The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1905-01-15


early thirties. The Irish Famine made
New England. Her manufacturing sys-
TEN, her railroads, her canals in the days
of canals the public works, the multi
form prosperity, we're due, so far as the
labor was concerned, largely to the
Irish Into the cotton factories, mean
while, came also English, Scotch Welsh
and French Canadian operatives
The race Of the elder settlers, having
done it's work and now demanding a
higher standard Of comfort, grew less
fertile For, it should be remembered
that the New England marriage rate or
birth rate decreases by deliberate choice
and for social and ecoromic reasons
THE Irish" increased and multiplied.
They possessed the land. The temporary
early prejudice, natural in a provincial
commonwealth. passed away In Bos-
ton a IT, some oTGe~ ci. O. hey became
the rulers. They we're thoroughly &C
climated They became Americans of
Americans Hardly has the still not old
observer Of conditions and changes IN
New Eng land time to mark the triumph
Of the Americanized Celt before new
races swim into his ken and disturb his
calculations. The prolific French Cana
dams are powerful or dominant. we be-
lieve, in some New England cities, Hol-
yoke, for instance. Did not the French
Canadian retain his love for home, for
my dear Canada. as perhaps you may
have heard him sing in French in train
at the Vermont border, he would be still
more important. Italy has come to
Boston. and to the rest Of the New Eng
land country. In the sacred towns OF
old name, Salem and Plymouth some
Italian dialect is apt to be the first Ian
guage the reverent visitor TO Gallows
Hill or Puddle Dock hears. The Greeks,
too. have settled in the Modern Athens.
The Portuguese are strong along the
Cape" Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, Ru-
mania, Russia, Poland have been empty
ing into the Connecticut and way sta
tions. Jews are numerous. What shall
the outcome be- asks the Boston Herald,
the murmur OF many strange tongues in
its respectable ears.
Wait till the day OF allig alton, till the
composite race. the new New Highlander,
il born. And don't worry. even If it be
true Of the New England Poles that
their moral standards are low The
moral standards of pious New England
in the late seventeenth and the eigh-
teeuth century were low. Remember how
many of your great-grandmothers had
to confess. in church. certain indiscre-
tons Of their hot youth when GEORGE
First, or Second was King. Those OF rs
who spring, and are glad Of It, from New
England stock should know enough of
our ancestors and ancestresses to know
that they were very human.
The real problem TO comfort the New
England convolutions is How Shall |
Make Living in the Sweet By and By?'
Wool and shoes are about the only
trades that have not been wrenched from
her. On cotton her hold is precarious.
Rich and frugal and full Of high charac-
ters and qualities as she is, the industrial
and commercial sceptre has pass ed from
her hands.
Full of landscape and seascape, coast
and mountain, she is the queen of sum
mer resorts" Her sons who have wan
dered away from her go back and buy
the old homesteads. Country places and
parks abound So do colleges and
schools Scenery and education are her
great attraction. But we foresee her as a
Switzerland on the sea. Her population
should speak many languages. like the
Swiss Polish, Italian, Greek, Portu
guese cantons will be needed In her
business