The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1894-10-19
SOCIETY IN ENGLAND.
Circles That Are Not Open TO Mere
Men of Money.
Ar:-eoc-- tic .sobIcs who Are Above Asss-
eis-ng with Wealthy Americans
Because of Their Financial
Eminence.

There is marked difference be-
tween the main body Of the Americans
who annually invade London nowadays
and those who used TO be seen years
ago Time was when the travelling
Americans did not care for society, pre-
.ferring TO do the sights ss speedily as
possible and hurry off to other show
places Now visitors from the land of
the free consider themselves quite as
much in the social swim as any lord or
lady in the peerage, are ''up" in all the
ways and customs of society, end are
regarded by London swelldom as rep
Preventative Americans In general
these are the sight-seers OF the past
grown anglicized and their sons and
daughters. l regard Mr. Astor as a
fair sample of the new American in
England, says correspondent of the
lArgonnut. His money, of course, en-
lsbles him to do anything he likes He
might stand on his head on the top of
the duke of York's column or play leap
frog down Pail Mall with Mr.. Wander
lbilt- 1t is doubtful, by the bye, If
either Of these performers would make
him a cause Of more plying smiles and
compassionate shoulder-shrugs than
his forced intrusion into London jonr-
'nalism or his ostentatious purchase of
the duke of Westminster's Thames bank
villa. He has too much money to let
the people who fnd 1t pleasant TO know
him show what they really think Of his
ldesertion Of his own country. And l
rather suspect that he knows very few
who are great enough In themselves to
be Indifferent TO the money power he
Ewields-
There Is a class of Doblemen among
the English aristocracy who arc above
any and all outside influences al
'together-1nen whom gold does not
dazzle. regard them as the highest
type Of nobility in every sense, and /
consider the duke of Northumberland
rs q striking instance of the sort Of
man mean. The duke Of Rutland is
another. The poorest, hunblest Amer
lean, were he a gentleman, might en-
Ter the society of these noblenen and
be cordially received By them But
all the wealth Of the Astors and Van
derbilts combined could not get recog-
milton for its possessors from the same
men, were there no other recommenda-
'tion. And am morally certain of one
thing: Buying end hiring gran9houses
in England by foreigners for no rhyme
or reason but the exhibition OF bit of
vulgar swagger, would not be IN any
sense O crcdential of respectability to
them. Much the reverse, ! should
imagine As for the duke Of West
minister, he is a shrewd man Of bust
ness, and, like all the Grosvenors, has
rs keen an eye to the main chance as a
horse-dealer or patent medicine
drummer. Yet l cannot somehow
think that any \ cry lasting friendship
has sprung up Detween his grace and
the American purchaser of Clieveden.
Indeed, the reported controversy con-
corning the right Of property in the
visitors book would seem to negative
the presumption Of the existence Of
very amicabl- relations. I often won.
der how men like Mr.. Astor can wish
20 fill fourth or ffth-rate position in
England instead of the first place in
America. He cannot at one moment
rely on the fact that he is an Amer
lean, and therefore the equal of any
man, and at the next set up as an Eng
Gsh country squire, or q London ed
ftor, and therefore several pegs below
the dukes and other nobility. he must
make his choice