don't need cultivation. It is a country full of resources and
commerce. They make fine rugs at Smyrna, and not dear."

"But," persisted Leger, "if the rugs are made of wool they must come
from sheep; and to have sheep you must have fields, farms, culture--"

"Well, there may be something of that sort," replied Georges. "But
their chief crop, rice, grows in the water. As for me, I have only
been along the coasts and seen the parts that are devastated by war.
Besides, I have the deepest aversion to statistics."

"How about the taxes?" asked the farmer.

"Oh! the taxes are heavy; they take all a man has, and leave him the
rest. The pacha of Egypt was so struck with the advantages of that
system, that, when I came away he was on the point of organizing his
own administration on that footing--"

"But," said Leger, who no longer understood a single word, "how?"

"How?" said Georges. "Why, agents go round and take all the harvests,
and leave the fellahs just enough to live on. That's a system that
does away with stamped papers and bureaucracy, the curse of France,
hein?"

"By virtue of what right?" said Leger.

"Right? why it is a land of despotism. They haven't any rights. Don't
you know the fine definition Montesquieu gives of despotism. 'Like the
savage, it cuts down the tree to gather the fruits.' They don't tax,