My Discovery of England | Page 5

and then forward to England
from the closed taxi itself ten dollars' worth of impressions of
American national character. I have myself seen an English literary
man,--the biggest, I believe: he had at least the appearance of it; sit in
the corridor of a fashionable New York hotel and look gloomily into

his hat, and then from his very hat produce an estimate of the genius of
Amer ica at twenty cents a word. The nice question as to whose twenty
cents that was never seems to have occurred to him.
I am not writing in the faintest spirit of jealousy. I quite admit the
extraordinary ability that is involved in this peculiar susceptibility to
impressions. I have estimated that some of these English visitors have
been able to receive impressions at the rate of four to the second; in fact,
they seem to get them every time they see twenty cents. But without
jealousy or complaint, I do feel that somehow these impressions are
inadequate and fail to depict us as we really are.
Let me illustrate what I mean. Here are some of the impressions of
New York, gathered from visitors' discoveries of America, and
reproduced not perhaps word for word but as closely as I can remember
them. "New York", writes one, "nestling at the foot of the Hudson,
gave me an impression of cosiness, of tiny graciousness: in short, of
weeness." But compare this--"New York," according to another
discoverer of America, "gave me an impression of size, of vastness;
there seemed to be a big ness about it not found in smaller places." A
third visitor writes, "New York struck me as hard, cruel, almost
inhuman." This, I think, was because his taxi driver had charged him
three dollars. "The first thing that struck me in New York," writes
another, "was the Statue of Liberty." But, after all, that was only natural:
it was the first thing that could reach him.
Nor is it only the impressions of the metropolis that seem to fall short
of reality. Let me quote a few others taken at random here and there
over the continent.
"I took from Pittsburg," says an English visitor, "an impression of
something that I could hardly define--an atmosphere rather than an
idea."
All very well, But, after all, had he the right to take it? Granted that
Pittsburg has an atmosphere rather than an idea, the attempt to carry
away this atmosphere surely borders on rapacity.
"New Orleans," writes another visitor, "opened her arms to me and
bestowed upon me the soft and languorous kiss of the Caribbean." This
statement may or may not be true; but in any case it hardly seems the
fair thing to mention it.
"Chicago," according to another book of discovery, "struck me as a

large city. Situated as it is and where it is, it seems destined to be a
place of importance."
Or here, again, is a form of "impression" that recurs again and
again-"At Cleveland I felt a distinct note of optimism in the air."
This same note of optimism is found also at Toledo, at Toronto--in
short, I believe it indicates nothing more than that some one gave the
visitor a cigar. Indeed it generally occurs during the familiar scene in
which the visitor describes his cordial reception in an unsuspecting
American town: thus:
"I was met at the station (called in America the depot) by a member of
the Municipal Council driving his own motor car. After giving me an
excellent cigar, he proceeded to drive me about the town, to various
points of interest, including the municipal abattoir, where he gave me
another excellent cigar, the Carnegie public library, the First National
Bank (the courteous manager of which gave me an excellent cigar) and
the Second Congregational Church where I had the pleasure of meeting
the pastor. The pastor, who appeared a man of breadth and culture,
gave me another cigar. In the evening a dinner, admirably cooked and
excellently served, was tendered to me at a leading hotel." And of
course he took it. After which his statement that he carried away from
the town a feeling of optimism explains itself: he had four cigars, the
dinner, and half a page of impressions at twenty cents a word.
Nor is it only by the theft of impressions that we suffer at the hands of
these English discoverers of America. It is a part of the system also that
we have to submit to being lectured to by our talented visitors. It is now
quite understood that as soon as an English literary man finishes a book
he is rushed across to America to tell the people of the United States
and Canada all about it, and how he came to write it. At home,