One of these old gentlemen told me some things of interest afterward; things about the aboriginals, mainly.  He thought them intelligent —­remarkably so in some directions—­and he said that along with their unpleasant qualities they had some exceedingly good ones; and he considered it a great pity that the race had died out.  He instanced their invention of the boomerang and the “weet-weet” as evidences of their brightness; and as another evidence of it he said he had never seen a white man who had cleverness enough to learn to do the miracles with those two toys that the aboriginals achieved.  He said that even the smartest whites had been obliged to confess that they could not learn the trick of the boomerang in perfection; that it had possibilities which they could not master.  The white man could not control its motions, could not make it obey him; but the aboriginal could.  He told me some wonderful things—­some almost incredible things—­which he had seen the blacks do with the boomerang and the weet-weet.  They have been confirmed to me since by other early settlers and by trustworthy books.

It is contended—­and may be said to be conceded—­that the boomerang was known to certain savage tribes in Europe in Roman times.  In support of this, Virgil and two other Roman poets are quoted.  It is also contended that it was known to the ancient Egyptians.

One of two things either some one with is then apparent:  a boomerang arrived in Australia in the days of antiquity before European knowledge of the thing had been lost, or the Australian aboriginal reinvented it.  It will take some time to find out which of these two propositions is the fact.  But there is no hurry.

CHAPTER XX.

It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things:  freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them. 
                                  —­Pudd’nhead Wilson’s New Calendar.

From diary: 

Mr. G. called.  I had not seen him since Nauheim, Germany—­several years ago; the time that the cholera broke out at Hamburg.  We talked of the people we had known there, or had casually met; and G. said: 

“Do you remember my introducing you to an earl—­the Earl of C.?”

“Yes.  That was the last time I saw you.  You and he were in a carriage, just starting—­belated—­for the train.  I remember it.”

“I remember it too, because of a thing which happened then which I was not looking for.  He had told me a while before, about a remarkable and interesting Californian whom he had met and who was a friend of yours, and said that if he should ever meet you he would ask you for some particulars about that Californian.  The subject was not mentioned that day at Nauheim, for we were hurrying away, and there was no time; but the thing that surprised me