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The
people of his fancy (60)
made diamonds synthetically, developed a convertible automobile-ship-helicopter-plane,
and fired glass bullets containing an electric spark
instantly fatal. (61)
The last years of Jules
Verne were not happy ones. Intellectual circles sneered
at (62)
him. He was not elected a member of the French Academy. Gossips said there
was no such man as Jules Verne. The Russians claimed him as a Slav, a Pole
and former espionage agent who had taken to letters.
(63)
Italian Intellectuals said Jules Verne was the pen name of a group of French
scientists and delegated a novelist to go to France to find the proof. The
man examined the manuscripts, and departed wholly convinced. (64)
To his colleagues he wired: "There is no Jules
Verne and Company--there is only Jules.”(65)
Jules Verne died in 1905.
The world attended his funeral, including all who had sneered and gossiped,
the thirty members of the French Academy, the diplomatic corps, and special
representatives of kings and presidents.
Of all the thousands of
words of praise uttered at his death, Jules Verne would have liked best
these two sentences from a Paris newspaper: "The
old story teller is dead. It is like the passing of Santa Claus.”(66)
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English
Intensive Reading 
Introduction
