Signor Marconi, in an interview in Washington, praised American democracy.
"Over here," he said, "you respect a man for what he is himself - not for what his family is - and thus you remind me of the gardener in Bologna who helped me with my first wireless apparatus.
"As my mother's gardener and I were working on my apparatus together a young count joined us one day, and while he watched us work the count boasted of his lineage.
"The gardener, after listening a long while, smiled and said:
"'If you come from an ancient family, it's so much the worse for you sir; for, as we gardeners say, the older the seed the worse the crop.'"
