In the midst of the lively conversation, the elegant, 90-year-old woman said, “Please excuse me. There’s something I want to share with you.” A moment later she came back with a letter, which she had received at the turn of the twentieth century. The writer was a young Englishman she had met during a transatlantic voyage. He was explaining to his 15-year-old correspondent how exciting it was to be growing up in the nation whose empire stretched around the globe. “What’s particularly impressive,” he wrote, “is that in spite of our modest size, the magnificent phrase still rings true: ‘Rule, Britannia! Rule the waves.’ And that’s going to be the reality for centuries to come.” How strange it felt listening to the young man’s words while realizing that the world’s once dominant nation was now sharply reduced in the course of less than one slender lifetime.