structure and the actual luster of the jewel in it. We were
painfully hunting over the earth, and in its bowels, for a few
crystals and prettily colored stones which we hoarded and
treasured, when in a manufacturing laboratory we could easily
produce them, more perfect than nature, and in unlimited
quantity.

Now, if you want to understand what I am printing here about
Rodman, you must think about this thing as a scientific
possibility and not as a fantastic notion. Take, for example,
Rodman's address before the Sorbonne, or his report to the
International Congress of Science in Edinburgh, and you will
begin to see what I mean. The Marchese Giovanni, who was a
delegate to that congress, and Pastreaux, said that the something
in the way of an actual practical realization of what Rodman
outlined was the formulae. If Rodman could work out the
formulae, jewel-stuff could be produced as cheaply as glass, and
in any quantity - by the carload. Imagine it; sheet ruby, sheet
emerald, all the beauty and luster of jewels in the windows of
the corner drugstore!

And there is another thing that I want you to think about. Think
about the immense destruction of value - not to us, so greatly,
for our stocks of precious stones are not large; but the thing
meant, practically, wiping out all the assembled wealth of Asia
except the actual earth and its structures.

The destruction of value was incredible.

Put the thing some other way and consider it. Suppose we should