I remember long ago a rather crude bust of a helmeted Amazon bearing upon her proud chest the words: "I Will!" She was supposed to typify Chicago, and I rather think she did. Cleveland's slogan is the conservative but significant "Sixth City," but Detroit comes out with a youthful shriek of self-satisfaction, declaring that: "In Detroit Life is Worth Living!" Doesn't that claim reflect the quality of youth? Doesn't it remind you of the little boy who says to the other little boy: "My father can lick your father"? Of course it has the patent-medicine flavor, too; Detroit, by her "slogan," is a cure-all. But that is not deliberate. It is exaggeration springing from natural optimism and exuberance. Life is doubtless more worth living in Detroit than in some other cities, but I submit that, so long as Mark Twain's "damn human race" retains those foibles of mind, morals, and body for which it is so justly famous, the "slogan" of the city of Detroit guarantees a little bit too much. I find the same exuberance in the publications issued by the Detroit Board of Commerce. Having just left the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, I sedulously avoided contact with the Detroit body--one can get an overdose of that kind of thing. But I have several books. One is a magazine called "The Detroiter," with the subtitle "Spokesman of Optimism." It is full of news of new hotels and new factories and new athletic clubs and all kinds of expansion. It fairly bursts from its covers with enthusiasm--and with business banalities about Detroit's "onward sweep," her "surging ahead," her "banner year," and her "efficiency." "Be a Booster," it advises, and no one can say that it does not live up to its principles. Indeed, as I look it over, I wonder if I have not done Detroit an injustice in giving to Cleveland the blue ribbon for "boosting." The Detroit Board of Commerce even goes so far in its "boosting" as to "boost" Detroit into seventh place among American cities, while the "World Almanac" (most valuable volume on the one-foot shelf of books I carried on my travels) places Detroit ninth. Like Cleveland, I find that Detroit is first in the production of a great many things. In fact, the more I read these books issued by commercial bodies, the more I am amazed at the varied things there are for cities to be first in. It is a miserable city, indeed, which is first in nothing at all. Detroit is first in the production of overalls, stoves, varnish, soda and salt products, automobile accessories, adding machines, pharmaceutical manufactures, aluminum castings, in shipbuilding on the Great Lakes and, above all, in the manufacture of motor cars. And, as the Board of Commerce adds significantly, "That's not all!" But it is enough. * * * * *