FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[9]Slang for citizens.[10]Slang for information, facts.[11]Mexican hash in corn-husk.

[9]Slang for citizens.

[10]Slang for information, facts.

[11]Mexican hash in corn-husk.

A fundamental idea with the American is to educate children. This is carried to the extent of making it an offense not to send those above a certain age to school, while State or town officers, called "truant police," are on the alert to arrest all such children who are not in school. The following was told me by a Government official in Washington, who had obtained it from a well-known literary man who witnessed the incident. The literary man was invited to visit a Boston school of the lower grade, where he found the teacher, an attractive woman, engaged in teaching a class of "youngsters," the progeny of the working class. After the visitor had listened to therecitations for some time, he remarked to the teacher, "How do you account for the neatness and cleanliness of these children?" "Oh, I insist upon it," was the reply. "The Board of Education does not anticipate all the desiderata, but I make them come clean and make it a part of the course;" then rising and tapping on the table, she said, "Prepare for the sixth exercise." All the children stood up. "One," said the teacher, whereupon each pupil took out a clean cloth handkerchief. "Two," counted the teacher, and with one concerted blast every pupil blew his or her nose in clarion notes. "Three," came again after a few seconds, and the handkerchiefs were replaced. At "four" the student body sank back to their seats without even smiling, or without having "cracked a smile." You could search the world over and not find a prototype. It goes without saying that the teacher wasa wit and wag, but the lesson of handkerchiefs and their use was inculcated.

Education is a part of the scheme to make all Americans equal. A more splendidsystemit is impossible to conceive. Every possible facility is afforded the poorest family to educate their children. Public schools loom up everywhere, and are increased as rapidly as the children, so there is no excuse for ignorance. The schools are graded, and there is no expense or fee. The parents pay a tax, a small sum, those who have no children being taxed as well as those who have many. There are schools to train boys to any trade; normal free schools to make teachers; night schools for working boys; commercial schools to educate clerks; ship schools to train sailors and engineers. Then come the great universities, in part free, with all the splendid paraphernalia, some being Stateinstitutions and others memorials of dead millionaires. Then there are the great technical schools, as well as universities (where one can study Chinese, if desired). There are schools of art, law, medicine, nature, forestry, sculpture; schools to teach one how to write, how to dress, how to eat, and how to keep well; schools to teach one how to write advertisements, to cultivate the memory, to grow strong; schools for shooting, boxing, fencing; schools for nurses and cooks; summer schools; winter schools.

And yet the American is not profoundly educated. He has too much within his reach. I have been distinctly surprised at crude specimens I have met who were graduates of great universities. The well-educated Englishman, German, and American are different things. The American is far behind in the best sense, which I am inclined tothink is due to the teachers. Any one can get through a normal school and become a teacher who can pass the examination, and I have seen some singular instances. If all the teachers were obliged to pass examinations in culture, refinement, and the art ofconveyingknowledge, there would be a falling of pedagogic heads. The free and over education of the poor places them at once above their parents. They are free, and the daughter of a ditch laborer, whose wife is a floor scrubber, upon being educated is ashamed of her parents, learns to play the piano, apes the rich, and is at least unhappy.

The result is, there remains no peasant class. The effect of education on the country boy is to make him despise the farm and go to the city, to become a clerk and ape the fashions of the wealthy at six or eight dollars a week. He has been educated up to the standard of his "boss"and to be his equal. The overeducation of the poor is a heartless thing. The women vie with the men, and as a result women graduates, taking positions at half the price that men demand, crowd them out of the fields of skilled labor, whereas the man, not crowded out, should, normally, marry the girl. In power, strength, and progress the American nation stands first in the world, and all this may be due to splendid educational facilities. But this is not everything. There result strife, unhappiness, envy, and a craze for riches. I do not think the Americans as a race are as happy as the Chinese. Religious denominations try to have their own schools, so that children shall not be captured by other denominations. Thus the Roman Catholics have parochial schools, under priests and sisters, and colleges of various grades. They oppose the use of theBible in the public school, and in some States their influence has helped to suppress its use. The Quakers, with a following of only eighty thousand, have colleges and schools. The Methodists have universities, as have the Presbyterians, Episcopalians, and others. All denominations have institutions of learning. These schools are in the hands of clergymen, and are often endowed or supported by wealthy members of the denomination.

A remarkable feature of American life is the college of correspondence. A man or firm advertises to teach by correspondence at so much a month. Many branches are taught, and if the student is in earnest a certain amount of information can thus be accumulated. Among the people I have met I have observed a lack of what I term full, broad education, producing a well-rounded mind,which is rare except among the class that stands first in America—the refined, cultured, educated man of an old family, who is the product of many generations. The curriculum of the high school in America would in China seem sufficient to equip a student for any position in diplomatic life; but I have found that a majority of graduates become clerks in a grocery or in other shops, car conductors, or commercial travelers, where Latin, Greek, and other higher studies are absolutely useless. The brightest educational sign I see in America is the attention given to manual training. In schools boys are taught some trade or are allowed to experiment in the trades in order to find out their natural bent, so that the boy can be educated with his future in view. As a result of education, women appear in nearly every field except that of manual labor on farms, which isperformed in America only by alien women.

The richest men in America to-day, the multi-millionaires, are not the product of the universities, but mainly of the public schools. Carnegie, Rockefeller, Schwab, men of the great steel combine, the oil magnates, the great railway magnates, the great mine owners, were all men of limited education at the beginning. Among great merchants, however, the university man is found, and among the Harvard and Yale graduates, for example, may be found some of America's most distinguished men. But Lincoln, the martyred President, had the most limited education, and among public men the majority have been the product of the public school, which suggests that great men are natural geniuses, who will attain prominence despite the lack of education. The best-educatedmen in America to my mind are the graduates of West Point and Annapolis, the military and naval academies. These two institutions are extremely rigorous, and are open to the most humble citizens. They so transform men in four years that people would hardly recognize them. The result is a highly educated, refined, cultivated, practical man, with a high sense of honor and patriotism. If America would have a school of this kind in every State there would be no limit to her power in two decades.

Despite education, the great mass of the people are superficial; they have a smattering of this and that. An employer of several thousand men told the Superintendent of Education of the District of Columbia that he had selected the brightest boy graduate of a high school for a position which required only a knowledge of simple arithmetic. Thegraduate proved to be totally unfit for the position and was discharged. Later he became the driver of a team of horses. America abounds in thousands of educational institutions, yet there is not one so well endowed that it can say to the world we wish no more money. It is singular that some multi-millionaire does not grasp this opportunity to donate one hundred millions to a great national school or university, to be placed at Washington, where the buildings would all be lessons in architecture of marble after the plans of a world's fair. Instead they leave a few thousands here and a few there. Carnegie, the leading millionaire, gives libraries to cities all over the States, each of which bears the name of the giver. The object is too obvious, and is cheap in conception. In San Francisco some years ago a citizen tried the same experiment. He proposed togive the city a large number of fountains. When they were finishedeachone was seen to be surmounted by his own statue. A few were put up, how many I do not recall, but one night some citizens waited on a statue, fastened a rope to its neck, and hauled it down. So peculiar are the Americans that I believe if Mr. Carnegie should place his name on ten thousand libraries, with the object of attaining undying fame, the people, by a concerted effort, would forget all about him in a few decades. Such an attempt does not appeal to any side of the American character. I have known the best Americans, but Mr. Carnegie has not known the best of his own countrymen or he would not attempt to perpetuate his memory in this way.

Among the most delightful people I have met in America are the army and navy officers, graduates of West Point and Annapolis, well-bred, cultivated men, patriotic, open-hearted, and chivalrous. They are like our own class of men who answer to the American term of gentlemen. I am not going to tell you of their splendid ships, their training or uniform, but of a few of their idiosyncrasies. There is no dueling in the army. If two men have trouble at the academies they fight it out with bare fists, and in the army settle it in some other way, dueling being forbidden. Owing to the fact that all men are equal in America, the attitude of the officer tothe civilian is entirely different. If a civilian strikes an officer in Germany the latter will cut him down with his saber and be protected in it, but here the man would be arrested and treated as any other criminal; in a word, the officer is a servant of the people, and stands with them. He has been trained to treat his men well, and they respect him. But while the officer is the people's servant and his salary in some part is paid by the humblest grocer's clerk, laborer, or artisan, the officer has a social position which, in the eyes of himself and the Government, makes him the social equal of kings and emperors; and here we see a strange fact in American life.

When a garrison is ordered to a town or city, people call to pay their respects. The grocer, who in being taxed aids in paying the officer's salary, ispersona non grata. The grocer, milk dealer, shoedealer, and retail dealers in general might call, but would not be received on cordial terms. The wife of the colonel might return the call of the grocer's wife if she made a good appearance, but the latter would under no circumstances be invited to a function at the camp or post. The undertaker, the dentist, the ice-man, the retail shoe man are under the ban. Certain kinds of business appear to have certain social rights. Thus a dentist would not be received, but the man who manufactures dentists' tools may be a leader among the "Four Hundred."

Strange complications arise. A young officer fell in love with a sergeant's daughter, and married her, as I learned from a well-known officer at the Army and Navy Club. This was serious enough, as there could be no intimacy between a commissioned and non-commissioned officer. The young man andhis bride were ordered to a distant post, where the story of course followed them. All went well for a time. The bride sank her social inferiority in the rank of her husband, and the ladies of the post called on her, not as the sergeant's daughter but as the officer's wife. The mother of the bride finally decided to visit her, and thus became the guest of the officer, who was a lieutenant. Under ordinary circumstances it was the duty of all the ladies to call on the mother of the lieutenant's wife; but it so happened that she was the wife of a sergeant, and hence to call was impossible. No one did so.

The young wife felt herself insulted, and the ubiquitous reporter seized upon the situation, until it was taken up by every paper in the country. The pictures of mother, daughter, and sergeant were shown, and columns were written on the subject. Almost to a man the editorsdenounced what they termed the snobbishness of the army, and denounced West Point for producing snobs, claiming that the ladies of the post, had they been real ladies, would have called on a respectable laundress even if she had been the sergeant's wife. I refer to this to show the intricacies of American etiquette. The point is that nearly all the editors who knew anything, believed that the ladies were right, but did not dare to say so on account of the fact that the majority of their readers felt themselves the equals of the army officer; hence the cry of snobbery that went whistling over the land. The lieutenant committed a gross mistake in marrying the girl; he married out of his class. But in America I am told there are no classes, and I am constantly forgetting this.

In the army there are several black regiments (negroes). They have blackchaplains, and attempts have been made to find black officers, but the social difficulties make this impossible, though the blacks are free and independent citizens and help pay the salaries of the white men. It would be impossible to force white soldiers to admit to their regiment black soldiers. No white man would permit a black officer to be placed over him, even by inference.

In the navy we see an entirely different situation. On every ship are negroes in the crew, sleeping on the same gun-decks with the white men, and no fault is found; but a negro officer would be an impossibility. Though several have been sent to the Naval Academy, none have "gone through." Even in these almost perfect institutions favoritism exists. To illustrate: the son of a prominent man was about to fail in his examinations, when the powers that be passed theword that he must pass,nolens volens. The professor in whose class he was and who had found him deficient resented this, and when he learned that it was the intention to pass the boy over his head he resigned and was ordered to his regiment. The young man was graduated, entered the army and, aided by influence, jumped many of his class men and finally acquired rank at the request of the wife of one of the Presidents. This was a very exceptional case, the result of strong national sentiment that favored the father.

The management of the army does not seem rational to a foreigner. To preserve the idea of republican simplicity and equality, army men are not rewarded with orders, as in other countries, which is a great injustice. Few officers, though veterans of many wars, wear medals, and when they do they were not given as rewards for bravery, but are merely corpsbadges, showing that the officer belongs to this or that army corps. But if an officer does a brave deed he may be promoted several points over his fellows, as brave as he, but who did not have the same opportunity to show bravery. Ill feeling may be the result. Every man is expected to be brave, and extraordinary examples of bravery are recognized in other nations by the presentation of medals, the possession of which creates no ill feeling. The actual head of the army is the Secretary of War, a political appointment, an adviser selected by the President, who, usually, has no military knowledge. This officer gives all the orders to the general of the army, and, as in a recent instance, a vast amount of friction has been the result. Intense feeling was occasioned by the elevation of certain officers, who were supposed to possess remarkable executive ability.

Civil war veterans at the Army and Navy Club complained to an acquaintance of mine that when they arrived at the seat of war in Cuba they found their superior officers to be, first, General Wheeler, an ex-Confederate, against whom they had fought in the civil war; second, Colonel Wood, who had been a contract army surgeon under nearly all of them; and finally, Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt, who was a babe in arms when they were fighting the battles of the civil war. This story serves to illustrate the point that political "pulls" and favoritism are rampant in the service, and are the cause of much disgust among officers. General Funston affords an illustration that has incensed many officers. Funston was an unknown man, who captured Aguinaldo by a clever ruse, a valuable and courageous piece of work, which should have been rewarded with adecoration andsomepromotion; but he was jumped over the heads of hundreds, landing at the top of the army in one "fell swoop." I judge the policy of the Government to be to promote officers so soon as they show evidence of extraordinary capability.

It would be an easy matter for any one to obtain photographs of plans and sketches of American fortifications. One of my friends hired a photographer to get up what he called a scrap-book of pictures to take home to his family in Tokio in order to "entertain his people." The photographer sent him a wonderful series, showing the forts overlooking New York harbor, interiors and exteriors; and those in Boston, Portland, Baltimore, Fort Monroe, Key West, and San Francisco were also obtained. Photographs of guns and charts, which can be purchased everywhere, were included, as well asGovernment reports. If Japan ever goes to war with the Yankees my friend's scrap-book will be in demand. I do not believe the American War Department makes any secret of the forts. They are open to the public. Even if a kodak were not permitted, pictures could be secured. My friend said his photographer had a kodak which he wore inside his vest, the opening protruding from a button-hole. All he had to do was to stand in front of an object and pull a cord. Such a kodak is known as a "detective camera." There are several designs, all very clever. I once saw my face reproduced in a paper, and until I heard about this camera it was a mystery how the original was obtained, as I had not "posed" for any one.

The possibility of America going to war with another nation is remote. From what I see of the people and theirtremendous activity they could not be defeated by any nation or combination of nations. They are like Senator ——'s Malay game-cock, of which the senator has said that there is only one trouble with him—the bird never knows when he is licked, and if he does he does not stay licked. America could raise an army of ten or twelve millions of the finest fighters in the world for defense against any combination, and she would win. The senator told me a story, which illustrates the situation. One of the American men-of-war in a Malay port had an old American eagle aboard as a mascot and pet. When the men got liberty they went ashore with the eagle, and showed it as an "American game-cock." The natives wanted to arrange a match, and finally one was planned, the eagle cock against a black Malay. When the fight began, the black cock put its spurinto the eagle several times, the latter doing nothing but eye the cock, first with one eye, and then with the other. Once more the black cock stabbed the eagle, bringing blood, whereupon the eagle leaned forward, and as the cock thrust out its head, seized it with one claw, pressed it to the ground, and with the other tore off its head and began to eat it. This is what would happen if almost any nation really and seriously went to war with the United States. But the country was ill prepared for the war with Spain. If Cervera had reached the New England coast he could have shelled Boston and then New York.

Service in America is not compulsory. It is merely made popular, and as a result, every part of the country has State militia of splendidly drilled men, ready to be called on at a moment's notice. They receive no pay, considering it anhonor to be in the militia service. In the regular army old names are perpetuated. The great generals and admirals have sent sons into the service. Our Government would do well to send young men to West Point and Annapolis. The Japanese did this for years, and received the best of their ideas from those sources. There is but one thing in the way. Chinamen aretabooedin America, and doubtless would reach no farther than the port of entry. The only way to get in now would be for a new minister or diplomat to bring over ten or a dozen young men as members of the suite and then distribute them among the schools and universities—a humiliation that China will probably resent.

Our trade with America is extremely valuable to her. The cotton, flour, and other commodities we import represent a vast sum, and I believe if we refusedat once to buy anything from America we could make our own terms in less than two years. This could be accomplished very gradually. The Americans would find it out first through their consuls, who are all instructed to report on every possible point of vantage that can be taken in China by their merchants. They would report a decreased demand. American merchants would then demand an explanation from the Department of State, and finally we could announce that we preferred to buy from our friends, American treatment of the Chinese being inimical to good feeling. Knowing the American business men as I do, you could count on a wail coming up from them. An appeal would be made to Congress through representatives and senators, the American business men demanding that the "Chinese matter" be arranged upon a "more liberal basis."When you touch the pocketbook of "Uncle Sam" you reach his earthquake center; yet for defense, for the preservation of the national honor, this people will spend untold sums. The American Government bond is the best security in the world. It is founded on the rock of honor and patriotism. And there is no repudiation like that of ——, and none like the pretended one of ——.[12]We have our faults, and it is well to recognize them; but I never saw them until I mingled with the English and Americans.

There is of course a large foreign element in the American army—thousands of Irish and Germans; but this does not signify, as I learn that in the State of Massachusetts, the stronghold of Americans, the Irish hold a third of the official positions, the native-born Yankeesabout one-fourth. This is particularly exasperating to old families in New England, as it is notorious that the Irish come directly from the very dregs of the poverty-stricken peasantry—the "bog-trotters." I was much impressed by the high standard of honor in the army and navy, and am told that it is the rarest of occurrences for a regular army officer to commit a crime or to default. This is due to the training received at the military and naval schools, where young men are placed on their honor.

FOOTNOTE:[12]China has twice repudiated its Government bonds within four centuries.

[12]China has twice repudiated its Government bonds within four centuries.

It is seldom that I have been complimented in America, but a lady has told me that she envied our "art sense." She said the Chinese are essentially artistic, that the cheapest thing, the most ordinary article, is artistic or beautiful. I wished that I could return the compliment, but a strict observance of the truth compels me to say that the reverse is true in America. If one go into a Chinese shop and ask for any ordinary article, it will be found artistic. If one go into an American shop, say a hardware "store," there will not be found an article that would be considered decorative, while everything in a Chinese shop of like character would fall under this head.The conclusion is that the Chinese are artistic, while the Americans are not.

The reason lies in the fact that the Chinese are homogeneous, while the Americans are a mixed race, that is injured by the continual introduction of baser elements. If immigration could be stopped for fifty years, and the people have a chance to acquire "oneness," they might become artistic. The middle class, however, is, from an artistic standpoint, a horror; they have absolutely no art sense, and thenouveaux richesare often as bad. The latter sometimes place their money in the hands of an agent, who buys for them; but all at once a man may break out and insist upon buying something himself, so that in a splendid collection of European names will appear some artistic horror to stamp the owner as a parvenu.

The Americans have not produced agreat painter. By this I mean a really great artist, nor have they a great sculptor, one who is or has been an inspiration. But they have thousands of artists, and many poor ones thrive in selling their wares. You may see a man with an income of thirty thousand dollars having paintings on his walls that give one the vertigo. The poor artist has taken him in, or "pulled his leg," to use the latest American slang. There are some fine paintings in America. I have visited the great collections in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Chicago, and those in many private galleries, but the best of the pictures are always from England, France, Germany, and other European countries. Old masters are particularly revered. Americans pay enormous sums for them, but sometimes are deceived.

They have art schools by the hundred,where they study from the nude and from models of all kinds. There are splendid museums of art, especially in Boston and New York. The art interests are particularly active, but not the people; there are a few art lovers only, the people in the mass being hopeless. Cheap prints, chromos, and other deadly things are ground out by the million and sold, to clog still deeper the art sense of an inartistic people. They laugh at our conventional Chinese art, but the extreme of conventionality is certainly better than some of the daubs I have seen in American homes. Americans have peculiar fancies in art. One is called Impressionist Art. As near as I can understand it, painters claim that while you are looking at an object you do not really see it all, you merely gain an impression; so they paint only the impression. In a museum of art I was shown severalrooms full of daubs, having absolutely nothing to commend them, weird colors being thrown together in the strangest manner, without rhyme or reason, but over which people went mad. The great masters of Europe appeal to me strongly. In America, marine painters attract me the most, for example, Edward Moran, who is a splendid delineator of the sea. Bierstadt is a noble painter, and so is Thomas Moran. There are half a hundred men who are fine painters, but half a thousand men and women who think they are artistic but who are not.

Americans have developed no individual architecture. You see semipagoda-like effects in the East, and old English houses in the South. They steal the latter and call them Colonial. They steal the architecture of the Moors and call it Mexican. They borrow Roman and Grecian effects for great publicbuildings. At one time they went mad over the French roof, or mansard. Nowhere have I seen purely American architecture. The race is not possessed of sufficient unity. So all their art is from abroad, and notably is French and English. They make broad effects, and give them an American name; but they are copied from the Dutch or Germans. All the furniture designers in America are Europeans. You will find a splendid house with a Chinese room, having teak inlaid with ivory, etc.; a Japanese room, a Moorish room, and an Italian room, all splendidly decorated; but the family lives in an "American room," that is commonplace and subversive of all art digestion and assimilation. The average middle-class American knows absolutely nothing about art; the lower classes so little that their homes are hopeless. Knowing this,they are preyed upon by thousands of foreign swindlers. There are hundreds of articles manufactured in Europe to sell to the American tourist. I have seen Napoleonic furniture enough to load a fleet. I can only compare it to the pieces of the true cross and the holy relics of the Catholics, of which there are enough to fill the original ark which the Bible tells the Americans landed on Mount Ararat in a great flood.

The houses of the best people I have told you about are as far removed from the commonplace as the equator from the poles. They are rich in conception, sumptuous in detail, artistic in every way, and filled with the art gems of the world. But these people have descended from refined people for several generations. They are the true Americans, but make up a small number compared to the inartistic whole. I believe Americarecognizes this, and with her stupendous energy is doing everything to educate the masses in art. They are building splendid museums; rich men give away millions. There are hundreds of art schools, free to all, and art is taught in all the schools. Fine monuments are placed in public squares and parks, and beautiful fountains and memorials in these and other public places. Their buildings, though foreign in design, are beautiful. In Boston one may see marvelous work in frescoes, etc., and in the Government buildings at Washington. The Capitol, while not American in design, is a pile worthy of the great people who erected it.

The questions I know you will wish answered are, Whether this stupendous aggregation of States is a success? Does it possess advantages beyond those of the Chinese Empire? Does it fulfil the expectations of its own people? Frankly, I do not consider myself competent to answer. I have studied America and the Americans for many years during my visits to this country and Europe, and while I have seen many accounts of the country, written after several months of observation, I believe that no just estimate of the republican form of government can be formed after such experience. My private impression, however, is that the republic falls far short of whatthe men in Washington's time expected, and it is also my private opinion that it has not so many advantages as a government like that of England.

It is too splendid an organization to be lightly denounced. The idea of the equality of men is noble, and I would not wish to be arraigned among its critics. There is too much good to offset the bad. I have been attempting to amuse you by analyzing the Americans, pointing out their frailties as well as their good qualities. I tell you what I see as I run, always, I hope, remembering what is good in this spontaneous and open-hearted people. The characteristic claim of the people is that the Government offers freedom to its citizens; yet every man is quite as free in China if he behaves himself, and he can rise if he possesses brains.

Any native-born citizen in the United States may become the head of thenation has he the courage of his convictions, the many accomplishments which equip the great leader, and should the hour and the man meet opportunity. This is the one prize which distinguishes America from England. The latter in other respects offers exactly as much freedom with half the wear and tear; in fact, to me the freedom of America is one of her disadvantages. Every one knows, and the American best of all, that all men arenot equal, never were and never can be. Yet this false doctrine is their standard, and they swear by it, though some will explain that what is meant is political freedom. Freedom accounts for the gross impertinence of the ignorant and lower classes, the laughable assumptions of servants, and the illogical pretenses of thenouveau riche, which make America impossible to some people. Cultivated Americans are asthoroughly aristocratic as the nobility of England. There are the same classes here as there. A grocer becomes rich and retires or dies; his children refuse to associate with the families of other grocers; in a word, the Americans have the aristocratic feeling, but they have no peasant class; the latter would be, in their own estimation, as good as any one. One class, the lower and poorer, is arraigned against the upper and richer, and the gap is growing daily.

But this would not prove that the republic is a failure. What then? It is, in the opinion of many of its clergymen, a great moral failure. No nation in history has lasted many centuries after having developed the "symptoms" now shown in the United States. I quote their own press, "the States are morally rotten," and you have but to turn to these organs and the magazines of the pastdecade, which make a feature of holding up the shortcomings of cities and millionaires, to read the details of the tragedy. Thieves—grafters—have seized upon the vitals of the country. St. Louis, Philadelphia, New York, Chicago, great representative cities—what is their history? The story of dishonesty among officials, of bribery, stealing, and every possible crime that a man can devise to wring money from the people. This is no secret. It has all been exposed by the friends of morality. City governments are overthrown, the rascals are turned out, but in a few months the new officers are caught devising some new "grafting" operation.

I have it from a prominent official that there is not an honest State or city administration in America. What can a nation say when for years it has known that a large and influential lobby has beenmaintained to influence statesmen, a lobby comprising a corps of "persuaders" in the pay of business men? How do they influence them? The great fights waged to defeat certain measures are well known, and it is known that money was used. Certain congressmen have been notoriously receptive. I have seen the following story in print in many forms. I took the trouble to ask a well-known man if it was possible that it could be founded on fact; his reply was, "Certainly it is a fact." A briber entered the private room of a congressman. "Mr. ——, to come right to the point, I want the —— bill to pass, and I will give you five hundred dollars for the vote and your interest." The congressman rose to his feet, purple with rage. "You dare to offer me this insulting bribe? You infernal scoundrel, I will throw you out." "Well, suppose we make it onethousand," said the imperturbable visitor. "Well," replied the congressman, cooling down, "that is a little better put. We will talk it over."

The American Government had been attempting, since 1859, to build a canal across the Isthmus. I believe surveys were made earlier than that, but bribery and corruption and "graft" enabled the friends of transcontinental railroads to stop the canals. It would be a disadvantage to the railroads to have a canal across the Isthmus. So in some mysterious way the canal, which the people wished, has not been built, and will not be until the people rise and demand it. Corruption has stood on the Isthmus with a flaming sword and struck down every attempt to build the canal. The morality of the people is low. Divorce is rampant, the daily journals are filled with accounts of divorces, and daily listsof crimes are printed that would seem impossible to a nation that can raise millions to send to China to convert the "heathen." If they would only divert these Chinese missionaries from China to their own heathen and grafters, but they will not. The peculiar freedom of the country, which is nothing less than the most atrocious license, tends to drag it down.

The papers have absolutely no check on their freedom. Men and women are attacked by them, ruined, held up to scorn and ridicule, and the victim has no recourse but to shoot the editor and thus embroil himself. That it is a crime to ridicule a man and make him the butt of a nation or the world seems never to occur to these men. Certain statesmen have been so lampooned by the "hired" libelers that they have been ruined. The press hires a class of men, calledcartoonists, usually ill-bred fellows of no standing, yet clever, in their business, whose duty it is to hold up public men to ridicule in every possible way and make them infamous before the people. This is called the freedom of the press, and its attitude, or the sensational part of it, in presenting crime in an alluring manner, is having its effect upon the youth of the country. Young girls and boys become familiar with every feature of bestial crime through the "yellow journals," so called, and that the republic will reap sorely from this sowing I venture to prophesy.

I asked one of the great insurance men why it was that great financial institutions took so strong an interest in politics. He laughed, and said, "If I am not mistaken, not long since your country repudiated its Government bonds, and they are not negotiable to any greatextent among your people." Hearing this I assumed the American attitude and "sawed wood." "We take an interest in politics," he continued, "to offset the professional blackmailer and thief. Now in the case of your repudiation I understand all about it. The Chinese Government was in straits, and suddenly some seemingly patriotic citizen started a petition, stating to the Government that the subscribers offered their Government securities to the Government as a gift. By no means all the bondholders signed, but enough, I understand, to have justified your Government in repudiating the bonds—'at the request of the people'—thus destroying the national credit at home and abroad. Now in America that would be called 'graft.' The act would be done by a few grafters in the hope of reward, or by some unscrupulous statesmen to save the Government frombankruptcy during their term of office. I conceive this to be what was done in China. If we do not keep eternal watch we shall be bled every day. It is done in this way: a grafter becomes an assemblyman, and with others lays a plan of graft. It is to get up a bill, so offensive to our corporation that it would mean ruin if passed. The grafter has no idea that it will pass, but it is made much of, and of course reaches our ears, and the question is how to stop it. We are finally told that we had better see Mr. ——, in our own city. He is accordingly looked up and found to be a cheap and ignorant politician, who, if there are no witnesses, tells our agent plainly that it can be stopped for ten thousand dollars. Perhaps we beat him down to eight thousand, but we pay it. Hundreds of firms have been blackmailed in this way. Now we keep an agent in the StateCapitol to attend to our interests, and we take an interest in politics to head off the election of professional grafters."

One of the most serious things in this phase of national immorality is showing itself in what are termed "lynchings"; that is, a negro commits a crime against a white woman, and instead of permitting the law to run its course, the people rise, seized with a savage craze for revenge, batter in the jails, take the criminal, and burn him at the stake. This burning is sometimes attended by thousands, who display the most remarkableabandonand savagery. Some African chiefs have sacrificed more people at one time, but no savage has ever displayed greater bestiality, gloated over his victim with more real satisfaction, than these free Americans in numerous instances when shouting and yelling about the burning body of some unfortunate whosecrime has aroused their ferocity to the point of madness.

Not one but many clergymen have denounced this. They compare it to the most brutal acts of savagery, and we have the picture of a country posing as civilized, with the temerity to point out the sins of others, giving themselves over to orgies that would disgrace the lowest of races. I have it from the lips of a clergyman that during the past twelve years over twenty-five hundred men have been lynched in the United States. In a single year two hundred and forty men were killed by mobs in this way, many being burned at the stake. If any excuse is offered, it is said that most of these were negroes, and the crime was rape, and the victims white women; but of the number mentioned only forty-six were charged with this crime and but two-thirds were black. Many confessed as the torch wasapplied, many died protesting their innocence, and in no case was the offense legally proved. This lynching seems to be a mania with the people. It began with the attack of negroes on white women. The repetition of similar cases so enraged the whites that they have become mad upon the subject. The feeling is well illustrated by the remark of a Southerner to me. "If a woman of my family was attacked by a negro I must be his executioner. I could not wait for the law." This man told me that no lynching would ever have taken place had it not been for the uncertainty of the law. Men who were known to be guilty of the grossest of crimes had been virtually protected by the law, and their cases dragged along at great expense to the State, this occurring so many times that the patience of the people became exhausted. This man forgot that thelaw was instigated for the purpose of justice.

The negro is an issue in America and a cause of much crime, a vengeance on the people who held them as slaves. The negro has increased so rapidly that in forty years he has doubled in number, there now being over nine millions in the country. At the present rate there will be twenty-five millions in 1930—a black menace to the white American.

The negro is a factor in the national unrest. They outnumber the whites in some localities, and hence vote themselves many offices, while the few whites pay eighty or eighty-five per cent of the taxes and the negroes supply from eighty to ninety per cent of the criminals. While this is going on in the South and the whites are rising and preparing to disfranchise the blacks in many States, the people of Boston and Cambridge arediscussing the propriety of the whites and blacks marrying to settle the question of social equality. Such proposals I have read. Reprinted in the South, they added fuel to the flame.

Another element of distress in America is the attitude of labor, the policy of the Government of letting in the lowest of the low from every nation except the Chinese, against whom the only charge has been that they are too industrious and thus a menace to the whites. The swarms of people from the low and criminal classes of Europe have enabled the anarchists to obtain such a foothold that in this free country the President of the United States is almost as closely guarded as the Emperor of Russia. The White House is surrounded and guarded by detectives of various kinds. The secret-service department is equal in its equipment to that of many European nations,and millions are spent in watching criminals and putting down their strikes and riots. The doctrine of freedom to all appeals so well to the ignorant laborer that he has decided to control the entire situation, and to this end labor is divided into "unions," and in many sections business has been ruined.

The demands of these ignorant men are so preposterous that they can scarcely be credited. The merchant no longer owns his business or directs it. The laborer tells him what to pay, how to pay it, when and how long the hours shall be—in fact, undertakes to usurp entire control. If the owner protests, the laborers all stop work, strike, appoint guards, who attack, kill, or intimidate any one who attempts to take their place. In this way it is said that one billion dollars have been lost in the last few years. Contracts have been broken, men ruined,localities and cities placed in the greatest jeopardy, and hundreds of lives lost. Every branch of trade has its "union," and in so many cases have the laborers been successful that a national panic comes almost in sight. Never was there a more farcical illustration of freedom. Irrational, ignorant Irishmen, who had not the mental capacity to earn more than a dollar a day, dictated to merchant princes and millionaire contractors. In New York it was proved that the leaders of the strikers sold out to employers, and accepted bribes to call off strikes.

The question before the American people is, Has an American citizen the right to conduct his own business to suit himself and employ whom he wishes? Has the laborer the right to work for whom and what rate he pleases? The imported socialists, anarchists, and their converts among Americans say no, and it willrequire but little to precipitate a bloody war, when labor, led by red-handed murderers, will enact in New York and all over the United States the horrors of the French Commune.

The republic for a great and enlightened country has too many criminals. I am told by a prohibition clergyman that the curse of drink and license has its fangs in the heart of the land. He tells me that the Americans pay yearly $1,172,000,000 for their alcoholic drink; for bread, $600,000,000; for tobacco, $625,000,000; for education, $197,000,000; for ministers' salaries, $14,000,000. It has been found that the downfall of eighty-one per cent of criminals is traceable to drink. He said: "Our republic is a failure morally, as we have 2,550,000 drunkards and people addicted to drink. We have 600,000 prostitutes, and many more doubtless that are not known, andin nine cases out of ten their downfall can be traced to drink."

I listen to this side of the story, and then I see wonderful philanthropy, institutions for the prevention of crime, good men at work according to their light, millions employed to educate the young, thousands of churches and societies to aid man in making man better. When I listen to these men, and see tens of thousands of Christian men and women living pure lives, building up vast cities, great monuments for the future, I feel that I can not judge the Americans. They perhaps expect too much from their freedom and their republican ideas. I shall never be a republican. I believe that we all have all the freedom we deserve. It is well to remember that man is an animal. After all his polish and refinement, he has animal tastes and desires, and if he makes laws that are indirect opposition to the indulgence which his animal nature suggests, he certainly must have some method of enforcing the laws. Like all animals, some men are easily influenced and others not, and the human animal has not made progress so far but that he needs watching in order to make him conform to what he has decided or elected to call right.

You will expect me to compare the American to the Chinaman, but it is impossible. Some things which we look upon as right, the American considers grievous sins. The point of view is entirely at variance, but I have boundless faith in the brilliant and good men and women I have met in America. I say this despite my other impressions, which also hold.

The great political scheme of the people is poorly devised and crude. It is so arranged that in some States governorsare elected every year or two and other officers every year, representatives of the people in Congress every two years, senators every six, Presidents every four years. Thus the country is constantly in a whirl, and as soon as the rancor of one national election is over begins the scheming for another. The people have really little to do with the selection of a President. A small band of rich and influential schemers generally have the entire plan or "slate" laid out. A plan, natural in appearance, isarrangedfor the public, and at the right time the slated program is sprung. Senators should be elected by the people, congressmen should be elected for a longer period, and Presidents should have twice the terms they do. But it is easy to suggest, and I confess that my suggestions are those of many American people themselves which I hear reformers cry abroad.

The vital trouble with America to-day is that she can not assimilate the 600,000 debased, ignorant, poverty-stricken foreigners who are coming in every year. They keep out the one peaceful nation. They exclude the Chinese and take to the national heart the Jew, the Socialist, the Italian, the Roumanian and others who constitute a nation of unrest. What America needs is the "rest cure" that you hear so much about here. She should close her seaports to these aliens for ten years, allow the people here to assimilate; but they can not do it. The foreign transportation lines under foreign flags are in the business to load up America with the dregs of Europe. I know of one family of Jews, four brothers, who wished to come to America, but found that they would have to show that they were not paupers. They mustered about one thousand dollars. One came over,and sent back the money by draft. The second brought it back as his fortune, then immediately sent it back for another brother to bring over, and so on until they all arrived, each proving that he was not a pauper. Yet these same brothers, each with several children, became an expense to the Government before they were earners. The children were sent to industrial homes, and later entered the sweat-shops. In America there is not a Chinaman to-day in a workhouse, or a pauper[13]at the expense of the Government; yet the Chinese are not wanted here.

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