sex, and speak directly to men, while standing so close as even to touch, let alone being enveloped in their breath. They are also highly amused at our scruples about being seen naked. What possible material harm, they say, can come to us of that? Clothing is worn by the Jovians simply according to feeling, and the young and vigorous, especially in Io's warmer latitudes, are usually without it. But exposure to any contact, even to that of the breath of the other sex, is an impropriety, or, as the case may be, a discourtesy or affront to the female. Of course, all respectable females avoid crowded places as much as possible. But even in such places a high courtesy prevails, to which the other sex can usually trust, for every well-bred man scrupulously clears the way for a passing female.
To return to the bathing, the morning bath always begins the day. The morning and day, by the way, are arranged after a fashion of their own by these Jovians, adapted more or less to what we would be apt to call the inconveniently irregular risings and settings, or rather appearances and disappearances, of their small sun. But these to themselves, accustomed to it all, and with nothing else or better to fall back upon, seemed the very perfection of order, variety, and suitability—so much so, indeed, that they were highly amused to hear that we preferred the monotony of our own regularly graduated day and night. The bathing-place of the district we resided in was not far from our lodging, and I used to stroll down of a morning to watch the neat slim young figures, as they skipped freely about in the clear water. If they were not exactly what we should call
