This question I concluded not to hear, and demanded if he had any
idea of Artesian wells; but he simply raised his eyebrows; while Mr.
Gliddon winked at me very hard and said, in a low tone, that one had
been recently discovered by the engineers employed to bore for water
in the Great Oasis.
I then mentioned our steel; but the foreigner elevated his nose, and
asked me if our steel could have executed the sharp carved work seen
on the obelisks, and which was wrought altogether by edge-tools of
copper.
This disconcerted us so greatly that we thought it advisable to vary
the attack to Metaphysics. We sent for a copy of a book called the
"Dial," and read out of it a chapter or two about something that is
not very clear, but which the Bostonians call the Great Movement of
Progress.
The Count merely said that Great Movements were awfully common
things in his day, and as for Progress, it was at one time quite a
nuisance, but it never progressed.
We then spoke of the great beauty and importance of Democracy, and
were at much trouble in impressing the Count with a due sense of the
advantages we enjoyed in living where there was suffrage ad libitum,
and no king.
He listened with marked interest, and in fact seemed not a little
amused. When we had done, he said that, a great while ago, there had
occurred something of a very similar sort. Thirteen Egyptian provinces
determined all at once to be free, and to set a magnificent example to
the rest of mankind.
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