Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 7.djvu/50

30 air, looking like a weather-cock, and dressed in a long overcoat, with rather short black trousers,—who is that gentleman?"

"He is a Protestant minister, a man of 'importance' in Massachusetts, where he is going to join his wife, an ex-governess advantageously implicated in a celebrated lawsuit."

"And that tall, gloomy-looking fellow, who seems to be absorbed in calculation?"

"That man calculates: in fact," said the Doctor, "he is forever calculating."

"Problems?"

"No, his fortune; he is a man of 'importance'; at any moment he knows almost to a farthing what he is worth; he is rich, a fourth part of New York is built on his land; a quarter of an hour ago he possessed $1,625,367 and a half, but now he has only $1,625,367 and a quarter."

"How came this difference in his fortune?"

"Well! he has just smoked a quarter-dollar cigar."

Doctor Dean Pitferge amused me with his clever repartees, so I pointed out to him another group stowed away in a corner of the saloon.

"They," said he, "are people from the far west, the tallest, who looks like a head clerk, is a man of 'importance,' the head of a Chicago bank, he always carries an album under his arm, with the principal views of his beloved city. He is, and has reason to be, proud of a city founded in a desert in 1836, which at the present day has a population of more than 400,000 souls. Near him you see a Californian couple, the young wife is delicate and charming, her well-polished husband was once a plow-boy, who one fine day turned up some nuggets. That gentleman"

"Is a man of 'importance,'" said I.

"Undoubtedly," replied the Doctor, "for his assets count by the million."

"And pray, who may this tall individual be, who moves his head backwards and forwards like the pendulum of a clock?"

"That person," replied the Doctor, "is the celebrated Cockburn of Rochester, the universal statistician, who has weighed, measured, proportioned, and calculated everything. Question this harmless maniac, he will tell you how