last decades of the
nineteenth century--a period which will be to American literature what
the Elizabethan Age is to English. It may, of course, be absurd, but
already there are certain individual Americanisms which have long been
_taboo_ in every reputable office in the United States, but are used
cheerfully and without comment in London dailies.

* * * * *

Once more it seems necessary to take precaution lest I be interpreted as
having said more than I really have said. It would be a mere
impertinence to affect to pronounce a general judgment on the level of
culture or of achievement of the two peoples in all fields of art and
effort; and the most that an individual can do is to take such isolated
examples drawn from one or from the other, as may serve in particular
matters as some sort of a standard of measurement. What I am striving to
convey to the average English reader is, of course, not an impression of
any inferiority in the English, but only the fact that the Englishman's
present estimate of the American is almost grotesquely inadequate.

FOOTNOTES:

[214:1] Mr. Archer, I find, has this delightful story: "A friend of mine
returned from a short tour in the United States, declaring that he
heartily disliked the country and would never go back again. Enquiry as
to the grounds of his dissatisfaction elicited no more definite or
damning charge than that 'they' (a collective pronoun presumed to cover
the whole American people) hung up his trousers instead of folding
them--or _vice versa_, for I am heathen enough not to remember which is
the orthodox process."

[215:1] But I cannot resist recording my astonishment at finding in Ben
Jonson the phrase "to have a good time" used in precisely the sense in
which the American girl employs it to-day, or at learning from Macaulay
that Bishop Cooper in the time of Queen Elizabeth spoke of a "platform"
in its exact modern American political meaning.

[220:1] Though it is worth noting that incomparably the best dictionary
of the English language yet completed is an American one.

CHAPTER IX

POLITICS AND POLITICIANS

The "English-American" Vote--The Best People in Politics--What
Politics Means in America--Where Corruption Creeps in--The
Danger in England--A Presidential Nomination for Sale--Buying
Legislation--Could it Occur in England?--A Delectable Alderman--
Taxation while you Wait--Perils that Englan