“And where does the treasury get them?” asked, with a sneer, M. Le Prohne, a native of the ancient Dauphiny, who towered head and shoulders above all the rest. “All your schemes are idle and absurd; property is robbery; abolish it, and all distinction between _thine_ and _mine_, and establish a grand People’s Bank, and give each one an equal credit on its books.” “And who,” sarcastically remarked M. Icarie, “will take care of the Bank, and be responsible for its managers, or see that the drafts of individuals are duly honored?” “Why not,” I asked in my enthusiasm, “make an equal division of property among all the members of the community?” “That would do very well for a start,” suggested Mr. Cotton, “but he was afraid that come Saturday night, a good many would demand, like the sailor, that the property be divided again, as they no longer retained their proportion.” This produced a smile, and as it was late, the company broke up and departed. Those who had had an opportunity of bringing forward their views were very much edified; others who had been obliged to listen, or to keep back their own projects, thought the party exceedingly dull, and could not help thinking that the evening had been spent very unprofitably. There were, indeed, persons there with plans of reform as wise, as deep, and as practicable as those I have taken notice of, and I owe an apology to their authors for my omissions. These omissions are the result of no ill feeling, and of no intentional neglect; and I certainly would repair them, but as I am pressed for time, and am not writing a history of reformers and projected reforms in a thousand volumes in-folio, the thing is absolutely out of the question. Let it suffice for me to say, that I have by me still some thousand and one of these projects, all of which their authors did me the honor to send me, with their respects, and all of which I examined with all the care and diligence they deserved.