The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1900-08-16
PARIS LETTER.
ON our Regular Correspondent mt.

PARIS, FRANCE, july 80, 1900.
The questions most frequently ask.
ed about the Paris Exposition are, ais
it a success2" and allow do you think
it compares with the Worlds Fair at
Chicago2" A whole volume, even an
encyclopedia might be written in re-
ply to either of these questions. For
Paris, the Exposition is a success. 1t
has brought thousands of visitors and
millions of francs to the city and has
convinced the world for the hundredth
time that there is no capital (et us be
thankful for the facD like Paris. 1t is
a tremendous advertisement for the
articles of luxury and taste for which
Paris is famous. 1t has averted or
perhaps only postponed a political
crisis which, in France, is always pre-
tentious OF revolution. History may
be able to record that this Exposition
by its restraining influence, imposing
good behavior on host at national
entertainment enabled the nation to
tide over and amelorate the condi-
tons which threatened to involve the
Civil Government in death struggle
with the allied forces of militarism and
Catholicism. If the Exposition shall
have done all this it is at least local
success. 1t, of course, has done more.
] hope it has opened the eyes of some
Americans TO the very formidable
rivalry OF Germany. Hungary, of Italy
and of Russia, in arts and manufact
ures. We are proud of our wonderful
prosperity and Of the fact that the last
year has eclipsed all others by about
5000, 900 in foreign trade, enabl-
ing us for the first time to write $2,-
ooo,ooo,ooo. But this need not blind
us to the fact that the percentage or
rate of progress from year to year in
some other countries has been greater
than in our own. Our competitors are
not sleeping, and our greatest danger
today is that we will spend too much
energy in self graduation.
In one essential particular our com
petitors in many European countries
have great advantage over us. They
know three or four languages and their
travelling statesmen are at home in
Mexico, South America, Central Asia,
and Africa-talking with the native
merchant in his own language, having
ten times as much fun and doing
twice as much business as our poor
American drummers who know only
English and who must use pad, pencil
and pantomine, in introducing their
goods. The old idea that native
American wit is equal to any emerg
ency and can cope successfully with
the polite and polyglot German or
Russian is very silly. A little dialect
will go infinitely further than wit, as
any American from Cuba, Porto Rico,
or the Philippines will tell us; more
over the impression that Americans
have monopoly of wit or business
shrewdness survives only with those
who have not travelled. French, Ger
man and Spanish ought to be taught
our youth IN the public schools. The
Governments of Europe have special
schools TOR the training of their con-
sular and commercial agents. They
make special study of the wants,
tastes, prejudices, manners and habits
of peoples beyond the seas. They
go among them with an equip
ment that is never acquiredby Amerl-
cans except in the enormously ex-
pensive school of experience.
How does this Exposition compare
with Chicago? 1t is about the same
size, has more restaurants and take
shows, is much more European or
cosmopolitan and immensely more
French than Chicago. 1t cost fifty
cents to pass the gates at Chicago,
here it costs only ten or twelve cents,
the price of tickets varying slightly
from day to day. The people who
attend this Exposition, the mass OF
them, are evidently not as we'll to do,
as we'll dressed or as intelligent as
those who were at Chicago. The
great majority of them are from the
city of Paris. The cheap entrance
fee makes the Exposition accessible
to thousands, who, if the fare were a
franc or twenty cents, would stay
away. AS result, the poorer classes
i had almost said the pauper class
es-hock to the show on Sundays and
fete days and one sees how much
there is of shabbiness, grotesqueness
poverty and pathos beneath the gild,
ing in this grear center where fashion
sits upon her throne, and dictates style
to all the world. Here, amid all the
A Ia.