d sentiment that the line of
its progress seems hitherto a mere track of ruin. In the very word is
something from which we shrink; it seems to signify nothing less than a
national apostasy, a denial of the faith in which we won our glory. The
democratic Englishman is, by the laws of his own nature, in parlous case;
he has lost the ideal by which he guided his rude, prodigal, domineering
instincts; in place of the Right Honourable, born to noble things, he has
set up the mere Plebs, born, more likely than not, for all manner of
baseness. And, amid all his show of loud self-confidence, the man is
haunted with misgiving.

The task before us is no light one. Can we, whilst losing the class,
retain the idea it embodied? Can we English, ever so subject to the
material, liberate ourselves from that old association, yet guard its
meaning in the sphere of spiritual life? Can we, with eyes which have
ceased to look reverently on worn-out symbols, learn to select from among
the grey-coated multitude, and place in reverence even higher him who
"holds his patent of nobility straight from Almighty God"? Upon that
depends the future of England. In days gone by, our very Snob bore
testimony after his fashion to our scorn of meanness; he at all events
imagined himself to be imitating those who were incapable of a sordid
transaction, of a plebeian compliance. But the Snob, one notes, is in
the way of degeneracy; he has new exemplars; he speaks a ruder language.
Him, be sure, in one form or another, we shall have always with us, and
to observe his habits is to note the tenor of the time. If he have at
the back of his dim mind no living ideal which lends his foolishness a
generous significance, then indeed--_videant consules_.

XXIII.

A visit from N-. He stayed with me two days, and I wish he could have
stayed a third. (Beyond the third day, I am not sure that any man would
be wholly welcome. My strength will bear but a certain amount of
conversation, even the pleasantest, and before long I desire solitude,
which is rest.)

The mere sight of N-, to say nothing of his talk, did me good. If
appearances can ever be trusted, there are few men who get more enjoyment
out of life. His hardships were never excessive; they did not affect his
health or touch his spirits; probably he is in every way a better man for
having--as he says--"gone through the mill." His recollection of the
time when he had to work hard for a five