I need not allude here to that very common British Snob, who makes
desperate efforts at becoming intimate with the great Continental
aristocracy, such as old Rolls, the baker, who has set up his quarters
in the Faubourg Saint Germain, and will receive none but Carlists, and
no French gentleman under the rank of a Marquis. We can all of us laugh
at THAT fellow's pretensions well enough--we who tremble before a great
man of our own nation. But, as you say, my brave and honest John Bull
of a Snob, a French Marquis of twenty descents is very different from
an English Peer; and a pack of beggarly German and Italian Fuersten
and Principi awaken the scorn of an honest-minded Briton. But our
aristocracy!--that's a very different matter. They are the real leaders
of the world--the real old original and-no-mistake nobility.
Off with your cap, Snob; down on your knees, Snob, and truckle.
CHAPTER XXIV--ON SOME COUNTRY SNOBS
Tired of the town, where the sight of the closed shutters of the
nobility, my friends, makes my heart sick in my walks; afraid almost to
sit in those vast Pall Mall solitudes, the Clubs, and of annoying the
Club waiters, who might, I thought, be going to shoot in the country,
but for me, I determined on a brief tour in the provinces, and paying
some visits in the country which were long due.
My first visit was to my friend Major Ponto (H.
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