So the Erewhonians take a flogging once a week, and
a diet of bread and water for two or three months together, whenever
their straightener recommends it.
I do not suppose that even my host, on having swindled a confiding widow
out of the whole of her property, was put to more actual suffering than a
man will readily undergo at the hands of an English doctor. And yet he
must have had a very bad time of it. The sounds I heard were sufficient
to show that his pain was exquisite, but he never shrank from undergoing
it. He was quite sure that it did him good; and I think he was right. I
cannot believe that that man will ever embezzle money again. He may--but
it will be a long time before he does so.
During my confinement in prison, and on my journey, I had already
discovered a great deal of the above; but it still seemed surpassingly
strange, and I was in constant fear of committing some piece of rudeness,
through my inability to look at things from the same stand-point as my
neighbours; but after a few weeks' stay with the Nosnibors, I got to
understand things better, especially on having heard all about my host's
illness, of which he told me fully and repeatedly.
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