"I fancy that's exactly what would happen to you if you were to set up
your laboratory in the States. They don't stand on ceremony with their
institutions there."

"I am not likely to go and see. Otherwise your remark is just," admitted
the other. "They have more character over there, and their character is
essentially anarchistic. Fertile ground for us, the States--very good
ground. The great Republic has the root of the destructive matter in
her. The collective temperament is lawless. Excellent. They may shoot
us down, but--"

"You are too transcendental for me," growled Ossipon, with moody concern.

"Logical," protested the other. "There are several kinds of logic. This
is the enlightened kind. America is all right. It is this country that
is dangerous, with her idealistic conception of legality. The social
spirit of this people is wrapped up in scrupulous prejudices, and that is
fatal to our work. You talk of England being our only refuge! So much
the worse. Capua! What do we want with refuges? Here you talk, print,
plot, and do nothing. I daresay it's very convenient for such Karl
Yundts."

He shrugged his shoulders slightly, then added with the same leisurely
assurance: "To break up the superstition and worship of legality should
be our aim. Nothing would please me more than to see Inspector Heat and
his likes take to shooting us down in broad daylight with the approval of
the public. Half our battle would be won then; the disintegration of the
old morality would have set in in its very temple. That is what you
ought to aim at. But you revolutionises will never understand that. You
plan the future, you lose yourselves in reveries of economical systems