they meant every word of it. It was a fitting summary of the impressions
left by the events of the week, and what the lips uttered must have been
in the hearts and minds of all.

[1]Into the world has come a new feeling,
Through the world goes a mighty call.

As an ounce of personal experience is worth a pound of second-hand
recital, a brief statement may here be given of the way in which the
present writer came to take up Esperanto, and of the experiences which
soon led him to the conviction of its absolute practicability and
utility.

In October, 1905, having just returned from an absence of some years in
Canada and the Far East, he had his attention turned to Esperanto for
the first time by reading an account of the Congress of Boulogne. He had
no previous knowledge of, or leanings towards, a universal language; and
if he had thought about it at all, it was only to laugh at the idea as a
wild and visionary scheme. In short, his attitude was quite normal.

But here was a definite statement, professing to be one of positive
accomplished fact. One of two things: either the newspaper account
was not true; or else, the facts being as represented, here was a
new possibility to be reckoned with. The only course was to send for
the books and test the thing on its merits. Being somewhat used to
languages, he did not take long to see that this one was good enough in
itself. A letter, written in Esperanto, after a few days' study of the
grammar at odd times, with a halfpenny Esperanto-English key enclosed,
was fully understood by the addressee, though he was ignorant up till