lems of Americans--social,
theological, political, economic; nor did they frequently rise above the
local to the universal. They were, in short, ordinarily provincial,
without, however, the rude durability or the homely truthfulness of
provincialism at its best.

To reflect upon the achievements of this dwindling cult is to discover
that it invented few memorable plots, devised almost no new styles,
created little that was genuinely original in its modes of truth or
beauty, and even added but the scantiest handful of characters to the
great gallery of the imagination. What local color did was to fit
obliging fiction to resisting fact in so many native regions that the
entire country came in some degree to see itself through literary eyes
and therefore in some degree to feel civilized by the sight. This is,
indeed, one of the important processes of civilization. But in this case
it was limited in its influence by the habits of vision which the local
colorists had. They scrutinized their world at the instigation of
benevolence rather than at that of intelligence; they felt it with
friendship rather than with passion. And because of their limitations of
intelligence and passion they fell naturally into routine ways and both
saw and represented in accordance with this or that prevailing formula.
Herein they were powerfully confirmed by the pressure of editors and a
public who wanted each writer to continue in the channel of his happiest
success and not to disappoint them by new departures. Not only did this
result in confining individuals to a single channel each but it resulted
in the convergence of all of them into a few broad and shallow streams.

An excellent example may be found in the flourishing cycle of stories
which, while Bret Harte was celebrating California, grew up about the
life of Southern plantations before the war. The mood of most of these
was of course elegiac and the motive was to show how much splendor had
perished in the downfall of the old regime. Over and over they repeated
the same themes: how an irascible planter refuses to allow his daughter
to marry the youth of her choice and how true love finds a way; how a
beguiling Southern maiden has to choose between lovers and gives her
hand and heart to him who is stoutest in his adherence to the
Confederacy; how, now and then, love crosses the lines and a Confederate
girl magnanimously, though only after a desperate struggle with herself,
marries a Unio