New Britain herald., 1916-07-20
Va10nal Touring Week
 M v. 5. 70 Open Angnsf C

Washington, D. C., July 20.-How peculiarly blest are the American peo- pie not only in that they have been spared the horrors of the great war now devastating most of Europe, but in the wonderful resources and un- paralledel beauties of the country it. self, is strikingly set forth in a com municatiOn to the National Geo. graphic society from it's director and editor, MT. Gilbert H. GrOsvenor. A part of the communication, issued as a bulletin today from the society's Washington headquarters, says:
 Rarely has there been afforded a more impressive illustration of the statement that it pays to advertise than is to be found in the story of the endless stream of tourists hastening to Europe during the several decades before the great war.
 "The appeal of the art treasures and associations of the Old World which is the original home of all Americans, is really not sufficient explanation of the fact that until last year 100 Am erican tourists were crossing the Att lantic to one American tourist who crossed the United States. The de- lightful literature which the European travel bureaus and steamship com- panieS placed at our disposal so Whct- ted our appetite for a view of the lakes of Ireland and Scotland, of the castles on the Rhine and Danube, Of the scenes made famous by Shakes peare, Dickens, Victor Hugo, and Goethe that we turned our backs upon scenery more beautiful, wild flower gardens and forests incomparably finer mountains more superb, and lakes more radiant than any to be seen in the lands across the Atlantic.
 Ut is true that one finds more an- cient culture in Europe. It is also true that he finds more splendid arch1tec- ture And likewise 1t Is true that he finds there better art; for before Am erica was born into the family of na- lions Europe had castles and cathe- drals and masterpieces of art and sculpture.
 "Rut in that architecture which Is voiced in the glorious temples of the seouoia grove and in the castles of the Grand Canyon, in that art which is mirrored in American lakes, which is painted in. geyser basins and fres- coed unon the side walls of the might test canyons, there Is a majesty and an appeal that the mere handlwork of men, splendid though it may be, can never rival.
 ''Nor is our country lacking in hal lowed and historic spots. Is Water loo where NapOleon's star of empire set forever, any more sacred to the American heart than AppOmattOX, where a new nation was born out of the throes of internecine strife? Are Austerlitz and Wagram. with their high tides of the French empire, of soil more sa cred or atmosphere more hallOwed than Valley Forge and Get tysburg, Plymouth Rock, Independ- ence Hall, and Mt. Vernon? Does London or Paris or Berlin contain more of inspiration to ue as a people than Washington, the nations capital?
 we have wandered far to find the , picturesque and the magnificent, and vet it is not entirely provincial phil Osophy which says that New York Is in many ways the most wonderful, the most striking, and the most interest ing of all cities of the earth; neither is it only the voice of the man who has never seen other sh ores that pro- nOunces Yell owstone Park the most marvellous picture book of natures library; nor yet is 1t the narrow pride of the spread-eagle orator alone that