ngton,
which has become a clearing house of ideas and a visible bond of common
interests and good feeling.

Throughout the years of Blaine's prominence, the public took more
interest in his bellicose encounters with Europe, and particularly with
Great Britain, than in his constructive American policy; and he failed
to secure for either an assured popular support. His attempt to widen
the gulf between Europe and America was indeed absurd at a time when the
cable, the railroad, and the steamship were rendering the world daily
smaller and more closely knit, and when the spirit of democracy,
rapidly permeating western Europe, was breaking down the distinction
in political institutions which had given point to the pronouncement
of 1823. Nevertheless Blaine did actually feel the changing industrial
conditions at home which were destroying American separateness, and
he made a genuine attempt to find a place for the United States in the
world, without the necessity of sharing the responsibilities of all the
world, by making real that interest in its immediate neighbors which his
country had announced in 1823. Even while Blaine was working on his plan
of "America for the Americans," events were shaping the most important
extension of the interests of the United States which had taken place
since 1823.

CHAPTER V. The United States And The Pacific

Long before the westward march of Americans had brought their flag to
the Pacific, that ocean was familiar to their mariners. From Cape Horn
to Canton and the ports of India, there ploughed the stately merchantmen
of Salem, Providence, and Newburyport, exchanging furs and ginseng for
teas, silks, the "Canton blue" which is today so cherished a link with
the past, and for the lacquer cabinets and carved ivory which give
distinction to many a New England home. Meanwhile the sturdy whalers of
New Bedford scoured the whole ocean for sperm oil and whalebone, and the
incidents of their self-reliant three-year cruises acquainted them with
nearly every coral and volcanic isle. Early in the century missionaries
also began to brave the languor of these oases of leisure and the
appetite of their cannibalistic inhabitants.

The interest of the Government was bound to follow its adventurous
citizens. In 1820 the United States appointed a consular agent at
Honolulu; in the thirties and forties it entered into treaty relations
with Siam, Borneo, and China; and owing to circumstances which wer