But there is one element from abroad that does not Americanise itself so easily--and that, curiously, is one the most American that comes from Europe--in other words, the _English_.

They find with us everything as English as it can possibly be out of England--their language, their laws, their literature, their very bibles, psalm- books, psalm-tunes, the same faith and forms of worship, the same common histories, memories, affinities, affections, and general structure of social life and public institutions; yet they are generally the very last to be and feel at home in America.

A Norwegian mountaineer, in his deerskin doublet, and with a dozen English words picked up on the voyage, will Americanise himself more in one year on an Illinois prairie than an intelligent, middle-class Englishman will do in ten, in the best society of Massachusetts.
Now, I am not dallying with a facetious fantasy when I express the opinion, that the life and song of the English lark in America, superadded to the other institutions and influences indicated, would go a great way in fusing this hitherto insoluble element, and blending it harmoniously with the best vitalities of the nation.
And this consummation would well repay a special and extraordinary effect.

Perhaps this expedient would be the most successful of all that remain untried.

A single incident will prove that it is more than a mere theory.