"Absolutely," replied Kwang, with a smile; "but I am not yet out of the country, and I don't propose to risk it much longer, or I may not be able to get out. However," he added, "there is not the slightest risk in taking you to visit the Asylum for _Znednettlapseiwz_. I have made a special study of these asylums, of which there are only about half a dozen in the whole country. I got permission some years ago. I had been discussing with Count Krafft the difficulty of dealing with a certain class of persons, to be found in every modern State, who act as a focus for all opposition. They cling obstinately to certain ethical and political doctrines quite out of harmony with those of the Super-State, and profess to regard Bureaucracy and Militarism as inconsistent with liberty. He told me a good deal about the methods employed, and suggested that I should visit one of these asylums. I did so and asked permission to make a study of a few individual cases. Eventually I wrote a monograph on the case of the very man we are going to see, and although it was never published Count Krafft was much pleased with it. The man we shall see, Mr. Stillman, represents a type that has almost entirely disappeared from Meccania. He has had a remarkable history. At one time, for two or three years, he was the chief political opponent of the great Prince Mechow. He belongs to an older generation altogether, a generation older than his contemporaries, if you understand what I mean. Nearly all his contemporaries are 'Good Meccanians,' but there are still the remnants of the opposition left. When Stillman was a boy there were left alive only a handful of men who had stood up to Prince Bludiron. Most of these former opponents had emigrated, some to Transatlantica, some to Luniland and elsewhere. The rest ultimately died out. Stillman attempted to create a new opposition, but it was a hopeless task. If you want to understand the political history of Meccania you cannot do better than get him to talk to you if he is in the mood." We approached the asylum, which stood upon a lonely moorland, far away from any village. The gates were guarded by a single sentinel. As we walked along the path, after leaving our car in a yard near the lodge, we passed little groups of men working upon patches of garden. They looked up eagerly as we passed, and then turned back to their tasks. I noticed they were dressed in ordinary black clothes. It struck me at once, because I had become so used to seeing everybody in the familiar colours of one of the classes. On my mentioning this to Kwang, he said, "That is perfectly in accordance with the Meccanian system. These men now belong to no class; they are shut off from the rest of the world, and their only chance of returning to it is for them to renounce, formally and absolutely, all the errors of which they have been guilty." "And do many of them 'recant'?" I asked.