ed the upper hand in American industry. We began this
review of American business with Cornelius Vanderbilt as the typical
figure. It is a happy augury that it closes with Henry Ford in the
foreground. Vanderbilt, valuable as were many of his achievements,
represented that spirit of egotism that was rampant for the larger part of
the fifty years following the war. He was always seeking his own advantage,
and he never regarded the public interest as anything worth a moment's
consideration. With Ford, however, the spirit of service has been the
predominating motive. His earnings have been immeasurably greater than
Vanderbilt's; his income for two years amounts to nearly Vanderbilt's total
fortune at his death; but the piling up of riches has been by no means his
exclusive purpose. He has recognized that his workmen are his partners and
has liberally shared with them his increasing profits. His money is not the
product of speculation; Ford is a stranger to Wall Street and has built his
business independently of the great banking interest. He has enjoyed no
monopoly, as have the Rockefellers; there are more than three hundred
makers of automobiles in the United States alone. He has spurned all
solicitations to join combinations. Far from asking tariff favors he has
entered European markets and undersold English, French, and German makers
on their own ground. Instead of taking advantage of a great public demand
to increase his prices, Ford has continuously lowered them. Though his
idealism may have led him into an occasional personal absurdity, as a
business man he may be taken as the full flower of American manufacturing
genius. Possibly America, as a consequence of universal war, is advancing
to a higher state of industrial organization; but an economic system is not
entirely evil that produces such an industry as that which has made the
automobile the servant of millions of Americans.

TRAVELING AFOOT[24]

JOHN FINLEY

[Footnote 24: Reprinted, by permission of the author and of the publishers,
from _The Outlook_, April 25, 1917. Copyright, 1917, by The Outlook Co.]

"Traveling afoot"--the very words start the imagination out upon the road!
One's nomad ancestors cry within one across centuries and invite to the
open spaces. Many to whom this cry comes are impelled to seek the mountain
paths, the forest trails, the solitudes or wildernesses coursed only by the
feet of wild animals. But to me the black or dun roads