Do not imagine that all these folks had come to the auction-room with the intention of buying. I might say that all of them had but come to see. Who was going to be mad enough, even if he were rich enough, to purchase an isle of the Pacific, which the government had in some eccentric moment decided to sell? Would the reserve price ever be reached? Could anybody be found to work up the bidding? If not, it would scarcely be the fault of the public crier, who tried his best to tempt buyers by his shoutings and gestures, and the flowery metaphors of his harangue. People laughed at him, but they did not seem much influenced by him. "An island! an isle to sell!" repeated Gingrass. "But not to buy!" answered an Irishman, whose pocket did not hold enough to pay for a single pebble. "An island which at the valuation will not fetch six dollars an acre!" said the auctioneer. "And which won't pay an eighth per cent.!" replied a big farmer, who was well acquainted with agricultural speculations. "An isle which measures quite sixty-four miles round and has an area of two hundred and twenty-five thousand acres!" "Is it solid on its foundation?" asked a Mexican, an old customer at the liquor-bars, whose personal solidity seemed rather doubtful at the moment. "An isle with forests still virgin!" repeated the crier, "with prairies, hills, watercourses--" "Warranted?" asked a Frenchman, who seemed rather inclined to nibble. "Yes! warranted!" added Felporg, much too old at his trade to be moved by the chaff of the public. "For two years?" "To the end of the world!" "Beyond that?" "A freehold island!" repeated the crier, "an island without a single noxious animal, no wild beasts, no reptiles!--" "No birds?" added a wag. "No insects?" inquired another. "An island for the highest bidder!" said Dean Felporg, beginning again. "Come, gentlemen, come! Have a little courage in your pockets! Who wants an island in perfect state of repair, never been used, an island in the Pacific, that ocean of oceans? The valuation is a mere nothing! It is put at eleven hundred thousand dollars, is there any one will bid? Who speaks first? You, sir?--you, over there nodding your head like a porcelain mandarin? Here is an island! a really good island! Who says an island?" "Pass it round!" said a voice as if they were dealing with a picture or a vase. And the room shouted with laughter, but not a half-dollar was bid.