THE eyes of the world gaze through their microscopes today and focus on Sark, much trumpeted as the last bastion of feudalism in the Western world.

Television, radio and newspaper teams from around the world will attempt to interview every one of the 474 electors in today’s historic election.

They will be looking for something quirky, something that will make readers in Reading and viewers in Vancouver splutter into their coffee cups at the sheer out-of-this-world quaintness of the tiny car-less isle off France.

Already the fables of Sark are running riot across the blogosphere: husbands can beat their wives provided the stick is no bigger than a finger; the Seigneur – the only man who can keep an unspayed dog and doves – can sleep with a bride on her wedding night. That is, of course, when he’s not busy paying his £1.79 feudal rent to the Queen.

It’s all very jolly, misleading, and more than a little patronising.

What many of the journalists won’t expect – and let’s hope they don’t encounter – is an island full of bitter souls.

For there is every danger that that will be the image portrayed to the world and left on its consciousness.

Yes, politics is a serious business in Sark, divided broadly along the lines of ‘You’re either with us, or agin’ us’.

Middle ground is in short supply.

And the pro- and anti-Barclays factions’ efforts to win the day will no doubt involve enough negative campaigning to make Hilary Clinton blush. One side will be portrayed as overly progressive developers who will ruin the island’s unique values while the others are made out to be Luddites determined to shackle Sark to its past, even if it means ruining its future.

But regardless of the right and wrongs of the two views (and, as in most arguments, there’s a bit of both) Sarkees must hope that this election makes history not just for being an end to an ancient system. It must also mark a turning point in the bitterness, a chance to start again.

Feud must not replace feudalism.