ENGLAND A PERSON 149 



In her relations with individual Englishmen 

 England also shows her personality. The repre- 

 sentative abroad feels very vividly how she expects 

 him to act in certain ways — ways in accordance 

 with her character and her settled line of action. 

 And she conveys these expectations to him not only 

 in formal official instructions from her Government : 

 the most important of those expectations are con- 

 veyed in a far more subtle and intimate but most 

 unmistakable way. The English Government did 

 not write officially to Nelson at Trafalgar that 

 England expected every man to do his duty. But 

 Nelson, standing there for England, knew very 

 well that this was what England was expecting of 

 him and of those serving under him. A representa- 

 tive would find it very hard to locate the exact 

 dwelling-place of the heart and soul and mind of 

 England, whether in Parliament, or in the Press, 

 or in the Universities, or in factories, or in the 

 villages. But that there is an England expecting 

 him to behave himself in accordance with her 

 traditions and character, and to act on certain 

 general but quite definite lines, and who will admire 

 and reward him if he acts faithfully to her expec- 

 tations, and condemn and in extreme cases punish 

 him if he is unfaithful, he has not the shadow of a 

 doubt. Nor does he doubt that this England, 

 besides expecting a certain general line of conduct, 

 will and can constrain him to act in accordance with 

 her settled determination — that she has authority 

 and has power to give effect to her will. 



And the official governmental representatives 

 are not the only representatives of England. Every 



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