THE ANGLO-AMERICAN SCHOOL OF

POLITE UNLEARNING

N the exuberant hospitality of America, if a

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person wants anything he has only to ask for it. Whether he gets it, is another matter; he will at least get something with the same name.

In London, if one in his secret heart longs for something, he has only to leave the main thoroughfares and get lost. He finds himself in a maze of narrow streets where shopkeepers make a living by selling unheard-of things to people who have wandered in by accident. These shopkeepers never advertise. Their disposition is secretive, and they trust to the method of ambush. A person is walking along with only a vague impulse to find his way out without demeaning himself by asking advice of a policeman. He finds himself in front of a shop devoted to traffic in snails from Astrakhan. It is the sole emporium for these articles. If the wayfarer be of an inquiring mind, the unexpected supply wakens a demand,

at least the demand for further knowledge. Who is there in all London who would be likely to support such a shop, or even know that it is here? The dingy sign appeals not to his conscious aims but to a dim sub-conscious longing for he knows not what. It seems a very strange coincidence that he of all persons in the world should have come upon the only place in London where these articles are for sale. The chances are that if he be an American he will pluck up courage and venture in and ask the proprietor, "How's the snailtrade to-day?" The shopkeeper receives him without surprise. He knows that, according to the doctrine of probabilities, somebody is bound to turn up in his shop, sometime.

To my mind this is the very romance of trade. Had I a moderate but assured income, as I trust all these London shopkeepers have, I should follow their example. I have no ambition to be a great "captain of industry," and have the magazine writers tell the truth about me. I should prefer to be one of these merchant adventurers in a small way. Hiding my shop from the unsympathetic public "as if the wren taught me concealment," I should bide my time. Let the

huge department stores cater to the obvious wants of the crowd. Some day my customer will drift in. He will find that my shop satisfies an inner, and hitherto unfelt, want. He will inadvertently buy something. Then he will drift off to the Antipodes, and ever after boast of his bargain. When he compares notes with other travelers, he will take down his treasure and ask, "When you were in London did you happen upon a queer little shop, the only place where they sell this sort of thing?" And when they, in shamefaced fashion, confess their failure to have discovered me, they will fall in his esteem.

I claim no merit for having one day wandered from the plain path of High Holborn into an obscure street where I accidentally stumbled upon what was to me the most interesting place in London. I am aware that, if I had not stumbled accidentally upon it, it would not have seemed so interesting to me. It was not, as it happened this time, a shop, but an educational institution. The sign above the door must have been recently painted, but the London smoke had already given it an air of grimy respectability. I read with

pleasure the legend, "The Anglo-American School of Polite Unlearning."

I was gratified over my discovery. Institutions of learning we have at home-and some very good ones too; but I realize that, in the nature of things, somewhere in London there must be an institution for the benefit of persons who are desirous, not so much of learning, as of being assisted to unlearn a number of things that are not good for them. And here it was. Like so many things in London, the moment I saw it, I felt that I had always seen it.

A few moments later I was in familiar converse with the Principal of the school, who gave me the history of the institution from its inception. He was a quiet, unassuming man, thoroughly devoted to his idea. In this age of educational fads it was a pleasure to find some one who adhered to very simple methods. "We do not believe," he said, "in what is called enriching the curriculum. When there have accumulated such vast stores of misinformation, we do not think it wise to burden our pupils' minds by trying to get them to unlearn everything. Such smattering has little educational value. We limit ourselves

to seeing that a few things which make the people of one country obnoxious to the people of another shall be thoroughly unlearned. When we consider what soil and climate have done in developing our own splendid type of manhood, it is natural that we should think highly of our own national environment, but it is unfortunate that we should usually think so poorly of those whose environment has been different. Each nation 'holds a thought' of its neighbors, and these thoughts are seldom altogether flattering. This is evidently a case for the application of mind cure.

"Even with nations so akin to each other as the British and the American, the thoughts that are held are not always pleasing, especially when they sometimes forget their company manners. The adjective 'American' is not usually found in conjunction with those heavenly twins, 'Sweetness and Light.' Indeed, the suggestion is quite the opposite. Only when used in connection with dentists does it imply undoubted excellence. In the United States the word British is not used as a term of endearment.

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"A good while ago Emerson declared that the English had good-will toward America, but in