Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-11-21

ply impossible. well, II Is good enough for
us-we live here" say the Chicagoans get.
ting together shoulder to shoulder and back
to back to howl defiance even to the implied
imputation
1t is pretty generally understood that the
least American of all American cities is
thousands Of foreigners In Chicago. Chi
cago, however. has a strange power of as
similating its foreigners New York has
scarcely any. You hear vast amount Of
foreign speech in Chicago-almost as
much of 1T, one might say, as in New
York. But it is the speech of people who
are making an effort to learn the English
language. and who are almost childishly
proud of every new word of our speech
that they acquire
Take a crowd of Scandinavians on their
way to work in Chicago. They are talking
boisterously in the funniest conceivable
attempt at English; but they are not talk
ing their own native language. They are
practicing the language of the country in
which they live. which gives them a liveli-
hood better than they ever knew before
the language of the country IN which they
intend to spend their lives. In New York
it is entirely different
An expert member of the New York
board of education told the writer not long
ago that more than one-half of the aliens
| who land in New York and remain there
| long enough to get a stake" to carry back
| to their own country. that is to say--make
no effort whatever to learn the English
speech. They huddle together In their own
quarters, and cling tenaciously-and GER
tainly ungratefully-to their own Ian
guages
A gang of italian subway hands around
New York patter their own italian patoiS
and have to have an interpreter to get
their orders from the foreman. This
writer watched a gang of Italian street
workers in Chicago the other afternoon
fellows of precisely the same class as
work on the subway in New York.
They were all making an eHort-a pa
thetic but valiant effort-to talk English
Irt>t.o tNaI q fOa 90
were becoming assimilated. 1t is said
upon excellent authority that far smaller
percentage of foreigners who come direct
| to Chicago from their immigrant ships re-
| turn to the old country than those who
| settle down in New York upon landing.
Secret of Power of Assimilation.
Perhaps the secret of the power of assimi-
| lation of Chicago is that the town Is so
vastly spread out and that the quarter
system is far less prevalent here than In
New York The foreigners do not hubble
together according to nativity in Chicago
to anything like the extent that they do in
New York.
They are scattered all over the vast eX-
panse of this city of the plain. The result
is that they become neighbors all over town
of Americans. They soon begin to initiate
the better way of living of their American
neighbors. They fall into the cleaner Amer
lean customs. They conceive dislike Tor
the word sanitation. Once they get INTO
the way of wholesomeness they DO not re-
vert to their old ways. They begin TO
chirk up and take pride in their American
ization.
They live on the best of terms with their
American neighbors and pick up the IAN
guage of the United States from them
And when they have saved enough money
to permit of their going back TO their own
countries. as perhaps they originally in
tended in coming to the United States they
are in such a state OF comparative cuiu-
walton and upliftedness-if the word may
be used-that they mentally balk at the
idea of reverting to the old life. and they
decide to make the United States their
home for the balance of their lives. Thus
| does Chicago make good citizens out of her
immigrants in the first generation OF them
You hear a vast amount of somewhat
inflated conversation here about the tire
mendouSly prosperous conditions prevail
ing in Chicago. and listening, and after
wards observing, you begin to wonder who
is getting all the money. Around the hotels
and clubs of course, there is the garish
splendor of Byzantium. magnifed a thou
sand fold every man seeming to be trying
to outvie his neigfbor in extravagance
But the average man on the street doesn't
look so ALFRED prosperous. nor. Tor the
matter of that, uoes the woman on the
street, and good streets have been taken
into consideration, too. to make up this
view. 1t is certain thing that the Chi
cago folk dressed themselves better ten
years ago than they do today.
| Compared With Washington.
The folk that you meet strolling on F
street of an afternoon or on Pennsylvania
avenue OF an evening after dinner are as
whole at least twice as well dressed the
people you meet, say. on State or Clark or
Madison or Dearborn streets in Chicago.
Ten years ago the average Chicago man
of business dressed better than the average
New York man of business. Now the Chi
cago business man looks like an underpaid
clerk by comparison. The Chicago women
in the shopping districts were ten years
ago the most splendiferously "~-ayed lot
ina ginable. 1t is simple fact that now,
outside of the strictly fashionable quarters.
the Chicago women look dowdy almost be-
yond belief.
And there is a strange cheapness about
things that does not seem to denote any
overw helming conditions of prosperity in
Chicago. They will give you things in the
shops here now for about a third off from
what they may be obtained at in New York
or Washington, and the appeals for trade
are pathetic in their subservient winsome-
ness.
The Chicago restaurateurs do everything
but rope you to get you into their estab-
lishments, and when they do get you in
they treat you in manner calculated to
cause you to feel like coming again. Their
prices, with one or two notable exceptions,
are vastly cheaper than the figures carded
by the restaurateurS of New York.
The schemes of the Chicago liquor men to
get business are amusing. if anything
could be amusing in connection with so
tremendous and gruesome drink traffic as
exists in this town. For cents. in Chica-
CO. they offer you a goblet containing al
most two quarts of beer 1t is called beer.
at any rate.
With this tremendous bowl of malt the
partaker of the beer gets enough free lunch
to last him at least two days, supposing
him to be an industrious and accumulative
free lunch eater. Slathers of the saloons
have great signs in front, Square meal
with each 3-cent glass of beer" and the
signs are verified. The food comprising the
free lunch may look doubtful. but 1t IS at
any rate said to be wholesome.
Other saloons invite trade by giving "A
fine Intercourse dinner" with Zach nickel
glass of beer-and one hesitates to record
the capacity of the nickel glass of beer.
Some of the saloons have gone even these
signs few better. One of them. for exam
PIE, has sign hilariously inviting you to
Come in and toss nickel on the bar for
a two-quart crock of the best suds in Chi
cago, and eat with it Italian table
d'hote dinner from soup to nuts'-a bar