The Last American | Page 3

instance; the tree itself has been growing for at least a hundred years,
and we know from the fallen mass beneath it that centuries had gone by
before its birth was possible."
He stopped speaking, his eyes fixed upon an inscription over a doorway,
partly hidden by one of the branches of the oak.
Turning suddenly upon me with a look of triumph, he exclaimed:
"It is ours!"
"What is ours?" I asked.
"The knowledge we sought;" and he pointed to the inscription,
NEW YORK STOCK EXC....
He was tremulous with joy. "Thou hast heard of Nhu-Yok, O my
Prince?"
I answered that I had read of it at school.
"Thou art in it now!" he said. "We are standing on the Western
Continent. Little wonder we thought our voyage long!"
"And what was Nhu-Yok?" I asked. "I read of it at college, but
remember little. Was it not the capital of the ancient Mehrikans?"
"Not the capital," he answered, "but their largest city. Its population
was four millions."
"Four millions!" I exclaimed. "Verily, O Fountain of Wisdom, that is
many for one city!"
"Such is history, my Prince! Moreover, as thou knowest, it would take
us many days to walk this town."
"True, it is endless."
He continued thus:
"Strange that a single word can tell so much! Those iron structures, the
huge statue in the harbor, the temples with pointed towers, all are as
writ in history."
Whereupon I repeated that I knew little of the Mehrikans save what I
had learned at college, a perfunctory and fleeting knowledge, as they
were a people who interested me but little.
"Let us seat ourselves in the shade," said Nofuhl, "and I will tell thee of
them."

We sat.
"For eleven centuries the cities of this sleeping hemisphere have
decayed in solitude. Their very existence has been forgotten. The
people who built them have long since passed away, and their
civilization is but a shadowy tradition. Historians are astounded that a
nation of an hundred million beings should vanish from the earth like a
mist, and leave so little behind. But to those familiar with their lives
and character surprise is impossible. There was nothing to leave. The
Mehrikans possessed neither literature, art, nor music of their own.
Everything was borrowed. The very clothes they wore were copied
with ludicrous precision from the models of other nations. They were a
sharp, restless, quick-witted, greedy race, given body and soul to the
gathering of riches. Their chiefest passion was to buy and sell. Even
women, both of high and low degree, spent much of their time at
bargains, crowding and jostling each other in vast marts of trade, for
their attire was complicated, and demanded most of their time."
"How degrading!" I exclaimed.
"So it must have been," said Nofuhl; "but they were not without virtues.
Their domestic life was happy. A man had but one wife, and treated her
as his equal."
"That is curious! But as I remember, they were a people of elastic
honor."
"They were so considered," said Nofuhl; "their commercial honor was
a jest. They were sharper than the Turks. Prosperity was their god, with
cunning and invention for his prophets. Their restless activity no
Persian can comprehend. This vast country was alive with noisy
industries, the nervous Mehrikans darting with inconceivable rapidity
from one city to another by a system of locomotion we can only guess
at. There existed roads with iron rods upon them, over which small
houses on wheels were drawn with such velocity that a long day's
journey was accomplished in an hour. Enormous ships without sails,
driven by a mysterious force, bore hundreds of people at a time to the
farthermost points of the earth."
"And are these things lost?" I asked.
"We know many of the forces," said Nofuhl, "but the knowledge, of
applying them is gone. The very elements seem to have been their
slaves. Cities were illuminated at night by artificial moons, whose

radiance eclipsed the moon above. Strange devices were in use by
which they conversed together when separated by a journey of many
days. Some of these appliances exist to-day in Persian museums. The
superstitions of our ancestors allowed their secrets to be lost during
those dark centuries from which at last we are waking."
At this point we heard the voice of Bhoz-ja-khaz in the distance; they
had found a spring and he was calling to us.
Such heat we had never felt, and it grew hotter each hour. Near the
river where we ate it was more comfortable, but even there the
perspiration stood upon us in great drops. Our faces shone like fishes. It
was our wish to explore further, but the streets were like ovens, and we
returned to the Zlotuhb.
As I sat