From the manufacturer of steam-engines to the
manufacturer of stockings, all were alike employed. There was no branch
of trade in Vraibleusia which did not equally rejoice at this new
opening for commercial enterprise, and which was not equally interested
in this new theatre for Vraibleusian industry, Vraibleusian invention,
Vraibleusian activity, and, above all, Vraibleusian competition.
Day and night the whole island was employed in preparing for the great
fleet and in huzzaing Popanilla. When at borne, every ten minutes he
was obliged to appear in the balcony, and then, with hand on heart and
hat in hand, ah! that bow! that perpetual motion of popularity! If a
man love ease, let him be most unpopular. The Managers did the
impossible to assist and advance the intercourse between the two
nations. They behaved in a liberal and enlightened manner, and a
deputation of liberal and enlightened merchants consequently waited upon
them with a vote of thanks. They issued so many pink shells that the
price of the public funds was doubled, and affairs arranged so skilfully
that money was universally declared to be worth nothing, so that every
one in the island, from the Premier down to the Mendicant whom the
lecture-loving Skindeep threatened with the bastinado, was enabled to
participate, in some degree, in the approaching venture, if we should
use so dubious a term in speaking of profits so certain.
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