Why should we
jeer at him because he has a great many uniforms, for instance? The very
essence of the really imaginative man is that he realises the various
types or capacities in which he can appear. Every one of us, or almost
every one of us, does in reality fulfil almost as many offices as
Pooh-Bah. Almost every one of us is a ratepayer, an immortal soul, an
Englishman, a baptised person, a mammal, a minor poet, a juryman, a
married man, a bicyclist, a Christian, a purchaser of newspapers, and a
critic of Mr. Alfred Austin. We ought to have uniforms for all these
things. How beautiful it would be if we appeared to-morrow in the
uniform of a ratepayer, in brown and green, with buttons made in the
shape of coins, and a blue income-tax paper tastefully arranged as a
favour; or, again, if we appeared dressed as immortal souls, in a blue
uniform with stars. It would be very exciting to dress up as Englishmen,
or to go to a fancy dress ball as Christians.
Some of the costumes I have suggested might appear a little more
difficult to carry out. The dress of a person who purchases newspapers
(though it mostly consists of coloured evening editions arranged in a
stiff skirt, like that of a saltatrice, round the waist of the wearer)
has many mysterious points. The attire of a person prepared to criticise
the Poet Laureate is something so awful and striking that I dare not
even begin to describe it; the one fact which I am willing to reveal,
and to state seriously and responsibly, is that it buttons up behind.
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