penniless and hungry. And when the sun sets, and darkness enwraps
the happy land, fireworks put a proper finish upon the national joy, and
the favourite set-piece represents, as it should, a noble-hearted Yankee
boy putting to flight a dozen stout red-jackets of King George.

Humour might suggest that the expression of Patriotism is a trifle
overdone. Perhaps also a truce might be made with King George, who,
if he be permitted to look from the shades upon a country which his
Ministers lost, must surely smile at this immortality of resentment. But
to the stranger, who witnesses this amazing carnival for the first time,
two reflections occur. In the first place, the stranger cannot but
be struck by the perfect adaptation of Jefferson's rodomontade to an
expected purpose. Although that eminent Virginian, at the highest point
of his exaltation, did not look forward to the inrush of foreigners
which is overwhelming his country, there is a peculiar quality in his
words, even when translated into Yiddish, which inspires an inexplicable
enthusiasm. In the second place, the stranger is astounded at the
ingenuity which inspires a crowd, separated by wide differences of race,
speech, and education, with a sudden sympathy for a country which is not
its own.

And when the last crackers are exploded, and the last flag is waved,
what is left? An unreasoning conviction, cherished, as I have said, by a
foreign population, that America is the greatest country on earth. What
the conviction lacks in sincerity it gains in warmth of expression,
and if America be ever confronted by an enemy, the celebrations of the
Fourth of July will be found not to have been held in vain. Where there
is no just bond of union, a bond must be invented, and Patriotism is the
most notable invention of the great Republic. To have knit up all the
nations of the earth in a common superstition is no mean achievement,
and it is impossible to withhold a fervent admiration from the rhetoric
which has thus attained what seemed, before its hour, the unattainable.

But in this cosmopolitan orgie of political excitement the true-born
American plays but a small part. He has put the drama on the stage,
and is content to watch the result. If a leader be needed in a time of
stress, the man of Anglo-Saxon blood will be ready to serve the country,
which belongs more intimately to him than to those who sing its praises
with a noisy clatter. Meanwhile he lets the politicians do