Pedigree, for the purpose in hand, is a pecuniary attribute and is, of course, a product of funded wealth, more or less ancient.

Virtually ancient pedigree can be procured by well-advised expenditure on the conspicuous amenities; that is to say pedigree effectually competent as a background of current gentility.

Gentlefolk of such syncopated pedigree may have to walk circumspectly, of course; but their being in this manner put on their good behavior should tend to heighten their effectual serviceability as gentlefolk, by inducing a single-mindedness of gentility beyond what can fairly be expected of those who are already secure in their tenure.
Except conventionally, there is no hereditary difference between the standard gentlefolk and, say, their "menial servants," or the general population of the farms and the industrial towns.

This is a well-established commonplace among ethnological students; which has, of course, nothing to say with respect to the conventionally distinct lines of descent of the "Best Families." These Best Families are nowise distinguishable from the common run in point of hereditary traits; the difference that makes the gentleman and the gentlewoman being wholly a matter of habituation during the individual's life-time.

It is something of a distasteful necessity to call attention to this total absence of native difference between the well-born and the common, but it is a necessity of the argument in hand, and the recalling of it may, therefore, be overlooked for once in a way.