What astonished me most, however, was to find in the railway carriage
a respectable looking man reading a comic journal. True, he did not
laugh much: he had got decency enough for that; but what was a
grief-stricken citizen doing with a comic journal, anyhow? Before I
had been in London an hour I had come to the conclusion that we
English must be a people of wonderful self-control. The day before,
according to the newspapers, the whole country was in serious danger
of pining away and dying of a broken heart. In one day the nation
had pulled itself together. "We have cried all day," they had said
to themselves, "we have cried all night. It does not seem to have
done much good. Now let us once again take up the burden of life."
Some of them--I noticed it in the hotel dining-room that evening--
were taking quite kindly to their food again.

We make believe about quite serious things. In war, each country's
soldiers are always the most courageous in the world. The other
country's soldiers are always treacherous and tricky; that is why
they sometimes win. Literature is the art of make-believe.

"Now all of you sit round and throw your pennies in the cap," says
the author, "and I will pretend that there lives in Bayswater a young
lady named Angelina, who is the most beautiful young lady that ever
existed. And in Notting Hill, we will pretend, there resides a young
man named Edwin, who is in love with Angelina."

And then, there being sufficient pennies in the cap, the author
starts away, and pretends that Angelina thought this and said that,
and that Edwin did all sorts of wonderful things. We know he is
making it all up as he goes along. We know he is making up just what
he thinks will please us. He, on the other hand, has to make-believe