"You see I never had a chance to learn just one thing. I can do many
things tolerably well, for I had to do them. I can splice a rope, repair
a machine, shingle a house and if necessary build a barn. I can play
ragtime on the piano, throw a steer or ride a bucking broncho. I can
even make soda biscuits. I am the child of the pioneers, and in order to
survive, they had to be jacks of all trades.
"I bought a tool in a department store the other day," and he drew it
from his pocket. "It can do sixteen things tolerably well, but it isn't
worth shucks for any one job, if you want to do it right. That's me."
The Herr Director wanted to know what "shucks" meant, and after I
laboriously explained it to him and he had handled the patent tool he
said:
"Your travelling men have come over to Germany and tried to sell us this
kind of thing, but they found no market. When we want a gimlet, or a
saw, or a coat-hanger we want that one thing and want it as good as it
can be made. We marvel at your adaptability, but we are too thorough to
be adaptable, and we do not need to be. You Americans will never be able
to compete with us until you learn to specialize and do one thing well."
We sat long into the night comparing the German and the American Spirit,
but there was one phase of the former which the Herr Director clearly
demonstrated. There was a religious fervor in his patriotism which the
average American lacks. To him his country was not only above himself
but beyond everything else on Earth or in Heaven. There often seems
something sordid about our patriotism, something connected solely with
the individual's well-being. I glory in our sense of liberty, in the
opportunity to live unmolested, and in every man's chance to be himself;
but I fear we have as yet not learned to value our duty to this country
as much as we do our privilege.
I am sure there will be no lack of fighters if the country is in danger;
but shall we be able to fight the long, exhausting battle which
presupposes discipline and subordination?
The United States gives much to the individual, more, I think, than any
other country; but she has not given intelligently, she has nearly
pauperized us all by her beneficence, and has demanded nothing in
return, nor even taught us common gratitude.
Our children are told that they must love their country, but what that
means beyond fighting when it is in danger they know not. That it means
to do their work thoroughly, that they must learn to do things well, and
exalt the nation by becoming efficient workmen that they may help win
their country's battles in the factory, or behind the counter, they do
not yet know; and what we have not learned, we cannot teach.
This questioning mood of mine is never gendered as I contemplate the
mob, the many who are driven to revolt either by their unbridled
passions or by the unbearable conditions under which they have to
labor; my fear is strongest when I look into the schools and when I face
our youth which comes out of them, inefficient, but above all,
undisciplined. They do not lack physical courage, nor yet devotion to
the country, in a sort of abstract way; they do lack the submission to
intelligent authority.
In this latter-day test of different ideals of the state, through the
cruel, undecisive test of war, we may learn from Germany to instill this
"_Pflichttreue_," this loyalty to the job. We may also learn the more
difficult lesson for us individualists--submission to authority which we
must make intelligent, as well as conscientious.
Necessity will soon teach us to be thorough, and thoroughness
presupposes patience. Add these qualities and this discipline to the
enterprise, the love of fair play, the courage, the faith in God and
man, which we possess, and we too may ultimately develop a patriotism
which will stand the test of adversity, and emerge from it purified and
strengthened.
When we stepped out of the restaurant and its German atmosphere into
the unmistakably American Broadway, my German guests felt that my
rampant Americanism had been thoroughly subdued. However they had
literally "reckoned without their host." My protracted silence had
misled them, but I could contain myself no longer.
"We are now walking in the streets of the second largest city in the
world, its population thrown together and blown together from every
quarter of the globe, and the most of these people, if not the worst of
them, have come here in the last thirty-five years. They brought neither
love of their new country nor knowledge of its language and
institutions; they all came to make money, and to-morrow morning four
millions of people will begin again the competitive battle from which
they are resting to-night.
"The laws which govern them are illy made, but they have made them, or
at least had a chance to select those who did make them. They have not
always chosen well; the officers who govern them are often not good men;
frequently they are only the most cunning politicians and one has but
scant respect for them. Yet in spite of it all, this is a fairly well
governed city and it is quite remarkable that these four million people
live together in comparative peace and order. Neither is there any ill
from which this great city or any group of its individuals suffers for
which there is not some help or healing or some attempt to heal.
"If I were an absolute stranger without money, knowing neither the
language of the people nor their ways, I would rather be on the streets
of the city of New York than anywhere else."
"How do you account for it?" the Frau Directorin ventured to ask,
although the Herr Director had been violently expressing his dissent.
"We have several things to count on here, even when conditions seem
intolerable. Let me name them.
"We are all human beings; some of us have inherited the Old Testament
righteousness and the passion for justice, and many of us have the New
Testament desire for service. These together make a very effective
combination, and go a great way towards the glorious results we shall
ultimately achieve."
For once the Herr Director was silent, and as we had reached our hotel,
I think I might have slept peacefully that night had not the Nebraskan
triumphantly remarked as we were being shot up to the topmost floor:
"Say, I did get that lobster à la Milkburgh with pickles and mince pie,
didn't I? I always get what I want when I want it."