“‘How do men get to be dictators, that’s what I want to know?’ Aunt Flora looked round disgruntledly but with an air as if soliciting approbation for her dissatisfaction.
‘Oh, the formula is simple,’ Walter said. ‘You gather around you all the ‘have-nots.’ You keep on the right side of the law, speaking, denouncing, promising, till, with all the natural discontent which exists in human nature poured out in your support, you carry the elections and are swung into the saddle. Just when your closest supporters become troublesome and the Army a little restive, you embrace the old order of nationalists and allay all their grievances and anxieties. With yourself now firmly in the saddle, the Army your obedient instrument, you shoot your erstwhile supporters as traitors to the national cause and become an out-and-out patriot. Bravo! bis! bis! But when the old order dutifully asks permission to decorate you for your patriotic services with one of their most ancient orders of nobility, you say, No. You are a simple man in a mackintosh, with a simple heart. Ostentation is foreign to your nature. Besides, aren’t you a revolutionary? But, above all, a patriot. Bravo! bis! bis!’”
William Gerhardie, Of Mortal Love