"I'm not so sure of that. I used to think Rockwell was quite a promising young man at one time. But that is not the question. If, after all, though it does sharpen a man's wits, it only makes him discontented for the rest of his life, I maintain that such a state of improvement is not to be desired. If things are really better and pleasanter in Europe, I don't want to know it. It would make me dissatisfied, unless I was to be a renegade, and give up the country I was born in; would you have a man do that?" "Never!" said Harry. "I hold that it is a sort of desertion, to give up the post where Providence has placed us, unless in extreme cases; and I believe a man can live a more useful and more honourable life there than elsewhere. But I think travelling a very great advantage, nevertheless. The very power of comparison, of which you complain, is a source of great intellectual pleasure, and must be useful if properly employed, since it helps us to reach the truth." The doctor shook his head. "I want you just to tell me how much of this grumbling and fault-finding is conceit, and how much is the natural consequence of travelling? Is everything really superior in Europe to what we have here?" "Everything? No;" said Harry, laughing. But you would seem to think a man dissatisfied, doctor, if he did not, on the contrary, proclaim that everything is immeasurably better in this country than in any other on the globe. Now, confess, is not that your standard of patriotism?" "Ah, you are shifting your ground, young gentleman. But we shall bring you to the point presently. Now tell us honestly, were you not disappointed with the looks of things when you came back?" "If by disappointed, you mean that many things as I see them now, strike me as very inferior to objects of the same description in Europe, I do not scruple to say they do. When I landed, I said to myself, "'The streets are narrow and the buildings mean; Did I, or fancy, have them broad and clean?'" {George Crabbe (English poet, 1754-1832), "Posthumous Tales: Tale VI--The Farewell and Return", Part II, lines 79-80} "I feared so!" and the doctor looked much as a pious Mahometan might be supposed to do, if he were to see a Frank seize the Grand Turk by the beard. "I should have thought better of you," he added. {"Frank" = a European Christian; "Grand Turk" = Ottoman Emperor}