Page:Traveler from Altruria, Howells, 1894.djvu/201

Rh that I think the buyer is worse than the seller—incomparably worse. I suppose you are not troubled with either case, in Altruria?"

"Oh, no!" said the Altrurian, with an utter horror, which no repetition of his words can give the sense of. "It would be unimaginable."

"Still," the banker suggested, "you have cakes and ale, and at times the ginger is hot in the mouth?"

"I don't pretend that we have immunity from error; but upon such terms as you have described, we have none. It would be impossible."

The Altrurian's voice expressed no contempt, but only a sad patience, a melancholy surprise, such as a celestial angel might feel in being suddenly confronted with some secret shame and horror of the Pit.

"Well," said the banker, "with us, the only way is to take the business view and try to strike an average somewhere."

"Talking of business," said the professor, turning to the manufacturer, who had been quietly smoking, "why don't some of you capitalists take hold of farming, here in the east, and make a business of it as they do in the west?"

"Thank you," said the other, "if you mean me, I