ich
represents him; in the United States he feels that it is the _State_,
_i.e._, himself. In England it is the Barbarian alone that dares be
indifferent to the opinion of his fellows; in America everyone
expresses his opinion and "voices" his idiosyncrasies with perfect
freedom. This position has, however, its seamy side. There is in
America a certain anarchy in questions of taste and manners which the
long possession of a leisured, a cultivated class tends to save us
from in England. I never felt so kindly a feeling towards our
so-called "upper class" as when travelling in the United States and
noting some effects of its absence. This class has an accepted
position in the social hierarchy; its dicta are taken as authoritative
on points of etiquette, just as the clergy are looked on as the
official guardians of religious and ecclesiastical standards. I do not
here pretend to discuss the value of the moral example of our
_jeunesse doree_, filtering down through the successive strata of
society; but their influence in setting the fashion on such points as
scrupulous personal cleanliness, the avoidance of the _outre_ in
costume, and the maintenance of an honourable and generous standard in
their money dealings with each other, is distinctly on the side of the
humanities. In America--at least, "Out West"--everyone practically is
his own guide, and the _nouveau riche_ spends his money strictly in
accordance with his own standard of taste. The result is often as
appalling in its hideousness as it is startling in its costliness. On
the other hand I am bound to state that I have known American men of
great wealth whose simplicity of type could hardly be paralleled in
England (except, perchance, within the Society of Friends). They do
not feel any social pressure to imitate the establishment of My Lord
or His Grace; and spend their money for what really interests them
without reference to the demands of society.

It is rather interesting to observe the different forms which
vulgarity is apt to take in the two countries. In England vulgarity is
stolid; in America it is smart and aggressive. We are apt, I think, to
overestimate the amount in the latter country because it is so much
more in voluble evidence. An English vulgarian is often hushed into
silence by the presence of his social superior; an American vulgarian
either recognises none such or tries to prove himself as good as you
by being unnecessarily _grob_. This has, at