Famous Givers and Their GiftsBolton, Sarah Knowles
History
Famous Givers and Their Gifts
Bolton, Sarah Knowles
Philanthropists
Mr. Carnegie and his party of chosen friends made the journey by coach
in seven weeks, from July 17 to Aug. 3, 1881, and had a most enjoyable
as well as instructive trip. _The Critic_ gives Mr. Carnegie
well-merited praise, saying that "he has produced a book of travel as
fresh as though he had been exploring Thibet or navigating the River of
Golden Sand." The book is dedicated to "My favorite heroine, my mother,"
who was the queen dowager of the volume, and whose happiness during the
journey seemed to be the chief concern of her devoted son.
This book had so cordial a reception that the following year, 1884,
another volume was published, "Round the World," covering a trip made in
1878-1879; Mr. Carnegie having sailed from San Francisco to Japan, and
thence through the lands of the East. As he starts, his mother puts in
his hand Shakespeare in thirteen small volumes; and these are his
company and delight in the long ocean voyage. Through China, India, and
other countries, he observes closely, learns much, and tells it in a
way that is always interesting. "Life at the East," he says, "lacks two
of its most important elements,--the want of intelligent and refined
women as the companion of man, and a Sunday. It has been a strange
experience to me to be for several months without the society of some of
this class of women,--sometimes many weeks without even speaking to one,
and often a whole week without even seeing the face of an educated
woman. And, bachelor as I am, let me confess what a miserable, dark,
dreary, and insipid life this would be without their constant
companionship."
Ten years later, in 1886, Mr. Carnegie published a book that had a very
wide reading, and at once placed the author prominently before the New
World and the Old World as well, "Triumphant Democracy, or Fifty Years'
March of the Republic."
The book showed extensive research, a deep love for his adopted country,
America, a warm heart, and an able mind. He wrote: "To the beloved
Republic, under whose equal laws I am made the peer of any man, although
denied political equality by my native land, I dedicate this book, with
an intensity of gratitude and admiration which the native-born citizen
can neither feel nor understand."
No one can read this book without being amazed at the power and
possibilities of the Republic, and without a deeper love for, and pride
in the greatness and true worth of, his country. The style is bright and
attractive, and the facts stated remarkable. Americans must always be
debtors to the Scotchman who has shown them how to prize their native
land.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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