Page 143 - erewhon

CHAPTER XV: THE

MUSICAL BANKS

n my return to the drawing-room, I found that the Ma-
Ohaina current had expended itself. The ladies were just
putting away their work and preparing to go out. I asked
them where they were going. They answered with a certain
air of reserve that they were going to the bank to get some
money.
Now I had already collected that the mercantile affairs of
the Erewhonians were conducted on a totally different sys-
tem from our own; I had, however, gathered little hitherto,
except that they had two distinct commercial systems, of
which the one appealed more strongly to the imagination
than anything to which we are accustomed in Europe, in-
asmuch as the banks that were conducted upon this system
were decorated in the most profuse fashion, and all mercan-
tile transactions were accompanied with music, so that they
were called Musical Banks, though the music was hideous
to a European ear.
As for the system itself I never understood it, neither can
I do so now: they have a code in connection with it, which
I have not the slightest doubt that they understand, but no
foreigner can hope to do so. One rule runs into, and against,
another as in a most complicated grammar, or as in Chi-

1 Erewhon