One day men would dare to wander again, and dare to pitch their tents in strange places ... but not those who had once been victims; not Richard Marcus, nor his sons, nor his sons’ sons, he vowed grimly....
And with that came the idea to dig himself in. And with the idea, determination.
He would marry—Molly, perhaps.... A sort of quick ripple seemed to pass over the world when he thought of Molly and of his savage outburst with her in the orchard. He would marry her—as he had said then, whether she liked it or not—and their son should be born in England, brought up in England, owning land in England; he should be reared to no ideas that were not purely insular; and he in his turn should marry an English girl, and their son—would he be enough Englishman yet to be allowed to tolerate foreigners? Or must that safer, easier attitude wait for the son of his son’s son? How many generations did it take to plant a man securely, son of the soil?
Retrogressive, all this. The result of the war. Who could afford, after such drastic teaching, again to omit patriotism from fundamental need?
Richard began to muse on just how fundamental was the need; and how much slapped on from the surface, by suggestion? What was patriotism? He had first asked himself this on a certain evening of shock, three years ago; and had since only succeeded in discovering, very thoroughly, what was the lack of it.
Sense of property, to start with ... but that presupposed actual ownership; that a farmer, a landed proprietor, was more directly inspired to fight for England, than—oh, than cockney Corporal Plunkett, who was probably serving in a shop before the call came.
Birthplace, then?—But Richard himself could answer the question of how much that mattered to the soul.... The law was surely overstressing topography.... The law was polishing a hollow shell of sentimentality. David—David was nearer truth when he defined patriotism as the sense of family: son of our house; thence to local fanaticism: sons of our village—and sons of our country, which was patriotism ... but it must stop there.... Sons of our five continents ... it sounded chilly, expanded so far. Internationalism again—Richard, denying it, yet could not prevent thought from crashing up against it from time to time.... One day, yes—but the soul must first catch cold in the pursuit of it.
What was patriotism? unity of pride in the nation’s slow-born history and tradition? Impetus of divine fury which springs from sanctuary violated?... He remembered his rage as the Gothas headed their insolent course straight up the Thames—“My Thames” ... he looked down the estuary towards the sea ... loving it ... looked up the river past Benfleet ... good British name that, pungent with jolly naval tradition ... his inward sight followed the dwindling stream through London, a draped lady stepping delicately beneath crossed blades of silver, searchlights that protected her ... and still farther up lay the Thames valley, noontide of green and gold drowsing gardens, and the glory of ancient woods.... “My Thames!”
Suddenly Richard flung back his head and laughed, heartily and with no trace of bitterness, at the mere idea that he could love it less because his mother happened to be somewhere else than here at the hour of his birth. It was—so entirely ridiculous! Screaming little red-faced atom ... what possible difference could it make to him, sucking at his bottle, if Hun-land or home-land were beyond the windows?... A world constructed on the arbitrary basis that each person must be screwed down solemnly and with ritual, in residence and in feeling, to the consecrated spot in which he was born, was really not unlike a Gilbert and Sullivan opera.