“I see. You want them for your children, perhaps: they would be found in the juvenile departments; fables and parables, and that sort of thing.”
“No, I mean books without any serious purpose, but for grown-up people. I seem to remember such works in the old Meccanian literature.”
“How very odd,” answered Lickrod, “that you should express a wish to see works of that kind.”
“Why?” I asked, in some surprise.
“Because we find works of that kind in great demand in the asylums for the mentally afflicted. You see, we treat the inmates as humanely as possible, and our pathologists tell us that they cannot read the books by modern authors. We have to let them read for a few hours a day, and they beg, really rather piteously, for the old books. It is always old books they ask for. I suppose in a way they are cases of a kind of arrested development. At any rate, they have not been able to keep pace with the developments of our ideas. Doctor Barm reported only last year that the only books that seem to have a soothing effect on these patients are those written, oh, two hundred years ago, and of the very kind you probably have in mind.”
CHAPTER XII
THE LATEST INSTITUTION
I went to see Kwang in the afternoon, and found him in a state of suppressed excitement—at least I could not help having that impression. After a little time, when I had given him some brief account of my experience at the dinner-party, he said, “I told you the other day that I had some thoughts of returning home. I shall be off in a fortnight.”
“This is rather sudden,” I said; “have you received bad news from home?”
“No,” he said; “I told you I had practically completed my work. The fact is, that things are beginning to develop rather fast here. I see signs of preparation for a ‘forward move.’”