Page:In defense of Harriet Shelley, and other essays.djvu/162

 WH 3 AT PAUL BOURGET THINKS OF US

HE reports the American joke correctly. In Boston they ask, How much does he know? in New York, How much is he worth? in Philadel phia, Who were his parents? And when an alien observer turns his telescope upon us advertisedly in our own special interest a natural apprehension moves us to ask, What is the diameter of his reflector? I take a great interest in M. Bourget s chapters, for I know by the newspapers that there are several Americans who are expecting to get a whole educa tion out of them; several who foresaw, and also foretold, that our long night was over, and a light almost divine about to break upon the land.

His utterances concerning us are bound to be weighty and well timed.

He gives us an object lesson which should be thoughtfully and profitably studied.

These well-considered and important verdicts were of a nature to restore public confidence, which had been disquieted by questionings as to whether so young a teacher would be qualified to take so large a class as seventy million, distributed over so exten sive a school-house as America, and pull it through without assistance.

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