BRITAIN AND AMERICA

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 43, 14 November 1917, Page 2

BRITAIN AND AMERICA

SPECIAL TEACHING FOR CHILDREN ADVOCATED. In the course of a notable speech made at the Guildhall, London, on August i (tEe tenor of which applies to this country equally with Britain), Mr. Page, tho American Ambassador, in touching upon tho Anglo-American relations which it was'hoped would ; result from the cooperation brought about through tho. war, said:—"Far more important than any particular Government (for Governments come and Governments go) is tho temper and action of puMlo opinion ill euch' free countries as ours. Tho complete and permanent union in all large aims of our two nations, generation after generation, must. therefore rest on the broad base of an informed and friendly public opinion in both countries. , "If this argument be sound, it leads us-every ono of Tie-to a high duty. The lasting friendship of two democratic nations must rest on the sympathetic knowledge that tho people of each nation have of tho other-even -upon... the personal friendship of large numbers of tho people with each other. Personal , friendship make a friendly public opinion It is therefore the'highest political duty that Britons and Americans can have to build up porsonal knowledge of ono. another and personal friendship. "I venture to put before you a few delinito suggestions. Put in your echpols an elementary book' about the TJnited .States—not a dull text book, but a book written by .1 sympathetic man of accurate knowledge, which shall tell every child in Britain about the .country, about the people. A p6rrtir.otorybook will fail. Havo a hundred books written, if necessary, till the right one bo written. There is, as you know, ono great book written by an Englishman about the United States, Lord Bryco's 'American Commonwealth.' I wish it we're read by as many people hern as in America. But this "is not a book for children. On tho American side, too, I hope to see a modern elementary book about Great Britain rmt into llio schoole—a book that elmll tell children of tho present Great Britain, and point in tho right spirit to the future. . "Then-encourage the giving. of popular lectures by well-informed Americana about our country and our people. . . • Wo ought, too, to encourage and welcomo tho moving pictures of each country that are slinwn in the other—pictures of characteristic and instructive sce»es and activities."