What the White Race May Learn from the Indian

by George Wharton James

MONO INDIAN COOKING CORN MUSH IN A
BASKET BY A CAMP FIRE.

“Three hundred thousand people have found out that they can live out of doors, and that out of doors is a safer place than indoors.

“People who have all their lives slept on beds of down, protected by thick walls of brick or stone, barricaded against the dangerous (?) air of night, have found that it is possible to spend a night upon an unsheltered hillside without risk to life, and it is more than likely that, as in the case of the Charleston earthquake, not a few modern troglodytes, who scarcely ever saw the light of day before, have been actually benefited by being forced out into the fresh air and the sunshine.

“The great tent colonies, improvised by the military authorities with such promptness under the efficient management of the able General Funston, may become the permanent homes for some of the thousands who are now for the first time in their lives tasting the sweets of an out-of-door life. Man is an out-of-door creature, meant to live amid umbrageous freshness, his skin bathed clean by morning dews or evening showers, browned and disinfected by the sun, fed by tropic fruits, and cheered by tropic birds and flowers. It is only through long generations of living under artificial conditions that civilized man has become accustomed to the unhealthful and disease-producing influences of the modern house to such a degree that they can be even in a small measure tolerated. But this immunity is only apparent. An atmosphere that will kill a Hottentot or a baboon in six months will also kill a bank president or a trust magnate—sometime. And if these tent-dwellers get such a taste of the substantial advantages of the out-of-door life that they refuse to return to the old unwholesome conditions of anti-earthquake days, they will profit substantially by their experience, terrible though it has been. It takes earthquakes and cyclones and tidal waves to jostle us out of the unnatural and degenerative ruts into which conventionality is always driving us.

“What advantages has the man in the brown-stone front over the man in the tent? Only these: A pale face instead of the brown skin which is natural to his species; a coated tongue, no appetite, and no digestion, instead of the keen zest for food and splendid digestive vigor of the tent-dweller; an aching head and confused mind and depressed spirits, instead of the vim and snap and energy, mental and physical, and the freedom from pain and pessimism of out-of-door dwellers; early consumption or apoplexy or paresis or cancer of the stomach or arteriosclerosis,—the dry rot of the body which stealthily weakens the props and crumbles the foundations of the citadel of life.”

Why is it that in our cities in summer, and in Florida and the South generally, and in the West, we do not follow the French custom of eating out of doors?

American visitors to Paris in the summer time have always been impressed by the prevalent custom there of dining out of doors. The sidewalks in front of cafés and restaurants are always so occupied with chairs and tables that pedestrians often have to step into the street to get by. This has long been the summer custom in Paris, but with the arrival of cold weather tables and chairs disappeared every year, and the diners returned to the close nicotine-laden air of the stuffy little dining-rooms inside. But last year, according to the London correspondent of the Outlook, an enterprising Frenchman, finding his patrons much attached to his open-air dining-room, and being short of room inside, undertook to make his guests comfortable out of doors by means of a large brazier placed upon the sidewalk. Others followed his example, and in a short time the streets were lined with braziers from the Madeline to the Bastile, much to the satisfaction of the cab-drivers and newsboys. One ingenious proprietor made his table-legs hollow, filled with hot water, and thus utilized them as foot-warmers. And so one may now enjoy a fashionable Parisian café au plein air any day in the year.

Everybody is always hungry at a picnic, not simply because of the unusual exercise, but as the result of the tonic appetite-stimulating influence of the out-of-doors. The same plan may be introduced into any private home by utilizing a back porch, or, when this is lacking, a tent-cloth awning may be provided at the expense of a few dollars.

The old Spanish patio, or inner court, provided the seclusion that many desire, with the possibility of a larger out-of-door life. Mr. Gustav Stickley, the far-seeing editor of The Craftsman, which so effectually pleads for a simpler and more democratic life for the people, has planned a number of Craftsman houses in which these open porches for eating, and sleeping as well, are introduced. This is a great step in the right direction, and is strongly to be commended.