The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1892-03-25
A REVOLT OF FASHION.
Not So Apt to saiaam Toward the Eas'
as We Used to he.

Not So Apt to sniaam Toward the Eass
as We Used to BE.
Americans have always been more or
less victimized by subssrvience TO
the arbitrary dictates of fashion that
continually makes salaam toward the
east, toward Europe and the ''old
world" countries While this habit of
mind is still characteristic to us as a
people, it is encouraging to note that in
one particular revolt has begun. We
refer to the conventional European
tour. For many years. because it was
sanctioned by fashion. it was supposed
by great many persons to be the most
pleasurable and instructive of possible
trips beyond their immediate native
borders. Most heroically, therefore,
they braved the material dangers and
the ennui Of an Atlantic voyage, and
spent months on the worn thorough
fares of Europe. in the wake of hun
bred of thousands that had taken pre-
cisely the same excursion under pre-
cisely similar auspices, with precisely
the same mistaken notion that they
were making the most profitable ex-
penditure of their time and money. He
who ventured to assert that there could
be found within the confines of our
country beauties and wonders excelling
those of foreign lands, atmospheres and
environments moro romantic and more
suggestive than any known in the other
hemisphere, was looked upon as an &C.
centric and a possible enemy to the
public veal. People were enslaved by
the same rules that still prescribe the
cut of their garments and the dimen
sions of their cartes-de-visite. Fashion
ordered them over sea, and over sea
they fastened
But in spite Of prejudice the plain
truth has made its way. Our own coun-
try, our own continent, is no whit be-
hind the so-called "old world" in at
Effectiveness to the unbiased traveller.
There are no charms of climate, seem
cry, bloom and fruitage over sea that
California does not transcend in every
particular. The odor of antiquity that
clusters about the pyramids of Egypt
hangs even more mysteriously over the
colossal pyramids in Mexico. There are
close at hand Alps and glaciers, deserts,
volcanoes. canons, petrifactions of en-
tire forests, hot mineral springs, cata-
racts, ruins of prehistoric civilizations
prehistoric dwellings still resisting the
leveling hand of time. There are abso-
Lutte PROJECTIONS of vegetation, OF flow
ers and fruits, of landscape and of cline.
Year by year we hear less of the old af-
fected talk of European scenery. He
who has "been abroad" no longer inn
AGNES that he wears an enviable halo.
Multitudes who formerly thought it
necessary to spend the winter in Italy
or the south of France now repair to
southern California. They are abandon
ing the old conventional routes for I'M
hackneyed delights of our own south
west 1t is healthy revulsion. and one
that should be encouraged by precept
and example. 1t is difficult to imagine
a more melancholy spectacle than an
American wanderer through Europe
who is ignorant of his own land. Such
snobbish representatives cast discredit
upon this nation, and it is a satisfaction
to note that they are yearly becoming
fewer; and we can find word of praise
for fashion itself when we find it, as at
present, strongly setting in direction
approved by common sense, and point
ing to more valuable education and
the increase of just national pride -
Mipneanolis Journal