Love of woman, innate in the American, is not enough in itself to explain the luxury that man lavishes on her in the United States. America is not the only country where man is devoted to woman and ready to satisfy all her caprices. The Frenchman is as keenly alive to her influences as the American, if not more.
The luxury of the American woman must be explained in another way.
Money is easily earned in the United States, and is freely spent. Business savours more of gambling than of commerce in the proper sense of the word.
Jonathan, then, is in a position much like that of a man whom I saw give a hundred franc note to a beggar one day in the streets of Monte Carlo. "If I win at trente et quarante," said he to some one who asked him how he could do such a foolish thing, "what are a hundred francs to me? I can afford to be generous to a poor fellow-creature out of it; if I lose, it is so much that the croupier will not get." When Jonathan covers his wife with diamonds, he says to himself: "If I win, I can indulge my wife without inconveniencing myself; if I lose, it is so much saved from the fray."
This is not all.
If the American thirsts after money, it is not for the love of money as a rule, but for the love of that which money can buy. In other words, avarice is a vice almost unknown in America. Jonathan does not amass gold for the pleasure of adding pile to pile and counting it. He pursues wealth to improve his position in life and to surround those dependent upon him with advantages and luxuries. He spends his money as gaily as he pockets it, especially when it is a question of gratifying his wife or daughters, who are the objects of his most assiduous attention. He is the first to admit that their love for diamonds is as absurd as it is costly, but he is good-humoured and says, "Since they like them, why should they not have them?"
In Europe, there is a false notion that Jonathan thinks only of money, that he passes his life in the worship of the almighty dollar. It is an error. I believe that at heart he cares but little for money. If a millionaire inspires respect, it is as much for the activity and talent he has displayed in the winning of his fortune as for the dollars themselves. An American, who had nothing but his dollars to boast of, might easily see all English doors open to him, but his millions alone would not give him the entrée into the best society of Boston and New York. There he would be requested to produce some other recommendation. An American girl who was rich, but plain and stupid, would always find some English duke, French marquis, or Italian count, ready to marry her, but she would have great difficulty in finding an American gentleman who would look upon her fortune or her dot as a sufficient indemnity.
At a public dinner, the millionaire does not find a place of honour reserved for him, as he would in England. The seats of honour are reserved for men of talent. Even in politics, money does not lead to honours.
No, the Americans do not worship the Golden Calf, as Europeans are often pleased to imagine.
As to the ladies, that is different—but we shall speak of them in another chapter.