"Everything in the house is electric," explained Jerry, as if he were conducting a sight-seeing party through the Louvre. "All the baking, washing, ironing, bread-making, and cleaning is done by electricity. There's even an electric sewing-machine to sew with, and an electric breeze to keep you cool while you're doing it. If I hadn't seen the thing with my own eyes I'd never have believed it."
He paused to watch the effect of his words.
"'Tain't much like the way you and me are used to," he grinned.
"No."
"I suppose in time you get so nothing knocks the breath out of you. I'm just coming to looking round here without feeling all of a flutter. The place did used to turn me endwise at first, it was so white and awesome. I actually hated to set foot within its walls. Seems 's if my fingers was always all thumbs every time I come inside the room. Still, I had to come in though; there were things I had to do here. So I schooled myself to forget the whiteness, and the blueness, and all the silvery glisten and call it just a kitchen. Besides, I found that grand as it is, it ain't a patch on some of the other things in the house. My eye! It's like the Arabian Nights!"
The Cape Codder stopped quite speechless from retailing these marvels.
"Yes," he went on presently, "they've got almost everything the electric market has to offer. Last year, though, Mr. Dick got a hankerin' for a wireless set. It appears that you can buy an outfit that will make you hear concerts, sermons, speeches, and about everything that's going on; at least that's what Mr. Crowninshield undertook to tell me, though whether he was fooling or not I couldn't quite make out. Still, it may be true. After what I've seen in this house I'm ready to believe about anything. Was he to say you could put your eye to a hole in the wall and see the Chinese eating rice in Hongkong it wouldn't astonish me."
Walter laughed.
"You can hear music and such things. My brother, who is a wireless operator, told me so. They broadcast all sorts of entertainments—songs, band-playing, sermons, and stories so that those who have amateur apparatus can listen in."
"Broadcast? Listen in?" repeated Jerry vaguely.