my
old Oxford tutor, wants to meet you; I wish you'd ask him down for a day
or two. He has the oddest opinions, but he's very stimulating.' It would
not occur to us that the oddity of the Oxford don's opinions would lead
him to blow up the house; because the Oxford don is an English type.
Suppose somebody said, 'Do let me bring old Colonel Robinson down for
the week-end; he's a bit of a crank but quite interesting.' We should
not anticipate the colonel running amuck with a carving-knife and
offering up human sacrifice in the garden; for these are not among the
daily habits of an old English colonel; and because we know his habits,
we do not care about his opinions. But suppose somebody offered to bring
a person from the interior of Kamskatka to stay with us for a week or
two, and added that his religion was a very extraordinary religion, we
should feel a little more inquisitive about what kind of religion it
was. If somebody wished to add a Hairy Ainu to the family party at
Christmas, explaining that his point of view was so individual and
interesting, we should want to know a little more about it and him. We
should be tempted to draw up as fantastic an examination paper as that
presented to the emigrant going to America. We should ask what a Hairy
Ainu was, and how hairy he was, and above all what sort of Ainu he was.
Would etiquette require us to ask him to bring his wife? And if we did
ask him to bring his wife, how many wives would he bring? In short, as
in the American formula, is he a polygamist? Merely as a point of
housekeeping and accommodation the question is not irrelevant. Is the
Hairy Ainu content with hair, or does he wear any clothes? If the police
insist on his wearing clothes, will he recognise the authority of the
police? In short, as in the American formula, is he an anarchist?

Of course this generalisation about America, like other historical
things, is subject to all sorts of cross divisions and exceptions, to
be considered in their place. The negroes are a special problem, because
of what white men in the past did to them. The Japanese are a special
problem, because of what men fear that they in the future may do to
white men. The Jews are a special problem, because of what they and the
Gentiles, in the past, present, and future, seem to have the habit of
doing to each other. But the point is not that nothing exists in America
except this idea; it is that nothing like this idea exists anywhere
exc