They came, dressed in derby hats,
coats, pants, vest, stiff collar and polka-dot tie, undoubtedly, said
my friend, each with an Eversharp pencil in his pocket, and all
singing the Star-Spangled Banner.
To the promoters of this pageant, and probably to most of the actors,
it seemed as if they had managed to express the most intimate
difficulty to friendly association between the older peoples of
America and the newer. The contradiction of their stereotypes
interfered with the full recognition of their common humanity. The
people who change their names know this. They mean to change
themselves, and the attitude of strangers toward them.
There is, of course, some connection between the scene outside and the
mind through which we watch it, just as there are some long-haired men
and short-haired women in radical gatherings. But to the hurried
observer a slight connection is enough. If there are two bobbed heads
and four beards in the audience, it will be a bobbed and bearded
audience to the reporter who knows beforehand that such gatherings are
composed of people with these tastes in the management of their hair.
There is a connection between our vision and the facts, but it is
often a strange connection. A man has rarely looked at a landscape,
let us say, except to examine its possibilities for division into
building lots, but he has seen a number of landscapes hanging in the
parlor.
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