Competition, emulation, and high wages give us an aristocracy of talent, genius, skill, tact, or whatever you like to call it; but you are by no means to understand that any of these aristocracies, or better classes, stand prominently before their fellows socially, or, that one is run after in preference to another; nobody runs after anybody in the World of London.

In this respect, no capital, no country on the face of the earth, resembles us; every where else you will find a leading class, giving a tone to society, and moulding it in some one or other direction; a predominating set, the pride of those who are in, the envy of those who are below it.  There is nothing of this kind in London; here every man has his own set, and every man his proper pride.  In every set, social or professional, there are great names, successful men, prominent; but the set is nothing the greater for them:  no man sheds any lustre upon his fellows, nor is a briefless barrister a whit more thought of because he and Lyndhurst are of the same profession.

Take a look at other places:  in money-getting places, you find society following, like so many dogs, the aristocracy of ’Change:  every man knows the worth of every other man, that is to say, what he is worth.

A good man, elsewhere a relative term, is there a man good for so much; hats are elevated and bodies depressed upon a scale of ten thousand pounds to an inch; “I hope you are well,” from one of the aristocracy of these places is always translated to mean, “I hope you are solvent,” and “how d’ye do?” from another, is equivalent to “doing a bill.”

Go abroad, to Rome for example—­You are smothered beneath the petticoats of an ecclesiastical aristocracy.  Go to the northern courts of Europe—­You are ill-received, or perhaps not received at all, save in military uniform; the aristocracy of the epaulet meets you at every turn, and if you are not at least an ensign of militia, you are nothing.  Make your way into Germany—­What do you find there? an aristocracy of functionaries, mobs of nobodies living upon everybodies; from Herr Von, Aulic councillor, and Frau Von, Aulic councilloress, down to Herr Von, crossing-sweeper, and Frau Von, crossing-sweeperess—­for the women there must be better-half even in their titles—­you find society led, or, to speak more correctly, society consisting of functionaries, and they, every office son of them, and their wives—­nay, their very curs—­alike insolent and dependent.  “Tray, Blanche, and Sweetheart, see they bark at me!” There, to get into society, you must first get into a place:  you must contrive to be the servant of the public before you are permitted to be the master:  you must be paid by, before you are in a condition to despise, the canaille.