`They were strange people in that little planet!' I said.

`They were indeed! Perhaps their method of government was the strangest of all. In this planet, I am told, a Nation consists of a number of Subjects, and one King: but, in the little planet I speak of, it consisted of a number of Kings, and one Subject!'

`You say you are "told" what happens in this planet,' I said. `May I venture to guess that you yourself are a visitor from some other planet?'

Bruno clapped his hands in his excitement. `Is oo the Man-in-the-Moon?' he cried.

Mein Herr looked uneasy. `I am not in the Moon, my child,' he said evasively. `To return to what I was saying. I think that method of government ought to answer well. You see, the Kings would be sure to make Laws contradicting each other: so the Subject could never be punished, because, whatever he did he'd be obeying some Law.'

`And, whatever he did, he'd be disobeying some Law!' cried Bruno. `So he'd always be punished!'

Lady Muriel was passing at the moment, and caught the last word. `Nobody's going to be punished here!' she said, taking Bruno in her arms. `This is Liberty-Hall! Would you lend me the children for a minute?'

`The children desert us, you see,' I said to Mein Herr, as she carried them off: `so we old folk must keep each other company!'

The old man sighed. `Ah, well! We're old folk now; and yet I was a child myself, once--at least I fancy so.'

It did seem a rather unlikely fancy, I could not help owning to myself--looking at the shaggy white hair, and the long beard--that he could ever have been a child. `You are fond of young people?' I said.

`Young men,' he replied. `Not of children exactly. I used to teach young men--many a year ago--in my dear old University!'

`I didn't quite catch its name?' I hinted.

`I did not name it,' the old man replied mildly. `Nor would you know the name if I did. Strange tales I could tell you of all the changes I have witnessed there! But it would weary you, I fear.'

`No, indeed!' I said. `Pray go on. What kind of changes?'

But the old man seemed to be more in a humour for questions than for answers. `Tell me,' he said, laying his hand impressively on my arm, `tell me something. For I am a stranger in your land, and I know little of your modes of education: yet something tells me we are further on than you in the eternal cycle of change--and that many a theory we have tried and found to fail, you also will try, with a wilder enthusiasm: you also will find to fail, with a bitterer despair!'

It was strange to see how, as he talked, and his words flowed more and more freely, with a certain rhythmic eloquence, his features seemed to glow with an inner light, and the whole man seemed to be transformed, as if he had grown fifty years younger in a moment of time.