ilia. "You
know, Jack, I have always said there was something exotic about you. You
are much too energetic and progressive for this settled old country. If
you had been born in America I suppose you would have been president at
the earliest moment the constitution permitted."

He hesitated a moment, then delivered himself of a bombshell. "I was
born in America," he said.

His eyes moved slowly from one stupefied face to another. "As I left at
the age of five weeks I can hardly claim that the incident left an
indelible impress. But the fact remains that I should be eligible for
the presidency if I chose to become an American citizen."

Isabel looked at her relative with an accession of interest; he had
suddenly ceased to be an alien, become in a measure a personal
possession. "Come over and try it," she said, impulsively. "_There_ is a
career worth while! A young country as full of promise as of faults!
Think of the variousness of achievement! England's history is made. If
you are all they claim, you might really make history in the United
States. If I only had a brother--" Her eyes were flashing for the first
time. "However--they say you love the fight. It is far more difficult to
become a president of the United States than a prime-minister of
England, for with us family influence counts for nothing."

"I am afraid I have not the qualities that do count. To be as frank as
yourself--I don't think I could stand your politics."

"But think of the excitement of really sounding your capacities!"
Impersonality was an achievement with Isabel and she could always
command it. "You can never do that here, no matter how brilliant your
success. There must always be the question of how far you would have
gone without your family, and friends of equal power. The ugliest lesson
of life is its snobbishness. Even when the herd can expect no return, a
blind instinct--doubtless an inheritance from the days when there were
but two classes--drives it to beat the drums for the socially elect. We
have enough of that in America, heaven knows, but the best thing that
can be said of American politics is that they are free of it. Besides,
if our politics are bad, so much the better for you. You might do for
the United States what your English great-grandfather helped to do for
this country in 1832. You might be another 'Great Revolutioner,' like
your still more illustrious ancestor, Sam Adams. You'll never, never
have such an opportunity to