‘And yet, you know, there is something in the kingship, Firmin. It stiffened up my august little grandfather. It gave my grandmother a kind of awkward dignity even when she was cross—and she was very often cross. They both had a profound sense of responsibility. My poor father’s health was wretched during his brief career; nobody outside the circle knows just how he screwed himself up to things. “My people expect it,” he used to say of this tiresome duty or that. Most of the things they made him do were silly—it was part of a bad tradition, but there was nothing silly in the way he set about them.... The spirit of kingship is a fine thing, Firmin; I feel it in my bones; I do not know what I might not be if I were not a king. I could die for my people, Firmin, and you couldn’t. No, don’t say you could die for me, because I know better. Don’t think I forget my kingship, Firmin, don’t imagine that. I am a king, a kingly king, by right divine. The fact that I am also a chattering young man makes not the slightest difference to that. But the proper text-book for kings, Firmin, is none of the court memoirs and Welt-Politik books you would have me read; it is old Fraser’s _Golden Bough_. Have you read that, Firmin?’ Firmin had. ‘Those were the authentic kings. In the end they were cut up and a bit given to everybody. They sprinkled the nations—with Kingship.’ Firmin turned himself round and faced his royal master. ‘What do you intend to do, sir?’ he asked. ‘If you will not listen to me, what do you propose to do this afternoon?’ The king flicked crumbs from his coat. ‘Manifestly war has to stop for ever, Firmin. Manifestly this can only be done by putting all the world under one government. Our crowns and flags are in the way. Manifestly they must go.’ ‘Yes, sir,’ interrupted Firmin, ‘but _what_ government? I don’t see what government you get by a universal abdication!’ ‘Well,’ said the king, with his hands about his knees, ‘_We_ shall be the government.’ ‘The conference?’ exclaimed Firmin. ‘Who else?’ asked the king simply. ‘It’s perfectly simple,’ he added to Firmin’s tremendous silence. ‘But,’ cried Firmin, ‘you must have sanctions! Will there be no form of election, for example?’ ‘Why should there be?’ asked the king, with intelligent curiosity. ‘The consent of the governed.’