that community where they are needed most.

The huge engine of the public schools is forever milling
over the raw material of the Union, educating the native
children, assimilating to the commonwealth the young people
of immigrant stocks. The higher education of taste and
refinement ought to go hand in hand, but it is sadly
deficient.

No one should expect that the public-school system could add
this to a task already appalling for its size and
complexity. It can be coped with only by organizations apart
from the existing schools, which might attempt for the
youthful artisan what the art schools attempt for the
training of architects, sculptors, and painters.

It is the fate of democracies to waste energy and attack
each problem by the wrong side. Commend us to a democracy to
put the cart before the horse every time! In the arts we
have been doing this imbecile trick steadily, persistently,
for a hundred years, trying to foster the fine arts while
our minor arts and crafts are too contemptible for
criticism.

Is it not about time to show that even a democracy can learn
something? Certainly if we can convince this community that
the most crying need is a thorough regeneration of the
industrial arts, the object will be attained. For though
democracies are often clumsy, when they once strike the
right path they rush forward to the highest places with a
speed and an irresistible force no other communities attain.

BELGIAN DRAMATIST CRITICIZES NEW YORK.

Money, Bustle, and Noise Are the Principal
Things Named as Characteristic
of Our Young Nation.

Maurice Maeterlinck, the Belgian dramatist and mystic philosopher, is by
no means dull in his appreciation of practical conditions. People who know
him say that he is not in the least lackadaisical or spiritually remote,
but is simple and frank and full of interest in every-day occurrences. A
short time ago he was asked to express his opinion of America. He
replied--to quote from the _Theater Magazine_:

I should be afraid to live in a city like New York. I
understand that money, bustle, and noise are its chief
characteristics. Money is useful, of course, but it is not
everything. Bustle and noise, also, are necessary adjuncts
of human industry. But they do not add to man's comfort nor
satisfy his soul's cravings.

America is t