To have created a Welfare State was a great achievement; but we must go on to create a Welfare Planet.

To be extravagant you need money. True. But you do not need your own money.

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.

What beefsteak is to Argentina, flamenco to Spain, cool reserve and self-control in all situations to an Englishman, what vodka is to a Russian and beer to a Bavarian, what money is to a Swiss, that is outdoor-life to an Australian. It is a noble mania, better than vodka, better than cool reserve, better than money.

When a wicked and unworthy subject annoyed the Sultan of Turkey or the Czar of Russia, he had his head cut of without much ceremony; but when the same happened in England, the monarch declared : "We are not amused".

In England the boy pats his adored one on the back and says softly, "I don't object, you know." If he is quite mad with passion, he may add: "I rather fancy you, in fact.

Bargaining is a repulsive habit; compromise is one of the highest human virtues - the difference between the two being that the first is practised on the Continent, the latter in Great Britain.