[Turning on them] Of course they have to make you a Bishop and
Boxer a General, because, after all, their blessed rabble of
snobs and cads and half-starved shopkeepers cant do government
work; and the bounders and week-enders are too lazy and vulgar.
Theyd simply rot without us; but what do they ever do for us?
what attention do they ever pay to what we say and what we want?
I take it that we Bridgenorths are a pretty typical English
family of the sort that has always set things straight and stuck
up for the right to think and believe according to our
conscience. But nowadays we are expected to dress and eat as the
week-end bounders do, and to think and believe as the converted
cannibals of Central Africa do, and to lie down and let every
snob and every cad and every halfpenny journalist walk over us.
Why, theres not a newspaper in England today that represents what
I call solid Bridgenorth opinion and tradition. Half of them read
as if they were published at the nearest mother's meeting, and
the other half at the nearest motor garage. Do you call these
chaps gentlemen? Do you call them Englishmen? I dont.[He throws
himself disgustedly into the nearest chair].
THE GENERAL [excited by Reginald's eloquence] Do you see my
uniform? What did Collins say? It strikes the eye.
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