Читать книгу Things That Have Interested Me - Arnold Bennett - Страница 11

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The Roumanian helter-skelter is said to have caused a "wave of depression" to run through the country. And there are pulse-feelers who regularly every week register—by a gauge of their own—the state of public opinion in regard to the war. According to them the fluctuations, especially in London, are continual and very appreciable. For myself, I have never been able to appreciate them. I find that British mankind is steadily divided into three main classes, and that nothing but an extremely great and striking event will shift individuals out of one class into another class. The first class consists of optimistic persons—and military officers are well represented in it. These persons have remained optimistic through everything, and for them the war is always going to end in about three months. They do not reason; they feel. The second class consists of grim, obstinate persons; it is the largest class. Speculation as to the end of the war rather bores them. They drive on, and on, and on. They are inclined to ignore both the pros and the cons. They do not reason; they feel. The third class consists of pessimistic persons. They were pessimistic after Mons and through Gallipoli; they were pessimistic when Douaumont was taken by the Germans, and equally pessimistic when it was taken from the Germans. They do not reason; they feel. Their haunting fear is that civilisation is doomed. This fear seems to keep them awake at nights, and they reflect in the dark upon previous disasters to civilisation.

I do not profess history, but I will venture the view that the great historical collapses have been made possible by one thing, namely, the corrupt growth of privilege. This was the real cause, for example, of the Roman collapse, of the Carlovingian collapse, and of the Bourbon collapse. Indeed, history is quite monotonous in this respect. I will also venture the view that the collapses have steadily decreased in intensity. Even the Northern tribes were anxious, indeed pathetically anxious, to preserve Roman institutions. As for the French revolution, it was immediately followed by a system decidedly superior to that which had been destroyed. Now, I do not see any sign of the corrupt extension of privilege—either at present or in recent times. I see the reverse. (True, a vast deal of privilege still survives—but it is a survival.) Nor can I find any reason whatever why civilisation should collapse. The war is terrific compared with previous wars, but our resources are terrific compared with the resources of our ancestors. I take little notice of the boastings of the prominent. That which will count is not what people say, however sincerely, but what lies at the bottom of men's minds. To wit, the instinct of self-preservation. This instinct acts in one way at the beginning of a row; but it acts in another way towards the end of a row. Long before civilisation is really endangered, this master instinct—far stronger even than conceit in the great mass of mankind—will come into play.

Meanwhile a good proof of the prevalence of grimness and optimism is the fullness of London. A director of the leading hotel company told me last week that London had never—during or before the war—been so full as it is to-day. The offices of flat agents have been thronged. I say "thronged." Hotels are turning away old customers because they are literally and physically full—not merely full in the commercial sense. More, they have increased their prices. They were well justified in doing so. For two years of the war the principal expensive hotels kept their prices reduced by about 50 per cent. They ignored the increase of costs. They gave nothing to their shareholders and very little to their debenture-holders. But they saved the hotel habit alive. They are now getting a bit—only a bit—of their own back. The causes of the fullness of London, I am informed by those whose perspicuity I respect, are five: 1, the Somme advance; 2, the destruction of Zeppelins; 3, soldiers' relatives from the Colonies; 4, British soldiers' relatives who come to London to see soldiers off and are kept there because soldiers seldom know when they are going off; 5 (and chiefly), restlessness of people immobilised in the country who cannot abide the country any longer and must have a change. Of course, town houses are closed. But town houses are being opened too. I know of a magnate who has chosen this moment to re-fit a big West End mansion. The regulations of the Ministry of Munitions prevent him from doing anything really noble in the structural line, but he is managing to spend over £2000 in curtains. It is true that the police are very strict about exposed lights! And, you see, Mr. M'Kenna was so ill-advised as to state publicly his opinion that the country would stand the financial strain to the end. Still, the year's expenditure will probably exceed his estimate by over a hundred millions.

11 November 1916.