“That is the dream!” cried Dominique, “that is the gigantic work which the future will achieve!  Algeria, connected with Timbuctoo by the Sahara railway line, over which electric engines will carry the whole of old Europe through the far expanse of sand!  Timbuctoo connected with Senegal by flotillas of steam vessels and yet other railways, all intersecting the vast empire on every side!  New France connected with mother France, the old land, by a wondrous development of the means of communication, and founded, and got ready for the hundred millions of inhabitants who will some day spring up there! . . .  Doubtless these things cannot be done in a night.  The trans-Saharian railway is not yet laid down; there are two thousand five hundred kilometres* of bare desert to be crossed which can hardly tempt railway companies; and a certain amount of prosperity must be developed by starting cultivation, seeking and working mines, and increasing exportations before a pecuniary effort can be possible on the part of the motherland.  Moreover, there is the question of the natives, mostly of gentle race, though some are ferocious bandits, whose savagery is increased by religious fanaticism, thus rendering the difficulties of our conquest all the greater.  Until the terrible problem of Islamism is solved we shall always be coming in conflict with it.  And only life, long years of life, can create a new nation, adapt it to the new land, blend diverse elements together, and yield normal existence, homogeneous strength, and genius proper to the clime.  But no matter!  From this day a new France is born yonder, a huge empire; and it needs our blood—­and some must be given it, in order that it may be peopled and be able to draw its incalculable wealth from the soil, and become the greatest, the strongest, and the mightiest in the world!”

  * About 1,553 English miles.

Transported with enthusiasm, quivering at the thought of the distant ideal at last revealed to him, Benjamin sat there with tears in his eyes.  Ah! the healthy life! the noble life! the other life! the whole mission and work of which he had as yet but confusedly dreamt!  Again he asked a question:  “And are there many French families there, colonizing like yours?”

Dominique burst into a loud laugh.  “Oh, no,” said he, “there are certainly a few colonists in our old possessions of Senegal, but yonder in the Niger valley, beyond Djenny, there are, I think, only ourselves.  We are the pioneers, the vanguard, the riskers full of faith and hope.  And there is some merit in it, for to sensible stay-at-home folks it all seems like defying common sense.  Can you picture it?  A French family installed among savages, and unprotected, save for the vicinity of a little fort, where a French officer commands a dozen native soldiers—­a French family, which is sometimes called upon to fight in person, and which establishes a farm in a land where the fanaticism of some head tribesman may any day stir up trouble.  It seems