It has been said (and the point is worth insisting on) that the Englishman cannot pretend that he goes into business with any other object than to make money. His motives are on the face of them mercenary if not sordid. The American is impelled primarily by quite other ambitions. Similarly, when the Englishman thinks of business, the image which he conjures up in his mind is of a dull commonplace like, on lines so long established and well-defined that they can embrace little of novelty or of enterprise; a sedentary life of narrow outlook from the unexhilarating atmosphere of a London office or shop. To the American, except in small or retail trade in the large cities, the conditions of business are widely different. All around him, lies, both actually and figuratively, new ground, wilderness almost, inviting him to turn Argonaut. The mere vastness and newness of the country make it full of allurement to adventure, the rewards of which are larger and more immediate than can be hoped for in older and more straitened communities. It has been said that the American people was, by its long period of isolation and self-communion, made to become, in its outlook on the policies of the world, a provincial people; but that the very provincialism had something of dignity in it from the mere fact that it was continent-wide. So it is with American business. The exigencies of their circumstances have made the American people a commercial people; but whereas in England a commercial life may not offer scope for any intellectual activity and may even have a necessary tendency to stunt the mentality of any one engaged in it, business in the United States offers exercise to a much larger gamut of abilities and, by its mere range and variety, instead of dwarfing has a tendency to keep those abilities trained and alert. A business in England has not approximately the same large theatre of operation or the same variety of incident as a business of the same turn over in America. It is almost the difference between the man who furnishes his larder by going out to his farmyard and wringing the necks of tame ducks therein, and him who must snatch the same supply with his gun from the wild flocks in the wilderness. But, indeed, no argument should be needed on the subject; for one solid fact with which almost every Englishman is familiar is that in any American (let us use the word) shopkeeper whom he may meet travelling in Europe there is a certain mental alertness, freshness, and vigour, however objectionably they may at times display themselves--which are at least not characteristic of the English shopkeeping class.