Page:The Plutocrat (1927).pdf/137

 seeming personal; it is only in appearance that I do seem so. I'm not really personal in my meaning. I"

"I understand," she said gravely. "Say what you are thinking."

"Then since you do permit me—well, frankly, I'm puzzled that you're so charitable as to be amused by such people. They belong to an objectionable bourgeoisie with which we ourselves avoid contact. We are never conscious of them unless we travel and then we are but too unhappily made aware of their existence. They swarm in politics and in business; they thrive upon a horrible ceremonial known as the Great American Banquet; they read mystery stories, buy maroon velours furniture, call their advertisements 'literature,' and speak of a tragic drama as a 'show.' They are blissful when a brass band plays 'In the Gloaming.' If it plays 'Suwanee River' they cry. Their religion is to pay for their wives' pews in expensive stone churches full of 'art glass,' and their patriotism is to bellow at a cultivated Chinaman that they are one-hundred-per-cent. Americans. We think they're rather terrible, Madame Momoro."

"You say—'we'?" she said inquiringly.

"I mean simply, Americans of good breeding and