If he were to scorn an offer to sell his father for vivisectional
purposes, we should applaud enthusiastically his altruism.
But it is only the Hero who wins our cheers, only the Villain who wins
our hisses. The minor characters are necessary, but we are not greatly
interested in them. The Villain must have a confederate to whom he can
reveal his wicked thoughts when he is tired of soliloquizing; the Hero
must have friends who can tell each other all those things which a
modest man cannot say for himself; there must be characters of lower
birth, competent to relieve the tension by sitting down on their hats
or pulling chairs from beneath their acquaintances. We could not do
without them, but we do not give them our hearts. Even the Heroine
leaves us calm. However beautiful she be, she is not more than the
Hero deserves. It is the Hero whom we have come out to see, and it is
painful to reflect that in a little while he will he struggling to get
on the 'bus for Walham Green, and be pushed off again just like the
rest of us.
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