Pickwick.

"I will not dilate on my title to trouble you for a few words more.
I perceive that I shall have a good deal to modify in my modest
treatise. I beg you to give us your views on some of the modifications
now going on in the East, especially the Turkish question and the
civilization of China."

"My dear professor," said the youthful Crichton sententiously, "do not
disturb yourself with those problems, which are already disposed of.
In twenty years the sultan will become a monk, to get rid of the chief
sultana, who has pestered his life out with her notions of woman's
rights, and who wore the Bloomer costume before the Crimean war. As
for the question about China, it is better to let sleeping dogs lie:
it has been a great mistake to arouse China, for it is a dog that
drags after it three hundred millions of pups. Only see the effect
already in Lima and San Francisco! Before a century has elapsed all
Asia, with Alaska and the Pacific part of America, to say nothing of
that petty extremity you persist in calling Europe, will be in the
power of China. Your little girls, professor, will be more liable to
lose their feet than their arms, for it is a hundred chances to one
but your great-grand-nieces grow up Chinawomen."

"Astonishing!" murmured the professor of geography.

"Admirable!" cried the doctor.

I had hitherto said nothing, though I was capitally entertained.
At length I ventured to take up my own parable, and, addressing the
pretended disciple of the Brahmans, I asked, "Can you enlighten us,