human
I cannot quite understand your social life over here, Mr. Lyon was saying one day.
gpt
You seem to make distinctions, but I cannot see exactly for what.
human
Perhaps they make themselves. Your social orders seem able to resist Darwin's theory, but in a republic natural selection has a better chance.
gpt
I was told by a Bohemian on the steamer coming over that money in America takes the place of rank in England.
human
That isn't quite true.
gpt
And I was told in Boston by an acquaintance of very old family and little fortune that 'blood' is considered here as much as anywhere.
human
You see, Mr. Lyon, how difficult it is to get correct information about us. I think we worship wealth a good deal, and we worship family a good deal, but if any one presumes too much upon either, he is likely to come to grief. I don't understand it very well myself.
gpt
Then it is not money that determines social position in America?
human
Not altogether; but more now than formerly. I suppose the distinction is this: family will take a person everywhere, money will take him almost everywhere; but money is always at this disadvantage--it takes more and more of it to gain position. And then you will find that it is a good deal a matter of locality. For instance, in Virginia and Kentucky family is still very powerful, stronger than any distinction in letters or politics or success in business; and there is a certain diminishing number of people in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, who cultivate a good deal of exclusiveness on account of descent.
gpt
But I am told that this sort of aristocracy is succumbing to the new plutocracy.
human
Well, it is more and more difficult to maintain a position without money. Mr. Morgan says that it is a disheartening thing to be an aristocrat without luxury; he declares that he cannot tell whether the Knickerbockers of New York or the plutocrats are more uneasy just now. The one is hungry for social position, and is morose if he cannot buy it; and when the other is seduced by luxury and yields, he finds that his distinction is gone. For in his heart the newly rich only respects the rich. A story went about of one of the Bonanza princes who had built his palace in the city, and was sending out invitations to his first entertainment. Somebody suggested doubts to him about the response. 'Oh,' he said, 'the beggars will be glad enough to come!'
gpt
I suppose, Mr. Lyon, said Margaret, demurely,
human
Oh, I couldn't say that money is not run after there to some extent.
gpt
I saw a picture in Punch of an auction, intended as an awful satire on American women. It struck me that it might have two interpretations.
human
Yes, Punch is as friendly to America as it is to the English aristocracy.
gpt
Well, I was only thinking that it is just an exchange of commodities. People will always give what they have for what they want. The Western man changes his pork in New York for pictures. I suppose that--what do you call it?--the balance of trade is against us, and we have to send over cash and beauty.
human
I didn't know that Miss Debree was so much of a political economist.
gpt
We got that out of books in school. Another thing we learned is that England wants raw material; I thought I might as well say it, for it wouldn't be polite for you.
human
Oh, I'm capable of saying anything, if provoked. But we have got away from the point. As far as I can see, all sorts of people intermarry, and I don't see how you can discriminate socially--where the lines are.
gpt
Oh, we do not try to discriminate--except as to foreigners. There is a popular notion that Americans had better marry at home.
human
Then the best way for a foreigner to break your exclusiveness is to be naturalized. Mr. Lyon tried to adopt her tone, and added,
gpt
Would you like to see me an American citizen?
human
I don't believe you could be, except for a little while; you are too British.
gpt
But the two nations are practically the same; that is, individuals of the nations are. Don't you think so?
human
Yes, if one of them gives up all the habits and prejudices of a lifetime and of a whole social condition to the other.
gpt
And which would have to yield?
human
Oh, the man, of course. It has always been so. My great-great-grandfather was a Frenchman, but he became, I have always heard, the most docile American republican.
gpt
Do you think he would have been the one to give in if they had gone to France?
human
Perhaps not. And then the marriage would have been unhappy. Did you never take notice that a woman's happiness, and consequently the happiness of marriage, depends upon a woman's having her own way in all social matters? Before our war all the men who married down South took the Southern view, and all the Southern women who married up North held their own, and sensibly controlled the sympathies of their husbands.
gpt
And how was it with the Northern women who married South, as you say?
human
Well, it must be confessed that a good many of them adapted themselves, in appearance at least. Women can do that, and never let anyone see they are not happy and not doing it from choice.
gpt
And don't you think American women adapt themselves happily to English life?
human
Doubtless some; I doubt if many do; but women do not confess mistakes of that kind. Woman's happiness depends so much upon the continuation of the surroundings and sympathies in which she is bred. There are always exceptions. Do you know, Mr. Lyon, it seems to me that some people do not belong in the country where they were born. We have men who ought to have been born in England, and who only find themselves really they go there. There are who are ambitious, and court a career different from any that a republic can give them. They are not satisfied here. Whether they are happy there I do not know; so few trees, when at all grown, will bear transplanting.
gpt
Then you think international marriages are a mistake?
human
Oh, I don't theorize on subjects I am ignorant of.
gpt
You give me very cold comfort.
human
I didn't know, said Margaret, with a laugh that was too genuine to be consoling,
gpt
And I am getting a great deal, said Mr. Lyon, rather ruefully.
human
I'm trying to find out where. I ought to have been born.
gpt
I'm not sure, Margaret said, half seriously,