originally inculcated upon us by the necessity of self-protection have been enforced and graven on our very nature, by the reaction of our experience against the rough and harsh relations, the jarring and often unfriendly intercourse, of external society.  Aliens to our Order—­that is, ninety-nine hundredths of our race—­take delight in the infliction of petty personal annoyance, at least never take care not to ’jar each other’s elbow-nerves,’ or set on edge the teeth that never bit them. We are careful not to wound the feelings or even the weaknesses of a brother.  Punctilious courtesy, frank apology for unintentional wrong, is with us a point of honour.  Disputes, when by any chance they arise, are referred to the arbitration of our chiefs, who never consider their work done till the disputants are cordially reconciled.  Envy, the most dangerous source of ill-will among men, can hardly exist among us.  Rank has been well earned by its holder, or in a few cases by his ancestors; and authority is a trust never to be used for its holder’s benefit.  Wealth never provokes covetousness, since no member is ever allowed to be poor.  Not only the Order but each member is bound to take every opportunity of assisting every other by every method within his power.  We employ them, we promote them, we give them the preference in every kind of patronage at our command.  But these obligations are points of honour rather than of law.  Only apostasy or treason to the Order involve compulsory penalties; and the latter, if it ever occurred in these days, would be visited with instant death,—­inflicted, as it is inflicted upon irreconcilable enemies, in such a manner that none could know who passed the sentence, or by whom it was executed.”

“And have you,” I asked, “no apostates, as you have no traitors?”

“No,” he said.  “In the first place, none who has lived among us could endure to fall into the ordinary Martial life.  Secondly, the foundations of our simple creed are so clear, so capable of being made apparent to every one, that none once familiar with the evidences can well cease to believe them.”

Here he paused, and I asked, “How is it possible that the means you employ to punish those who have wronged you should not, in some cases at least, indicate the person who has employed them?”

“Because,” he said, “the means of vengeance are not corporeal; the agency does not in the least resemble any with which our countrymen, or apparently your race on Earth, are acquainted.  A traitor would be found dead with no sign of suffering or injury, and the physician would pronounce that he had died of apoplexy or heart disease.  A persecutor, or one who had unpardonably wronged any of the Children of the Star, might go mad, might fling himself from a precipice, might be visited with the most terrible series of calamities, all natural in their character, all distinctly traceable to natural causes, but astonishing and even apparently supernatural in their accumulation, and often in their immediate appropriateness to the character of his offence.  Our neighbours would, of course, destroy the avenger, if they could find him out—­would attempt to exterminate our society, could they prove its agency.”