But I am in America to learn, not to teach, and
I hope you will have patience with my ignorance. I begin to be afraid that
it is so great as to seem a little incredible. I have fancied in my friend
here," he went on, with a smile toward me, "a suspicion that I was not
entirely single in some of the inquiries I have made, but that I had some
ulterior motive, some wish to censure or satirize."
"Oh, not at all," I protested, for it was not polite to admit a conjecture
so accurate. "We are so well satisfied with our condition that we have
nothing but pity for the darkened mind of the foreigner, though we believe
in it fully: we are used to the English tourist."
My friends laughed, and the Altrurian continued: "I am very glad to hear
it, for I feel myself at a peculiar disadvantage among you. I am not only
a foreigner, but I am so alien to you in all the traditions and habitudes
that I find it very difficult to get upon common ground with you. Of
course, I know theoretically what you are, but to realize it practically
is another thing. I had read so much about America and understood so
little that I could not rest without coming to see for myself.
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