"All right; yes."
"Buy a nickel's worth."
"Yes."
Ralph Dillie rejoiced. We went into the store and ordered a nickel's worth of candy. And directly the boy got it he started back for home on the run. And I watched him re-cross the border once more—into Pennsylvania.
XII CHARACTERISTICS
The chief characteristic of America is an immense patriotism, and out of that patriotism spring a thousand minor characteristics, which, taken by themselves, may be considered blemishes by the critical foreigner,—such troublesome little characteristics as national pride and thin-skinnedness, national bluster and cocksureness. But personal annoyance should not blind the critic or appreciator to the fundamental fact of the American's belief in America. This belief is not a narrow partizanship, though it may seem unpleasantly like that to those who listen to the clamour of excited Americans at the Olympic games and other competitions of an international interest. It is not merely the commercial instinct ever on the watch for opportunities for self-advertisement. It is a real, hearty patriotic fervour, the deepest thing in an American. It is something that cannot be shaken.
"It is a sacrament to walk the streets as an American citizen," says a Presbyterian circular. "Being an American is a sacred mission. Our whole life must be enthralled by a holy passion."