94 THE FAMILY AND THE NATION 



members have time to get acclimatized to their new 

 position and fresh responsibilities before the next onward 

 move. It also becomes evident that the same class of 

 ability is usually manifested through several centuries, 

 whether that ability be military, diplomatic, or com- 

 mercial, giving a very definite impression of the varieties 

 of talent that exist in the world, and are not by any 

 means always interchangeable. 



In considering families that have risen into promi- 

 nence from time to time, it should be remembered 

 that in England we have three great periods of national 

 and economic expansion — that of the thirteenth and 

 fourteenth centuries, corresponding with the crusades 

 and the English occupation of France, the remark- 

 able Elizabethan outgrowth of the sixteenth century, 

 and the great movements of the nineteenth century, 

 the effects of which we vv^ill treat separately. It 

 will be noticed that these epochs occur, roughly 

 speaking, at intervals of three hundred years, the 

 span of ten generations. Each of the periods gave 

 an opportunity for the latent ability of the nation 

 to come to the front — that ability which by marriages 

 and intermarriages had accumulated in certain families 

 and individuals during the preceding centuries. The 

 aristocracy of race and intellect was waiting ready to 

 declare itself as soon as the opportunity was given. 

 In any such time of expansion, the abler families rose 

 first, the less able followed as the road was made easier, 

 and the way to success was paved in front of them. So 

 it is that all good people, looking back over such a 

 period, are apt to lament the falling off of ability, and 

 to tell tales of the " giants " of those early days. Truly 



