Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1895-07-21
AMERICAN ExTRAvAGANcE.
How Unfavorably It Contrasts wiIh Enc
 Prudent Economy of Europeans

Prudent Economy oh
 The American thinks it fine thing to be pound foolish, mean thing to be penuywise. He lacks patience also; he loses courage over any plan or scheme that requires years to perfect, such as mapping out his life and say ing: ''I am now grown and educated; in five yearsI will do this, in five more that. in ten more something else," as the European does. He does not say: Tn ten years shall have paid all my fataer's debts; I shall then marry; in tea more I shall have laid by for my Yife and children five, ten, fifty, hun- fred thousand dollars, shall have bought this or that place for myself, this or that business for my son." The Americans mind is so full of large and splendid possi bilities that he comes to regard them as probabilities and to scorn the day of small things, the pa- tient process and careful economies by which important results are more often achieved than in any other way. Every American expects to succeed; every European looks to it that he shall not fail ignominiously in the race of1ife. He handicdps himself, he will give so much time, youth, money, to accom- plish such and such result. He will not marry too young or foolishly, knowing that ruin deux is all that awaits him. He takes long views and makes careful plans, not leaving much to chance or accident, unlike the American, who is always waiting Micawb ber-wise for the splendid chance that is to make his fortune, the something to turn up" that is to revolutionize all his future, the turn in the tide that is to lead on to victory though as often as not it strands him on the beach of diversity, old age and failure.
 But this is not doctrine that finds favor with our people; not d bit of it. Mrs. Jones, who has twelve hum dred a year. must dress like Mrs. Brown, who has hundred thousand. Mrs. Brown goes to the seaside and stops at an expensive hotel, therefore Mrs. Jones makes her husbands life a burden to him until he takes rooms for her on the same floor of the very same house. Outside of New England and the south it is refreshing rarity to meet any human being who gives as the only true, bona fide reason for not doing anything: T can't afford it, ,n with no sort of false shame or false hu- mility.
 The people with mutton broth pockets and turtle soup tastes. who spend their lives in refusing to be small peas or potatoes with all their might, and insisting upon being large golden pumpkins with all their soul, exist everywhere, of course, but they are as plentiful as blackberries with us, and growing more numerous every day. Millionaires set the pace, and all the frogs begin forthwith to convert themselves into oxen, and be, as they call it, ''swells," though many of them burst in the effort, so great are their social sensitiveness, their determina- ton to keep up with the procession, their horror of not being supposed to be in or able to keep up with this or that set, their intense social uneasi- ing of brass bands and burning of lime lights is their idea of society. They forget LowelI's delightful aphor- ism that "Good society would be charming if it deserved either the noun or the adjective.
 I do not say expenditure. Rich Europeans put as much money and more than we do in certain things pictures, books, curios, antiques, stained glass, Thoroughbred horses, pampered menials. wines, "collections" of all sorts, establishments, and great houses The show places, the great libraries, the winners of the derby and the Prix de Paris, the armies of powdered funkies. the galleries of paintings and statuary, the cellars of fine wines. the collections of fans, laces, old books, old shoes, old silver, old coins, old armor, musical instru- ments, snuff boxes, pipes, sea weed, butterflies, drinking fagons, costumes of all times and nations-all these show that the European is not nig- gardly, but spends his money with lib erality and intelligence. And some Americans do the same-an ever increasing number of them, in fact, But, as rule, the American wastes as much as he spends wisely. and the European never does this He under. stands exactly how each sou should go, in order to get out of every franc its utmost value. He. accurately calculates what his expenses will be; apportions his income or salary with the incest care, graduating his scale of expendi- ture with the wisdom born of thou, sand years experience of life in an overpopulated country; so much for rent, taxes, food, dress, accidentals, journeys, doctors bills, the education and establishment of children, the i'm provement or repairs of property, all in due proportion.-Lippi $.
 In the Right Place.