What the American does not realize--and one can hardly blame him--is this, that the average Englishman is reared up from schoolboyhood in the fear of two most awful and potent deities: "Side" and "Shop." It is "side" to talk about yourself, or your work, or your achievements, or your ambitions, or your wife, or anything that is yours. This is perhaps no bad thing, but it certainly handicaps you as a conversationalist, because naturally a man never talks so well as upon his own subject. The twin deity, "Shop," is an even more ruthless tyrant. Never, under any circumstances, may you discuss professional matters out of official hours. To talk "shop" is perhaps the most accursed crime in the English Secular Decalogue (set down hereafter). For instance, in an English military Mess, a junior officer who referred at table to matters connected with the life of the regiment would render himself liable to stern rebuke. At Oxford or Cambridge, an undergraduate who ventured, during dinner, upon a quotation from the Classics, would be fined pots of ale all around. In short, the more highly you are qualified to speak on a subject, the more slightingly you refer to it; and the more passionately you are interested in a matter, the less you say about it. However, perhaps it would be simpler to set down the Englishman's Secular Decalogue at length, appending thereto the appropriate comments of the proverbial Man from Missouri. Here it is. _The Englishman's Secular Decalogue_ (1) Thou shalt own allegiance to no man, save The King. Thou shalt be deferential to those above thee in station, and considerate of those below thee. To those of thine own rank thou mayest behave as seemeth good to thee. [_The Man from Missouri_: "I own allegiance to nothing on earth but the American flag. As a democrat, I recognize no man as being either above or below me in station."] (2) Thou shalt worship thine ancestors and family connections. [_The Man from Missouri_: "You got nothing on me there. We worship our Ancestors, too. Did you ever know an American who hadn't got his pedigree worked out to three places of decimals? Besides, that is why many of us have got such a soft spot for that funny old island of yours."] (3) Thou shalt not talk "shop." [_The Man from Missouri_: "That strikes me as punk. As a business man, without any mildewed delusions about ancestral acres, or the vulgarity of trade, my aim in life is to _do_ business, and do it all the time, and never worry about hurting the feelings of the family ghost."] (4) Thou shalt not put on side. [_The Man from Missouri_: "But you _do_!" _The Englishman_: "No, we _don't_! That stiffness of manner is due to shyness." _The Man from Missouri_: "Very well, then. Let it go at that."] (5) Thou shalt not speak aught but flippantly of matters that concern thee deeply.