as in Europe. And though the wealthy audiences behaved better than
wealthy audiences at Covent Garden (perhaps because the boxes are less
like inclosed pews than in London), it was mortifying to detect the
secret disdain for art which was expressed in the listless late
arrivings and the relieved early departures. The which disdain for art
was, however, I am content to think, as naught in comparison with the
withering artistic disdain felt, and sometimes revealed, by those Latin
and German artists for Anglo-Saxon Philistinism. I seem to be able to
read the sarcastic souls of these accomplished and sensitive aliens,
when they assure newspaper reporters that New York, Chicago, Boston,
Philadelphia, and London are really musical. The sole test of a musical
public is that it should be capable of self-support--I mean that it
should produce a school of creative and executive artists of its own,
whom it likes well enough to idolize and to enrich, and whom the rest of
the world will respect. This is a test which can be safely applied to
Germany, Russia, Italy, and France. And in certain other arts it is a
test which can be applied to Anglo-Saxondom--but not in music. In
America and England music is still mainly a sportive habit.

When I think of the exoticism of grand opera in New York, my mind at
once turns, in contrast, to the natural raciness of such modest
creations as those offered by Mr. George Cohan at his theater on
Broadway. Here, in an extreme degree, you get a genuine instance of a
public demand producing the desired artist on the spot. Here is
something really and honestly and respectably American. And why it
should be derided by even the most lofty pillars of American taste, I
cannot imagine. (Or rather, I can imagine quite well.) For myself, I
spent a very agreeable evening in witnessing "The Little Millionaire." I
was perfectly conscious of the blatancy of the methods that achieved it.
I saw in it no mark of genius. But I did see in it a very various talent