In his 'Dissolution' chapter, Cannadine appears to be arguing that hierarchy and empire left the stage together. Yet the British had surely abandoned hierarchy long before they had abandoned empire. The increasing commitment to 'development' is one clear sign of this. Shifting political ideals are another. The Commonwealth was not an inadequate substitute for empire once it had gone , but was an alternative imperial strategy that was being deployed long before the end of empire. The commitment to equality of status and free association, admittedly then limited to already self-governing white communities, goes back to 1926. It seemed expedient to successive British governments to extend the scope of the Commonwealth further and further. The monarchy adjusted with remarkable skill to a changing role. Although old elements of hierarchy clearly remained, the sovereign as head of the Commonwealth was a very different phenomenon to the Victoria who had received the homage of her subjects from across the world in London in 1897. At the level of high strategy, the Commonwealth could be regarded either as a tiresome sham, which seems to have been the view of Winston Churchill and may be the view of David Cannadine, or as a ploy for prolonging influence, which was probably the view of most ministers in Britain in the 1950s or 1960s. For Queen Elizabeth, however, equality and free association, seem to be ideals to be cherished. This is now a very outmoded view, no doubt appropriate for a lady of 75, but not for many others. Yet it may be that many British people even invested empire with these ideals, caring little for hierarchy and never being seduced by Ornamentalism.