Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1904-11-01
SOCIETY IN ENGLAND
power ~ B15TE AND INFLUENCE
OF THE LANDOWNlNG CLASS.

POWER or 61STE AND INFLUENCE
OF THE LANDOWNlNG CLASS.
The Number of Things That n "Gen-
tleman" Cannot Do Without Losing
Social Prestige Is Too Great by
Far to Catalogue.
An interesting book might be writ
ten on the influence Of the English
landowning class. Even in these days
of ubiquitous manufactures, when to
look at map Of England is to wonder
how it is possible for landowning
class even to exist, the social and po-
litical influence of that class is some
thing more than maintained.
The ambition of every successful
Englishman is to have "a place in the
country to get foothold on the as
piring territorial ladder, and the ranks
of the landed gentry are continually
. being reinforced, more so perhaps to-
day than ever before, by rNeruits from
the industrial army. The immense util-
ity of the English country gentleman
will not be questioned by any one who
really knows England.
But at the same time it is equally in
disputable that the sort Of life he at
fects-the endless indulgence in sport,
the salmon stream, the grouse moor,
the hunting box, the pheasant preserve
and SO on-is on the whole one Of more
or less harmless and often irresponsi-
bic idleness and that the neighborhood
in which be lives is rarely apt to re-
gard him as an apostle of strenuous
ness. .y;e, 80, =
The Country" everywhere stands for
leisure, and so long as the country"
continues to represent the supreme OBJ
ject of an Englishman's ambition and
his social ideal so long will England be
leisurely. .l,..sv -. =. ....- >.
Again, in an old and stable land, with
social standards as fixed as the social
foundations and governed by mon
archy, the conventions play an enor-
nous part, and the conventions in Eng
land are all against hard work. It is
the leisure class that rules, that makes
up society, that holds all the positions
men naturally covet. 49, t..,.
A sort OF -Four Hundred atmos-
phere permeates England. In America
one gets a whit Of 1t on Fifth avenue
and at Newport, but in England one Is
never away from it. The number Of
things, for instance, that a gentleman"
cannot do without losing social caste is,
in England, SO prodigious as to form
almost q schedule Of forbidden in
dustries. There are some trades and
professions that are respectable" and
those that are not.
Only an Englishman knows which is
which, why doctor ranks socially
above a dentist, why a man who sells
should be irretrievably below the man
who manufa ctures, and he, the Eng
hshman, knows it by an instinct which
is born in, him and which he never
examines and so cannot define. Any
one who can tell why the merchant
should consider himself and be con-
sidered by others the social superior
Of the biggest storekeeper in the king
dom will be we'll on the way toward
understanding England.
The daughter of wealthy manufac-
turer of kettles marries the owner Of
the largest dry goods store in London.
Why should she be thought and spo-
ken Of as having married a little,
though only a little, beneath her? Per-
. sonally, do not know. I merely OBJ
serve, without attempting an explana-
ton, that the man in the wholesale
business is mose looked up to than the
man in the retail business, that while
the former is not averse to talking
about his affairs, the latter is only too
anxious to "sink the shop" and that
social position in England is regulated
BY host Of perfectly Fictitious and
conventional considerations more read
lily felt than expressed.
Such graduatons exist of course to
some extent everywhere, but nowhere
are they 80 stereotyped, nowhere do
they strike SO deeply, as in England.
have never yet been able to discover
an Englishman who had not the social
privilege of despising some other Eng
Hshman, and the lower one penetrates
In the social scale the more complex
and mysterious and the more rigidly
defined do these lines Of demarcation
become.
The point is that throughout England
the sense Of the nobility Of work for
its own sake, if not actually lost, has
become so confused by the intrusion
Of quite alien factors that the sphere
Of action open to young man Of what
ever rank is sensibly circumscribed.
The country, while democratic in form,
is not democratic in spirit. 1t has not
accepted and does not subscribe to
that gospel of work which lies at the
root Of American strength, American
success, American democracy.
Any one who has looked into English
trade unionism must have realized how
largely it is mixed up with class spirit.
The worHngman who knows that his
smployer drives down to the Office at
half past 10, takes couple Of hours
for lunch, is home again shortly after
3 and thinks himself somewhat Of a
. 1nv,,S I,n q.