We reached our destination during the forenoon of the next day, and I was amazed when I beheld spreading out before me the vast institution where we were to hold our sittings. Chickle University covered, with its grounds and buildings, four square miles. Swift electric cars ran everywhere by routes so well planned that less than four minutes were consumed between the two most distant points. The several thousand buildings were of a uniform pattern, but lettered on the outside, so as easily to be distinguished: House of Latin, House of Chiropody, House of Marriage and Divorce, and so forth. Everything was taught here, and had its separate house; and the courses of instruction were named on a plan as uniform as the buildings: Get French Quick, Get Religion Quick, Get Football Quick, and so forth. The University was open to both sexes. I saw great crowds of young men and women trying to push their way into the House of Marriage and Divorce; and Kibosh informed me that this course was the second in popularity, and in such active demand that a corps of ninety-six instructors was kept lecturing continuously day and night. The football course had overflowed its own building so copiously that it was also filling the houses of Latin, Greek, Music, History, and Literature.
"And what do those students do?" I inquired.
"There have been none," he answered. "We have accommodations for two million students; but if this spelling reform fails to prove the—ahem—you'll remember what we said about rock-smiting, Mr. Greenberry—fails to prove the—er—attraction that Masticator anticipates, any idle houses in this University plant can be readily turned into the Chickle plant, which adjoins it."
I asked him, would they not meet great difficulty in finding professors for two million students?
"Professors are our lightest expense," he replied. "We can always pick them up for next to nothing."
So saying, Kibosh led us to the library; and here were some gentlemen assembled whose appearance clearly proclaimed them to be profound scholars, and who were to be of our spelling committee. While Kibosh made us known to each other, and we exchanged our formal greetings, the eye of each scholar sought the eye of every other scholar with that thirsty look an author wears, when the hope for compliments upon his writings flutters in his breast. But we were true professors, all of us, and not one had read a word that any of the others had ever written.
Deceit should always be discouraged, nay, firmly punished, in the young; for by reason of their immaturity they have but little judgment when to practise it; but to the old it is frequently of the greatest service. Intending, therefore, to be as agreeable as possible, I approached Professor Lysander Totts with a feigned knowledge of his work. Shaking him cordially by the hand, I said, "Ah, yes; Pecan Nuts!"
"What?" he replied, staring.
"Why, Pecan Nuts!" I repeated. "Let me congratulate——"