgrim Father,
the oldest of God's creatures. Being an old man's daughter, she has
escaped the virtues and vices of an irresponsible childhood. In the
primitive history of the land her ancestors took no part. They did not
play with flint-knives and set up dolmens where New York now stands.
They did not adorn themselves with woad and feathers. The Prince Albert
coat (or its equivalent) was always more appropriate to their ambition.
In vain you will search the United States for the signs of youth.
Wherever you cast your eye you will find the signal proofs of an eager,
grasping age. Youth loiters and is glad, listening to the songs of
birds, wondering at the flowers which carpet the meadow, and recking not
of the morrow. America is grave and in a hurry. She is not content to
fleet the time carelessly, as they did in the golden age. The one hope
of her citizens is to get to Wall Street as quickly as possible, that
they may add to their already useless hoard of dollars. For this purpose
they have perfected all those material appliances which increase the
rapidity and ease of life. They would save their labour as strenuously
as they would add to their fortunes. A telephone at every bed-head
has made the toil of letter-writing superfluous. A thousand ingenious
methods of "transportation" have taken away the necessity of walking.
There is no reason why in the years to come hand and foot should
not both be atrophied. But there is nothing young in this sedulous
suppression of toil. Youth is prodigal of time and of itself. Youth
boasts of strength and prowess to do great deeds, not of skill to pile
millions upon millions, a Pelion upon an Ossa of wealth. Nor in the vain
luxury of New York can we detect anything save the signs of age. It is
only in modern America that the mad extravagance of Nero's Rome may
be matched. There the banquet of Trimalchio might be presented without
surprise and without reproach. It differs from what are known as "freak
dinners" only in the superiority of its invention and in the perfection
of its table-talk.
In brief, the fantastic ambition of a "cottage" at Newport, as of
Trimalchio's villa in Southern Italy, is the ambition, not of primitive,
reckless, pleasure-loving youth, but of an old age, sated and curious,
which hurries to decay.
Again, it is not a young people which cries aloud "too old at forty!" In
the childhood of the world, the voice of age is the voice of wisdom.
It is for Nestor that Homer claims the profoundest respect, and to-day
America is teaching us, who are only too willing to learn the baneful
lesson, that knowledge and energy die with youth. Once upon a time I met
an American who had returned from his first visit to Europe, and when
I asked what was the vividest impression he brought from thence, he
replied: "I was surprised to see an old man like the German Emperor
doing so much work." In our more youthful eyes the German Emperor has
but crossed the threshold of life. The years of his mature activity lie
before him, we believe, like an untrodden road. But for the American,
prematurely worn out by the weight of time and the stress of affairs,
William II. already hastens to his decline, and clings to the reins of
office with the febrile courage of an old man.
And all the while America is sublimely unconscious that the joys of
childhood are not hers. Though with the hypochondria of advancing years
she demands a doctor for her soul, she knows not from what disease she
suffers. She does not pray for a Medea to thrust her into a cauldron of
rejuvenescence. With a bluff optimism she declares that she is still the
youngest of the nations, and boasts that when she has grown up to the
height of her courage and activity she will make triumphant even her
bold experiment in democracy. Not upon her has the divine injunction
descended: [Greek phrase]. She who knows so much knows not herself. How
should she, when she is composed of so many and so diverse elements?
And lacking self-knowledge, she lacks humour. With the best will in the
world, she cannot see the things about her in a true proportion. The
blithe atmosphere, clear as crystal, sparkling as champagne, in which
she lives, persuades her to take a too serious and favourable view of
her own character. And let it be remembered that with her optimism she
still treasures the sentimentality of her Puritan ancestors. She is
a true idealist, who loves nothing so dearly as "great thoughts." She
delights in the phrases and aspirations which touch the heart more
nearly than the head. Though her practice does not always square with
her theory, especially in the field of politics, she is indefatigable
in the praise of freedom, equality, and the other commonplaces of
democracy. The worst is, that she cannot laugh at herself. Her gravity
and sensitiveness still lie, like stumbling-blocks, in her path. She
accepts the grim adulation of such unwise citizens as Mr Carnegie as
no more than her due. If only she could dismiss the flattery of her
admirers with an outburst of Gargantuan hilarity, all virtues might be
added unto her. But, as I have said, she lacks this one thing. She is
the home of humourists and no humour. A thousand jesters minister to her
amusement, and she pays them handsomely. More jokes are made within her
borders in a day than suffice the rest of the globe for a year. And the
laughter which they provoke is not spontaneous. You can hear the creak
of the machine as it goes to work. The ever-present jester is a proof
that humour is an exotic, which does not grow naturally on the soil,
and does not belong more intimately to the American people than did the
cumbersome jokes of Archie Armstrong to the monarch who employed him.
The humour which simplifies life, and detects a spice of ridicule even
in the operations of business and politics, is rarely found in America.
Nor is its absence remarkable. The Americans are absorbed from early
youth to ripe old age in the pursuit of success. In whatever path they
walk they are determined to triumph. Sport for them is less an amusement
than a chance to win. When they embark upon business, as the most of
them do, their ambition is insatiable. They are consumed by the passion
of money-making. The hope of victory makes them despise toil and
renounce pleasure. Gladly will they deprive themselves of rest and lead
laborious lives. The battle and its booty are their own reward.
They count their gathered dollars with the same pride wherewith the
conquering general counts his prisoners of war. But the contest marks
their faces with the lines of care, and leaves them beggared of gaiety.
How can they take themselves other than seriously when millions depend
upon their nod? They have bent their energies to one special end and
purpose--the making of money; and in the process, as an American once
said to me, they forget to eat, they forget to live. More obviously
still, they forget to laugh. The comedy of their own career is never
revealed to them. Their very slang displays their purpose: they are "out
for the stuff," and they will not let it escape them. A kind of sanctity
hangs about money. It is not a thing to be taken lightly; it is no
proper subject for a jest. And as money and its quest absorb the best
energies of America, it follows that America is distinguished by a high
seriousness with which Europe is powerless to compete. However far a
profession may be removed from the mart, profit is its end. Brilliant
research, fortunate achievement--these also are means, like buying and
selling. In scholarship, as in commerce, money is still the measure of
success. Dr Münsterberg, a well-known professor at Harvard, has recorded
the opinion of a well-known English scholar, which, with the doctor's
comment, throws a clearer light upon the practice of America than a page
of argument. "America will not have first-class scholarship," said the
Englishman, "in the sense in which Germany or England has it, till every
professor in the leading universities has at least ten thousand dollars
salary, and the best scholars receive twenty-five thousand dollars." Dr
Münsterberg refused at first to accept this conclusion of the pessimist,
but, says he, the years have convinced him. Scholars must be paid
generously in the current coin, or they will not respect their work.
It is not greed, precisely, which drives the American along the road
of money-getting. It is, as I have said, a frank pride in the spoils,
a pride which is the consistent enemy of light-heartedness, and which
speedily drives those whom it possesses into a grave melancholy.
This, then, is the dominant impression which America gives the
traveller--the impression of a serious old gentleman, whom not even
success will persuade to laugh at his own foibles. And there is another
quality of the land, of which the memory will never fade. America
is apprehensive. She has tentacles strong and far-reaching, like the
tentacles of a cuttle-fish. She seizes the imagination as no other
country seizes it. If you stayed long within her borders, you would be
absorbed into her citizenship and her energies like the enthusiastic
immigrant.
You would speak her language with a proper emphasis and a becoming
accent. A few weeks passed upon her soil seem to give you the
familiarity of long use and custom. "Have I been here for years?" you
ask after a brief sojourn. "Can it be possible that I have ever lived
anywhere else?"