up in the uniform of a soldier. If an Englishman wants to swindle
English people he would as soon think of dressing up in the uniform of a
messenger boy. Everything in England is done unofficially, casually, by
conversations and cliques. The one Parliament that really does rule
England is a secret Parliament; the debates of which must not be
published--the Cabinet. The debates of the Commons are sometimes
important; but only the debates in the Lobby, never the debates in the
House. Journalists do control public opinion; but it is not controlled
by the arguments they publish--it is controlled by the arguments between
the editor and sub-editor, which they do not publish. This casualness is
our English vice. It is at once casual and secret. Our public life is
conducted privately. Hence it follows that if an English swindler wished
to impress us, the last thing he would think of doing would be to put on
a uniform. He would put on a polite slouching air and a careless,
expensive suit of clothes; he would stroll up to the Mayor, be so
awfully sorry to disturb him, find he had forgotten his card-case,
mention, as if he were ashamed of it, that he was the Duke of Mercia,
and carry the whole thing through with the air of a man who could get
two hundred witnesses and two thousand retainers, but who was too tired
to call any of them. And if he did it very well I strongly suspect that
he would be as successful as the indefensible Captain at Koepenick.

Our tendency for many centuries past has been, not so much towards
creating an aristocracy (which may or may not be a good thing in
itself), as towards substituting an aristocracy for everything else. In
England we have an aristocracy instead of a religion. The nobility are
to the English poor what the saints and the fairies are to the Irish
poor, what the large devil with a black face was to the Scotch poor--the
poetry of life. In the same way in England we have an aristocracy
instead of a Government. We rely on a certain good humour and education
in the upper class to interpret to us our contradictory Constitution. No
educated man born of woman will be quite so absurd as the system that he
has to administer. In short, we do not get good laws to restrain bad
people. We get good people to restrain bad laws. And last of all we in
England have an aristocracy instead of an Army. We have an Army of which
the officers are proud of their families and ashamed of their uniforms.
If I were a