LETTER V
Character and Culture—American Universities—Is the American "Electric" or Phlegmatic?—Alleged Laxity of the Family Tie—Postscript: The University System.
It is four weeks to-day since I landed in New York, and, save for forty hours in Philadelphia and four hours in Brooklyn, I have spent all that time in Manhattan Island. Yet, to my shame be it spoken, I am not prepared with any generalisation as to the American character. It has been my good fortune to see a great deal of literary and artistic New York, and, comparing it with literary and artistic London, I am inclined to say "Pompey and Cæsar berry much alike—specially Pompey!" The New Yorker is far more cosmopolitan than the Londoner; of that there is no doubt. He knows all that we know about current English literature. He knows all that we do not know about current American literature. He is much more interested in and influenced by French literature and art than the average educated Englishman—so much so that the leading French critics, such as M. Brunetière and M. Rod, lecture
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