"I would not like to say that Polchester had a more snobbish spirit than other Cathedral towns, but there is no doubt that, thirty years ago, the lines were drawn very clearly between the 'Cathedral' and the 'Others'....
When Joan arrived, then, in the Deanery dining-room, there was a fine gathering. Very unsophisticated they would all have been considered by the present generation. Lady Rose and Lady Mary, who were both of them nearer forty than thirty, had of course had some experience of London, and had been even to Paris and Rome. Of the 'Others' at this time, only Betty Callender, who had been born in India, and the Foresters had been farther, in all their lives, than Dryhorizon. Their lives were bound, and happily bound by the Polchester horizon. They lived in and for the local excitements, talks, croquet, bicycling (under proper guardianship), Rafiel or Buquay or Clinton in the summer, and the occasional (very, very occasional) performance of amateur theatricals in the Assembly Rooms.
Moreover, they were happy and contented and healthy. For many of them Jane Eyre was still a forbidden book and a railway train a remarkable adventure."
The Cathedral Sir Hugh Walpole
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