British Empire depends on trade, that we are a nation of traders, that
all our policy is shaped by trade, that therefore it can only be
hypocrisy in us to pretend to any of the finer feelings. This is not,
as you might suppose, the harmless sally of a one-eyed wit; it is the
carefully reasoned belief of Germany's profoundest political thinkers.
They do not understand a cavalier, so they confidently assert that there
is no such thing in nature. That is a bad mistake to make about any
nation, but perhaps worst when it is made about the English, for the
cavalier temper in England runs through all classes. You can find it in
the schoolmaster, the small trader, the clerk, and the labourer, as
readily as in the officer of dragoons, or the Arctic explorer. The
Roundheads won the Civil War, and bequeathed to us their political
achievements. From the Cavaliers we have a more intimate bequest: it is
from them, not from the Puritans, that the fighting forces of the
British Empire inherit their outlook on the world, their freedom from
pedantry, and that gaiety and lightness of courage which makes them
carry their lives like a feather in the cap.

I am not saying that our qualities, good or bad, commend us very readily
to strangers. The people of England, on the whole, are respected more
than they are liked. When I call them fanciers of other nations, I feel
it only fair to add that some of those other nations express the same
truth in different language. I have often heard the complaint made that
Englishmen cannot speak of foreigners without an air of patronage. It is
impossible to deny this charge, for, in a question of manners, the
impressions you produce are your manners; and there is no doubt about
this impression. There is a certain coldness about the upright and
humane Englishman which repels and intimidates any trivial human being
who approaches him. Most men would forgo their claim to justice for the
chance of being liked. They would rather have their heads broken, or