was palpable: his name was continually in men's mouths, and his fame grew by
repetition. As Tiberius said of Mucianus:

""Omnium quae dixerat feceratque, arte quadam ostentator"" (He had a knack of
showing off and advertising whatever he said or did).

But no personal qualities, however eminent, no gifts, no graces of heart or
head or soul could have brought a young man to Oscar Wilde's social position
and popularity in a few years.

Another cause was at work lifting him steadily. From the time he left Oxford he
was acclaimed and backed by a small minority of passionate admirers whom I have
called his fuglemen. These admirers formed the constant factor in his progress
from social height to height. For the most part they were persons usually
called "sexual inverts," who looked to the brilliancy of his intellect to gild
their esoteric indulgence. This class in England is almost wholly recruited
from the aristocracy and the upper middle-class that apes the "smart set." It
is an inevitable product of the English boarding school and University system;
indeed one of the most characteristic products. I shall probably bring upon
myself a host of enemies by this assertion, but it has been weighed and must
stand. Fielding has already put the same view on record: he says:

"A public school, Joseph, was the cause of all the calamities which he
afterwards suffered. Public schools are the nurseries of all vice and
immorality. All the wicked fellows whom I remember at the University were
bred at them....."

If boarding-school life with its close intimacies between boys from twelve to
eighteen years of age were understood by English mothers, it is safe to say that
every boarding-house in every school would disappear in a single night, and