YANKEE AND BRITON.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4477, 9 October 1922, Page 2

YANKEE AND BRITON.

BUSINESS HABITS COMPARED. THE WORK- FEVER. (By Lord Leverhulme in the “Westminster Gazette") Anyone visiting the United States must be struck with tjie great difference in English and American habits, and the difference is generally/ but not always, in favour ofl the American. In the first place, they are earlier risers in the morning. Next to right thinking, one must give first place in importance to early rising as a habit. The Americans never were heavy alcohol drinkers, and to-day they drink less alcohol than ever. The Americans are keener workers, “as a habit ” than are we British. It is true that one could offset these American advantages with points in our British character wherein we greatly excel the American ; but we are deal-, ing with habits and not national character, so we will for the moment omit setting out a list of strong points in our British character.. In any case, we never gain by parading our strong points, but we always gain by giving fullest thought and attention to correcting our weaknesses. If one has to leave by an early train from New York, one finds breakfast in full swing at 7/and a good breakfast readily served, at 6 o’clock in the dining-room. In London few hotel breakfast rooms are open before 8 in the morning and any breakfast earlier than that hour is a bedroom affair left to the night waiter. If you wish to get shaved in New York, you can get shaved at 6 a.m. easily and without previous arrangement. In England the barber’s shbp will be supposed to opep at 7.30, anl die barber not there till 8. These hotels and barbers in New York and London, remember, are catering for their clients. But we British are .not early risers ; the Americans are ; and that is all we can say about the matter. THE HABIT OF WORK. Long before the United States adopted prohibition, when one visited the United States it was the excep-; tion and not the rule, Ito see guests in an American hotel taking wine or other form of alcohol to lunch or dinner. In. the United Kingdom it was, and is, the exception to see guests at the hotel table who are not taking wine, beer, or whisky at lunch and dinner. ’ America has got, in a supreme degree the habit ofl work—that great and good habit which is the foundation of prosperity and happiness, national and individual/ In. Great Britain, if a young man has “expectations” of inherited wealth he not only does not apply himself to acquire the habit of work, buit he will never be given the chance to acquire it by parents or college masters. We have often seen in tlhe United Kingdom most promising young men absolutely spoiled by a small inheritance of a mere £lOOO a year. One could instance any, number of American young men to whom prospects off inherited wealth, running into incomes of one or more millions of dollars a year, have not blunted their desire for the habit of work. BAD HABITS FATAL. The United States holds to-day, in the coffers of her bankers, more than three-fourths of the world’s gold, and this fact alarms us; but really that fact is not our danger flor the future, but that American liabiits of early rising, hard work, and abstinence from alcohol are superior to our own. These habits are their real gold reserve. I have never known a person with bad habits of any kind, harmless or the reverse, that had any practical common sense. I have been reading, a book, “The Foundation of Japan,” by Mr Robert-son-Scott, and was astonished to learn the great part the young men and women there are playing in the development, of the country. They have formed a society to elevate themselves and the community in the towns in wlhich they live. I am certain ithere is finer materia! ih England for work of this kind than in Japan. Why should the young men and women here not band together to improve their native land, to make it easier to live a good life and more difficult tp be led away into evil;—we who hpve sent missionaries to teach, the people of Japan ? ~