The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1896-07-23
AMERICANS ABROAD.
Paper Read by Member of Glass B.

At this season of the year, when the trans
Atlantic steamers are carrying to Europe thou
sands of our people. one is wont to ask the ques-
ton, "Why is this thus?' Why do so many
Americans go abroad to spend their holiday?
Today in all the capitals of Europe. in the
Highlands of Scotland, down the Rhine, scaling
the Alps, ascending the Nile or basking on the
Mediterranean shore you will find Americans,
plenty of them. You will know them; you can't
mistake; for, with the hand of a Croesus, they
are spending good American gold dollars. All
the iewelry they possess is in evidence on each
and every occasion, and with a guide-boOk in
one hand and dictionary of the languages in
the other, you meet them at every turn. Bank
ers and bankers daughters, brewers and brew
ers' wives, ranchmen, miners and school
mains by the hundred, hurrying hither and
thither, rushing along in that distinctly Amer
lean fashion, passing over with glance all the
natural scenery, art and architecture of which
the old world boasts and then returning, become
the bore of their less fortunate or unfortunate
friends who preferred to remain at home, by re-
lating how they did" all Europe in thirty days.
In Revolutionary days we had tories, today
we have these anglO-maniacs who turn their
backs on their own fair land and overrun Eu-
rope because it is the fad. Probably we would
not miss them or would aught be said to dis
courage the annual migration of these unpatri-
otto Americans. were it not that each year they
leave in the Golfers of Europe some $780, 900.
At home the Yankee is considered shrewd, but
the salt air of the ocean seems to have the eff
feet of disspating his shrewdness, for on land
ing on the other side he is the most innocent,
gullible. and easily imposed upon lamb that ever
| faced the shears. 1t is we'll known fact that
the now we'll established imitation mummy
trade of Egypt was gotten up expressly for
| Americans. and that many other like enter
prises are t1ourishing with the aid of American
patronage. more money than brains is an
axiom freely applied to American tourists
abroad. Indeed, to such an extent does the
| American allow himself to be imposed upon,
that he has become, in Europe, an object of rid
! icule But aside from all this, the American
who goes abroad for sightseeing, cannot posi-
bly, see anything that can surpass in interest
that which his own country affords. Does he
seek landscape or natural beauty; where is
there in Europe that which can compare with
the Palisades of the Hudson, the Yosemite Val
ley, the Yellowstone Park, the Garden of the
Gods, or the Grand Canon of the Colorado?
Where, on Gods green EARTH can be found the
handiwork of nature in all its grand sublimity,
as is produced among the Rocky Mountains
The Alps and the Pyrenees sink into insignifi-
canoe when compared with these. Pixies Peak,
Mt. Rainier, St. Elias or Tacoma will afford the
mountain climber an exercise of his proves
equal to that required by the MatterhOrn OF
Blanc. The landlocked bays and arms of the
sea along the Alaska coast, are not surpassed
| by those of Norway, nor do the sunny plains OF
Lombardy or the south of France produce an
Eden such as is found in Southern California
where the orange, fig and olive flourish in all
their native luxuriance; where the fragrance OF
perpetual bloom ever goes up as a sweet incense
to natures God. The glaciers of the north, the
geysers of the west, the falls of Niagara in the
east and the caves of Lucay and Mammoth in
the south are natural wonders that have nc
equal in Europe or elsewhere. For archaeological
research the ruins of Susa or the catacOmDs OF
Egypt afford no more interesting or productive
field than can be found in Central or South
America. Mid the ruins of Yucatan or Peru is
to be found abundant traces of civilization, SO
old that its history was ancient when BabylOnia
and Thebes were in their infancy, and here, by
some, is thought to have been the cradle of the
human race. Our art galleries are overfowng
with the choicest productions of European and
American genius. Our large cities are rapidly
filling with an architecture that puts to shame
the ancient Grecian. And yet not one American
out of every fifty that goes abroad can give an
intelligent description of his own country with
its points of interest. 1t is to be hoped thai
Americans will shortly adopt an American fad
so that our own country may come to be appre
ciated as it should.
The man who knows he knows it all, is the
man whom everybody else knows he don't