y, I having never been off my
own hearth-rug for more than an hour or two at a time, while he was
circumnavigating and circumrailroading the globe. Yes, if anybody can
claim the title, I am certainly the prize idiot." I am afraid that we
all say such things as this to ourselves at times. Do we not use more
emphatic words than these in our self-depreciation? I cannot say how it
is with others, but my vocabulary of self-reproach and humiliation is so
rich in energetic expressions that I should be sorry to have an
interviewer present at an outburst of one of its raging geysers, its
savage soliloquies. A man is a kind of inverted thermometer, the bulb
uppermost, and the column of self-valuation is all the time going up and
down. Number Seven is very much like other people in this respect,--very
much like you and me.

This train of reflections must not carry me away from Number Seven.

"If I can't get a chance to boss this planet for a week or so," he began
again, "I think I could write its history,--yes, the history of the
world, in less compass than any one who has tried it so far."

"You know Sir Walter Raleigh's 'History of the World,' of course?" said
the Professor.

"More or less,--more or less," said Number Seven prudently. "But I don't
care who has written it before me. I will agree to write the story of
two worlds, this and the next, in such a compact way that you can commit
them both to memory in less time than you can learn the answer to the
first question in the Catechism."

What he had got into his head we could not guess, but there was no little
curiosity to discover the particular bee which was buzzing in his bonnet.
He evidently enjoyed our curiosity, and meant to keep us waiting awhile
before revealing the great secret.

"How many words do you think I shall want?"

It is a formula, I suppose, I said, and I will grant you a hundred words.

"Twenty," said the Professor. "That was more than the wise men of Greece
wanted for their grand utterances."

The two Annexes whispered together, and the American Annex gave their
joint result. One thousand was the number they had fixed on. They were
used to hearing lectures, and could hardly conceive that any subject
could be treated without taking up a good part of an hour.

"Less than ten," said Number Five. "If there are to be more than ten, I
don't believe that Number Seven would think the surprise would be up to
our expectations."

"Guess as much as you l