and putting all our answers together like a picture
puzzle, they had figured out a sort of skeleton chart as to the
prevalence of disease among us. Even more subtly with no show of horror
or condemnation, they had gathered something--far from the truth, but
something pretty clear--about poverty, vice, and crime. They even had
a goodly number of our dangers all itemized, from asking us about
insurance and innocent things like that.

They were well posted as to the different races, beginning with their
poison-arrow natives down below and widening out to the broad racial
divisions we had told them about. Never a shocked expression of the face
or exclamation of revolt had warned us; they had been extracting the
evidence without our knowing it all this time, and now were studying
with the most devout earnestness the matter they had prepared.

The result was rather distressing to us. They first explained the matter
fully to Ellador, as she was the one who purposed visiting the Rest
of the World. To Celis they said nothing. She must not be in any way
distressed, while the whole nation waited on her Great Work.

Finally Jeff and I were called in. Somel and Zava were there, and
Ellador, with many others that we knew.

They had a great globe, quite fairly mapped out from the small section
maps in that compendium of ours. They had the different peoples of the
earth roughly outlined, and their status in civilization indicated.
They had charts and figures and estimates, based on the facts in that
traitorous little book and what they had learned from us.

Somel explained: "We find that in all your historic period, so much
longer than ours, that with all the interplay of services, the exchange
of inventions and discoveries, and the wonderful progress we so admire,
that in this widespread Other World of yours, there is still much
disease, often contagious."

We admitted this at once.

"Also there is still, in varying degree, ignorance, with prejudice and
unbridled emotion."

This too was admitted.

"We find also that in spite of the advance of democracy and the increase
of wealth, that there is still unrest and sometimes combat."

Yes, yes, we admitted it all. We were used to these things and saw no
reason for so much seriousness.

"All things considered," they said, and they did not say a hundredth
part of the things they were considering, "we are unwilling to expose
our country to free communication with the rest of the