But that is the affair of a possible future,
and the actual Englishman is certainly not yet any sort of
American, unless, indeed, for good and for bad, he is a better
sort of Bostonian. He does not even speak the American language,
whatever outlandish accent he uses in speaking his own. It may be
said, rather too largely, too loosely, that the more cultivated
he is, the more he will speak like a cultivated American, until
you come to the King, or the Royal Family, with whom a strong
German accent is reported to prevail. The Englishman may write
American, if he is a very good writer, but in no case does he
spell American. He prefers, as far as he remembers it, the Norman
spelling, and, the Conqueror having said "_geole_," the
Conquered print "gaol," which the American invader must pronounce
"jail," not "gayol."
The mere mention of the Royal Family advances us to the most
marked of all the superficial English characteristics; or,
perhaps, loyalty is not superficial, but is truly of the blood
and bone, and not reasoned principle, but a passion induced by
the general volition.
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