* * * * * “The American trader in Europe has created the same feeling that prevails among a party of honest cardplayers when the card-sharper appears at the table.” * * * * * “The American politician never speaks but always ‘orates.’ If the matter under discussion in the legislative body is a question whether five cents shall be expended on pencils, or whether Mrs. Bridget O’Neill, or Mrs. Patrick O’Reilly shall be appointed scrubwoman of the Senate House, he considers it beneath his dignity to say anything that will not recall the diction of Cicero or Demosthenes. If the ceiling is to be cleaned and a three-and-elevenpenny contract is to be given out, he takes the floor and with a loud preliminary bellow announces that he is an American citizen, and anyone who says that he is not is a confirmed and hereditary liar.” * * * * * “If an American learns that a man has been bribed he does not hate him—he envies him.” * * * * * “In New York society no man is ever referred to as ‘Mr. Jones’ or ‘Mr. Smith.’ He is always referred to as ‘Mr. Jones, who is worth two million dollars,’ or ‘Mr. Smith, who is worth four million dollars and stole every cent of it.’” * * * * * “The average Chicagoan has not the faintest conception of the true meaning of right and wrong. Right is the method that succeeds in getting money. Wrong is the method that does not.” I shall beg the reader to observe particularly that I do not myself make these stinging assertions. In the words of the late Sir William Harcourt, “I merely quote them.” In a sense, perhaps, they may be most correctly described as exaggerations. But they are exaggerations of a kind which have more than a substratum of truth in them. I commend them to the swaggering rubber-jawed American for what they are worth. Did the scope of this book allow, it would be possible to cite numerous other animadversions upon American manners and customs by other pens.