"Of the fittest?"
We both laughed; but when I added, "Yes, for some qualities," we knew
(or I at least knew) that indeed that squalor of an earlier century is
associated with a hardness of fibre most intimately connected with the
survival of the English people.
Suppose that now in stress of circumstances, the toughness warps,
turns to ill-living, suspicion, selfishness and dishonesty, in the
grim determination not to "go under": is it then no longer venerable,
because it has ceased to be amiable? The onlooker should give an eye
to his own point of view.