The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1920-09-09
AMERICA Is 4 LAND OF
FLIMSY DRESS AND FANS
Land of Extremes, With Many Mill
ionaireS, and the Girls Scantily
Dressed-La! La! He Loves En-.

This is a story of America as seen
today through the eyes Of an Eng
lishman-and is amusing as we'll as
an interesting account. 1t recalls
the old adage, eff We could see our
selves as others see us.
Of course America is the land CT
extremes. The people are either de-
manding that all countries on earth
ioin in a League of Nations so that
universal brotherhood shah be main
tanned. or they want to shoot, at
sight the mug-wump patrlc: who
would tarnish the gl0ry of America
bv having obligations with decayed
and piayeu-out European ,aats IN
winter the thermometer signs away
below zero; and in SUMNER IL bub-
les up beyond the century. Just
now something like a hundred mil
lion Americans are gasping with
heat
New York is eapty-eAcer- for
some five million people who are
obliged to remain in ''th2 poor little
old town" The wealthy have gone
to Newport, or Southampton or Long
Island, or to the Berkshire Hills, or
to charming Tuxedo, and there they
live the simple life as only Ameri-
can millionaires can.
Half the people one meets are
millionaires. The war made eigh-
teen thousand new millionaires
dollars, not pounds. They are very
hospitable. The current thing, how
ever has been to visit Europe. Per-
haps you have met them.
AS the temperature is torrid Amer
lea is adaptive. Many country houses
have their sleeping porches, and
there, in the open, slumber is sought
in the hot, breathless nights Elec-
trio fans are everywhere buzzing
overhead in the shops and restau-
rants, and twirling with mechanical
sideswings so that the breeze be
spread. A little electric fan is hum
ming on the table as I write-to re-
1ieve the 102 in the shade limpness.
Elderly and even youthful British
golfers would think it bad form to
appear on the links in anything but
a jacket. The American, a stickler
for convention in most things apper-
tanning to garb, leaves his coat in the
club house and more likely than not
has his shirt sleeves rolled up above
the elbows.
Everybody wears "a straw hat.
The Panama of Hamburg is not very
popular. Mostly the round straw
hat is worn, and in the morning
when the great railway stations dis
gorge thousands of workers coming
in from the suburbs, you cannot
looking from your. hotel window
see people for straw.
Mems costumes are fimsy. The
waistcoat is unknown. To wear
braces or suspenders is to proclaim
yourself an old-timer or an English
man. Cool mohair suits are the
thing, though if you want to admit
it is real summer, you wear a Palm
Beach suit, canary colored coat and
pants, such as oil kings or steel mag
mates are supposed to don in the
general winter sunshine of Florida.
What the Englishman would call
a Nut-though the word has not the
same meaning in Amerisa-is not
content unless he is wearing a silk
shirt. A silk shirt costs anything
from s12 to $40. City clerks spent
half a weeks wages to buy a silk
shirt.
The most gorgeous silk shirts are
not worn in New York. The most
wonderful silk shirts I have seen
have been in the smaller towns of
the Middle West, in Illinois, Michi.
gan, Wisconsin and Iowa, flaming
stripes of chocolate and green and
puce, and collars of orange and
magenta.
At the risk of making myself un-
popular at home, I must say that
think the young American girl is the
greatest creature on earth. And
she has taste And, further, when
it comes to scantiness of attire in
the warm months she "goes some"
La, la! the costumes of the girls
saw in France last year were demure-
ness itself compared with the fimsi-
ness of the dress worn by the aver
age American girl this year.
Being mere man, I dare not at