Jules Verne Read Free Page B

mountains on the horizon. But I hardly saw them.
Confound these railways! You start, you arrive, and you have seen
nothing on the road!
    "No!" I exclaim, "there is none of the charm about it as there is in
traveling by post, in troika, tarantass, with the surprises of the
road, the originality of the inns, the confusion when you change
horses, the glass of vodka of the yemtchiks—and occasionally the
meeting with those honest brigands whose race is nearly extinct."
    "Mr. Bombarnac," said Ephrinell to me, "are you serious in regretting
all those fine things?"
    "Quite serious," I reply. "With the advantages of the straight line of
railway we lose the picturesqueness of the curved line, or the broken
line of the highways of the past. And, Monsieur Ephrinell, when you
read of traveling in Transcaucasia forty years ago, do you not regret
it? Shall I see one of those villages inhabited by Cossacks who are
soldiers and farmers at one and the same time? Shall I be present at
one of those merry-makings which charm the tourist? those djiquitovkas
with the men upright on their horses, throwing their swords,
discharging their pistols, and escorting you if you are in the company
of some high functionary, or a colonel of the Staniza."
    "Undoubtedly we have lost all those fine things," replies my Yankee.
"But, thanks to these iron ribbons which will eventually encircle our
globe like a hogshead of cider or a bale of cotton, we can go in
thirteen days from Tiflis to Pekin. That is why, if you expect any
incidents, to enliven you—"
    "Certainly, Monsieur Ephrinell."
    "Illusions, Mr. Bombarnac! Nothing will happen either to you or me.
Wait a bit, I promise you a journey, the most prosaic, the most homely,
the flattest—flat as the steppes of Kara Koum, which the Grand
Transasiatic traverses in Turkestan, and the plains of the desert of
Gobi it crosses in China—"
    "Well, we shall see, for I travel for the pleasure of my readers."
    "And I travel merely for my own business."
    And at this reply the idea recurred to me that Ephrinell would not be
quite the traveling companion I had dreamed of. He had goods to sell, I
had none to buy. I foresaw that our meeting would not lead to a
sufficient intimacy during our long journey. He was one of those
Yankees who, as they say, hold a dollar between their teeth, which it
is impossible to get away from them, and I should get nothing out of
him that was worth having.
    And although I knew that he traveled for Strong, Bulbul & Co., of New
York, I had never heard of the firm. To listen to their representative,
it would appear that Strong, Bulbul & Co. ought to be known throughout
the world.
    But then, how was it that they were unknown to me, a pupil of
Chincholle, our master in everything! I was quite at a loss because I
had never heard of the firm of Strong, Bulbul & Co.
    I was about to interrogate Ephrinell on this point, when he said to me:
    "Have you ever been in the United States, Mr. Bombarnac?"
    "No, Monsieur Ephrinell."
    "You will come to our country some day?"
    "Perhaps."
    "Then you will not forget to explore the establishment of Strong,
Bulbul & Co.?"
    "Explore it?"
    "That is the proper word."
    "Good! I shall not fail to do so."
    "You will see one of the most remarkable industrial establishments of
the New Continent."
    "I have no doubt of it; but how am I to know it?"
    "Wait a bit, Mr. Bombarnac. Imagine a colossal workshop, immense
buildings for the mounting and adjusting of the pieces, a steam engine
of fifteen hundred horse-power, ventilators making six hundred
revolutions a minute, boilers consuming a hundred tons of coals a day,
a chimney stack four hundred and fifty feet high, vast outhouses for
the storage of our goods, which we send to the five parts of the world,
a general manager, two sub-managers, four secretaries, eight
under-secretaries, a staff of five hundred clerks and nine hundred
workmen, a whole regiment of travelers like your servant, working in
Europe, Asia, Africa, America,