Mr. Frank Buckland writes: 'The crowd stood like a lot of marble statues; nobody offered to move, or say, or do, or suggest anything. Upon my word, I think an English crowd is very selfish or exceedingly stupid.' Mr. Buckland's sharp alternative was needless; any London crowd may be entirely what he suggests. But this is their affliction, for the vicious circle makes itself complete. By leasehold influence the intellect is weakened and sinks into dull selfishness; it thus becomes incompetent to recognize the cause of its affliction and to undertake the cure.
This mental weakness manifests itself not merely in the general absence of superior men, but by a wide-spread disregard or want of scrupulous financial honesty. Those who have special insight into the domestic life of London families, and know more than the world at large about their income and expenditure, can give a curious account of their condition. A proportion, whether large or small we will not say, though it is fairly calculable, are careful people, and habitually honest, but the rest proceed upon a constant system of indebtedness. Young men who seldom fail to spend their money quite as quickly as they earn it, marry on their income, and expect, without a thought of calculation, that enough will come whenever more is wanted. The proceeding is not limited to any rank of life, but we will take in illustration the abundant class of clerks, commercial and professional, whose time is spent in most elaborate contrivances to prevent one set of 'Christian' gentlemen from cheating, or from being cheated by their fellow-Christians. Under present business circumstances these poor men are commonly condemned to life-long drudgery with little pay. Considering the kind of work they do, the pay, compared to what is given to accomplished artisans, is quite sufficient, and they might live well on it, with comfort, in a simple way. But they must live, it seems, 'like gentlemen;' their wives and daughters, too, are 'ladies,' which, interpreted by them, means people not accustomed to
