Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-07-15
INVADING YANKEES
londoner's View of the Tour
ist From the States.
NO FLATTERY IN THIS
Preying on American Patriotism.
Hanging Out Old Glory to
Catch Trade.
From the London Chronicle

from the London Chronicle.
June. which brings many good things
to London. brings also the Americans.
They come in with the Strawberries and
are just as welcome. Indeed. I never
feel that the Season" has really begun
until In twenty minute stroll down
Bond street and Regent street I am
privileged to encounter representatives
or pretty nearly every state in the
Union.
They are easily spotted The walk.
the trim, neat dress, the ultra -voIuni-
nous veil and the eternal little bag at
the waist of tho women mark them
out before they have said a word. Is
the American feminine form, by the
way. In peril of change? Or are the
ravishing, long-limbed Gibson girls
merely the product of an artists fancy?
Or. II they exist, Is it that they are too
fragile and too precious for export? I
do not know. But do know that thew
are very rarely to be seen in London
and that the physical characteristic
OF our fair visitors from across the
Atlantic is scarcely that of the 1.-the
and sprightly grace of the Gibson tyne
To the average Londoner 1 expect
most Americans look merely American.
BUT to the initiated half the fun of
L
nual invasion is to trace back to their
local ha b1tation the various and inoop
gruous elements that unite to form II
II Is game. of course that can ONLY
De played within certain broad Hmita-
tions. There are ninety odd millions of
Americans, and the business of placing
them In their proper pigeon hole is a
fascinating employment, but also a
battling one.
Placing" Americans.
There cannot, however. be much doubt
about that sharp, ascetic, rather shriv-
eled little woman with eyeglasses. She
surely, must hail from New England.
And if you see an American girl with a
ouoyant freshness and elasticity of face
inquire and movement, YOU will probably
not be far wrong in ascribing her to the
south. When the freshness turns to
gaucherie and the elasticity to some
thlnS IKE sprawl, the odds are that
you are in the presence of Chicago. And
Wnen all is correct and circumspect
and subdued to an almost European neu-
trallty. 1t is a fairly safe guess that New
York stands before you.
But perhaps. after all, the voices of
dress and bearing. American women
seem TO look and dress so much alike at
all events when they are on their travels
and the fashions over there are SO an
pdlilhsiy universal, that 1T is a desperate
Undertaking to try to infer their state
from their appearance But there is no
| mistaking the soft, slow southern draWl
or the Chicago burr or the precision
of Boston, or the celebrated far western
nasal rasp. or the aoidulated accents of
New England or the somewhat coloriess
and undistinguished clarity of New York
| With the men one stands better
chance. There are fewer of them for
one thing, and for another they are more
local and more pronounced than. Their
woman folk in manners, appearance AMI
speech. Given a felt hat and frock
coat. and the odds are anything that
their Wearer is from the south New
England men, too. have a look and a
beard all their own, and an expert could
probably distinguish between a New
Yorker and Westerner at a glance