Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1854-07-22
Extract from a Lecture by Wendell Phillips.
EUROPEAN AND YANKEE LIFE.


striking characteristic Of the people of Euroye,
Is the want Of enterprise. Here anything contri.
hutes to progress, and every man i3 striving to
rise. And he hasa motive, forho knows if he sue
cceds in accommodating, he will have more infu.
encc and a higher social position. But abroad, the
poor man has no motive to strive-tle handspring
is taken away. Property will not change his con.
dition. Tho mountain weight of conservatism
keeps all classes as they were. We are heads,
ever suhiccting The clements to our uses, and say.
ing labor. There is nothing Of this abroad. The
season is, we have much to do, and but q few to
60 it, while they have but little to do, and many to
do it. Consequently, we invent labor-saving ma
chincry, while they do as their fathers did without
seeking to improve it. For instance, in Italy, you
will see the farmer breaking up his land with two
cows, and the root Of a tree for a plough, while he
is dressed in skin with the hair on. In Rome,
Vienna, or Dresden, if you hire a man to saw your
wood, hc does not bring a saw-horsc. lie never
had one, nor his fl'hcr before him. But he places
one end of the saw upon the ground, and the other
against his breast, and taking the wood in his
hands, rubs 1T against the saw. And he will be all
day doing two hours work. 1t is a solemn fact,
that in Florence, a city filed with the %triumphs Of
art, there is not a single auger, and if a carpenter
would bore a hole, he does it with q red hot pokerl
This results not from n want Of industry, but of
sagacity, of thought. The people are by no means
idle. They toll early and late, men, women and
children, with an industry that shames the labor
saving Yankee.
The Pope does not allow the steamboats, to como
npto his wharves, but anchors them II mile off so
that his ragged boatmon may make n few pennies
10y rowing passengers ashore. Thus he makes
labor that the poor may live. IN Rome, charcoal
is principally used for fuel, and you see \ string of
twenty mules bringing little sacks of it upon their
backs, when one mule would draw it in a cart.
But the charcoal vcnder never had o cart, and SO
he keeps his twenty mules and feeds them. There
is no want of Industry, but there is also no COM
~ ,l, 1900. 1-1- 1,--.l II
nervous, as though he was chasing a dollar. With
us, money is everything, and when we go abroad,
We arc surprised to fad that the dollar has ceased
to be almighty. If Il Yankee refuses to do a Job
for fifty cents, he will probably do it for a dollar,
and will certainly do it for five. But one of the
lazzaroni OF Naples, who has earned two cents, and
eaten them, will work no more that day, if you offer
him ever 50 large a sum. lie has earned enough
for the day and he wants no more. So there is no
eagerness for money, no motive for it, and every
body moves slowly.
Another phase of European life is TO be seen
IN the modes of travelling. Here everybody trav-
els, and consequently our means of travelling are
the best in the world. But abroad, government
docs not encouragc travelling. Itknowsth hat there
is a mysterious connection between h~urrying to
and fro, and dangerous knowledge on the part of
the people. So the modes Of travelling are very
In Lyons, one Of the largest cities of France,
we have known a traveller to waita week to obtain
n seat IN n stage coach, and in Marseilles two
weeks. This explains why Paris is France. The
people of that city can dernolish one government
and construct another, before the people of the 9th
er cities can hear of it.
Another characteristic Of the people abroad is,
that they arc e%conlmical, and arc not ashamed of
it. If a Yankee tries to save a dollar, there are
nine chances in ten that he will tell q lie to conceal
it. y Frenchman would not he ashamed to own
he was trying to save a dollar. Coaches on the
continent travel in the night, because it saves time,
meal, and a bed. When II Frenchman enters a
coach, he pulls on a night cap and goes to sleep.
lie resignes himselfto govcrnment-shuts his eyes
and opens his mouth to receive whatever may be
put into it. Thus, if the stage stops on the way an
hour, he never asks the cause, but sleeps on, with
the door locked upon him.. A Yankee would be
out, asking fifty questions.
a marked distinction abroad, is the culture ard
courtesy of the masses, with one exception. This
relates to the stagc-coach. The English praise
us for our attention to women and sick persons
travelling, and we deserve it, compared with them.
On the continent, the seats of stages are numbered,
you take a particular one, and are not expected to
move to oblige anybody.