River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1918-02-28


years ago an Englishman in America,
happening to enter into conversation
with a negro schoolteacher, learned
that one of the keenest desires of her
life was to see London. and that she
especially wanted to visit every place
that was connected with the characters
in Dickens.
Places Of Special interest.
Many Americans, again, spend indus
trious days in hunting up buildings that
have some historic connection with the
foundation and early development of
their own communities. There is a
long list of churches where eminent
Americans of the colonial period were
baptised: William Penn, at All Hal
lows, Barking; Roger Williams at st.
Sepulchere's; Calvert, the founder of
MarSIand, at st. Giles-in-the-Fields;
General Oglethorpe,' the founder Of
Georgia, at Martin s-in-the-Fields; and
John Harvard at st. Saviour'S Cathe-
dral, Southwark, where the incident is
now commemOrated by memorial
window. st. Ethelburga's is Of inter-
est as the church where Henry Hud-
son and his crew are reported to have
made their last communion the night
before they sailed. The house in New
man street, occupied by Benjamin
West, may be quoted as an example
of many buildings whose associations
appeal to American visitors almost ex-
clusively.
It would be quite a mistake, how
ever, to suppose that to the American
| London serves no other purpose than
| to make more vivid what he has learn
| ed at school. However diligent he
may be in following up it's historical
and literary associations, he finds time
to sample it's lighter side-its theaters
and other entertainments, and its so
cial festivities, in so far as he has
access to them. Even that ornament
of the American-learned world, DR.. An
drew d. White, the late president of
Cornell university, records in his au-
photography how, after working in the
British museum, he found refreshment
in an evening at Maskelyne and
Cookies "great temple of jugglery."
Yet, after all, as Oliver Wendell
Holmes puts it, "the great sight is Lon
DON" In the old days, before the era
Of motor traffic, nothing could beat the
top of hOrse-drawn bus as a means
of RECALLING oneself with the ever-chang-
ing panorama of the streets, and, al
though the petrol engine has banished
the more leisurely progress of that
time, an outside seat on bus remains
unrivaled as point from which to
observe the everyday life of the city.
The streets themselves impress an
American with their tidiness. Their
paving is kept in good repair, and they
are free from the litter that disfgures
important thoroughfares in New York.
Some Of the Exceptions.
AS a rule, the American in London
means to have a good time, and gets
it. There are, of course, exceptions
people who lack the gifts of sympathy
and Imagination, and who accordingly
miss all that is of unique interest in
the scenes they visit. A man of this
| type was once, it is said, standing on
the Terrace of the House of Com
mons and Dragging about the glories
Of some river in his own state. 1t was
q much finer river than the Thames
cleaner, wider, and SO on. John Burns
happened to be close by and could not
stand it. do you know, SIR" he broke
in, 'what that brown river is? It's
liquid history" But that narrow-mind-
ed provincialism is not the prevailing
mental attitude Of cultivated Ameri-
cans. On the contrary, the impact of
London upon them would more faith
fully be expressed by the passage in
which James Russell Lowell, under a
different figure, emphasized that sense
of historic continuity which appealed
so strongly to John Burns.
zone thing about London" he said,
''impresses me beyond any other sound
/ have ever heard, and that is the low
unceasing roar one hears always in the
air; it is not mere accident, like a
tempest or cataract, but it is impress
sive, because it always indicates hui
man will, and impulse, and conscious
movement; and I confess that when
hear it I almost feel as if were lis
tening to the roaring loom of time.n