.
Our public buildings are atrocious, and--and--I could go on for pages,
but I spare you. The worst of it is that it may be true. You know how
much my opinion is worth. I might as well be a boy of ten for all I can
say, judged by experience and comparison; but to me everything in this
city is small, disappointing, unbeautiful. Nothing, except the music,
fills my ideal of what I thought life would be when I pictured it in my
tent. Is life small? Are men pygmies? Or are my judgments naught?

[Sidenote: _Ernest Hume to Francis Hume_]

You are right in distrusting your judgments. I should not trust them,
either, because, as you say, you have no standard of comparison. But I
think this may truly be said. America is young, and therefore you must
not expect of her a full artistic development. She has done some of the
greatest moral work imaginable. There her instinct was unspoiled, just
as that of youth should be. She came "trailing clouds of glory." But
art is not the flower of the moment. Neither is it to be borrowed from
other lands; though thus may we obtain the technique which teaches
appreciation. A few geniuses seem to be born full-fledged; I doubt if a
nation could be. A man, even a genius, has to learn to use his tools.
So does a people. The French are form-mad. I don't wonder. Outer beauty
is a subtile poison. Once taste it and you never lose the craving. It
is a beautiful zeal, but not always the best zeal. I've been a coward
and an absentee about life myself, but I'd rather trust some of those
vigorous old pirates like Sir Francis Drake, who went about picking up
new worlds like huckleberries, than a carpet-knight on tiptoe at the
apex of civilization. But don't misunderstand me. My pen ran away. I
don't under-value your Frenchman. I only say, Be patient with America.
She is so young, poor girl! The only discouraging thing about it is, as
he says, that she doesn't know it. If she would learn of her grandams
and great-aunts, she would burn her fingers and tear her frock less
often. Her lovers must simply be patient and wait till she grows to her
task. Perhaps when she really is older and stronger, and has lifted her
straw a day, she'll be capable of carrying this burden of government.
No, she hasn't solved her problem yet; democracy is the highest form of
government, but she does not yet know how to administer it. I find I am
not so far out of gear with civilization as I thought, for I have
strong ambitions for you