The world is living through depressing days enough and most
of us, without finding any attraction for the more flamboyant forms of patriotism, can take con- siderable satisfaction in calling ourselves Englishmen (or more broadly, Britons). While America wrestles with her financial crisis we can look back to our own experiences in 1931 and remember how swiftly and smoothly the machinery got working again after the first dislocation. We observe the conditions in which this month's election has been conducted in Germany and search our own experience in vain for anything comparable. We watch Cabinets following one another in rapid succession in France, each with an average life of a few months, and recognize some advantages at any rate in the possession of a stable government with a five years' tenure. Our unemployment figures are bad enough, but they are far better than America's or Germany's, and our budget balances, which few other budgets do. We have plenty of faults, and to do us justice we are fairly candid in telling each other of them, but there are some national virtues on which now and then we may congratulate ourselves.
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