“I see. You are a genuine Foreign Observer. Well, to tell the truth, so am I,” he said more confidentially. “I am not here because I like it. I detest the whole lot of them. I came here for the first time five or six years ago. I had heard a lot about the country and its wonderful organisation. Organisation! Blessed word! I had also heard some rather tall stories, and thought the accounts had been exaggerated. I came with an open mind. I rather prided myself on being an impartial observer. I was prepared to allow a lot for the natural differences of taste between one nation and another. At first I was so keenly interested that I didn’t mind the little restrictions, but when the novelty had worn off, and I began to realise what it all meant, I determined to make a more thorough study of the country than I had at first thought would be worth while. So I am here now studying Meccanian education. Now the only way, so far as I know, of getting rid of your everlasting ‘conductors’ is to get permission to study some special subject. I went through just the same experience. I was what they call merely a ‘general’ observer. The Authorities don’t exactly like the ‘general’ observer. They can’t find it in their hearts to let him alone. As they regulate their own people they must keep as close a watch on the foreigner. As he doesn’t fit into their system, they have to invent a system for him. It is troublesome to them, and not very pleasant for the foreigner; but Meccanian principles make it necessary. However, if you can satisfy them that you are a bona fide student of some special subject—it doesn’t matter what it is, you may choose anything from the parasites in the intestines of a beetle to the philosophy of the Absolute—they will treat you quite decently, according to their lights.”
“How do you account for this difference?” I asked.
“They are immensely flattered by the notion that if you come here to study anything, it must be because their knowledge is so superior to what can be found elsewhere. However, if you want to get rid of the daily worry of a ‘conductor,’ that is what you must do. But you must be a specialist of some sort, or they won’t admit you to the privilege.”
“But there is no special subject I want to study,” I said. “I am just a ‘general’ observer, and if I undertake to study a special subject I shall miss seeing what I most want to see.”
“That is a difficulty. Perhaps you had better go on as you have been doing, and when you have had enough of that, go in for some political institutions; they have got you registered as a National Councillor, so you can pretend to study the working of the Constitution or some such thing.”
“That’s rather a good idea,” I said; “but, judging from what I have seen, I should doubt whether they will let me see what I want to see.”
“Why, what do you want to see?”
“Just what I cannot get from an inspection of the machinery of the State—the effect of the laws and customs on the actual life of the people.”
“Ah, that you will have to get by the aid of your imagination.”