A NATIONAL CHARACTERISTIC. 333 



sectarians suspected me of being an ecclesiastical 

 spy. 



The Jews were more suspicious than any of the 

 others, particularly as the government was then vent- 

 ing on them one of its periodical fits of persecution. 



The women of the better orders of society are by no 

 means free from this unlovely trait. One morning, 

 after an all-night ride in a train, I roused up from fitful 

 snatches of sleep, indulged in sitting up, and bade a 

 nice old lady on the other side of the car, whom I had 

 conversed with the evening before, good-morning. 



" Some one has stolen my watch in the night," she 

 replied, holding up ruefully the chain that dangled from 

 ner bosom. Seeing that the snap was broken, I sug- 

 gested that it was only lost under the seats. She 

 shook her head, but acted on my suggestion, and im- 

 mediately found the watch. 



She and a young woman had slept on the same seats, 

 which can be pulled out and used as a mattress, and 

 missing her watch in the morning, she had, without a 

 moment's reflection, suspected the young woman of 

 robbing her. The idea that it might only be lost 

 seemed not to have entered her head. 



One cannot help laying the blame for this abnormal 

 development of one of the most unlovely traits of 

 human character to the pernicious influence of the sys- 

 tem of government under which they live. 



Suspicion and mutual distrust are the legitimate leg- 

 acy that an autocratic government, which has to be sus- 

 picious in order to exist, transmits to the people. In 

 short, it seemed to me simply a case of " like govern- 

 ment, like people." 



