Comparing London society as it was when I first knew it with what it has since become, I should say that its two most distinguishing features were its then comparative smallness and its practically unquestioned position. Its position was mainly founded on the hereditary possession of land, its nucleus being the heads of more or less ancient families whose rent rolls enabled them to occupy London houses and play an agreeable and ornamental part in the business of entertaining and being entertained for the few months called "the season." Certain qualifications in the way of family being given, mere personal charm and accomplishment would often secure for their possessors a high place in its ranks. Indeed, such qualifications were by no means always necessary, as was shown in still earlier days by the cases of Moore and Brummell; but, on the whole, the social conditions then prevalent in London coincided with what, in the country, I had known and accepted, when a child, as part of the order of Nature. Of society as represented by a definite upper class, the basis was still inheritance in the form of inherited land. This was no mere accident. It was a fact definitely explicable in terms of statistical history. At the time of the battle of Waterloo, outside the landed class there did not exist in England five hundred people whose incomes exceeded L5,000 a year. The landed class was typically the rich class of the country. The condition of things since then has in this respect been reversed. During the sixty years succeeding the battle of Waterloo business incomes exceeding L5,000 a year had increased numerically in the proportion of one to eight, while since that time the increase has been still more rapid. On the other hand, not only has the number of the large agricultural landlords shown no increase whatever, but since the year 1880 or thereabouts their aggregate rental has suffered an actual decrease, having fallen in the approximate proportion of seventy to fifty-two. This shrinkage in the fortunes of the old landed families, except those who were owners of minerals or land near towns, and the multiplication of families newly enriched by business, were, when I first knew London, proceeding at a rate which had never been known before. It was, however, slow in comparison with what it has since become, and the old landed families, at the time to which I am now alluding, still retained much of their old prestige and power, as is shown by the fact that the leaders of both political parties were still mainly drawn from the limited class in question. It is shown with even greater clearness by facts more directly presenting themselves to the eye of the ordinary observer.