But the trouble is that I am utterly unqualified to speak in that way. I am not one of the elect. If some one called me that, I would knock him down if I could, and kick him full of holes. That is because I think that the elect almost invariably elect themselves. They are intellectual Huertas, and as such I generally detest them. I merely print the "Press's" statement because I think it is interesting, sometimes, to see what a city thinks about itself. For my own part, I should think more of Grand Rapids if, instead of sitting tight and thinking these extraordinary thoughts, it had done more to carry out the plan it had for its own beautification. That is not to say that it is not a pretty city. It is. But its beauty is of that unconscious kind which comes from hills, and pleasant homes, and lawns, and trees. The kind of beauty that it lacks is conscious beauty, the creation of which requires the expenditure of thought, money, and effort. And if it does nothing else to indicate its intellectual and esthetic soarings, I should say that it might do well to discard the reading lamp in favor of the crowbar, if only for long enough to take the latter instrument, go down to the park, and see what can be done about that chimney which rises so absurdly there. * * * * * The lack of coherent municipal taste is all the more a reproach to Grand Rapids for the reason that taste, perhaps above all other qualities, is the essential characteristic of the city's leading industry. I used to have an idea that "cheap" furniture came from Grand Rapids. Perhaps it did. Perhaps it still does. I do not know. But I do know that the tour I made through the five acres, more or less, of rooms which make up the show house of Berkey & Gay, afforded me the best single bit of concrete proof I met, in all my travels, of the positive growth of good taste in this country. Just as the whole face of things has changed architecturally in the last ten or fifteen years, furnishings have also changed. The improved appreciation which makes people build sightly homes makes them fill those homes with furniture of respectable design. People are beginning to know about the history of furniture, to recognize the characteristics of the great English furniture designers and to appreciate the beauty which they handed down. We went through the warerooms with Mr. Gay, and as I feasted my eyes upon piece after piece, set after set, of Chippendale, Sheraton, Heppelwhite, and Adam, I asked Mr. Gay about the renaissance which is upon us. One thing I was particularly curious about: I wanted to know whether the improvement in furniture sprang from popular demand or whether it had been in some measure forced upon the public by the manufacturers.