"Let me tell you a fable," said the book. "There were two men
wrecked upon a desert island; one of them made believe he was at
home, the other admitted - "
"Oh, I know your kind of fable," said the reader. "They both
died."
"And so they did," said the book. "No doubt of that. And
everybody else."
"That is true," said the reader. "Push it a little further for
this once. And when they were all dead?"
"They were in God's hands, the same as before," said the book.
"Not much to boast of, by your account," cried the reader.
"Who is impious now?" said the book.
And the reader put him on the fire.
The coward crouches from the rod,
And loathes the iron face of God.
XII. - THE CITIZEN AND THE TRAVELLER.
"LOOK round you," said the citizen. "This is the largest market in
the world."
"Oh, surely not," said the traveller.
"Well, perhaps not the largest," said the citizen, "but much the
best."
"You are certainly wrong there," said the traveller. "I can tell
you . . ."
They buried the stranger at the dusk.
XIII. - THE DISTINGUISHED STRANGER.
ONCE upon a time there came to this earth a visitor from a
neighbouring planet. And he was met at the place of his descent by
a great philosopher, who was to show him everything.
First of all they came through a wood, and the stranger looked upon
the trees.
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