Now,
candidly--is this sufficient to justify a reproach from Europe that we
are striving to claim or to create an aristocracy?
"And then there is that other reproach--we're such outrageous
tuft-hunters. I shall not deny having seen an American run himself out
of breath to get a peep at a duke, but I never knew an American spend
money to see one, unless the American was too beastly rich to care for
money at all. And then, hereditary nobles do not wear well here. Let a
visiting duke be followed within a year by anything less than a king,
and the visitor will fail to excite anybody out of a walk. You must not
in England judge of this subject from the effect on our people of a
certain not remote visit; for the people of the United States have a
feeling of respect and affection for the present royal family of Great
Britain which no other royal family or individual, past or present, has
ever produced. Hum, hum! Our people mean well; but curiosity and
imitation will not die out of the human race till an inch or two more of
the spinal column drops off."
Still with a view to the gathering of facts for my intended treatise, I
asked Bainbridge to explain in what distinctive manner the people of the
United States were benefited by a republican form of government.
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