“Pray tell me,” I said, “what became of the reformer who proposed all this change?”

“All this change?  Why, sir, the one-thousandth part is not told:  he proposed that his system should be general:  not only in the gootle trust, but every trust in the country was to be broken up in the same way!  When I had him before me, and had stated my objections to the plan, I asked him what were its advantages.

“‘Sir,’ he replied, ’I speak for millions of gentlemen in uncongenial employments, mostly manual and fatiguing.  This would give them the kind of activity that they would like—­such as their class enjoys in other countries where my system is in full flower, and where it is deemed so sacred that any proposal for its abolition or simplification by trusts is regarded with horror, especially by the working men.’

“Having reported to the Panjandrum (whose vermiform appendix may good angels have in charge) and received his orders, I called the reformer before me and addressed him thus: 

“’Illustrious economist, I have the honor to inform you that in the royal judgment your proposal is the most absurd, impudent and audacious ever made; that the system which you propose to set up is revolutionary and mischievous beyond the dreams of treason; that only in a nation of rogues and idiots could it have a moment’s toleration.’

“He was about to reply, but cutting his throat to intimate that the hearing was at an end, I withdrew from the Hall of Audience, as under similar circumstances I am about to do now.”

I withdrew first by way of a window, and after a terrible journey of six years in the Dolorous Mountains and on the Desert of Despair came to the western coast.  Here I built a ship and after a long voyage landed on one of the islands constituting the Kingdom of Tortirra.

THE KINGDOM OF TORTIRRA

Of this unknown country and its inhabitants I have written a large volume which nothing but the obstinacy of publishers has kept from the world, and which I trust will yet see the light.  Naturally, I do not wish to publish at this time anything that will sate public curiosity, and this brief sketch will consist of such parts only of the work as I think can best be presented in advance without abating interest in what is to follow when Heaven shall have put it into the hearts of publishers to square their conduct with their interests.  I must, however, frankly confess that my choice has been partly determined by other considerations.  I offer here those parts of my narrative which I conceive to be the least credible—­those which deal with the most monstrous and astounding follies of a strange people.  Their ceremony of marriage by decapitation; their custom of facing to the rear when riding on horseback; their practice of walking on their hands in all ceremonial processions; their selection of the blind for military command; their pig-worship—­these and many other comparatively natural particulars of their religious, political, intellectual and social life I reserve for treatment in the great work for which I shall soon ask public favor and acceptance.