in the country than in London, especially in those remnants of time
which the English call weekends, and which stretch from Friday afternoon
to the next Monday morning. It is within these limits that people are
ordinarily "asked down," and as the host usually lives from five to ten
miles from the nearest station, the guest is met there by a motor which
hurls him over the intervening ground at the speed of the train he has
just left. The motor is still the rich man's pleasure, as the week-end
is his holiday; and it will be long before the one will be the poor
man's use, or the other his leisure. For the present he must content
himself, in England, at least, with his own legs, and with the
bank-holiday which now comes so often as to be dreaded by his betters
when it lets him loose upon their travel and sojourn in excursional
multitude. This is not likely ever to come under question of affecting
the London season, as one heard the week-end accused of doing. It was
theorized that people went out of town so much, in order to be at home
in the country for their friends, that with two afternoons and three
nights lost to the festivities of London, the season was sensibly if not
vitally affected. But that was in the early weeks of it. As it grew and
prospered through the latter half of June and the whole of July, the
week-end, as an inimical factor, was no longer mentioned. It even began
to be recognized as an essential element of the season. Like the king's
visits to Denmark, to Ireland, to Germany, it really served to intensify
the season.

At this point, I find it no longer possible to continue celebrating that
great moment in the social life of a vast empire without accusing myself
of triviality and hypocrisy. I have become aware that I really care
nothing about it, and know almost as little. I fancy that with most
English people who have passed the heyday of their youth, perhaps
without having drunk deeply, or at all, of the delirious fountain of