bivouâc was considerably farther into the
waste of chaos than any mortal army of crusaders had ever marched before.
Fourier's works, also, in a series of horribly tedious volumes, attracted a good
deal of my attention, from the analogy which I could not but recognize between
his system and our own. There was far less resemblance, it is true, than the
world chose to imagine; inasmuch as the two theories differed, as widely as the
zenith from the nadir, in their main principles.
    I talked about Fourier to Hollingsworth, and translated, for his benefit,
some of the passages that chiefly impressed me.
    »When, as a consequence of human improvement,« said I, »the globe shall
arrive at its final perfection, the great ocean is to be converted into a
particular kind of lemonade, such as was fashionable at Paris in Fourier's time.
He calls it limonade à cèdre. It is positively a fact! Just imagine the
city-docks filled, every day, with a flood-tide of this delectable beverage!«
    »Why did not the Frenchman make punch of it, at once?« asked Hollingsworth.
»The jack-tars would be delighted to go down in ships, and do business in such
an element.«
    I further proceeded to explain, as well as I modestly could, several points
of Fourier's system, illustrating them with here and there a page or two, and
asking Hollingsworth's opinion as to the expediency of introducing these
beautiful peculiarities into our own practice.
    »Let me hear no more of it!« cried he, in utter disgust. »I never will
forgive this fellow! He has committed the Unpardonable Sin! For what more
monstrous iniquity could the Devil himself contrive, than to choose the selfish
principle - the principle of all human wrong, the very blackness of man's heart,
the portion of ourselves which we shudder at, and which it is the whole aim of
spiritual discipline to eradicate - to choose it as the master-workman of his
system? To seize upon and foster whatever vile, petty, sordid, filthy, bestial,
and abominable corruptions have cankered into our nature, to be the efficient
instruments of his infernal regeneration! And his consummated Paradise, as he
pictures it, would be worthy of the agency which he counts upon for establishing
it. The nauseous villain!«
    »Nevertheless,« remarked I, »in consideration of the promised delights of
his system - so very proper, as they certainly are, to be appreciated by
Fourier's countrymen - I cannot