The Easterner and Westerner do not see beneath the surface of the seeming commercial indolence. They are used to their own spick and span little towns, filled to the brim with bustle, noise, activity and the whoop-la of American get-ahead-of-your-neighbor atmosphere.
It may be that this will never be quite duplicated in a sub-tropical climate. But the business is there, even if the men do walk slowly.
The tourist, looking at commercial externals only, naturally marvels at the gowns of the women, the artistic and lavish homes, the unbridled entertaining and the constant touch its richer members keep with New York, nearly nine hundred miles away. Its people discuss the last play, the best opera and the newest dishes at Sherry’s as easily as they do home gossip. Naturally, this is not true of all the people, but it fairly represents the attitude of the leading set.
The New York trip has been made easy by the “Yankee millionaires,” who have made Augusta part of an elaborate railway and hotel system.
Of course there remains—and praise be that it is so—those of the old régime. They are not altogether carried away by this elated modern spirit. They do not entertain tourists or the passing cottager. They are not quite sure but the new spirit may bring the Newport morals. They recoil from the constant phrase, “They do it in New York.”
They remind the imitative younger generation that a well-born Southerner has nothing to learn in manners and morals, and that progress is not always improvement.
They point to Charleston as the dignified ideal of all that is old and best.
They sigh, and say, “Things are not as they used to be.”
To which Punch would again reply, “They never were.”