On the Continent there is one topic which should be avoided-the weather; in England, if you do not repeat the phrase "Lovely day, isn't it?" at least two hundred times a day, you are considered a bit dull.

In England only uneducated people show off their knowledge; nobody quotes Latin or Greek authors in the course of conversation, unless he has never read them.

A foreign observer is struck by our gentleness: by the orderly behaviour of the English crowds, the lack of pushing and quarrelling, the willingness to form queues.

Israel also deprived the world of its chance of shedding tears of genuine sympathy over her destruction. The world resents this; it likes to feel noble and sympathetic.

A couple from Sydney or Melbourne might leave on the same day for their holiday: the wife might go sun-bathing at Surfers Paradise, in Queensland, the husband ski-ing in the Snowy Mountains. A lucky country.

If somebody tells you an obviously untrue story, on the Continent you would remark, "You are a liar, Sir, and a rather dirty one at that." In England you just say "Oh, is that so?" Or "That's rather an unusual story, isn't it?

The English have no soul; they have the understatement instead.