"—!" the visitor grunted.
"Perhaps it is necessary, as you suggest, for a utopia to be isolated to a certain degree. We do enjoy advantages here that are wanting on—what did you say your home-world is called?"
"Aridity VI."
"Just so. Yet, our chief advantage is not our monopoly of gobbler-fleece but the perfection of our social institutions. Here there is no crime, no war, no politics, no hunger, and little disease. Our Utopians are not greedy, envious, wrathful, lazy, or bedeviled with lusts...."
"Come again! Every night, there's a line outside my bedroom door, five deep. Not that I object, but in the Land of the Pure it seems a strange thing."
His guide tried to conceal his smile. "It is because you are a visitor. A certain romantic charm attaches to your peculiar position. An aura. On the whole, our citizens are more moderate in their appetites. Puritanism, too, is a short-coming. You have been enjoying your stay, I take it?"
"Oh yes!"
"The food?"
"Excellent. I must have gained thirty pounds."