RAILROADS, TELEGRAPHS, AND CIVILIZATION. 321 



sent to let her child go to places which would formerly be considered 

 out of the world, because she can correspond with her daily ; and it 

 only requires a journey of a few hours or days, which also promises a 

 welcome variety to the monotonous life of the parental home, to bring 

 the separated family together again. A change has also come over 

 the course of family life, in which habit and tradition had established 

 fixed customs, whereby the old ways are slowly dissolved and new 

 forms take their place. The prescription of kin, in which the choice 

 of a wife was formerly confined, is relaxed ; the old Frankish courting 

 by the parents for the son is out of fashion ; the wedding-feast is ar- 

 ranged to suit the railroad-train on which the young couple will begin 

 their journey ; fresh blood and strange customs are pressing into the 

 close circle of ancient relationship and stiff usage ; they break up the 

 pride of neighborhood narrowness, and make it first tolerant, then in- 

 viting to the foreign better usages, against which it had shut itself up, 

 and which it had despised, merely because they were strange. 



On the other side, if modern facilities for moving about furnish 

 opportunities for extending our ideas and knowledge, they also lead to 

 superficiality in observation, which loses in depth and thoroughness 

 what it gains in extent. We travel far in a day, but we see only by 

 glances. Between the beginning of the journey and its appointed end 

 the passenger generally stops only as long as the train, or, at very im- 

 portant stations, only over till the next train. What lies between passes 

 before his vision like a scene in a theatre, or is lost while he sleeps. The 

 guide-books furnish all the information he seeks. For many the num- 

 ber of miles they have traveled over is the most important point. It 

 is evident that nothing useful can come from traveling of this kind. 

 Another undeniable result is the neglect of what is near and around us 

 for what is distant. Many people know more of foreign countries than 

 of their own neighborhoods, consequently their attachment for home is 

 weakened. From indifference to disdain is only a step. On this ground 

 are explained the disappearance of old customs, which gave fixedness 

 to social life in the family and the commune, the dissatisfaction with 

 the narrowness of the home, and a relaxation of regard for persons in 

 authority and for older persons, whose experiences, gathered in the 

 narrow home circle, are not allowed to compete with the assumed ver- 

 satile and superior knowledge of traveled youth. In a wider circle are 

 thus explained the rapid spread of the fashions and a kind of leveling 

 in life and customs. The new styles, which formerly went out very 

 slowly, now spread quickly through all classes, and the differences 

 between country and city are disappearing. 



Returning to the public life of society, we find two features in 

 which there seems to be a connection between changes that are going 

 on and the modern conditions of transportation, viz., the democratic 

 tendencies of society, and the prevalence of materialism. The demo- 

 cratic tendency, which is peculiar to the times, does not limit itself to 



TOL. XXVII. 21 



