traditional East and in the modern Western world.
This basic difference lies, not in wealth (the East, like the West,
knows great riches as well as great poverty), but rather in
_comfort_--using the word in its broad sense. The wealthy Oriental of
the old school spends most of his money on Oriental luxuries, like fine
raiment, jewels, women, horses, and a great retinue of attendants, and
then hoards the rest. But of "comfort," in the Western sense, he knows
virtually nothing, and it is safe to say that he lives under domestic
conditions which a Western artisan would despise.[256]

To-day, however, the Oriental is discovering "comfort." And, high or
low, he likes it very well. All the myriad things which make our lives
easier and more agreeable--lamps, electric light, sewing-machines,
clocks, whisky, umbrellas, sanitary plumbing, and a thousand others: all
these things, which to us are more or less matters of course, are to the
Oriental so many delightful discoveries, of irresistible appeal. He
wants them, and he gets them in ever-increasing quantities. But this
produces some rather serious complications. His private economy is more
or less thrown out of gear. This opening of a whole vista of new wants
means a portentous rise in his standard of living. And where is he going
to find the money to pay for it? If he be poor, he has to skimp on his
bare necessities. If he be rich, he hates to forgo his traditional
luxuries. The upshot is a universal growth of extravagance. And, in this
connection, it is well to bear in mind that the peoples of the Near and
Middle East, taken as a whole, have never been really thrifty. Poor the
masses may have been, and thus obliged to live frugally, but they have
always proved themselves "good spenders" when opportunity offers. The
way in which a Turkish peasant or a Hindu ryot will squander his savings
and run into debt over festivals, marriages, funerals, and other social
events is astounding to Western observers.[257] Now add to all this the
fact that in the Orient, as in the rest of the world, the cost of the
basic necessaries of life--food, clothing, fuel, and shelter, has risen
greatly during the past two decades, and we can realize the gravity of
the problem which higher Oriental living-standards involves.[258]

Certain it is that the struggle for existence is growing keener and that
the pressure of poverty is getting more severe. With the basic
necessaries rising in price, and with m