A Straight Deal; Or, The Ancient Grudge

before the war makes no matter-that I received an invitation to join a society f

d," I said

indeed!" I knew something about England's friendly acts, about Venezuela, and Manila Bay, and Edmund Burke, and John Bright, and the Queen, and the Lancashire cotton spinners. And more than this historic knowledge, I knew living English people, men and women, among whom I counted dear and even beloved friends. I knew also, just as well as Admir

acts and policies of England's throughout our relations with her. The third cause, I said, was certain traits of the English and ourselves which have produced personal friction. An American does or says something which angers an Englishman, who thereupon goes about thinking and saying, "Those insufferable Yankees!" An Englishman does or says something which angers an American, who thereupon goes about thinking and say

he English. Them he would like to fight; and to the astonished visitor he told his reason. He, it appeared, was one of our Americans who marched through London streets on that da

what the rest of London was doing that day? Didn't he remember that she flew the Union Jack and the Stars and Stripes together from every symbolic pinnacle of creed and government that rose above her continent of streets and dwellings to the sky? Couldn't he feel that England, his old enemy and old mother, bowed and stricken and struggling, was opening her arms to him wide? She's a person who hides her tears even from herself; but it seems to me that, with a drop of imagination and half a drop of thought, he might

proportions. He wouldn't want to blot an Empire out because a handful of muckers called him names. Of this I am perfectly sure, because in Paris streets it was my happy lot four months after the Armistice to talk with many American soldiers, among w

rience next a British regiment come back from the front to rest. The streets of the two ca

shyme you've brought nob

we of theirs, and that they entertained preconceived notions. They suddenly found that we were, once again to quote Mr. Kipling, "bachelors in barricks most remarkable like" themselves. An American first sergeant hit a British first sergeant. Instantly a thousand men were milling. For thirty minutes they kept at it. Warriors reeled together and fell and rose and got it in the neck and the jaw and the

ently, that the English were "easy." They tried it on in sundry ways, but ended by the discovery that, while engaged upon this enterprise, they

ted to be as economical of his time as he could and see everything best worth while for him to see during his leave. Would she, therefore, tell him what things in Paris were the most interesting and in what order he had best take them? She replied with another suggestion; why not, she said, ask for permission for England?

requently been in America and had talked to him as no stranger to the country could. She, of course, did not urge his going to England; she adv

ly counsel. Finally, when the time came for her to go away from Brest, she

ng. It is not at all your fault. You are only nineteen years old and you cannot read about us, because you have no chance; but at least you do know one English person now, and th

eives letters from him which show that nothing is left of his anti-English complex. It is another instanc

hem "cut out the dope." At this very moment that I write-November 24, 1919-the dope is being fed freely to all who are ready, whether through ignorance

etarded English cordiality towards Americans. Of these I shall speak as plainly as I know how. But also, being an American and therefore by birth more indiscreet than Ian Hay, I shall speak as plainly as I know how of those tr

nglish train. It stopped somewhere, and out of the

ked an Englishman, a stranger, who sat

e guard," said

, this American does not

in the same established way, a way that their long experience of life has hammered out for their own convenience, and which they like. We're not nearly so closely knit together here, save in certain spots, especially the old spots. In Boston they understand each other with very few words said. So they do in Charlest

would have been longer than the Englishman's. But I am not going to accept the idea that the Englishman didn't know and said so in his brief usual

who had broken the rules of the game. We do have some rules here in America, only we have not nearly so many,

whose face you had never seen before, and with whom you had not ye

o say, "What damned business is that of

es and the English in this respect is simply, that with them the territory of a man's privacy covers more ground, and different ground as well. An Englishman doesn't expect strangers to ask him questions of a guide-book sort. For all such questions his English system provides perfectly definite persons to answer. If you want to know where the ticket office is, or where to take your baggage, or what time the train goes, or what platform it starts from, or what towns it stops at, and what churches or other buildings of interest are to be seen in those tow

ir book to our advantage. But I am not theorizing, I am not seeking to show that we manage life better or that they manage life better; the only moral that I seek to draw from these anecdotes is, that we should each understand and hence make allowance for the other fellow's way. You will admit, I am sure, be you American or English, that everybody has a r

ng uniform, just as our army and navy officers do; it is convenient, practical, and saves trouble. But we have declared it menial, or despotic, or un-American, or something equally silly, and hence our ambassadors must

me a

" said Mr. Choa

aiter. Similarly in crowded hotel dining-rooms or crowded ra

e," or "When does the tr

I say this with all the more certainty because of a fairly recent afternoon spent in an English garden with English friends. The question of pronunciation came up. Now you will readily see that with them and their compactness, their great public schools, their two great Universities, and their great London, the one eternal focus of them all, both the chance of diversity i

e knows where to place anybody who says

," said I, "becau

an American. It

d have been something like comi

ying that he was an American, the answer would have been different. Not all the English yet, but

s, who took out a cigar, felt for and found no matches, looked about, and there was a silence. My friend thereupon produ

iend: "It's not the thing for a comm

n American," said my frien

to us they have come to accept my friend's pertinent distinction: t

heard some of our own soldiers express dislike of the English because of their coldness. The English are not cold; they are silent upon certain matters. But it is all there. Do you remember that sailor at Zeebrugge carrying the unconscious body of a comrade to safety, not sure yet if he were alive or dead, and stroking that comrade's hea

sn't

n's notion of his right to privacy lies at the bottom of quite a number of these things. You may lay some of them to snobbishness, to caste, to shyness, they may have var

read a book of his which had delighted me. I met him at lunch, I had not known hi

O

nd could have told anybody that you mustn't too abruptly or obviously refer to what the other fellow does, still less to w

all out a man's name across a room full of people, some of whom may be total strangers, invades his privacy and theirs. Have you noticed how, in our Pullman parlor cars, a party sitting together, generally young women, will shriek their conversation in a voice that bores like a gimlet th

between ourselves and the English, I mustn't omit to give instances of divergence, where an Englishma

, and he wishes to be civil, to help you to have a good t

ke her. But her dinners are rather amusing. Of course the f

h the Englishman more peremptorily recoils, although he hates well nigh as deeply all abstract discussion, or to be clever, or to have you be clever

hen you enter your pews on Sunday a

refuse to discuss religious

neel, as we do, after reaching their pews; they stand for a moment, covering their faces with their well-br

t as much a cause for our misunderstanding each other. It is both a help and a trap. If we Americans spoke something so whol

gage baggage?" says the E

ggage luggage?" says the

y treacle?" inqui

it molasses," ans

ar when you mean a carriage

iage, we mean a car,"

he can't help that; he's not to be criticized for that. But we and the English speak a tongue that has the same mother. This identity in pedigree has led and still leads to countless family discords. I've not a doubt that divergences in vocabulary and in accent were the fount and origin of some swollen noses, some battered eyes, when our Yankees mixed with the Tommies. Each would be certain to think that the other couldn't "talk straight"-and each would be certain to say so. I shall not here spin out a list of different names for the same things now current in English and American usage: molasses and treacle will suffice for an example; you will be able easily to think of others, and there are many such that occur

ish accent as "affected"; and our accent displeases the English. Now what Englishman, or what American,

erica are mottled with varying accents literate and illiterate; equally true it is that each nation has its notion of the other's way of speaking-we're known by our shril

ng, talking at ease. Later, at the inn I was shown to a small table, where sat already a young Englishman in evening dress, at his dinner. As I sat down opposite him, I bowed, and he returned it. Presently we were talking. When I said that I was

n it," he remarked, af

hat reluctantly, I think, but with excellent good-

guess,' and that I don't, perhaps, talk through my nose

it. "You t

n't mean to talk lik

him, and bro

knew you were English, althoug

d, "dropping h's-

er is talking through your nose.

erican voice. The train yesterday was full of it

ce about the hotel. I should do well to avoid the reading room. The hotel went in r

more plainly to you the mor

r if there is not also something else at the bottom of it. You and I will say things about our cousins to our aunt. Our aunt would not allow outsiders to say those things. Is it this, the-members-of-the-family principle, which makes us less discreet than the French? Is it this, too, which leads us by a seeming paradox to resent criticism more when it comes from England? I know not how it may be with you; but with me, when I pick up the paper and read that the Germans are calling us pig-dogs again, I am merely amused. When I read French or Italian abuse of us, I am sorry, to be sure; but when some English paper jumps on us, I

d my power to make lucid in short compass. I trust that they have been made lucid. I must now get on to further anecdotes, illustrating other and less subtle causes of misunderstanding; and

. There was a good deal of this at one time. During that period an Englishman, who had brought letters to a gentleman in Boston and in cons

r dress suit with you. The man will take you upstairs

house with the rest of his eleven. They were to go there on a coach. The American discovered after arriv

to go home,"

n: but too many English used to be socially brutal-quite as much so to each other as to us, or any one. One should bear that in mind. I know of nothing more English i

to days that were nearer in spirit to the Waterloo of 1815, which a haughty Engl

quence asked to lunch. He naturally and hospitably gathered to meet her various distinguished guests. Afterwards she wrote him that she wished him to

lood. He was wearing the kilt of his clan. While she talked with him she stared, and finally burst out la

her they had nothing to say, but crowded and wailed of their own discomforts, meals, rooms, every paltry personal inconvenience to which they were subjected, or feared that they were going to

tre, disputing the sixpence which you always have to pay for your program in the London th

had turned upon a certain historic house in an English county

ates will all be ours pretty soon. We're going to buy them up and turn your island i

ge between Liverpool and Halifax in June, 1919, the officer expressed satisfaction to be g

church she was shown the tomb of a soldier who had been killed in battle three centuries ago. In his honor and memory, because he lo

out in all this time?"

" she w

now, anyway," an

heard this were shocke

hink she w

pray do not fail to give those other Americans who were shocked by the outrage of the lamp their due. How wide of the mark would you be if you judged us all by

low, you must watch out for something whi

in her country-house. Although she had seen him b

can know the

did

ans who lived in London and went everywhere. One certainly

on, and Philadelphia, and in many other places where existed a society with still some ragged remn

e Cakewalks, and the Smith-Trapezes' Mrs. Smith-Trapeze wasn't as extraordinary as her daughter-the one that put the live frog in Lord Meldon's soup-and of course neither of them were "talked about

mpression I have received. Vulgar American

d for a moment, a

perfect

perfectly friendly, and after that a

his one, and happened a few week

ation led him to repeat to her what he had said to his hostess at l

-are blase. We see each other too much, we are all alike in our ways, and we are awfully

ations, and go to their houses, and eat their food, and drink their

returned

n't that awfully low down of y

came to break up, she contrived in the manner of her farewell to make the American u

d a card to the club. The American, upon sitting down alone in this company, felt what I suppose that many of us feel in like circumstances: he wished there were somebody there who knew him and could nod to him. Nevertheless, he was spoken to, asked questions

w

ceful, those

. It was

dalous. Such abuses should never have been possible in the first place. It

ensational novel about Chicago makes them out,"

the Sam Johnson. "It's quite the sort of

sea has separated us, we're still inveterately like you, a bullying, dishones

ohnson sa

a man of note, bearing a celebrated name. He was telling the compan

erything else fails, you can always go to one

en them singly, they make my several points clear. As I see it, they reveal the chief whys and wherefores of friction between English and Americans. It is also my hope that I have been equally d

ere. Some readers know it already, knew it before I began; while for others, what has been said will be enough. These, if they have the will to friendship instead of the will to hate, will get rid of their an

ss are to come. Such is our passionate belief. Crudity is the seamy side of youth. Our crudity rubs the English the wrong way. Compare the American who said we were going to buy England for a summer resort with the Englishman who said t

a thousand years of tradition would have thicker hides and would never feel it necessary to assert themselves. Give an Englishman as good as he gives you, and you are certain to win his respect, and probably his regard. In this connection see my ane

ame things, we hate the same things. We have the same notions about justice, law, conduct; about what a man should be, about what a woman should be. It is like the mother-tongue we share, yet speak with a difference. Take the mother-tongue for a parable and symbol of all the rest. Just as the word "girl" is identical to our sight but not to our hearing, and means oh!

help some reader to a better understandin

ights, he respects the rights of his neighbor just as strictly. We Americans are losing our grip on this. It is the bottom of the whole thing. It is the moral keystone of democracy. Howsoever we may talk about our own rights to-day, we

t which they accord each other. I shall not more than mention the match between our Benicia Boy and their Tom Sayers. Of this the English version is as defective as our school-book

nternational tug-of-war. A friend of mine was anchor of our team. We happ

y you pulled us

N

the blackguards on yo

e blackguards on our side of t

N

pulled you o

es who was not our friend. Right down through the years ever since, there have been Sam Johnsons writing and saying unfavorable things about us. The Tory must be eternal, as much as the Whig or Liberal; and both are always needed. There wil

brought into any consultation.

the Esquimaux and complaining that they grew no pineapples and wore skins. In Littell you will find how few are the recent Sam Johnsons as compared with the recent friendly writers. You will also be reminded that our anti-English complex wa

erly Review, which in that early day

nces can break.... Nations are too ready to admit that they have natural enemi

sts who are making the trouble and the noise. In England the will to friendship rules, has ruled for a long while. Does