All of this was, of course, a long-winded way of letting the neighbors know that Jack and company were about to stink the place up to a degree that no one who had not been near a mountain of fermenting camel shit could even imagine; but Mr. Foot delivered the terrible news at such numbing length and so laden down with homiletical baggage as to beat his auditors into submission before the essential point of what he was saying had even penetrated their minds.