Читать книгу These are the British онлайн

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But the important Englands or, rather, Britains are very different. There is the dynamic, bustling industrial Britain of the Midlands, the Northeast, and the Lowlands of Scotland. There is the great commercial Britain of London, Bristol, Glasgow, Southampton, Liverpool—the Britain of traders, middlemen, agents, and bankers, the Britain whose effect on the political development of the country and world has been tremendous.

Out of these Britains have come the machines and the men who have kept the country in business and twice helped to smash the military power of Germany. The steel plants of South Wales, the engineering factories of Birmingham, the banks of London, the shipyards of the Clyde—these are the real modern Britain. They are not so attractive as the old villages sleeping in the afternoon sun. But from the standpoint of Britain, and from that of the United States as well, they are much more satisfying and reassuring than Merrie England.

For this is the Great Britain that is not satisfied with the past or the present, that dreams great and necessary dreams of the industrial uses of atomic energy, that strives to expand the three great groups of industry: metals and metal-using, textiles, and chemicals. It is the combination of this Britain and the character of the old England that provides a basis for faith.