New-York tribune., 1906-08-05
THE oRAo1Es OF THE OBVIOUS.

We are long suffering people. Our patience
is illimitable and it is wonderfully good humOred
into the bargain. But it is time for us to rebel
We must begin TO discourage the bores who have
SO long presumed upon our amiability that in
deed they hardly to be blamed for their
present sublime cOmplacency. The bores in
question are, to partieulariZe, those alien OBJ
servers who spend few months or weeks here
take vOluminous notes, and then, in our own
publications, tell us all about it, The reader
need not be alarmed. We contemplate no re-
prisals for unsympathetic things said by these
visitors, for droll mistakes or misrepresenta-
tons. Our protest springs simply from weari-
ness over the whole silly business. Foreign crit.
icism is not in itself to be resented. 1t NAV be
very useful, and in such case is to be received
with gratitude. But why does not Europe send
us a critic?
She sends us instead observers who, if we
may judge by what they print are no more
qualified to talk about us than a child is GuaIi-
fed to talk about the binomiaI theorem. They
land with flourish of trumpets bring, as
rule, unimpeachabIe credentials. Often they are
men of letters whose books have already as
sured them a welcome. We receive them cord
ially perhaps too cordially. Almost before they
know it they are being made comfortable in
more than one pleasant club an indulgence
which sometimes astonishes the recipient for he
knows that clubs abroad rarely show the same
swift unQuestiOnng hospitality to visiting
Americans. Now, if the man upon whom we law
lsh our kindness were to announce that we all
dined in our shirtsleeveS that lynchings in
broadway were as common as cabs in Plccadilly
that our smart" young men drove about in
phaetons drawn by mixed teams Of drOmedaries
and dachshunde, we could forgive him. But he
goes out and discOverS-a skyscraper!
How that skyscraper has helped the visiting
author to cover up for his compatriots the nov
erty of his imagination, the feebleness of his
power of perception! When will he realize that
the skyscraper is n detail. that for such pur.
poses as he entertains it is as old as the Pyra-
m1ds, that disquisitiOns upon il are about as
profitable as disquistiOnS upon last years pay-
ing stones, and that we are tired to death of
hearing it described in eloquent periods? Mean
while, he continues to diIate upon IL as upon
stupendOus social document Where is his
intelligence? In a country like ours is there
nothing for him to think about save the material
things that lie upon the surface? Why does
he behave like child at a fair gasping with
amazement over the confusion before him. over
the mere pageantry that he sees? Can he never
hope to understand the human nature beneath
that which appeals to his rowing eye? Here is
Mr.. II. G. Wells whose tales have given MS so
much pleasure. After his flying trip through the
country he concludes that "the lavish spending
OF Fifth avenue is but the flower, the
often brilliant, the sometimes gaudy flower of
'the American economic process, and such slow
land patient accumulatOrs as Mr. Astor the
rounding and ripening fruit" No doubt hut
when Mr.. Wells adds that ''one need he onlv
little while in America TO realize this,' we are
inclined TO ask him why he didn't stay longer.
think little harder and tells us something more
important. He dilates upon his discovery of the
Waldorf Astoria, but we have heard Of the suh-
ject before, and his reflections ON il contain MOTH
ing new.
At this late day nobody needs to be told that
certain things or conditions in America are tvD-
ical and fraught with tremendous lessons II
has been dinned into our ears until we are sick
Of it. America is huge country in which mill
ions Of people are doing an incredible number
of interesting things. and IL makes furiouslv
TO think" without our dragging in a single sky
scraper or citing n single millionaire II is
the monotonOus and commonplace character of
these alien observations that disgusts The
oracles Of the obvious are as tiresome as a book
agent with their twaddlng repetitlons of the
historic fact that two and two make four Even
Mr. Henry James has moved us TO a mild won
der IN this matter. Much was expected OF him
when he revisited his native land 10 see whether
or not It had been improving it's time In his
Absence but the message which he has en-