title: A southerner in Europe;
text: tf. V V • ^ ' .O"" .*!.!nL% '^> V' ♦I**- 'c* ^^*"^^ '.m^»* ^«^'X '•♦^^** ** ^ -^v^^^^" •* ^<^%. \^mBB^.^ .1^^^. ■a »P ► A A Southerner in Europe n^^T^ BEING FOURTEEN NEWSPAPER LET- TERS OF FOREIGN TRAVEL WRITTEN "^Slh^: WITH ESPECIAL REFERENCE TO ^" SOUTHERN CONDITIONS :: :: :: :: BY CLARENCE HAMILTON POE Editor and Manager The Progressive Farmer and Southern Farm Gazette, and Joint Author of "Cotton: Its Cultivation, Marketing, Manufacture, Etc." MUTUAL PUBLISHING COMPANY RALEIGH. N. C. LlBHARYof QGNGRESS Two Oopies Received DEC 26 !908 ' Ciipycikiri; £niry GLASS c^ XXc, Ho, COPY y. COPYRIGHT 1908 BY CLARENCE HAMILTON POE DEDICATION: TO ALL ALERT-MINDED SOUTHERNERS WHO FIND LESSONS FOR OUR TIME IN THE HISTORY OF OTHER TIMES. AND FOR OUR COUNTRY IN THE EXPERIENCES OF OTHER COUNTRIES TABLE OF CONTENTS. CHAPTER. PAGE. I. — Back to the Old Ancestral Home: A Foreword „ 6 II. — Notes of Passage Across the Atlantic 12 III. —England and Scotland: A Fair Land Let Down from Heaven 17 IV. — English People, Cities, Agriculture and Postal System 25 V. — Glimpses of English Life and Customs-. 36 VL— Among Castled Walls and Palaces Old in Story „ „ 49 VII — "The Pleasant Land of France" 60 VIII.— At Napoleon's Tomb and the Old Court of Versailles . 70 IX. — Belgium, Holland, Germany: Countries Where Everybody Works 79 X. — Wise Economies America Should Learn from Europe 90 XL — Switzerland : Two August Weeks Among Lakes, Peaks and Scenei-y Unrivaled 99 XII. — " The Grandeur that was Rome" 109 XIIL— What Rome and Pompeii Can Teach Us. 118 XIV. — How the South May Win Leadership: Some Practical Lessons from Euro- pean Life and History 129 I. Back to the Old Ancestral Home: A Foreword. New York City, N. V. Here I am in New York, and to-day our ship will start to take me across the broad Atlantic — morning, noon and night; morning, noon and night, and morning, noon and night again and again for eight days, possibly nine, with all the speed of throbbing and powerful engines, riding on the billows of an unfathomed sea, until the shores of old Scotland at last come into view. Going across the ocean is not a matter of much moment now: accidents by sea are probably few- er in proportion to traffic involved than accidents by land, and the number of Southerners who go abroad is probably increasing three times as rap- idly as the population. But with all the ease of ocean travel now, I wonder how many start across without some thought of those three little barks that set out across the misty and mysterious deep from ■ the little port of Palos in 1492? Ever since the dawn of creation, through ages and ages, aeons and aeons, the great Atlantic had lashed itself with furious storms, had wearied itself with never-resting billov/s, — generations 6 coming and going; empires rising and falling, — while no man took up its perpetual challenge to search out the borders of its mighty realm. Cen- turies came and v/ent, and yet it guarded its se- cret of a Newer World; the Indian on this side not even dreaming that the sun looked down on any other land, and the European held back by superstition and by dread from attempting to an- swer the Sphinx-like riddle of the mighty waters. EUROPE IS NOT A FOREIGN COUNTRY; IT IS OUR OLD HOME. This is one of the thoughts that come to mind as we join in now with "those that go down to the sea in ships": that it is only in the last half hour of human history, as it were, and only in the last minute of time, comparatively speaking, that man has brought the sea under his dominion, making it his servant to carry him from conti- nent to continent. Moreover, it is also only in the last half hour of human history that there have been any white people in America. Europe isn't really a foreign country: it is our old home. This is the idea I should like especially to impress upon my read- ers; and it seems to me that in our educational system we make a mistake in dealing only with what these last three or four generations have done here in America and ignoring the long and weary upward course of civilization through centuries of European history — just as if a son inheriting a princely fortune and an ancient and honorable name should migrate to a new coun- try and yet fail to teach his children anything of the struggles by which his ancestors had de- veloped their sturdy virtues or acquired their broad possessions. Every liberty of which we boast, as Tom Watson points out in his "Story of France," was cradled in Europe; it was over there that martyrs bled for the rights that we en- joy to-day, and that patient generations slowly wrought out the principles of government which have made us a happy people. AND THE EUROPEANS ARE ALL OUR KINS- FOLK. Really, therefore, as I have indicated, I am go- ing back to our old home, — much as if the son or grandson of one of your uncles who went out to California in the gold-hunting days of '49 should come back now to see his relatives and the ancestral dwelling-place. These men and women of Europe to-day are all our kinsfolk, even if we have let the relation- ships become indistinct and uncertain. It was in most cases only some chance, accident or whim, or at most, some change of policy in government, that caused our ancestors to come to America: .with a slightly different turn of Fortune's wheel you and I to-day would he Europeans, too. And even as it is, we cannot he indifferent to European history, nor find its pages meaningless for our times. Have you ever thought of it, that your an- cestors — the men whose blood now courses in your veins — played some part in the whole mighty drama of the ages? When Caesar conquered Gaul, your ancestors and mine, wild, ferocious men, heard somewhere the tramp of the Roman legions. In the struggle between the old gods of my- thology and the new and strange religion of the Christ of Galilee, your ancestors and mine were ranged on one side or the other. When the days of the martyrs came, it was our blood that ran in the veins of those who suffered at the stake or of those who applied the burning torch. And as I look back through the dim centuries to where Peter the Hermit stands amid those strangely 'dressed men and women preaching a crusade for the rescue of the Holy Sepulchre, I know that my fathers and yours, either as mailed knights or as hard-featured and hard-living peas- 9 ants, listened to the orator's fiery words and left home and loved ones to fight the hated Turk. Through the nightmare of the Dark Ages, through the long years of feudal authority, in the bloody and fruitless wars that followed, what part did these kinsmen and kinswomen of ours play? There is the great castle with its towers and battlements — and alas! with its dungeons, too! Did your kinsfolk and mine know the sun- nier side of life in the days when knighthood was in flower, or did they know only the peasant's bitter toil and dirty hovel — or perhaps torture and imprisonment itself? EUROPE'S LARGER PERSPECTIVE SHOWS THAT THE WORLD IS GROWING BETTER. One thing at least a European trip and a sur- vey of European history should do for a man: it ought forever to cure him of pessimism about the progress of the race. The curtain rises upon a stage of barbarism so fierce that the old Norse warriors on their forays are reported as finding especial delight in tossing captive infants from spear's point to spear's point. The boasted glo- ries o*f "the age of chivalry" become but a mock- ery when we recall that in its damp dungeons the limbs of innocent prisoners often rotted off, and that even the knightly vow to honor women ap- plied only to those of gentle birth. We have to 10 look back but a few centuries to the time when men thought they did God-service by burning to death all with whom they disagreed about re- ligion. And even existence itself in those days was hard and unlovely. So crude were the tools in use and so ineffectual the farm methods that even with good government the masses would have been in want such as no class of people in the South knows to-day: a thirteenth century writer, for example, reporting that the average harvest was only threefold the seed. But even this meager product was subject to grievous taxes to support more or less worthless kings and vicious courts until just prior to the French Revolution it is said that one-half of all the peasant earned was paid to the Government in actual taxes, and that after paying the additional feudal dues and church tithes, only one-fifth of his earnings was left him for the support of himself and family. THE TRUTH ABOUT ''THE GOOD OLD DAYS." The scroll of European history unrolled before him, one looks back, too, to the time when the lives of men and women were at the unquestioned disposal of lord or monarch; when at the nod of some one in authority your ancestor or mine per- haps was hurried away to wear out his life with cause untried in some loathsome dungeon; and 11 when men thouglit it the natural thing to die in wars in .which no one but the king himself had any interest. Contrasting this picture with that of present- day American freedom, who can doubt the great truth uttered by Bishop Fitzgerald — that "the progress of humanity under the rule of an all- wise, ail-gracious, all-loving God, is forward, not backward"? TWO BIG FACTS TO KEEP IN MIND. It is these two or three thoughts then that I would have my readers keep in mind in connec- tion with the articles that I shall write — First, that we are ourselves the inheritors of the long years of old European history no less than our kinsfolk who now live there — just as the son who moves away, no less than the son who stays at home, is the heir of all the family traditions that preceded his departure. Second, that these English and German and Scotch and Dutch and French are our kinsfolk left at the old home, and that so large a part of the real history of our race has been made with- in their borders that American history really deals, as I have said, only with the last half-hour of human progress. II. Notes of Passage Across the Atlantic. On board S. S. Caledonia, Avchor Line. This is the second day of July, so the menu card in the steamer dining-room tells me, and so say all well-regulated calendars, but it doesn't seem right to put a July date line over a letter when 1 have spent the morning with my winter coat on, my winter overcoat, and one blanket (steamer rug) securely wrapped around me — ■ while the only thoroughly warm and comfortable moments spent in my steamer chair to-day were after a fellow-passenger had thrown a second blanket over me! It's as cold here now as it is in the South in mid-November with cotton-picking in the day- time and 'possum hunting at night: cold enough for late muscadines to be gone and for persim- mons to be giving promise of the time for mak- ing 'Simmon and locust beer again. I could hard- ly believe before I left home — not even when it was established out of the mouths of two or three witnesses — that I should need a heavy overcoat in crossing the ocean in July, but I find, in fact, that the only thing more comfortable than one overcoat, would be two overcoats. 13 IN THE FOGS OFF THE "BANKS" OF NEW- FOUNDLAND. It's colder, of course the way we have come: the "Northern route," as it is called, landing us in Scotland. After leaving New York we skirt the New England coast and keep to the northeast until we go through the "banks" off Newfound- land. This puts us so far north that the aurora borealis or "northern lights" are plainly visible, as they were last night and night before. These "banks," as most readers know, are sub- ject to terrible fogs, fogs so dense that vessels can be seen only a short distance away, so that if our steamer did not sound its fierce and terrible fog horn every four or five minutes for hours at a time sometimes, there would be serious danger of running into some small and unsuspecting fish- ing craft. It has been but a short time since such an accident did really occur here: a great steamer dashing through the mist upon a small fishing boat, with the result that seventeen men were knocked into the ^vater and drowned before they could be rescued. "THE SOLITARY INHABITANTS OF AN OCEAN-COVERED PLANET." For two days now, however, we have seen no signs of life apart from our own boat: not a fish- 14 ing smack nor steamer nor any living thing ex- cept one or two seabirds. So far as ocular evidence goes, we might be the sole and solitary inhabitants of an ocean-covered planet. And yet you would not think of this unless you did so deliberately: the steamer carries such a little world in itself that it seems self-sufficient; and somehow, too, the ocean in its every phase seems to breed a spirit of complacency and satis- faction such as the dry land nowhere knows. "They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters" — do they not seem to have in all cases a certain calm confidence and re- pose such as it would seem more natural to asso- ciate with the immovable majesty of the hills and the mountains? On the ocean, too, time goes by with noiseless tread. We have now been on board five days' and nights and have done nothing more exciting than eat and sleep (eating, with its three full and regular meals a day, and two or three other half- way meals in the shape of tea, broth, cakes, sand- wiches, etc., thrown in for good measure, is our principal occupation), except to play an occasion- al game of quoits and shuffleboard, walk the deck in the cool October breeze, or joke and prank with fellow:-passengers. Still the time has passed all too quickly. Barring the time when sea-sickness 15 holds you in thraldom, you would like a voyage of a month instead of a week; and not many of our passengers have been seriously sea-sick. THE ATLANTIC AND THE PACIFIC CON- TRASTED. Such is "life on the ocean wave" as we have found it thus far: our previous experiences having been limited to occasional trips between Norfolk and New York, between Norfolk and Boston, and one brief trip on the Pacific between Los Angeles, Cal., and the ineffably beautiful and romantic Catalina Islands: a place where one's castles in Spain seem to shape themselves into reality and where Tennyson's lotus-eaters might well dream their lives away. Somehow the Atlantic, blus- tery, practical, commercial, seems to partake of the nature of the busy English, American and German peoples found on its borders, while the peaceful Pacific, with a thousand sleepy and easeful islands dotting its sunny bosom, seems indeed to typify the spirit of the Orient with its dreamy religions and its slower and more easy- going nations. Thus far on this trip we havQ not had a real storm such as the Atlantic in its more restless moods is capable of bringing to pass, but we have had about the usual quota of rough weather: high waves last night and this morning that showed 16 us indeod how it feels to be "rocked in the cradle of the deep," while at other times the sea has been as smooth as a mill-pond. A PRAYER FOR "OUR GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN, KING EDWARD." There are yet two more days before I can mail these notes; and before that time there will prob- ably be others that I shall wish to add — some, for example, about my fellow-passengers, repre- senting all parts of the United States and the ut- termost parts of the earth: as far at least as Lucknow, India. A number of Scotch people are on board, and my first definite and clear-cut im- pression of having really left my home country came last Sunday when, in the Church of England service in the music-room, prayer was made not only for the President of the United States, but also for "our gracious sovereign King Edward, Her Majesty Queen Alexandra," and for the Prince of Wales and the nobility of Great Britain. III. England and Scotland: A Fair Land Let Down Out of Heaven. Liverpool, England, I had intended writing more of my ocean trip, but that is ancient history now, and too many other beautiful and wonderful things have crowded upon my sight for me even to revive memories of that rarely beautiful night when the silvery crescent of the new moon in the clear sky above them glorified and seemingly enchanted the long and fancifully shaped cloud lines ranged above the ocean's far horizon. Old castles seem- ed to be there with marvelous towers and battle- ments; mountain peaks, and cathedral spires, too, while the beauty of the northern lights added a singular glory to the outlying edge of the great cloud masses. But this was seeing in imagination only what I have since seen in reality, some im- pressions of which it is now my purpose to record. THE SPIRIT OP THE WRITER'S LETTERS. And in the very beginning of these letters, let me ask the reader's pardon if what I write shall seem somewhat disjointed and unsymmetrical. A traveler here sees so much, and in a hurried trip 18 like mine has scenery and history and art and circumstance thrust upon him in such confusing variety that it is extremely difficult to bring or- der out of chaos, especially when writing must be done at odd moments and under untoward sur- roundings. Will my readers pardon me, there- fore, if I attempt nothing more ambitious than a series of gossipy friendship letters about the things I see that interest me and that I think will interest them? And with this understanding I am ready to set out with my impressions of the Old World. "LAND OP BROWN HEATH AND SHAGGY WOOD." Scotla,nd, I shall not forget, was the first Euro- pean country to greet my eye ; nor can I believe that I shall find one of which I shall carry away a finer impression. It is no wonder that the Scotchman loves his country: no wonder that it was from Scotland that the lines came — Breathes there a man with soul so dead Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land? With its beautiful mountains, lakes, meadows, and rocky shore line, it makes in its natural scenery alone an irresistible appeal to our fancy and to our admiration; but far more effective is its claim upon our love and our interest when we 19 look back upon the panorama of its thousand mighty years of history until now every tongue and land has been enriched by stories of Scot- ish romance and Scottish adventure. I can hardly do better perhaps than to outline briefly the course of my travels up to this hour and then follow it up later with such comment as I may wish to make. On Sunday then, let me say, we landed in Glasgow; Monday we went to Ayr, the home of Robert Burns; Tuesday we went through the Trossachs country made famous in the novels of Sir Walter Scott, traveling partly by coach, and partly by rail, ending the day with a visit to Stirling Castle; Wednesday we spent in Edinburgh; Thursday we visited Melrose Abbey, Abbottsford (the home of Sir Walter Scott), and went thence by rail to Wordsworth's lake coun- try, a memorable seventeen-mile coaching trip form Keswick to Ambleside bringing us in late afternoon to our boat on Windermere; by its wa- ters we spent last night, and this late Friday evening finds me writing this letter from Liver- pool, England. THE BEAUTY OF RURAL SCOTLAND. The very first and the most vivid impression made upon the traveler here, I believe, is that of the beauty of the country, the rural districts. Towns here look much like those in America — a 20 little older, streets a little more crooked, more old buildings rich in historic associations. But between the country here and the country in America the difference is much more marked. I remember how Mr. C. S. Wooten said to me last winter, speaking of his trip abroad last summer: "England looks like a country just let down from Paradise. I didn't see a weed nor a gully nor a poor horse, sheep or cow in the whole country." And I am now prepared to vouch for his state- ment. True, I have seen a few weeds and one or two gullies, but in all my travel in Scotland and England thus far I have not seen more weeds or gullies than I have sometimes seen in a single ten-acre lot in America. SCOTLAND VS. VIRGINIA. A Virginia girl who stood beside me as the stone-fenced farm plats on the Scottish coast came into view, exclaimed at the beauty of the scene. "Oh," I replied, "Virginia will look that way a hundred or two years from now when population becomes dense and farming good." But her reply is worth recording and worthy of serious thought: "The trouble is that we are wearing out the land and letting it wash away long before ever the dense population comes." 21 A GLIMPSE OP ENGLISH FARMING. Here in England it is very different. Every foot of land seems to have attention, intelligent attention, the fields being as carefully tended as our gardens, while the Scotch and English gar- dens themselves are models of beauty and excel- lence such as Americans do not even dream of. The fences enclosing the farms are nearly all of stone, or else hedges; stone walls line every road; railway tracks are bordered with shrubbery; the public highways are all of macadam and kept in constant repair; while the meanest houses are so neat and so beautified by lawn, hedge, shrub and flower that you can hardly think of the inmates as being poor at all. A frame house is almost never seen. The stone fences cross hill, meadow, and even climb the mountain-sides, and add a touch of picturesqueness to the landscape which nothing else could quite replace. Every home, too, has a wealth of beautiful flowers, and vege- tables are cultivated much more extensively and in much greater variety than with us. If I could choose but one of England's points of superiority as a gift for my own country, how- ever, I believe I should take her good roads. With such beautiful highways, innumerable oth- er good things would be added to us. No one could ever think of putting up a ramshackle cabin 2 22 alongside such roads, and in a thousand ways they would stimulate and hasten the development of our people and of our resources. AMONG THE HAUNTS OF ROBBIE BURNS. I shall never forget how through the fog the rocky coast of Scotland gradually came into view last Sunday morning, and how I thought, "For the first time in my life I gaze upon land which white men knew five hundred years ago!" Nor can I ever forget my first set trip into Scottish territory, this being ray visit to Ayr, the birth- place of the poet Burns, on Monday last. Leav- ing out of consideration its usual Scotch neat- ness and cleanliness, I doubt whether any reader of mine now lives in a humbler home than that in which the immortal Scotch poet first saw the light of day. A low roofed stone house thatched with straw, you enter one room and pass into the next, finding it divided into stalls for the cattle and sheep; then the two adjoining rooms — on the same ground floor — were those of the Burns family. " 'Tis but a cot roofed in with straw, A hovel made of clay. One door shuts out the sun and storm, One window greets the day; And yet I stand within this room, And hold all thrones in scorn. For here beneath this lowly thatch Love's sweetest bard was born." 23 We rambled by "the banks and braes of bon- nie Doon," we crossed the "auld brig," and we followed the line of Tarn O'Shanter's famous ride, looking into the broken walls of Alloway Kirk where he saw the ghostly dance. The "auld Kirk" dates back to the year 1145, and the bell which, still unbroken, surmounts its crumbling walls has stood the storms of nearly four hundred winters. ENVIRONMENT AND SPIRIT OF SCOTT, BURNS, AND WORDSWORTH. It may not be unwise just at this point to an- ticipate my narrative just a little and comment on the homes of two other poets — Scott and Wordsworth — which I have seen since visiting Ayr. Scott's beautiful and even lordly home at Abbottsford, overlooking the Tweed, is a treas- ure house of Scottish historical relics: coats-of- arms, swords, suits of armor, blunderbusses, etc., etc. About Wordsworth's country I shall always remember most vividly how the clouds wrapped its low mountain peaks in mist, and how more nearly than anywhere else I have observed (except in our very highest American mountains) heaven and earth seemed there to meet. Having seen the rustic and lowly home of Burns, I shall always better understand how the inspired Scottish ploughman sang songs with the 24 smell of the soil about them; having seen Scott's home and its numberless illustrations of his tire- less energy in collecting Scotch historical relics, I shall always think of it in connection with his great works of fiction; while I must think that a man born in Wordsv/orth's country as I have seen it is predestined to be an intense lover of nature. I am especially glad that at sunset last night I saw the ever low-lying clouds envelop the summit of one of the mountains on which Words- worth loved to gaze; and after such a scene I shall always find greater pleasure in his lines: "Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star, Hath had elsewhere its setting, And cometh from afar: Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness. But trailing clouds of glory do we come From God, who is our home." It is easy about Windermere to "look up through Nature to Nature's God," and the "trail- ing clouds of glory" never seem to be very far away. IV. England's Cities, People, and Postal System. Chester^ England. I wrote last in Liverpool, and before going further it may be well to say a word about that famous English city. It is of most interest to Southerners because of its relation to our cotton industry, and it was fitting therefore that of all places in it we should first visit the Cotton Ex- change. We found it upon the occasion of our visit somewhat less tumultuous than we have found the New York Cotton Exchange when we have visited it, but at times the English bidding grev/ quite exciting. January and February futures were selling at fractions above "five pence" (ten cents) when we were in Liverpool, and cables from New York evidently had an important bear- ing upon prices offered. A VIVID IMPRESSION OP DIFFERENCES IN TIME. It is of interest to record, by the way, that though we were at the Liverpool Exchange well in the afternoon, it was at that time so early in 26 the day in New York that New York cables were just beginning to come in, while it was still later in the afternoon that cablegrams from New Or- leans, still further west, began to make their ap- pearance. One section of the Liverpool Ex- change is devoted to trading in Egyptian cotton, cablegrams from Alexandria, Egypt, keeping English buyers informed as to the course of prices in the African market. Of course, this in- terest here, however, is only a side line, as it v>^ere, to the dominant interest in the American staple, and even a rumor of "hot winds in Texas," such as was exciting the Liverpool Exchange on the day of our visit, has its effect on the market. COTTON "THE MOST BARBAROUSLY HAN- DLED COMMERCIAL PRODUCT IN THE WORLD." We were also interested in seeing the condition in which American cotton arrives in Liverpool, and no one who once sees the plight in which the great Southern farm product reaches the English spinner can fail to agree with Edward Atkinson in pronouncing cotton "the most barbarously handled commercial product in the world." Not only do the bales look ragged, dirty, beggar-like, and generally disreputable, but the actual loss and waste in handling is nothing less than enor- mous and a serious reflection upon the sound 27 sense and business ability of Southern planters. A glance at a wagon load of American cotton be- ing hauled down an English street is enough to make any Southerner an advocate of better baling methods. Cotton from India and Egypt arrives in immeasurably better condition, and I am told that, other things being equal, manufacturers here prefer the foreign cotton for this reason. LIVERPOOL AND THE SLAVE TRADE. Liverpool is also of peculiar interest to South- erners because it was long a center of the slave- trading industry. England did not finally pro- hibit the slave trade until 1807 (America in 1789 had fixed the year 1808 as the time when the nefarious traffic should end with us), and even in 1807 the Liverpool merchants protested hardly less vigorously than they had done a generation before against this interference with their "com- mercial rights." It v/as England, as John Rich- ard Green points out, that introduced slavery in- to the West Indies and America — a Pandora's box of unnumbered evils from which even Hope itself seems to have been excluded. Let it also be mentioned in this connection that when Eng- land came to the abolition of slavery in her West India colonies in the 30's, she paid the owners for their loss. Would God that North and South in America had been wise enough (as Lincoln .wished) to settle their slavery trouble in the same way! HOW INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS SAVED GLASGOW. Somewhat larger than Liverpool is Glasgow, Scotland, where we first landed, but of which I have said but little until now. Glasgow is a fine illustration of the fact that the prosperity of a town depends not so much upon its natural re- sources as upon the progressiveness of its people. Fifty years ago the Clyde River at Glasgow was only 180 feet wide and three feet deep. By spending $35,000,000 in deepening and broaden- ing it (it is now 500 feet wide), Glasgow has put itself in the forefront of European seaports and has made itself the greatest British city except London. Our Southern folk would do well to take the example of Glasgow to heart and redouble their energies in behalf of all well-conceived plans for inland waterways and other internal improve- ments. COMMON NAMES MORE FAMILIAR THAN IN NEW YORK OR BOSTON. There is one thing about these Scotch and English towns that cannot fail to impress itself upon any thoughtful visitor, and that is the sim- 29 ilarity of the surnames to those common through- out our Southern country. It is the most strik- ing illustration I have yet found of the oft-repeat- ed statement that the South is now the most thor- oughly Anglo-Saxon part of America. Walk down any business street in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liver- pool, Chester, or any other English or Scotch town that I have seen, and on the signs you will see in most cases names so common in your own town or county that you can hardly believe yourself in a foreign country, while the surnames you would find displayed in a business street in Boston or New York are strangely foreign and unfamiliar to a Southern traveler. I venture the prediction that any Southerner can walk down the main streets of Glasgow or Liverpool and find five times as many familiar names as he would find in a similar area on Broadway, New York. And it's a good stock of folk with which to claim kin — these English and Scotch, It's very foolish and very harmful for jingoes to try to stir up bad feeling between England and America. We belong to the same great family, our ideals are mainly the same, and the two nations should work together in furthering those ideals through- out the v/ide world. 30 ENGLISH ROYALTY A LIFELESS, MAKE-BE- LIEVE FORMALISM. Too many of our people are given to saying that England is a Kingdom and the United States a Republic: therefore to praise England's system of government is political heresy. The truth is, that the English system is, in many respects, hiore democratic than the American, royalty here being nothing more nor less than an emasculated and perfectly harmless piece of "make-believe" formalism which the people amusing themselves have chosen to perpetuate, since it does no harm and costs no great deal to maintain.. Not only is it true that the "King's speech" which comes nominally from him at the opening of each Par- liament, is written for him by the popular min- istry and the King himself cannot change a word in it, but the people even show a disposition to have their own way about the social affairs of royalty — the only remaining phase of English life in which the King is really King at all. It was only last week that an incident happened vividly illustrating this fact. The Labor and Socialist Party has been gaining strength rapidly here in recent years, and now has thirty members in Parliament. Well, one of these thirty had at- tacked King Edward so bitterly that when the King gave a reception to the House of Commons/ 31 a few days ago this Socialist member was not invited — and the upshot is that the English press and people criticise the King so vigorously that the incident is not likely to be repeated. My recollection is, that President Roosevelt of our country some time ago refused to invite Senator Tillman to a similar function without exciiing half so much ado. NEARLY AS MANY VOTERS AS IN AMERICA. There are also practically as many voters in proportion to population here in England as in America: here one inhabitant in every six is a voter and in America one in every five. More than this, England has the Australian ballot sys- tem, as every American State should have, both in primary and in regular elections (with special provision for illiterates) ; and bribery in elec- tions, direct or indirect, is checked by well-con- ceived legislation. America might also well take lessons from England in the matter of civil service reform and municipal government. Public ownership of street railways, water-works, etc., is common in the cities, and while I do not know about water rates, I do know that street-car fares are only about half as much as in America. 32 EFFICIENCY OF THE ENGLISH- POSTOFFICE. Especially useful to the English people is the postoffice, which has here reached a degree of efficiency in public service in comparison with which our American postoffice system shows to decidedly poor advantage. But as we came abroad ten years ago (at Tom Watson's suggestion) and grafted the European idea of rural mail delivery upon our postoffice system, perhaps we shall sometime force Congress into giving us the par- cels post and postal savings bank also. Going down the street in Windermere Friday morning, I was struck by the sign: Postoffice for Money-Orders, Savings Bank, Parcels Post, Telegrams, Insurance, Annuity, Internal and Revenne Stamps. Nor does this sign exaggerate the business done by any common English postoffice. The Govern- ment owns the telegraph here and the rate is one cent a word, with a minimum charge of twelve cents, the telegraph offices being run in connec- tion with the postoffices. On press telegrams the rate is only one-fourth cent a word; and provision is made that rural mail carriers shall handle all prepaid telegrams left in mail-boxes. Over the telephone business the Government also exercises supervision and "constructs private telegraph and telephone lines on rental terms," as the official announcement explains. HOW THE PARCELS POST WORKS IN ENG- LAND. The parcels post and the postal savings bank especially interest me, as I believe we should lose no time in adopting these invaluable im- provements in America. Any package not over eleven pounds in weight, or three feet six inches in length, may be taken to a postoffice here and sent by parcels post to any part of Great Britain upon these charges: One pound or less, 6 cents. Between 1 and 2 pounds, 8 cents. Between 2 and 3 pounds, 10 cents. Between 5 and 7 pounds, 14 cents. Between 7 and 8 pounds, 16 cents. Between 8 and 9 pounds, 18 cents. Between 9 and 10 pounds, 20 cents. Between 10 and 11 pounds, 22 cents. An examination of the official rates would in- dictate, too, that not only may parcels be sent within Great Britain at these rates, but packages may be sent from here to almost any part of the habitable world as cheaply as they may be sent from one county-seat to the next in America. And yet an American Congress, session after session. 34 has refused to heed the growing popular demand for the parcels post service. John Wanamaker, when Postmaster-General, wisely declared that the two greatest reasons why we have no parcels post are (1) the Adams Ex- press Company, and, (2) the American Express Company. Sometime, however, the people are going to bring such pressure to bear upon our Solons at Washington that these giant corpora- tions will no longer be allowed to stand in the way of the needs of the people in this matter, and our farmers, by vigorous action, may 'do much to speed the day. THE POSTAL SAVINGS BANK ALSO A SUC- CESS. Of no less value is the Postal Savings Bank and its allied features. Anybody (even children over seven years of age) can go to any postoffice here and open up a savings account, depositing twenty- five cents or more at the time, 2i per cent inter- est a year being allowed on all deposits, and the Government of Great Britain guaranteeing the safety of the funds. Deposits may be made or withdrawn at any postoffice, no matter where you are, if you have your deposit book with you. No one may deposit more than $1,000 in this way, but after the $1,000 mark is passed, the de- 35 positor may invest in interest-bearing Govern- ment stock. GOVERNMENT INSURANCE. At each postofflce, too, the Government calls at- tention to its life insurance provisions, which are virtually a feature of the postal savings bank de- partment. You may take out insurance that will (1) pay you so much a year until death, or (2) after ten years, or (3) after twenty years from beginning, or (4) at the ages of 55, 60, or 65, or (5) at death. V. Glimpses of English Life and Customs. London, England. My last letter, I believe, ended with, some com- ment upon the Government of England. One thing that interests foreigners in tkis connection is how the Government maintains itself in a free trade country without imposing excessive property taxes. Be it remembered, then, that England is not without tariff taxes, but there are few of these and nearly all these few are levied on luxuries or semi-luxuries. Remembering how notable a part the tea tax played in our early Revolutionary his- tory in America, it is of interest to see that with- in her own borders England has maintained this heavy tariff until now the Government collects $40,000,000 to $50,000,000 a year from this source alone, and nearly $75,000,000 a year from the tariff on tobacco, and snuff. The excise or whiskey taxes bring in $150,000,000 a year more, and there are also special income and inheritance taxes, and taxes upon the gross earnings of rail- ways, except where the rate is less than two cents a mile. THE INHERITANCE TAX. The inheritance tax, it will be recalled, is one which President Roosevelt has recently commend- 37 ed to tlie attention of Americans. Over here an estate exceeding $500 in value pays a government tax of 1 per cent; $2,500, 2 per cent; $5,000, 3 per cent; $50,000, 4 per cent; and so on up to $500,000, which pays 6 per cent, and $5,000,000, which pays 8 per cent. There are also special graduated taxes in case property goes to persons not near of kin, amounting to 10 per cent where the property goes to persons very far removed in kinship, or not of blood relationship at all. There are also special stamp taxes of many kinds, and special Boer War taxes now (similar to our Span- ish-American War taxes) which require stamps on checks and upon all receipted bills. There is a considerable party here which favors the establishment of a protective tariff, this senti- ment gaining strength, in part, from the unfair methods of American monopolies competing for British trade. Socialism has also been making marked growth among the working classes for a number of years past. WOMAN SUFFRAGE A LIVE ISSUE. Just at this writing, however, the livest politi- cal issue is woman suffrage. For a long time the women of England who are tax-payers have had the privilege of voting for city and county of- ficers, and they are now fighting earnestly for the 38 privilege of voting for members of Parliament — as if to say, for members of the British Con- gress, as well as for local and State officers. In a number of cases the woman suffrage advocates have grov/n so riotous in their meetings as to make it necessary for the police to interfere. When indicted, however, the women agitators re- fuse to pay the fines imposed, going to jail in- stead — and then they make a great ado about be- ing "martyrs" to the cause of equal suffrage. If the woman suffrage idea prevail, the priv- ilege of voting will be given, of course, only to women who are tax-payers ("rate-payers" they are called here) or householders (that is, widows or others who are heads of houses). A TEMPERANCE DEMONSTRATION IN HYDE PARK. Another very live subject is the temperance question. All parts of Great Britain, and especial- ly Scotland, are rum-cursed. The most powerful temperance argument I have ever witnessed was in Chester depot the other day when an old gray- haired woman was attacked both by her husband and her own half-drunken son. The officers in- terfered and drove off the men, while the weeping woman sobbed piteously in broken Lancashire dialect: "They makes six pounds [$30j a week, 39 but never a farthing [half-cent] do they give me: it all goes for drink, drink." Whiskey, as I have intimated, is especially the bane of Scotland, and many fear that it is almost hopelessly sapping the strength of one of the finest races of people in the world. But the Scot- tish Temperance League and other organizations are making a brave fight against the evil, and here in London yesterday I saw a temperance pro- cession "terrible as an army with banners," a mile and a half long, marching into Hyde Park where the immense audience (made up chiefly of working people) was addressed from eight differ- ent stands by a great variety of speakers. For nearly two hours the thousands of spectators lis- tened and cheered and laughed, ending by adopt- ing vigorous resolutions in behalf of the "Licens- ing Bill" which Parliament is now beginning to consider. WHAT THE LICENSING BILL PROVIDES. 