Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1884-01-10

Generally, however, it is true that
the European traveler-and the more
surely if he is British and person OF
any note-leayes the States quite as
ignorant of them and their people on
all essential points as he was before he
crossed the ocean, and with his igno-
rance at once confused and confirmed
and elevated into cOnceit by misappre-
hension of the very little of any real
significance that he has been able to
see. For the distinguished traveller sees,
indeed, through no fault of his own,
very little that reveals to him the real
condition of american" society, of
which he touches only the surface at a
few salient points. All the vast level
range below, not to say the yet I'M
DERIVING strata, is hidden from his
eyes. If he is q man of any fame in
politics, literature, art, or society, his az
rival is announced by the press; he is
interviewed; he is seized upon by vari-
Gus people, who, with social, business,
OF other motives, wish to use him for
their own purposes. He is entertained,
teted, taken to this, that, and the other
institution, where he is expected, and
indeed almost required, to, make a few
remarks. " He passes over a great many
miles Of country shut up in a railway
car, and surrounded by his party"
He sees big waterfall and some noun
tains, a president and some governors,
waterfalls and mountains in their own
way; and this is all. What does this
teach him of the society Of the people
among whom he has been? Entertain
ments, parties, receptions, among people
OF wealth (the only people with whom
he is likely to mix), are much the same
upon the surface in the superior circles
of all Western nations. And who learns
anything about anybody in formal $50
Getty? What do we ever learn of each
other at such gatherings? We merely
90 through the parade in due form.
Moreover, these more or less distin-
guished strangers are on such occasions
here the principal guests. People are
invited to meet them. They are on
exhibition to the other guests, and the
other guests are on exhibition to them.
What is the meeting? An intro
dGctiOn, languid hand-shake of some
scores or some hundreds, 4 few words,
delighted to meet, charmed, :"
''hope," ''always remember" and so
forth; and this repeated a dozen times
in the principal places, and two or
three times in the minor places. OF
what significance or insructiveness is
this? 1t is not at such entertainments,
or at formal dinners, or even at less
formal breakfasts, that q people is to
be studied in its habits Of life, its tone
of thought, its morals, or even it's
language. To do that it is necessary
to live among them, and to live among
them unremarked as a notabilitV and
q Watchful stranger; to see them when
they are off their guard, and not
when you are on parade to them, and
they, are, or wish TO be, on parade
to you. Probably the most ignorant
man about anything essentially and
enthusiastically American, = who
has been in the country, is Lord Cole
ridge; and SO he will doubtless remain,
except as to what may be seen almost
rs well in photograph as in reality. The
Englishman who, according to my OBJ
servation, is most capable, of all of his
living countrymen, to write with under
standing about the country told me that
after having lived here year and q
half he was obliged to throw over
board all his theories and the opinions
he had formed, and begin again from
the foundation. Richard Grant White
IN AtlaHtjc.