The case is different with the "bogus diploma" trade. Business and not vanity is doubtless the ruling motive with the foreigners who strut in plumage bought of the Philadelphia "university." The diploma of M. D. is worth its price for display before the eyes of the patients waiting in the "doctor's" office, while to Squeers of Dotheboys Hall the degree of A. M. is good for at least three new pupils, and Ph. D. for a dozen. I presume that in some of the foreign magazines and weekly newspapers of a certain class, D. D. or L.L. D. has a real cash value of at least five per cent. more in pay, or perhaps it may turn the scale in favor of an article which, without that honorary signature, might be put in the waste-paper basket. So long as such practical results can be had the diploma trade is likely to flourish, with full variety offered to buyers. Now, it is not impossible to turn to trade account an Order of the Elephant, of the Iron Crown, of the Legion of Honor, or of the Medjidieh, as probably shrewd mechanics,contractors, and tradesmen in America and England can attest. But while this is an additional inducement to buyers, I am sure the new industry appeals to a loftier emotion than that of mere money-making. America, in fact, is ripe for this improvement. The modern phrase of ambition here in America is "social status;" and dealers in heraldry are doing a business so thriving in coats of arms for seal rings and scented note-paper, that I fancy it is this that has suggested the trade in noble titles. The village of Podunk looks down on the neighboring town of Hardscrabble. "Hardscrabble," say the scornful Podunkers, "plumes itself on its wealth, but Podunk prides herself on her birth--on her extremely old families!" In fact you find all over the republic people talking of their aristocratic families, and their "refined neighborhood," and "refined birth"--even where, after all, it may be only a case of refined petroleum.