Show Wh os S Who Wh o 0 in In A America By HERBERT KAUFMAN I pASQUALE the bootblack will well some day be a grandfather So o will Swenson 1 your new janitor and b by the favor of Provi- Provi ence and his lusty progeny Demetrios the tile Greek waiter at th thi the i will in process process of time open a bottle 9 of good Cy Cyprian rian I In U n celebration of his Ius daughters daughter's fertility L The youngsters are already sitting cheek by with yours yours yours- daily rubbing away further bits of the insulating prejudice dice with which their elders have aborted mutual mutu l comprehension Slowly the bootblack stand will grow into a row of chairs with a hat blocking machine and and a cigar case on the side and we naIl Hall eventually read Pasquales Pasquale's name in the the tax tax lists and behold him lolling in his limousine or whizzing past in a sky roadster t tt t g Another glance in the prophetic crystal foretells that that Swenson will ill swear at the incompetence of later janitors and bewail the J scarcity of efficient custodians custodians' for his his' string of apartments and fA 1 tenements And Demetrios early sensing the profits profits' in glucose will learn the car cares cares' s r of business greatness when his waster vaster waster sons should be reducing his responsibilities instead of of his bank balance w T They'll eyll be topside men men on the seesaw when lots of us s for forr r whom whom ii they temporarily w wipe pe boots boots' and set set chairs are are bumping on the ground round i Thus our I national vitality H li y constantly fre freshens e with it 1 a alien ien r infusion ft r r l t n nV V We cannot hold hold holdt t to type as as older I nations s m maintain nt th their ir characteristics Ten million direct descendants of the late lamented Mr Chin Chint t have luve regularly mated and bred to spawn of the equally f fecund C Ar tr T. Chow Chinaman is always Chinaman a Chinaman-a a primary yellow man n. n And theres there's the answer to his his' baffling complacency lie lie he docs does not blend therefore h he neither b bends nor mends his ways Sire and scion they are minted with identical di dies dies dies-an s an an unalloyed coinage since Hias Hia's forebears crawled through a aBut the Indi Indian passes asses But we laboratories of racial chemistry the th greatest anthropological anthropological anthro anthro- pR experimental stations in the path of hi history tory decade decad on decade play with myriad mixtures of temperament temperament quicken quicken ken the peasant with the dr dreamer amer warm the torpid with tropic i imagination a brighten the dr drab b Saxon n with str streaks aks of Latin L Latin Li i bril bril- hancy Blend Blend succeeds blend I d a and 1 in geometrical progression lavishly provide substance for still further strains Prejudices and ami bigotries are ire re eliminated in the crossing The The- toxins of intolerance nce rare are dis dissolved dis- dis I solved solved the the synthetic blood revitalizes communities wea weak with ith in- in J breeding Back and forth from forth from vein vein t to vein vein the the changing I lymph passes Th The weedy sap of the old world orld slowly alters aHers its poisons and passions reduced In in the dilution to Jo a tonic for r fresh inspirations I 1 J J t tHere Here and there a a little foulness sS works in But it does not persist only persist only still peoples p gr grow g row w st stagnant gnant pant and and b become one vile vite a and d bile lile the ran random unfit from a stagnant land oc occasionally a introduce duce I a defiling impulse in the national stream it dies in the current Scum v vanishes IJes fron front K 00 We create a language an art a thought all our own Each 1 is an aHer altered d fabric Already the sparse threads of south Europe Europ increase in the pattern First the and the Celt modify the Saxon Anglo design now now no it displays strong Slavic Scandinavian and Aegean impulses which Accentuate accentuate with the rears ears to show in turn a still dim but but- ever ever stronger Semite in- in n- n I luence t J As the metal with which these lines are printed must be back into the pots pot pot and nd rete sHed with antimony before it is gain fit fa to furnish good type so in each generation we escape t trophy by the in induction l tion of a strengthening g alien aien element to vi vitalize aliz ur mettle Tl new types types- cast well and each prints a clean sharp hour hou The melting pot preserves our force forc and originality 1 Each epoch produces its own own version of of- of Who Who i in America merica 1 i And therein lies the promise promis of the republic The Declaration of oJ Independence abolished ancestors The Chinese figure differently differently and and look what a mess mess they've made of it W They built a great wall to keep Out dut ut all foreigners and Progress has ever since been hammering for admittance Copyright 1916 by Herbert Kaufman Great Britain and all other rights reserved |