Nigel Farage has changed. I remember the Farage I used to write about, five years ago, at Ukip’s peak: a blur of bibulous mischief in either mustard cords or Thatcherite pin-stripes, tirelessly pulling pints for the cameras, parping with cartoon merriment, and sporting that bug-eyed smirk that made him look like a toad plotting a practical joke. He was noisy, chaotic, and revelrous in mayhem. His hands virtually squelched with glee.

Not any more. This new Farage – the one leading The Brexit Party – is different. His manner is stern, even severe; he proclaims his new party to be “organised” and “professional”; and he appears to have overcome his weakness for public clowning: no more clambering on to the turret of a tank after two swift pints at noon. His suits, meanwhile, are sharper and more sober – and so, it seems, is he.

This new Farage, in short, is not someone a Tory leader can dismiss as a nutty no-hoper. He’s now a threat. A serious threat.

Today he held a press conference in London. He was blunt, brisk, efficient. No japes, no larking. Several of his party’s candidates were present, but (aside from their chairman Richard Tice) none spoke. Their role, it appeared, was to applaud their leader, which they did with particular vigour whenever he rounded on a media outlet (the BBC, the Guardian) whose coverage he considered insufficiently favourable.