New Britain herald., 1919-04-16
As OTHERS SEE US.

Americans felt rather vaingloriou9ly proud of our ability to strike the rock or our national genius and watch the l stream of dollars flow forth. We were not seriously offended at the charge that we were ;l race in pursuit Of the will O tho Wisp dollar In fact we felt rather flattercd, complimentc1, by the poorly concealed snCcrS oi Tor eigners. All this, perhaps, because if. we were accused of being dollar chasers we could snap our fingers and reply that we were not only dollar chasers but also dollar getters. We were a bit puffcd up at our fcats of lcgcrdcmain which enabled u5 to pluck money out of the air, the ground, the sea, any place where no one else suspected money existed.
 After our experiences during the war, after passing through the t'c;;ns ing fires of sacrifice, after being purged, sof the dross, we would hang our heads in shame if the world still thought that our goal was wealth u'-d our am bition it's accunlulat tion. It believe We were not only the most wonderful people on earth but the only people on earth. At leas. such. would seem to be tho ease from tue testimony of Philip Gibbs, English war correspondent and icCturcr, whose yaledictory to America IS published ill the Now Iclk Times, which print ed his superla tive news dispatches from Europe during ciVilizAtiOn 5 great struggle for life.
 MT. Gibbs has been in America for three months and during his visit nas appeared on the lecture stage dozens of times, has shaken the hands of his audiences and has been entertained and dincd. He has met and seen thousands of United Staters an1 he has studied us at close range with the pltilcs5 microscope of tho newspaper man. And this is what his Sla5s showed him:
 C,
 1ot mont the Americans being q
 hard practical people eXclusi|ciJ
 cnca-ed in the chase of the al-
 mighty dollar, and quite selfish i0
 tho exploitation of their own ma
 terial interests. My reading of
 them is entirely different. So far
 from being hard and material
 they seem to mo the greatest
 idcalists in the world at the pres
 ent time. and to be emotional Gl-
 most to the point of scntimentai-
 ty. In any public gathering, at Y any private dinner table, the
 idealist takes all tho applause,
 finds it easy to put spell over .
 his company, and can express his : own sentiment with d simplicity :
 and emotion which would cause 8 Y
 smile or an ironical shrug in tho ~.
 sophisticated circles of England ;
 or France. ;
 The almighty dollar is cha:5c,l ;carnestlye enough. I find it is 9 :.
 necessary item of ones life in
 New" York, for example, But
 tho American people give it away
 out of their margin of wealth.
 however small that margin may
 be-with astonishing generosity,
 provided their urse-strings arc
 tugged by an emotional appeal.
 Americans are not only generous, we are pure idealists, MT. Gibbs finds, declaring:
 I find the American people
 ripe for action of unselfsh ideal
 ism Of which few nations would
 be capable. There is through
 out the United States, as. far as
 have been able to discover, a
 great stirring of emotion, due to
 the war and to the generous sac
 rif1ce they have made, which de-
 mands something higher and no-
 bier in the next chapter of their
 history than material gain and
 selfish safety.
 Most complimentary of all, Mir. Gibbs finds us desirous of helping hu- manity by preventing future wars. He says:
 I have found, in many cities of
 the United States bodies of peo- pie working, thinking, talking, earnestly and eager to devote their souls and to dedicate their hearts to the service of humanity so that what has happened in the fields of Europe shall not happen soon again, and so that the com mon peoples of the world shall have greater safety and better luck. It is spiritual purpose among a great people which must count in the future of the world unless it is made powerless by the baser passions of political groups pulling the wires behind the scenes.
 Truly, the whole makes a pleasing | picture. Three months is short time to devote to a study of a people. | But we may judge from MT. Gibbs'