Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/139

 What may be said of New Zealand may be said of Australia. Is it pioneering in social or industrial reform for a peaceful country to build battleships, and present them to a quarrelsome king thousands of miles away? This afternoon I went to a theatre, and saw moving pictures of the Panama canal. The pictures have packed the house for weeks; they are doing much to increase respect here for American energy and ability. The comments I heard around me were extremely gratifying. Never in the history of the world has a great work been carried on as energetically, as economically or as intelligently as at Panama. These pictures prove the smartness of the Yankee, and the actual accomplishment at Panama is as great as the big talk about the smart Yankee has ever been In this city of Sydney there is a big department store operated by the Anthony Hordern Co. Anthony Hordern was a plodder who built up a great business, and died from overwork at sixty-four. The business is now managed by heads of departments trained by Anthony Hordern, but his two sons own it. A floor-walker told me today that the store employs four thousand people, and has fifteen acres of floor space. I do not know just how much an Australian's statements should be discounted; the average at home is about one-third. The store has a special sale on now, which is attracting great crowds, as special sales seem to everywhere. Wherever I go here, floor-walkers step up and ask if I have been waited on, whereupon I reply that I am simply a visitor looking about, etc. In most cases the floor-walker will show me around; at Anthony Hordern's today, he mentioned Marshall Field's