In another place I have spoken of the rise of certain needle trades from those of sweaters and sweaters’ victims to a standardized industry, with an output estimated at hundreds of millions yearly. The industry of cloak- and suit-making has been to a large extent developed by the immigrants themselves. When the stranger looks upon the loft buildings in other parts of the city, gigantic beehives with the swarms of workers going in and out, he seldom comprehends that great wealth has been created for the community by these humble workers. The man who now stands at the gates of Ellis Island turns his socially trained mind toward the development of methods for the protection and assimilation of the immigrant after the gates have closed upon him. But the best conceived plans of this Commissioner of Immigration and others who have long studied the question will be fruitless unless, throughout the country, an intelligent and respectful attitude toward the stranger is sedulously cultivated. In the early glow of our enthusiasm, when we were first brought in contact with the immigrant, we dreamed of making his coming of age—his admission to citizenship—something of a rite. Many who come here to escape persecution or the hardships suffered under a militaristic government idealize America. They bring an enthusiasm for our institutions that would make it natural to regard admission to the rights and responsibilities of citizenship with seriousness. Years ago we urged the use of school buildings, that registration and the casting of the ballot might be dignified by formal surroundings. This has been done in several cities, although not yet in New York. * * * * * The foreign press, particularly the Yiddish, has a distinct Americanizing influence. Many adults never learn the new language and, indeed, acquire here the habit of newspaper-reading. The history of the United States, biographies of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and other distinguished Americans appear in the pages of these papers, and one Italian daily published serially the Constitution of the United States. Effective, too, as an educational and assimilating measure have been the lectures in foreign languages conducted for many years by the Educational Alliance on East Broadway and by the various settlements, and included, for some years past, in the evening courses of the Department of Education. * * * * *