It is a wonderful thing to invent agricultural machinery and to discover new methods by which two blades of grass can be made to grow where but one grew; yet if only some one could tune our dull American ears, so that our farmers might catch the melody of the singing land and sing with it; if our boys and girls would love wild roses well enough to wear them--if, and that is a very big if--some one could teach us Americans to be proud of having descendants, we might add a new note to the great American out-of-doors, and keep it American. That night we sat upon a wide verandah, overlooking a valley through which the Hudson rolled majestically; we saw populous cities, picturesque villages and bounteous farms; we looked into the heart of the out-of-doors and I was proud of it and of its free people, who ought to be a grateful people. There was deep silence everywhere; no sound except that of the birds, and they did not sing jubilantly as birds ought to sing in so blessed a place and on so glorious an evening. No one sang except the same Italian who was coming home with his wife and numerous progeny. He still wore the rose behind his ear, although it had faded. Those who sat with us had every luxury and more money than they knew how to spend; but they could not sing, for they were old, children there were none, and if there had been, they would not have been singing--they would have had a victrola. After the Italian had eaten his frugal but pungent fare he came to the big verandah to get his orders for the next day, and the Herr Director spoke Italian to him and he replied in that language which in itself is almost a song. His mistress asked him to bring his wife and children to sing for us. His wife did not come but the children came. They would not sing an Italian song, it is true--that was just for themselves, in the fields where only God heard. They sang some sentimental thing they had heard in the "movies"--chewing gum the while. I asked them to sing something their teacher taught them but they knew nothing except "My Country 'tis of Thee" and the "Star Spangled Banner," both of which they sang joylessly and not understandingly. How and why should they understand when the Americans did not? It was a day full of dismal failure in my attempt to impress upon my guests the American spirit, and the failure of it was "rubbed" in by the Herr Director, who, as he bade me good-night, quoted as a parting shot this bit of German verse: "Und wo Man singt Da las dich froelich nieder, Denn boese Menchen haben keine Lieder." The rub was in his inference that we have no song because we have no noble spirit. IV _The Spirit at Lake Mohonk_