r private greenhouses were on a grand scale and contained
fruit as well as flowers. A family that could not have a hot-house for
fresh vegetables, with a few fruit trees in it, would be poor indeed.
Where a number of families had united in purchasing extensive grounds,
very fine conservatories were erected, their expense being divided among
the property holders, and their luxuries enjoyed in common.

So methodical were all the business plans of the Mizora people, and so
strictly just were they in the observance of all business and social
duties that no ill-feeling or jealousy could arise from a combination of
capital in private luxuries. Such combinations were formed and carried
out upon strictly business principles.

If the admirable economy with which every species of work was carried on
in Mizora could be thoroughly comprehended, the universality of luxuries
need not be wondered at. They were drilled in economy from a very early
period. It was taught them as a virtue.

Machinery, with them, had become the slave of invention. I lived long
enough in Mizora to comprehend that the absence of pauperism, genteel
and otherwise, was largely due to the ingenious application of machinery
to all kinds of physical labor. When the cost of producing luxuries
decreases, the value of the luxuries produced must decrease with it. The
result is they are within reach of the narrowest incomes. A life
surrounded by refinement must absorb some of it.

I had a conversation with the Preceptress upon this subject, and she
said:

"Some natures are so undecided in character that they become only what
their surroundings make them. Others only partially absorb tastes and
sentiments that form the influence about them. They maintain a decided
individuality; yet they are most always noticeably marked with the
general character of their surroundings. It is very, very seldom that a
nature is fixed from infancy in one channel."

I told her that I knew of a people whose minds from infancy to mature
age, never left the grooves they were born in. They belonged to every
nationality, and had palaces built for them, and attendants with
cultivated intelligences employed to wait upon them.

"Are their minds of such vast importance to their nation? You have never
before alluded to intellect so elevated as to command such royal
homage." My friend spoke with awakened interest.

"They are of no importance at all," I answered, humiliated at having
alluded