New-York tribune., 1906-11-12
A PANIED GENTS.

Mr.. Gorky took back to Europe with him some
impressions" If reports be true, they were
all he took back with him from this country,
and If there had been freight rate upon i'm
pressions the noted revolutionist might have
felt constrained TO leave them behind. Natr-
rally they were most painful impressions. Mr..
GOrkys capacity for being panied is exceptional
anyway, and his opportunities while in this
country for indulging It were rare He has put
his pain on paper, and from the cabled accounts
Of 1t the author must have been glad that he
got away from here alive. We are, too. We
should have been sorry If America had proved
too much for his tyrant hating soul.
Gorky came 10 this country under the i'm
preston that It was the land of liberty and
dollars Our liberty turned out to be merely a
metal statue and even that we do not permit
on our land. but have showed It we'll out into the
water, where II can in no wise affect the con-
Germs Of the citizens, and is only a lure to lit
erary lions. 1t is typical of America that It
places Liberty on lonely island Devils Isle
a sort Of penal settlement a place proper for
the restraint Of suspicious characters likely at
any time TO disturb the public repose. Gorky
doesn't say Just these things, but this is the
way he feels about It, If we understand his SEN
timents as they are represented IN some cabled
extracts from his book. oh, Liberty, what tears
are shed in thy name! When we add Gorky's
10 the food it is lucky thing that Bellows
Island is not awash with the brine!
FI1berty! Why, we wouldn't even allow Lib
erty in our first class hotels as a distinguished
visitor and temporary sojOurner from a foreign
land, much less give IL permanent foothold
upon our continent. We would kick the thing
about from hostlery 10 hosiery until It was
driven 10 retirement in a rathole, treating 1t as
a suspicious and dangerous character, likely to
disturb us in the enjoyment Of our slavery For
are slaves. GOrky says so. The statues of
our heroes in the public squares cry out, Gorky
says, 10 us, bidding be free but we hurry
by without looking at them. They get no more
attention than Gorky, the emancipator. who
tried TO break our golden chains and carry them
away with him, but who went back empty
handed
Dollars are as hard to get over here as lib
erty. Mr.. Gorky does not explain to us, and
we shall not attempt TO say, which is the more
painful disillusiOnment, to find men not free
or dollars not free. How deeply the revolution
lst is pained regarding the restraints Oh our
dollars may be inferred from his emitting this
part Of his Impressions" "The Yellow De
mon" 1t is enough TO make gold change It's
color to find itself linked in chromatic infamy
with The Yellow Peril" and The Yellow
Press But the title shows that Gorky saw
the color or our money when he was here. and
seis at rest ali reports TO the contrary
No distinguished visitor has gone back so
free ms Gorky from that bins toward fattery
which hospitality imposes We stretched our
immigration laws little to let him and his
affinity" land and look at our "Yellow De-
mon' ana mat was all. We neither wined nor
dlned him. We did not fete him. We did nor
lionize him-but for this roar we should hardly
realize that we had had a lion among lis 80 there
is no reason why he should not saw what he
pleases, and feel the better for SAYING II Per-
haps what he says will sell, and that will mako
its expression an even greater lenltiye of his
grief. But The Impressions" seem in timed
10 find d market The public appetite for wit.
less abuse Of things american should have been