"Have you ever," he asked, "had occasion to explain the principles of hydraulics, or chess, or philosophical idealism to a three-year-old child, or a charwoman? You must forgive me, but really I can think of no better comparison. I am quite as powerless now as you have been if you have ever attempted it. I can only assure you that such things _are_. Without Jarvo or Akko or some one who understood, you might have sailed the high seas all your life and never have come any nearer to Yaque." St. George reflected. "Is Yaque the only example of this kind of thing," he asked, "that the Fourth Dimension would reveal?" "By no means," said the prince in surprise, "the world is literally teeming with like revelations, once the key is in your hands. The Fourth Dimension is only the beginning. We utilize that to isolate our island. But the higher dimensions are gradually being conquered, too. Nearly all of us can pass into the Fifth at will, 'disappearing,' as you have the word, from the lower dimensions. It is well-known to you that in a land whose people knew length and breadth, but no _up_ and _down_, an object might be pushed, but never lifted _up_ or put _down_. If it were to be lifted, such a people would believe it to have 'disappeared.' So, from you who know only three dimensions, Yaque has 'disappeared,' until one of us guides you here. Also we pass at will into the Fifth Dimension and even higher, and seem to 'disappear'; the only difference is that, there, we should not be able yet to guide one who did not himself understand how to pass there. Just as one who understands how to die and to come to life, as you have the phrase, would not be able to take with him any one who did not understand how to take himself there..." St. George listened, grasping at straws of comprehension, remembering how he had heard all this theorized about and smiled at; but most of all he was beset by a practical consideration. "Then," he said suddenly, the question leaping to his lips almost against his will, "if you hold this key to all knowledge, how is it that the king--Mr. Holland--could get away from you, and the Hereditary Treasure be lost?" The prince sighed profoundly. "We have by no means," he said, "perfected our knowledge. We are at one with the absolute in knowledge--true. But the affairs of every day most frequently elude us. Not even the most advanced among us are perfect intuitionists. We have by no means reached that desirable and inevitable day when our minds shall flow together, without need of communication, without possibility of secret. We still suffer the disadvantage of a slight barrier of personality." "And it is into one of these lapses," thought St. George irreverently, "that the king has disappeared." Aloud he asked curiously concerning a matter which was every moment becoming more incomprehensible. "But how, your Highness," he said simply, "did your people ever consent to have an American for your king?"