In Search of an Unknown Race — page 117: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

VAN. 107 council of ten of the wisest and best among the citizens, The chief magistrate was also his adviser, while under the latter were subordinate officers of lesser grade and rank. Crime was of rare occurrence, and punished with instant death by beheading. Lesser offenses, such as stealing, assaults, and the hundred other petty criminal- ities peculiar to cities throughout the world, were them- selves by no means common. This is not strange, for two very especial reasons. In the first place, the vast mineral and agricultural wealth of the province gave every man more than abundance—-all he had to do was to seek it. Poverty was unknown, hence no man coveted his neighbor’s wealth. And in the second place, intoxicants were banished from city and province alike, by the sternest of prohib- itory edicts. Even the lighter wines, such as are man- ufactured from native grapes the world over, were wanting in Itambez. Their use in sickness was not needed, for the reason that sickness itself was rare in that equable temperature and health-giving air, And where intoxicants are not found in any form, there you will notice a corresponding absence of crime in its various phases. That Van should at once begin to learn the easy language was his uncle’s first definite proposition. And that Ninada herself should be his teacher, afforded as much secret delight to Van as ill-concealed vexation to Flores. But Mr. Briscoe had his reasons for thus doing, so the matter was settled then and there. One day in Itambez was the delightful counterpart of that preceding it, and the one following. EOmMmiIicdoo ‘S (E(0)