sensation is a rare thing in this hum-drum life, and I had it here.

There was nothing stale or worn out about the thoughts and feelings the

situation and the circumstances created. It seemed strange--stranger

than I can tell--to think that the central figure in the cluster of men

and women, chatting here under the trees like the most ordinary

individual in the land, was a man who could open his lips and ships

would fly through the waves, locomotives would speed over the plains,

couriers would hurry from village to village, a hundred telegraphs would

flash the word to the four corners of an Empire that stretches its vast

proportions over a seventh part of the habitable globe, and a countless

multitude of men would spring to do his bidding. I had a sort of vague

desire to examine his hands and see if they were of flesh and blood,

like other men's. Here was a man who could do this wonderful thing, and

yet if I chose I could knock him down. The case was plain, but it

seemed preposterous, nevertheless--as preposterous as trying to knock

down a mountain or wipe out a continent. If this man sprained his

ankle, a million miles of telegraph would carry the news over mountains

--valleys--uninhabited deserts--under the trackless sea--and ten thousand

newspapers would prate of it; if he were grievously ill, all the nations

would know it before the sun rose again; if he dropped lifeless where he

stood, his fall might shake the thrones of half a world! If I could

have stolen his coat, I would have done it. When I meet a man like

that, I want something to remember him by.

As a general thing, we have been shown through palaces by some

plush-legged filagreed flunkey or other, who charged a franc for it; but

448

The Innocents Abroad