Now, I
certainly hoped, after what I had said to you and what my friends had
explained of our civilization, that you would not have done a thing of
this kind. I will see the porter, as soon as I am up, and ask him not to
mention the matter to any one, but, I confess, I don't like to take an
apologetic tone with him; your conditions are so alien to ours that they
will seem incredible to him, and he will think I am stuffing him."
"I don't believe he will think that," said the Altrurian, "and I hope you
won't find the case so bad as it seems to you. I am extremely sorry to
have done wrong--"
"Oh, the thing wasn't wrong in itself. It was only wrong under the
circumstances. Abstractly, it is quite right to help a fellow-being who
needs help; no one denies that, even in a country where every one is for
himself."
"I am so glad to hear it," said the Altrurian. "Then, at least, I have not
gone radically astray; and I do not think you need take the trouble to
explain the Altrurian ideas to the porter. I have done that already, and
they seemed quite conceivable to him; he said that poor folks had to act
upon them, even here, more or less, and that if they did not act upon them
there would be no chance for them at all.
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