Much has been said of the keenness of American dollar hunting and the devoutness of American dollar worship. The former I admit; the latter I deny. Keenness in dollar hunting is indeed great; but I know of no country in which money is less worshiped as money. The gift of over seventy millions of dollars last year to colleges, libraries and universities, to say nothing of other vast gifts, abundantly proves that, if the American knows how to chase the mighty dollar, he also knows how to use it. It may be said that these great gifts by millionaires merely result from a desire to atone for their making such huge fortunes or to erect monuments to their own glory. Doubtless there is at times an alloy of this feeling; but I believe that the great current of their feeling is sound and patriotic, and I believe it for the reason that even larger gifts than theirs, in the aggregate, for every sort of noble purpose, are made by men and women of small means throughout the whole country.

It was my fortune to be President of the American Delegation at the Peace Conference of The Hague. That conference was held at a time when the American people were supposed to be, and indeed were, more occupied with every sort of enterprise, large and small, than ever before; and yet no other nation found time to make such efforts for the creation of a Tribunal of Arbitration and for the establishment of every possible guaranty for peace. The mails and cables were burdened with messages to us from all sorts and conditions of men, in all parts of the American Republic. Some were eloquent; some easily lent themselves to ridicule; some were deeply pathetic. One, I remember, which came from a Protestant Bishop in one of the remotest Southwestern States of the American Union, was one of the most touching utterances I have ever seen. It was simply a circular letter begging his clergy and laity to put up constant prayers that the chances for the peace of the world might be increased by the conference. This circular letter had at least one interesting result. It was shown to the late venerable Chancellor of the German Empire, and it deeply affected him. I have had ample opportunities to compare American materialism with American idealism during my connection with

the Diplomatic Service. The American Embassy in Berlin has had, during many years, to deal with questions of material interests, some very serious, but not one of them stirred a tithe of the widespread, deep feeling which was aroused in 1899 by the hope that something might be done for humanity in the way of increasing the chances for peace among nations.

There is nothing that need surprise one in my statement that the American people really, in their hearts, cherish ideals more precious than material gains. Let me remind you that the great body of the first settlers of the territory now occupied by the American Union came to it in obedience to religious and political ideals, and that, in doing this, they abjured all material considerations. Let me remind you that this immigration in obedience to ideal motives was continued during more than a century There is nothing strange, then, in the fact - for it is a fact that the American people have inherited and to-day show a devotion strong and unmistakable for other than mere material gains.

-

And this brings me to another American characteristic. It is absolutely certain that, like the German people, the people of the United States are most sincerely devoted to peace. They seek, above all things, to live at peace with other nations, and to do all in their power to promote peace throughout the world. No one really acquainted with the United States will gainsay this. It would indeed be a mistake to suppose that this devotion to peace would lead to anything like tame submission to wrong; but it certainly is rendering war between the United States and other nations more and more improbable. At various times in our recent history sensation mongers in the press and jingo orators on the stump have striven to provoke belligerent feelings; but the sober second thought has prevailed, and, in every case where arbitration has been possible, there has been an overwhelming insistence upon it by the great mass of American citizens. Probably no nation ever felt a deeper and more universal bitterness toward another than the United States toward Great Britain at the close of our Civil War. I need not recall the causes of that feeling; but the great fact to be

observed is that President Grant, with the American people at his back, turned a deaf ear to demagogs and demagogism, to jingoes and jingoism, and insisted that all the questions at issue should be settled by peaceful arbitration. The result is a matter of history. Again and again has the American people demanded and obtained the peaceful settlement of questions such as, in former days, led so often to war. The case just arbitrated between the United States and Mexico abundantly shows this.

There is yet one other characteristic of American life to which I wish especially to call attention, and that is the constant and increasing respect for Germany in every part of the United States. Such respect surely leads to a widespread desire for nearer acquaintance and friendship. The manifestations of German courage, energy, patience, in the century just ended, have especially contributed to this feeling. Evidences of it meet a thoughtful observer at every turn. One evidence is to be seen in the ever increasing American demand for knowledge of Germany-of her institutions, of her history, of her literature. An American newspaper is considered as sadly lacking in enterprise if it does not frequently give its readers valuable news or descriptive letters from Germany. Such letters, while often finding matter for amusement in differences of custom and opinion, are almost without exception fair in their judgments and kindly in their spirit. Still another evidence of this feeling is to be seen in the remarkable growth of American higher education scientific, literary and technical- during the last forty years. It is a curious fact that while, down to the middle of the nineteenth century, the ideas regarding education which controlled American institutions of learning were derived almost entirely from Great Britain, since that time, during the whole latter part of that century, the ideas and methods which permeate and give substance to American instruction in every field, whether in literature, in scientific investigation, in theology, in medicine, in technical processes, in the whole range of higher instruction, save in law, have come and are coming from Germany. Singular indeed it seems

that while, to this hour, the outer forms of higher instruction and even collegiate and university architecture continue to be derived mainly from English universities, the whole body of instruction is, by far, most strongly influenced from Germany. It is a most significant fact that, in spite of the wonderful attractions of English university life, hardly more than a handful of American students are evcr to be found either at Oxford or Cambridge, while in the German universities and special schools for advanced instruction American students are to be found by hundreds and even thousands. I need hardly point out the effect of this in strengthening the relations between the two countries. Every American student who passes even a single semester in a German university absorbs a respect for the German fatherland, gratitude to its institutions of learning and admiration for its professors. The result of this is that, more and more, German history, German literature and the German language are cultivated aomng the leaders of American thought in every field.

τα

HITE, GILBERT, an English clergyman and naturalist; born at Selborne, Hampshire, July 18, 1720; died at Oxford, June 20, 1793. He received his education at Basingstoke, under the Rev. Thomas Warton, and at Oxford. He was a Fellow of Oriel College, and was made one of the senior proctors of the university in 1752. He soon fixed his residence in his native village, where he passed a quiet life in study, especially in close observation of nature. His principal work, The Natural History of Selborne (1789; new "edition with notes by Frank Buckland," 1875), is a model of its kind,

of enduring interest; it was soon translated into German. It deals with a great variety of phenomena that came under the author's notice, and is in the form of letters. Thomas Brown's edition (1875) contains Observations on Various Parts of Nature and The Naturalist's Calendar, first published after the author's death. In 1876 appeared a volume of White's unpublished letters.

THE HOUSE-MARTEN.

SELBORNE, November 20, 1773. DEAR SIR: In obedience to your injunctions, I sit down to give you some account of the house-marten, or marlet; and, if my monography of this little domestic and familiar bird should happen to meet with your approbation, I may probably soon extend my inquiries to the rest of the British hirundines · the swallow, the swift, and the bank-marten.

A few house-martens begin to appear about the 16th of April; usually some few days later than the swallow. For some time after they appear, the hirundines in general pay no attention to the business of nidification, but play and sport about, either to recruit from the fatigue of their journey, if they do migrate at all, or else that their blood may recover its true tone and texture after it has been so long benumbed by the severities of winter. About the middle of May, if the weather be fine, the marten begins to think in earnest of providing a mansion for its family. The crust or shell of this nest seems to be formed of such dirt or loam as comes most readily to hand, and is tempered and wrought together with little bits of broken straws, to render it tough and tenacious. As this bird often builds against a perpendicular wall, without any projecting ledge under it, it requires its utmost efforts to get the first foundation firmly fixed, so that it may safely carry the superstructure. On this occasion the bird not only clings with its claws, but partly supports itself by strongly inclining