For Henry James, class was 'the essentially hierarchial plan of English society' which was 'the great and ever-present fact to the mind of a stranger; there is hardly a detail of life that does not in some degree betray it'.

Lord Beaverbrook was fundamentally a lonely man, with a low sense of his own self-worth, who was incapable of forming a stable, loving relationship with anyone. He could charm or he could bully; he could give or he could take; he was glad to see his guests arrive and pleased to see them go. Although many people genuinely loved him, he was incapable of believing that this was either possible or true. No wonder he was so restless, so impatient, so vindictive, so quick to lose his temper, so eager to stir things up.

Of all the memorable phrases that have been minted and mobilised to describe modern British royalty, 'constitutional monarchy' is virtually the only one which seemes to have neither been anticipated nor invented by Walter Bagehot. It was he who insisted that 'a princely marriage is the brilliant edition of a universal fact, and as such it rivets mankind'; and he who warned that the monarchy's 'mystery is its life. We must not let in daylight upon magic'.

He was, albeit only briefly, the hero of the world's hopes.

Royal relationships across the generations have often been strained and distant, rather than close and affectionate. Most eldest sons, interminably waiting to become king, have not been on the best of terms with the sovereign to whose death they look forward with a debilitating combination of guilt-ridden anxiety and eager anticipation. And younger sons (and daughters, too) have often found their lives empty of purpose: cut off by their royal statius, but unable to find anything rewarding with which to fill the time.

For Henry James, class was 'the essentially hierarchial plan of English society' which was 'the great and ever-present fact to the mind of a stranger; there is hardly a detail of life that does not in some degree betray it'.

David Irving has consistenly applied an evidential double standard, demanding absolute documentary proof to convict the Germans (as when he sought to show that Hitler was not responsible for the Holocaust), while relying on circumstantial evidence to condemn the British (as in his account of the Allied bombing of Dresden).