Evening capital. (Annapolis, Md.) 1884-1910, 1890-09-17
zinc Fad Con Things Eng,ish.

ne recent E8gilsn impress on
American Life" is the subj ct of a
paper in Belford's Magazine by
James w. Gerard. 1t was quite the
style to be English bsfore the Revo-
luton, Mr.. Gerard tells US. The
colonial governors were men of rank
aud culture, and they brought with
them people OF their own kind. The
loyal Americans initiated them in
dress and manner fully as slavishly
as the fashionable New Yorker or
Bostonian now initiates them.
The Revolution brought a change.
The colonies became intensely hos
tile to everything English. To say
that man was like an Englislman
was to render him unpopular. We
initiated the French, with whom
our sympathies were wholly. In
the years Immediately following the
Revolution Americans were too busy
making up for the financial losses
entailed by the war to care for any
thing beyond money getting. Mr..
Gerard calls this period the dark
ages of the United States. 1t was
during these years that Mrs. Troll
lope visited US and wrote:
Writers In the United States have
little encouragement to exercise their
powers In any manner more dignified
than becoming the editor of a magazine
or newspaper. The general taste is de-
cidedly bad; this Is obvious not only
from the mass of slipslop poured forth by
the daily and weekly press, but from the
inflated tone of eulogy in which their
insect authors are lauded.
And when Harriet Martineau
came to US in 1880 she mentions
that at party one evening the lion
of the hour was tall, thin person,
with cock nose and squint eye,
who had made $500, 600 by single
speculation in tallow.
But the invention of the steam
ship changed our social life again.
Travel became cheap. Americans
and English mingled freely once
more. Americans discovered once
more how admirable were the ways
and the spirit of old England, and
for the second time fell to initiating
the mother country with all their
might.
Mr.. Gerard says:
Through steam navigation English
thought and science have spread their
wings, aud stimulated intellectual action
and progress on this side of the water.
English journalistic, periodical and light
literature furnishes q favorite literary
pabulum, and has become a model for
imitation here. English athletic sports
and tastes are now the vogue, and have
pushed the sedentary from their corners
and counters. English outdoor games
amuse and develop both our young men
and women, and are manifestly inn
proving the American physique, and
making it stronger, more developed and
more healthy. English apparel and
fashions are adopted as not only sensible
and suitable, but becoming. English
manners and modes of speech are sedu-
lousy initiated. English servants and
even clergymen are imported in large
numbers, and broad "a" is adopted, and
even, under English ridicule, the nasal
twang is becoming reprehensible Speech
is being characterized by infections, and
quick. sharp, heavy voice has become
sign of low breeding, or. a ranglaise.
bad form"
All of which, if true, goes to
prove that even now, after nearly
500 years of existence. the American
people have still no character Of
their own, but must continually
initiate somebody else.