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T HE W IND OF C HANGE
    But the big social changes that are already starting to bubble underneath the surface in the Edwardian years – the rise of socialism, the suffragette movement with its push towards women’s rights, and the growing political awareness of the needs of working people, pushed forward by the dawn of World War I – are far more significant in changing the entire landscape for the many, a tidal wave of change, if you like, than big windfalls of cash for the small but privileged minority.
    And yet the innate snobbery of the aristocrats still prevails: many families still can’t help looking down their noses on these rich, youthful, usually high-spirited American girls whose manners are perceived to be ‘something between a Red Indian and a Gaiety Girl’.
    In addition, the huge spending power of the American heiresses easily surpasses anything the British aristocrats have known. So there’s an envy factor in there, too. The American girls are much better dressed, for starters. They think nothing of ordering 90 dresses at a time in Paris, only to wear them just once. (Wearing things once, of course, means no one can ever criticise you for donning the same garment again.)
    By 1914, 60 peers of the realm and 40 sons of peers have married American women. So some of those balls, lavish parties, champagne-spouting fountains and the other many indulgences of the ‘smart set’ that followed Edward VII were indirectly underwritten by the millions flowing from the coffers of the American heiresses, as well as propping up the existence of some of the country’s greatest estates.
    In the time-honoured tradition of the ‘if you’ve got it, flaunt it’ set so follows the mantra: ‘If you haven’t got it any more, use other people’s money’. After all, with so much hectic social networking at stake, who was going to let the outdated rules and snobbery of the older generation stop them?

B EING L ADY B OUNTIFUL
    Yet despite all this big spending and trading of money for status, the mega-rich are not completely oblivious to the world beyond their own.
    Outward appearances are everything. And while aristocratic families often treat their servants and those living on their estate as inferior beings from a separate planet, they are, at the same time, obliged to foster the general idea that they are moral guardians of the needy and less well off. They have to be seen to be conscious of their responsibilities to others. It is called noblesse oblige : if you are privileged and rich, you have a moral duty to public service and charity; it means you are seen to be putting your money to good use.
    This idea – of patronising the poor with one hand, dispensing charity and goodwill from the Big House, and exploiting them with the other by using them as an astonishingly cheap labour force – promotes the centuries-old view of a paternalistic lord and master who is concerned about the wellbeing of his tenants. And in fairness, not all the big landowning families are cynical in their treatment of the poor people living on their estates; some genuinely do form good relationships with their tenants and want to help them.
    Consuelo Vanderbilt, for instance, becomes well known for her devotion to the welfare of the poor people on the big Blenheim estate, and her concern for the wellbeing of her 40 live-in servants – a dedication to charitable works that manifests itself throughout her life. Yet the truth is, Consuelo is behaving according to all the rules and traditions that dictate the every move of a very wealthy aristocratic woman: the Edwardian mistress of a country estate is a key player in this demonstration of concern for the needy. It is her role and hers alone to be Lady Bountiful, dispensing goodwill locally, making visits and perhaps giving advice and hand-me-downs to the needy tenants.
    Whatever her own feelings or views, the wealthy country-house wife is obliged, as an important duty, to visit the