and modern history, and varieties of religion, and nature of the laws, and their codification, and amount of revenue, and whence drawn, and methods of collection, and percentage of loss, and character of climate, and—­well, a lot of things like that; we must suck the maps and cyclopedias dry.  And while we posted up in this way, the Faculty’s wives must flock over, one after the other, in a studiedly casual way, and help my wife keep the New Zealander quiet, and not let him get out and come interfering with our studies.  The scheme worked admirably; but it stopped business, stopped it entirely.

“It is in the official log-book of Yale, to be read and wondered at by future generations—­the account of the Great Blank Day—­the memorable Blank Day—­the day wherein the wheels of culture were stopped, a Sunday silence prevailed all about, and the whole University stood still while the Faculty read-up and qualified itself to sit at meat, without shame, in the presence of the Professor of Theological Engineering from New Zealand: 

“When we assembled at the dinner we were miserably tired and worn—­but we were posted.  Yes, it is fair to claim that.  In fact, erudition is a pale name for it.  New Zealand was the only subject; and it was just beautiful to hear us ripple it out.  And with such an air of unembarrassed ease, and unostentatious familiarity with detail, and trained and seasoned mastery of the subject-and oh, the grace and fluency of it!

“Well, finally somebody happened to notice that the guest was looking dazed, and wasn’t saying anything.  So they stirred him up, of course.  Then that man came out with a good, honest, eloquent compliment that made the Faculty blush.  He said he was not worthy to sit in the company of men like these; that he had been silent from admiration; that he had been silent from another cause also—­silent from shame—­silent from ignorance!  ‘For,’ said he, ’I, who have lived eighteen years in New Zealand and have served five in a professorship, and ought to know much about that country, perceive, now, that I know almost nothing about it.  I say it with shame, that I have learned fifty times, yes, a hundred times more about New Zealand in these two hours at this table than I ever knew before in all the eighteen years put together.  I was silent because I could not help myself.  What I knew about taxes, and policies, and laws, and revenue, and products, and history, and all that multitude of things, was but general, and ordinary, and vague-unscientific, in a word—­and it would have been insanity to expose it here to the searching glare of your amazingly accurate and all-comprehensive knowledge of those matters, gentlemen.  I beg you to let me sit silent—­as becomes me.  But do not change the subject; I can at least follow you, in this one; whereas if you change to one which shall call out the full strength of your mighty erudition, I shall be as one lost.  If you know all this about a remote little inconsequent patch like New Zealand, ah, what wouldn’t you know about any other Subject!’”