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fully conscious of our real defects, and that we are assuming this bold, triumphant pose in order to brave it out; and, being thus convinced, they miss the full humour of the proceeding. For we are quite genuine in our quaint persuasion that we are heaping glory on ourselves, and are establishing a splendid prestige in the eyes of the world: the contempt of European nations is, we feel certain, a mere affectation bred of jealousy, while their unconcealed hostility is proof of the real respect which our prowess has produced.

The psychical root-cause of this collapse of humour, with the extraordinary misjudgments to which it lends itself, is the total eclipse of sympathetic imagination involved in the self-absorption of the fray. The Jingo spirit is a blind fury, which disables a nation from getting outside itself or recognizing the impartial spectator in another. Here is the quintessence of savagery, a complete absorption in the present details of a sanguinary struggle inhibiting the mental faculties of imagination and forethought which are the only safeguards of a policy.