Contrary to the reports issued by a local publication which have obtained some currency abroad, we are able to state on the very best authority that no improper incidents of any kind took place on the occasion of the formal opening of the Karburator Central Power Station. In connection with this, the Burgomaster of Greater Prague has resigned his office and has gone into the country to recuperate. Mr. Billington, doyen of the Diplomatic Corps, is, contrary to published reports, well and active. The fact is that all present declare that nothing in their experience has ever made so powerful an impression upon them. Every citizen has the right to fall to the earth and worship God, and the performance of miracles is not in conflict with any official position whatever in a democratic State. It is in any case decidedly improper to connect the Chief of State with regrettable incidents occasioned only by insufficient ventilation, combined with excessive strain upon the nerves.

X. Saint Ellen

CHAPTER X

SAINT ELLEN

A few days after these occurrences G. H. Bondy was wandering through the streets of Prague, a cigar between his teeth, thinking things over. Anyone who met him would have thought that he was looking at the pavement; but Mr. Bondy was really looking into the future. “Marek was right,” he was saying to himself, “Bishop Linda even more so. It was simply impossible to bring God to earth without a confounded lot coming of it. People could do what they liked, but it was going to shake the banks and do goodness knows what with industry. A religious strike broke out at the Industrial Bank to-day. We installed a Karburator there, and within two days the officials declared the bank’s property to be a sacred trust for the poor. That couldn’t have happened when Preis was manager. No, it certainly would never have happened.”