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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mizora: A Prophecy, by Mary E. Bradley
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Mizora: A Prophecy
+       A MSS. Found Among the Private Papers of the Princess Vera Zarovitch
+
+Author: Mary E. Bradley
+
+Release Date: March 4, 2008 [EBook #24750]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MIZORA: A PROPHECY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Greg Weeks, George P. Snoga, Martin Pettit and
+the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+MIZORA:
+
+A PROPHECY.
+
+
+A MSS. FOUND AMONG THE PRIVATE PAPERS OF THE
+PRINCESS VERA ZAROVITCH;
+
+_Being a true and faithful account of her Journey to the Interior of the
+Earth, with a careful description of the Country and its Inhabitants,
+their Customs, Manners and Government._
+
+
+WRITTEN BY HERSELF.
+
+[Illustration: Publisher's logo]
+
+NEW YORK:
+
+_G. W. Dillingham, Publisher_,
+
+Successor to G. W. Carleton & Co.
+
+MDCCCXC.
+
+_All Rights Reserved._
+
+Copyright, 1889
+by
+Mary E. Bradley.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The narrative of Vera Zarovitch, published in the _Cincinnati
+Commercial_ in 1880 and 1881, attracted a great deal of attention. It
+commanded a wide circle of readers, and there was much more said about
+it than is usual when works of fiction run through a newspaper in weekly
+installments. Quite a number of persons who are unaccustomed to
+bestowing consideration upon works of fiction spoke of it, and grew
+greatly interested in it.
+
+I received many messages about it, and letters of inquiry, and some
+ladies and gentlemen desired to know the particulars about the
+production of the story in book form; and were inquisitive about it and
+the author who kept herself in concealment so closely that even her
+husband did not know that she was the writer who was making this stir in
+our limited literary world.
+
+I was myself so much interested in it that it occurred to me to make the
+suggestion that the story ought to have an extensive sale in book form,
+and to write to a publisher; but the lady who wrote the work seemed
+herself a shade indifferent on the subject, and it passed out of my
+hands and out of my mind.
+
+It is safe to say that it made an impression that was remarkable, and
+with a larger audience I do not doubt that it would make its mark as an
+original production wrought out with thoughtful care and literary skill,
+and take high rank.
+
+                                Yours very truly,
+
+                                    Murat Halstead.
+
+_Nov. 14th, 1889._
+
+
+
+
+PART FIRST
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Having little knowledge of rhetorical art, and possessing but a limited
+imagination, it is only a strong sense of the duty I owe to Science and
+the progressive minds of the age, that induces me to come before the
+public in the character of an author. True, I have only a simple
+narration of facts to deal with, and am, therefore, not expected to
+present artistic effects, and poetical imagery, nor any of those flights
+of imagination that are the trial and test of genius.
+
+Yet my task is not a light one. I may fail to satisfy my own mind that
+the true merits of the wonderful and mysterious people I discovered,
+have been justly described. I may fail to interest the public; which is
+the one difficulty most likely to occur, and most to be regretted--not
+for my own sake, but theirs. It is so hard to get human nature out of
+the ruts it has moved in for ages. To tear away their present faith, is
+like undermining their existence. Yet others who come after me will be
+more aggressive than I. I have this consolation: whatever reception may
+be given my narrative by the public, I know that it has been written
+solely for its good. That wonderful civilization I met with in Mizora, I
+may not be able to more than faintly shadow forth here, yet from it, the
+present age may form some idea of that grand, that ideal life that is
+possible for our remote posterity. Again and again has religious
+enthusiasm pictured a life to be eliminated from the grossness and
+imperfections of our material existence. The Spirit--the Mind--that
+mental gift, by or through which we think, reason, and suffer, is by one
+tragic and awful struggle to free itself from temporal blemishes and
+difficulties, and become spiritual and perfect. Yet, who, sweeping the
+limitless fields of space with a telescope, glancing at myriads of
+worlds that a lifetime could not count, or gazing through a microscope
+at a tiny world in a drop of water, has dreamed that patient Science
+and practice could evolve for the living human race, the ideal life of
+exalted knowledge: the life that I found in Mizora; that Science had
+made real and practicable. The duty that I owe to truth compels me to
+acknowledge that I have not been solicited to write this narrative by my
+friends; nor has it been the pastime of my leisure hours; nor written to
+amuse an invalid; nor, in fact, for any of those reasons which have
+prompted so many men and women to write a book. It is, on the contrary,
+the result of hours of laborious work, undertaken for the sole purpose
+of benefiting Science and giving encouragement to those progressive
+minds who have already added their mite of knowledge to the coming
+future of the race. "We owe a duty to posterity," says Junius in his
+famous letter to the king. A declaration that ought to be a motto for
+every schoolroom, and graven above every legislative hall in the world.
+It should be taught to the child as soon as reason has begun to dawn,
+and be its guide until age has become its master.
+
+It is my desire not to make this story a personal matter; and for that
+unavoidable prominence which is given one's own identity in relating
+personal experiences, an indulgence is craved from whomsoever may peruse
+these pages.
+
+In order to explain how and why I came to venture upon a journey no
+other of my sex has ever attempted, I am compelled to make a slight
+mention of my family and nationality.
+
+I am a Russian: born to a family of nobility, wealth, and political
+power. Had the natural expectations for my birth and condition been
+fulfilled, I should have lived, loved, married and died a Russian
+aristocrat, and been unknown to the next generation--and this narrative
+would not have been written.
+
+There are some people who seem to have been born for the sole purpose of
+becoming the playthings of Fate--who are tossed from one condition of
+life to another without wish or will of their own. Of this class I am an
+illustration. Had I started out with a resolve to discover the North
+Pole, I should never have succeeded. But all my hopes, affections,
+thoughts, and desires were centered in another direction, hence--but my
+narrative will explain the rest.
+
+The tongue of woman has long been celebrated as an unruly member, and
+perhaps, in some of the domestic affairs of life, it has been
+unnecessarily active; yet no one who gives this narrative a perusal, can
+justly deny that it was the primal cause of the grandest discovery of
+the age.
+
+I was educated in Paris, where my vacations were frequently spent with
+an American family who resided there, and with whom my father had formed
+an intimate friendship. Their house, being in a fashionable quarter of
+the city and patriotically hospitable, was the frequent resort of many
+of their countrymen. I unconsciously acquired a knowledge and admiration
+for their form of government, and some revolutionary opinions in regard
+to my own.
+
+Had I been guided by policy, I should have kept the latter a secret, but
+on returning home, at the expiration of my school days, I imprudently
+gave expression to them in connection with some of the political
+movements of the Russian Government--and secured its suspicion at once,
+which, like the virus of some fatal disease, once in the system, would
+lose its vitality only with my destruction.
+
+While at school, I had become attached to a young and lovely Polish
+orphan, whose father had been killed at the battle of Grochow when she
+was an infant in her mother's arms. My love for my friend, and sympathy
+for her oppressed people, finally drew me into serious trouble and
+caused my exile from my native land.
+
+I married at the age of twenty the son of my father's dearest friend.
+Alexis and I were truly attached to each other, and when I gave to my
+infant the name of my father and witnessed his pride and delight, I
+thought to my cup of earthly happiness, not one more drop could be
+added.
+
+A desire to feel the cheering air of a milder climate induced me to pay
+my Polish friend a visit. During my sojourn with her occurred the
+anniversary of the tragedy of Grochow, when, according to custom, all
+who had lost friends in the two dreadful battles that had been fought
+there, met to offer prayers for their souls. At her request, I
+accompanied my friend to witness the ceremonies. To me, a silent and
+sympathizing spectator, they were impressive and solemn in the extreme.
+Not less than thirty thousand people were there, weeping and praying on
+ground hallowed by patriot blood. After the prayers were said, the voice
+of the multitude rose in a mournful and pathetic chant. It was rudely
+broken by the appearance of the Russian soldiers.
+
+A scene ensued which memory refuses to forget, and justice forbids me to
+deny. I saw my friend, with the song of sorrow still trembling on her
+innocent lips, fall bleeding, dying from the bayonet thrust of a Russian
+soldier. I clasped the lifeless body in my arms, and in my grief and
+excitement, poured forth upbraidings against the government of my
+country which it would never forgive nor condone. I was arrested, tried,
+and condemned to the mines of Siberia for life.
+
+My father's ancient and princely lineage, my husband's rank, the wealth
+of both families, all were unavailing in procuring a commutation of my
+sentence to some less severe punishment. Through bribery, however, the
+co-operation of one of my jailors was secured, and I escaped in disguise
+to the frontier.
+
+It was my husband's desire that I proceed immediately to France, where
+he would soon join me. But we were compelled to accept whatever means
+chance offered for my escape, and a whaling vessel bound for the
+Northern Seas was the only thing I could secure passage upon with
+safety. The captain promised to transfer me to the first southward bound
+vessel we should meet.
+
+But none came. The slow, monotonous days found me gliding farther and
+farther from home and love. In the seclusion of my little cabin, my fate
+was more endurable than the horrors of Siberia could have been, but it
+was inexpressibly lonesome. On shipboard I sustained the character of a
+youth, exiled for a political offense, and of a delicate constitution.
+
+It is not necessary to the interest of this narrative to enter into the
+details of shipwreck and disaster, which befel us in the Northern Seas.
+Our vessel was caught between ice floes, and we were compelled to
+abandon her. The small boats were converted into sleds, but in such
+shape as would make it easy to re-convert them into boats again, should
+it ever become necessary. We took our march for the nearest Esquimaux
+settlement, where we were kindly received and tendered the hospitality
+of their miserable huts. The captain, who had been ill for some time,
+grew rapidly worse, and in a few days expired. As soon as the approach
+of death became apparent, he called the crew about him, and requested
+them to make their way south as soon as possible, and to do all in their
+power for my health and comfort. He had, he said, been guaranteed a sum
+of money for my safe conduct to France, sufficient to place his family
+in independent circumstances, and he desired that his crew should do all
+in their power to secure it for them.
+
+The next morning I awoke to find myself deserted, the crew having
+decamped with nearly everything brought from the ship.
+
+Being blessed with strong nerves, I stared my situation bravely in the
+face, and resolved to make the best of it. I believed it could be only a
+matter of time when some European or American whaling vessel should
+rescue me: and I had the resolution to endure, while hope fed the flame.
+
+I at once proceeded to inure myself to the life of the Esquimaux. I
+habited myself in a suit of reindeer fur, and ate, with compulsory
+appetite, the raw flesh and fat that form their principal food.
+Acclimated by birth to the coldest region of the temperate zone, and
+naturally of a hardy constitution, I found it not so difficult to endure
+the rigors of the Arctic temperature as I had supposed.
+
+I soon discovered the necessity of being an assistance to my new friends
+in procuring food, as their hospitality depends largely upon the state
+of their larder. A compass and a small trunk of instruments belonging to
+the Captain had been either over-looked or rejected by the crew in their
+flight. I secured the esteem of the Esquimaux by using the compass to
+conduct a hunting party in the right direction when a sudden snow-storm
+had obscured the landmarks by which they guide their course. I
+cheerfully assumed a share of their hardships, for with these poor
+children of the North life is a continual struggle with cold and
+starvation. The long, rough journeys which we frequently took over ice
+and ridges of snow in quest of animal food, I found monotonously
+destitute of everything I had experienced in former traveling, except
+fatigue. The wail of the winds, and the desolate landscape of ice and
+snow, never varied. The coruscations of the Aurora Borealis sometimes
+lighted up the dreary waste around us, and the myriad eyes of the
+firmament shone out with a brighter lustre, as twilight shrank before
+the gloom of the long Arctic night.
+
+A description of the winter I spent with the Esquimaux can be of little
+interest to the readers of this narrative. Language cannot convey to
+those who have dwelt always in comfort the feeling of isolation, the
+struggle with despair, that was constantly mine. We were often confined
+to our ice huts for days while the blinding fury of the wind driven snow
+without made the earth look like chaos. Sometimes I crept to the narrow
+entrance and looked toward the South with a feeling of homesickness too
+intense to describe. Away, over leagues of perilous travel, lay
+everything that was dear or congenial; and how many dreary months,
+perhaps years, must pass before I could obtain release from associations
+more dreadful than solitude. It required all the courage I could command
+to endure it.
+
+The whale-fishing opens about the first week in August, and continues
+throughout September. As it drew near, the settlement prepared to move
+farther north, to a locality where they claimed whales could be found
+in abundance. I cheerfully assisted in the preparations, for to meet
+some whaling vessel was my only hope of rescue from surroundings that
+made existence a living death.
+
+The dogs were harnessed to sleds heavily laden with the equipments of an
+Esquimaux hut. The woman, as well as the men, were burdened with immense
+packs; and our journey begun. We halted only to rest and sleep. A few
+hours work furnished us a new house out of the ever present ice. We
+feasted on raw meat--sometimes a freshly killed deer; after which our
+journey was resumed.
+
+As near as I could determine, it was close to the 85° north latitude,
+where we halted on the shore of an open sea. Wild ducks and game were
+abundant, also fish of an excellent quality. Here, for the first time in
+many months, I felt the kindly greeting of a mild breeze as it hailed me
+from the bosom of the water. Vegetation was not profuse nor brilliant,
+but to my long famished eyes, its dingy hue was delightfully refreshing.
+
+Across this sea I instantly felt a strong desire to sail. I believed it
+must contain an island of richer vegetation than the shore we occupied.
+But no one encouraged me or would agree to be my companion. On the
+contrary, they intimated that I should never return. I believed that
+they were trying to frighten me into remaining with them, and declared
+my intention to go alone. Perhaps I might meet in that milder climate
+some of my own race. My friend smiled, and pointing to the South, said,
+as he designated an imaginary boundary:
+
+"Across _that_ no white man's foot has ever stepped."
+
+So I was alone. My resolution, however, was not shaken. A boat was
+constructed, and bidding adieu to my humble companions, I launched into
+an unknown sea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+On and on, and on I rowed until the shore and my late companions were
+lost in the gloomy distance. On and on, and still on, until fatigued
+almost to exhaustion; and still, no land. A feeling of uncontrollable
+lonesomeness took possession of me. Silence reigned supreme. No sound
+greeted me save the swirl of the gently undulating waters against the
+boat, and the melancholy dip of the oars. Overhead, the familiar eyes of
+night were all that pierced the gloom that seemed to hedge me in. My
+feeling of distress increased when I discovered that my boat had struck
+a current and was beyond my control. Visions of a cataract and
+inevitable death instantly shot across my mind. Made passive by intense
+despair, I laid down in the bottom of the boat, to let myself drift into
+whatever fate was awaiting me.
+
+I must have lain there many hours before I realized that I was traveling
+in a circle. The velocity of the current had increased, but not
+sufficiently to insure immediately destruction. Hope began to revive,
+and I sat up and looked about me with renewed courage. Directly before
+me rose a column of mist, so thin that I could see through it, and of
+the most delicate tint of green. As I gazed, it spread into a curtain
+that appeared to be suspended in mid-air, and began to sway gently back
+and forth, as if impelled by a slight breeze, while sparks of fire, like
+countless swarms of fire-flies, darted through it and blazed out into a
+thousand brilliant hues and flakes of color that chased one another
+across and danced merrily up and down with bewildering swiftness.
+Suddenly it drew together in a single fold, a rope of yellow mist, then
+instantly shook itself out again as a curtain of rainbows fringed with
+flame. Myriads of tassels, composed of threads of fire, began to dart
+hither and thither through it, while the rainbow stripes deepened in hue
+until they looked like gorgeous ribbons glowing with intensest radiance,
+yet softened by that delicate misty appearance which is a special
+quality of all atmospheric color, and which no pencil can paint, nor the
+most eloquent tongue adequately describe.
+
+The swaying motion continued. Sometimes the curtain approached near
+enough, apparently, to flaunt its fiery fringe almost within my grasp.
+It hung one instant in all its marvelous splendor of colors, then
+suddenly rushed into a compact mass, and shot across the zenith, an arc
+of crimson fire that lit up the gloomy waters with a weird, unearthly
+glare. It faded quickly, and appeared to settle upon the water again in
+a circular wall of amber mist, round which the current was hurrying me
+with rapidly increasing speed. I saw, with alarm, that the circles were
+narrowing A whirlpool was my instant conjecture, and I laid myself down
+in the boat, again expecting every moment to be swept into a seething
+abyss of waters. The spray dashed into my face as the boat plunged
+forward with frightful swiftness. A semi-stupor, born of exhaustion and
+terror, seized me in its merciful embrace.
+
+It must have been many hours that I lay thus. I have a dim recollection
+of my boat going on and on, its speed gradually decreasing, until I was
+amazed to perceive that it had ceased its onward motion and was gently
+rocking on quiet waters. I opened my eyes. A rosy light, like the first
+blush of a new day, permeated the atmosphere. I sat up and looked about
+me. A circular wall of pale amber mist rose behind me; the shores of a
+new and beautiful country stretched before. Toward them, I guided my
+boat with reviving hope and strength.
+
+I entered a broad river, whose current was from the sea, and let myself
+drift along its banks in bewildered delight. The sky appeared bluer, and
+the air balmier than even that of Italy's favored clime. The turf that
+covered the banks was smooth and fine, like a carpet of rich green
+velvet. The fragrance of tempting fruit was wafted by the zephyrs from
+numerous orchards. Birds of bright plumage flitted among the branches,
+anon breaking forth into wild and exultant melody, as if they rejoiced
+to be in so favored a clime.
+
+And truly it seemed a land of enchantment. The atmosphere had a peculiar
+transparency, seemingly to bring out clearly objects at a great
+distance, yet veiling the far horizon in a haze of gold and purple.
+Overhead, clouds of the most gorgeous hues, like precious gems converted
+into vapor, floated in a sky of the serenest azure. The languorous
+atmosphere, the beauty of the heavens, the inviting shores, produced in
+me a feeling of contentment not easily described. To add to my senses
+another enjoyment, my ears were greeted with sounds of sweet music, in
+which I detected the mingling of human voices.
+
+I wondered if I had really drifted into an enchanted country, such as I
+had read about in the fairy books of my childhood.
+
+The music grew louder, yet wondrously sweet, and a large pleasure boat,
+shaped like a fish, glided into view. Its scales glittered like gems as
+it moved gracefully and noiselessly through the water. Its occupants
+were all young girls of the highest type of blonde beauty. It was their
+soft voices, accompanied by some peculiar stringed instruments they
+carried, that had produced the music I had heard. They appeared to
+regard me with curiosity, not unmixed with distrust, for their boat
+swept aside to give me a wide berth.
+
+I uncovered my head, shook down my long black hair, and falling upon my
+knees, lifted my hands in supplication. My plea was apparently
+understood, for turning their boat around, they motioned me to follow
+them. This I did with difficulty, for I was weak, and their boat moved
+with a swiftness and ease that astonished me. What surprised me most was
+its lack of noise.
+
+As I watched its beautiful occupants dressed in rich garments, adorned
+with rare and costly gems, and noted the noiseless, gliding swiftness of
+their boat, an uncomfortable feeling of mystery began to invade my mind,
+as though I really had chanced upon enchanted territory.
+
+As we glided along, I began to be impressed by the weird stillness. No
+sound greeted me from the ripening orchards, save the carol of birds;
+from the fields came no note of harvest labor. No animals were visible,
+nor sound of any. No hum of life. All nature lay asleep in voluptuous
+beauty, veiled in a glorious atmosphere. Everything wore a dreamy look.
+The breeze had a loving, lingering touch, not unlike to the Indian
+Summer of North America. But no Indian Summer ever knew that dark green
+verdure, like the first robe of spring. Wherever the eye turned it met
+something charming in cloud, or sky, or water, or vegetation. Everything
+had felt the magical touch of beauty.
+
+On the right, the horizon was bounded by a chain of mountains, that
+plainly showed their bases above the glowing orchards and verdant
+landscapes. It impressed me as peculiar, that everything appeared to
+rise as it gained in distance. At last the pleasure boat halted at a
+flight of marble steps that touched the water. Ascending these, I gained
+an eminence where a scene of surpassing beauty and grandeur lay spread
+before me. Far, far as the eye could follow it, stretched the stately
+splendor of a mighty city. But all the buildings were detached and
+surrounded by lawns and shade trees, their white marble and gray granite
+walls gleaming through the green foliage.
+
+Upon the lawn, directly before us, a number of most beautiful girls had
+disposed themselves at various occupations. Some were reading, some
+sketching, and some at various kinds of needlework. I noticed that they
+were all blondes. I could not determine whether their language possessed
+a peculiarly soft accent, or whether it was an unusual melody of voice
+that made their conversation as musical to the ear as the love notes of
+some amorous wood bird to its mate.
+
+A large building of white marble crowned a slight eminence behind them.
+Its porticos were supported upon the hands of colossal statues of women,
+carved out of white marble with exquisite art and beauty. Shade trees of
+a feathery foliage, like plumes of finest moss, guarded the entrance and
+afforded homes for brilliant-plumaged birds that flew about the porticos
+and alighted on the hands and shoulders of the ladies without fear. Some
+of the trees had a smooth, straight trunk and flat top, bearing a
+striking resemblance to a Chinese umbrella. On either side of the
+marble-paved entrance were huge fountains that threw upward a column of
+water a hundred feet in height, which, dissolving into spray, fell into
+immense basins of clearest crystal. Below the rim of these basins, but
+covered with the crystal, as with a delicate film of ice, was a wreath
+of blood red roses, that looked as though they had just been plucked
+from the stems and placed there for a temporary ornament. I afterward
+learned that it was the work of an artist, and durable as granite.
+
+I supposed I had arrived at a female seminary, as not a man, or the
+suggestion of one, was to be seen. If it were a seminary, it was for the
+wealth of the land, as house, grounds, adornments, and the ladies'
+attire were rich and elegant.
+
+I stood apart from the groups of beautiful creatures like the genus of
+another race, enveloped in garments of fur that had seen much service. I
+presented a marked contrast. The evident culture, refinement, and
+gentleness of the ladies, banished any fear I might have entertained as
+to the treatment I should receive. But a singular silence that pervaded
+everything impressed me painfully. I stood upon the uplifted verge of an
+immense city, but from its broad streets came no sound of traffic, no
+rattle of wheels, no hum of life. Its marble homes of opulence shone
+white and grand through mossy foliage; from innumerable parks the
+fountains sparkled and statues gleamed like rare gems upon a costly
+robe; but over all a silence, as of death, reigned unbroken. The awe and
+the mystery of it pressed heavily upon my spirit, but I could not refuse
+to obey when a lady stepped out of the group, that had doubtless been
+discussing me, and motioned me to follow her.
+
+She led me through the main entrance into a lofty hall that extended
+through the entire building, and consisted of a number of grand arches
+representing scenes in high relief of the finest sculpture. We entered a
+magnificent salon, where a large assembly of ladies regarded me with
+unmistakable astonishment. Every one of them was a blonde. I was
+presented to one, whom I instantly took to be the Lady Superior of the
+College, for I had now settled it in my mind that I was in a female
+seminary, albeit one of unheard of luxury in its appointments.
+
+The lady had a remarkable majesty of demeanor, and a noble countenance.
+Her hair was white with age, but over her features, the rosy bloom of
+youth still lingered, as if loth to depart. She looked at me kindly and
+critically, but not with as much surprise as the others had evinced. I
+may here remark that I am a brunette. My guide, having apparently
+received some instruction in regard to me, led me upstairs into a
+private apartment. She placed before me a complete outfit of female
+wearing apparel, and informed me by signs that I was to put it on. She
+then retired. The apartment was sumptuously furnished in two
+colors--amber and lazulite. A bath-room adjoining had a beautiful
+porcelain tank with scented water, that produced a delightful feeling of
+exhilaration.
+
+Having donned my new attire, I descended the stairs and met my guide,
+who conducted me into a spacious dining-room. The walls were adorned
+with paintings, principally of fruit and flowers. A large and superb
+picture of a sylvan dell in the side of a rock, was one exception. Its
+deep, cool shadows, and the pellucid water, which a wandering sunbeam
+accidentally revealed, were strikingly realistic. Nearly all of the
+pictures were upon panels of crystal that were set in the wall. The
+light shining through them gave them an exceedingly natural effect. One
+picture that I especially admired, was of a grape vine twining around
+the body and trunk of an old tree. It was inside of the crystal panel,
+and looked so natural that I imagined I could see its leaves and
+tendrils sway in the wind. The occupants of the dining-room were all
+ladies, and again I noted the fact that they were all blondes:
+beautiful, graceful, courteous, and with voices softer and sweeter than
+the strains of an eolian harp.
+
+The table, in its arrangement and decoration, was the most beautiful
+one I had ever seen. The white linen cloth resembled brocaded satin. The
+knives and forks were gold, with handles of solid amber. The dishes were
+of the finest porcelain. Some of them, particularly the fruit stands,
+looked as though composed of hoar frost. Many of the fruit stands were
+of gold filigree work. They attracted my notice at once, not so much on
+account of the exquisite workmanship and unique design of the dishes, as
+the wonderful fruit they contained. One stand, that resembled a huge
+African lily in design, contained several varieties of plums, as large
+as hen's eggs, and transparent. They were yellow, blue and red. The
+centre of the table was occupied by a fruit stand of larger size than
+the others. It looked like a boat of sea foam fringed with gold moss.
+Over its outer edge hung clusters of grapes of a rich wine color, and
+clear as amethysts. The second row looked like globes of honey, the next
+were of a pale, rose color, and the top of the pyramid was composed of
+white ones, the color and transparency of dew.
+
+The fruit looked so beautiful. I thought it would be a sacrilege to
+destroy the charm it had for the eye; but when I saw it removed by pink
+tipped fingers, whose beauty no art could represent, and saw it
+disappear within such tempting lips. I thought the feaster worthy of the
+feast. Fruit appeared to be the principal part of their diet, and was
+served in its natural state. I was, however, supplied with something
+that resembled beefsteak of a very fine quality. I afterward learned
+that it was chemically prepared meat. At the close of the meal, a cup
+was handed me that looked like the half of a soap bubble with all its
+iridescent beauty sparkling and glancing in the light. It contained a
+beverage that resembled chocolate, but whose flavor could not have been
+surpassed by the fabled nectar of the gods.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+I have been thus explicit in detailing the circumstances of my entrance
+into the land of Mizora, or, in other words, the interior of the earth,
+lest some incredulous person might doubt the veracity of this narrative.
+
+It does seem a little astonishing that a woman should have fallen by
+accident, and without intention or desire, upon a discovery that
+explorers and scientists had for years searched for in vain. But such
+was the fact, and, in generosity, I have endeavored to make my accident
+as serviceable to the world in general, and Science in particular, as I
+could, by taking observations of the country, its climate and products,
+and especially its people.
+
+I met with the greatest difficulty in acquiring their language.
+Accustomed to the harsh dialect of the North, my voice was almost
+intractable in obtaining their melodious accentuation. It was,
+therefore, many months before I mastered the difficulty sufficiently to
+converse without embarrassment, or to make myself clearly understood.
+The construction of their language was simple and easily understood, and
+in a short time I was able to read it with ease, and to listen to it
+with enjoyment. Yet, before this was accomplished, I had mingled among
+them for months, listening to a musical jargon of conversation, that I
+could neither participate in, nor understand. All that I could therefore
+discover about them during this time, was by observation. This soon
+taught me that I was not in a seminary--in our acceptance of the
+term--but in a College of Experimental Science. The ladies--girls I had
+supposed them to be--were, in fact, women and mothers, and had reached
+an age that with us would be associated with decrepitude, wrinkles and
+imbecility. They were all practical chemists, and their work was the
+preparation of food from the elements. No wonder that they possessed the
+suppleness and bloom of eternal youth, when the earthy matter and
+impurities that are ever present in our food, were unknown to theirs.
+
+I also discovered that they obtained rain artificially when needed, by
+discharging vast quantities of electricity in the air. I discovered that
+they kept no cattle, nor animals of any kind for food or labor. I
+observed a universal practice of outdoor exercising; the aim seeming to
+be to develop the greatest capacity of lung or muscle. It was
+astonishing the amount of air a Mizora lady could draw into her lungs.
+They called it their brain stimulant, and said that their faculties were
+more active after such exercise. In my country, a cup of strong coffee,
+or some other agreeable beverage, is usually taken into the stomach to
+invigorate or excite the mind.
+
+One thing I remarked as unusual among a people of such cultured taste,
+and that was the size of the ladies' waists. Of all that I measured not
+one was less than thirty inches in circumference, and it was rare to
+meet with one that small. At first I thought a waist that tapered from
+the arm pits would be an added beauty, if only these ladies would be
+taught how to acquire it. But I lived long enough among them to look
+upon a tapering waist as a disgusting deformity. They considered a large
+waist a mark of beauty, as it gave a greater capacity of lung power; and
+they laid the greatest stress upon the size and health of the lungs. One
+little lady, not above five feet in height, I saw draw into her lungs
+two hundred and twenty-five cubic inches of air, and smile proudly when
+she accomplished it. I measured five feet and five inches in height, and
+with the greatest effort I could not make my lungs receive more than two
+hundred cubic inches of air. In my own country I had been called an
+unusually robust girl, and knew, by comparison, that I had a much larger
+and fuller chest than the average among women.
+
+I noticed with greater surprise than anything else had excited in me,
+the marked absence of men. I wandered about the magnificent building
+without hindrance or surveillance. There was not a lock or bolt on any
+door in it. I frequented a vast gallery filled with paintings and
+statues of women, noble looking, beautiful women, but still--nothing but
+women. The fact that they were all blondes, singular as it might appear,
+did not so much impress me. Strangers came and went, but among the
+multitude of faces I met, I never saw a man's.
+
+In my own country I had been accustomed to regard man as a vital
+necessity. He occupied all governmental offices, and was the arbitrator
+of domestic life. It seemed, therefore, impossible to me for a country
+or government to survive without his assistance and advice. Besides, it
+was a country over which the heart of any man must yearn, however
+insensible he might be to beauty or female loveliness. Wealth was
+everywhere and abundant. The climate as delightful as the most
+fastidious could desire. The products of the orchards and gardens
+surpassed description. Bread came from the laboratory, and not from the
+soil by the sweat of the brow. Toil was unknown; the toil that we know,
+menial, degrading and harassing. Science had been the magician that had
+done away all that. Science, so formidable and austere to our untutored
+minds, had been gracious to these fair beings and opened the door to
+nature's most occult secrets. The beauty of those women it is not in my
+power to describe. The Greeks, in their highest art, never rivalled it,
+for here was a beauty of mind that no art can represent. They enhanced
+their physical charms with attractive costumes, often of extreme
+elegance. They wore gems that flashed a fortune as they passed. The
+rarest was of a pale rose color, translucent as the clearest water, and
+of a brilliancy exceeding the finest diamond. Their voices, in song,
+could only be equaled by a celestial choir. No dryad queen ever floated
+through the leafy aisles of her forest with more grace than they
+displayed in every movement. And all this was for feminine eyes
+alone--and they of the most enchanting loveliness.
+
+Among all the women that I met during my stay in Mizora--comprising a
+period of fifteen years--I saw not one homely face or ungraceful form.
+In my own land the voice of flattery had whispered in my ear praises of
+face and figure, but I felt ill-formed and uncouth beside the perfect
+symmetry and grace of these lovely beings. Their chief beauty appeared
+in a mobility of expression. It was the divine fire of Thought that
+illumined every feature, which, while gazing upon the Aphrodite of
+Praxitiles, we must think was all that the matchless marble lacked.
+Emotion passed over their features like ripples over a stream. Their
+eyes were limpid wells of loveliness, where every impulse of their
+natures were betrayed without reserve.
+
+"It would be a paradise for man."
+
+I made this observation to myself, and as secretly would I propound the
+question:
+
+"Why is he not here in lordly possession?"
+
+In _my_ world man was regarded, or he had made himself regarded, as a
+superior being. He had constituted himself the Government, the Law,
+Judge, Jury and Executioner. He doled out reward or punishment as his
+conscience or judgment dictated. He was active and belligerent always in
+obtaining and keeping every good thing for himself. He was
+indispensable. Yet here was a nation of fair, exceedingly fair women
+doing without him, and practising the arts and sciences far beyond the
+imagined pale of human knowledge and skill.
+
+Of their progress in science I will give some accounts hereafter.
+
+It is impossible to describe the feeling that took possession of me as
+months rolled by, and I saw the active employments of a prosperous
+people move smoothly and quietly along in the absence of masculine
+intelligence and wisdom. Cut off from all inquiry by my ignorance of
+their language, the singular absence of the male sex began to prey upon
+my imagination as a mystery. The more so after visiting a town at some
+distance, composed exclusively of schools and colleges for the youth of
+the country. Here I saw hundreds of children--_and all of them were
+girls_. Is it to be wondered at that the first inquiry I made, was:
+
+"Where are the men?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+To facilitate my progress in the language of Mizora I was sent to their
+National College. It was the greatest favor they could have conferred
+upon me, as it opened to me a wide field of knowledge. Their educational
+system was a peculiar one, and, as it was the chief interest of the
+country. I shall describe it before proceeding farther with this
+narrative.
+
+All institutions for instruction were public, as were, also, the books
+and other accessories. The State was the beneficent mother who furnished
+everything, and required of her children only their time and
+application. Each pupil was compelled to attain a certain degree of
+excellence that I thought unreasonably high, after which she selected
+the science or vocation she felt most competent to master, and to that
+she then devoted herself.
+
+The salaries of teachers were larger than those of any other public
+position. The Principal of the National College had an income that
+exceeded any royal one I had ever heard of; but, as education was the
+paramount interest of Mizora, I was not surprised at it. Their desire
+was to secure the finest talent for educational purposes, and as the
+highest honors and emoluments belonged to such a position, it could not
+be otherwise. To be a teacher in Mizora was to be a person of
+consequence. They were its aristocracy.
+
+Every State had a free college provided for out of the State funds. In
+these colleges every department of Science, Art, or Mechanics was
+furnished with all the facilities for thorough instruction. All the
+expenses of a pupil, including board, clothing, and the necessary
+traveling fares, were defrayed by the State. I may here remark that all
+railroads are owned and controlled by the General Government. The rates
+of transportation were fixed by law, and were uniform throughout the
+country.
+
+The National College which I entered belonged to the General
+Government. Here was taught the highest attainments in the arts and
+sciences, and all industries practised in Mizora. It contained the very
+cream of learning. There the scientist, the philosopher and inventor
+found the means and appliances for study and investigation. There the
+artist and sculptor had their finest work, and often their studios. The
+principals and subordinate teachers and assistants were elected by
+popular vote. The State Colleges were free to those of another State who
+might desire to enter them, for Mizora was like one vast family. It was
+regarded as the duty of every citizen to lend all the aid and
+encouragement in her power to further the enlightenment of others,
+wisely knowing the benefits of such would accrue to her own and the
+general good. The National College was open to all applicants,
+irrespective of age, the only requirements being a previous training to
+enter upon so high a plane of mental culture. Every allurement was held
+out to the people to come and drink at the public fountain where the cup
+was inviting and the waters sweet. "For," said one of the leading
+instructors to me, "education is the foundation of our moral elevation,
+our government, our happiness. Let us relax our efforts, or curtail the
+means and inducements to become educated, and we relax into ignorance,
+and end in demoralization. We know the value of free education. It is
+frequently the case that the greatest minds are of slow development, and
+manifest in the primary schools no marked ability. They often leave the
+schools unnoticed; and when time has awakened them to their mental
+needs, all they have to do is to apply to the college, pass an
+examination, and be admitted. If not prepared to enter the college, they
+could again attend the common schools. We realize in its broadest sense
+the ennobling influence of universal education. The higher the culture
+of a people, the more secure is their government and happiness. A
+prosperous people is always an educated one; and the freer the
+education, the wealthier they become."
+
+The Preceptress of the National College was the leading scientist of the
+country. Her position was more exalted than any that wealth could have
+given her. In fact, while wealth had acknowledged advantages, it held a
+subordinate place in the estimation of the people. I never heard the
+expression "very wealthy," used as a recommendation of a person. It was
+always: "_She_ is a fine scholar, or mechanic, or artist, or musician.
+_She_ excels in landscape gardening, or domestic work. _She_ is a
+first-class chemist." But never "_She_ is rich."
+
+The idea of a Government assuming the responsibility of education, like
+a parent securing the interest of its children, was all so new to me;
+and yet, I confessed to myself, the system might prove beneficial to
+other countries than Mizora. In that world, from whence I had so
+mysteriously emigrated, education was the privilege only of the rich.
+And in no country, however enlightened, was there a system of education
+that would reach all. Charitable institutions were restricted, and
+benefited only a few. My heart beat with enthusiasm when I thought of
+the mission before me. And then I reflected that the philosophers of my
+world were but as children in progress compared to these. Still
+traveling in grooves that had been worn and fixed for posterity by
+bygone ages of ignorance and narrow-mindedness, it would require courage
+and resolution, and more eloquence than I possessed, to persuade them
+out of these trodden paths. To be considered the privileged class was an
+active characteristic of human nature. Wealth, and the powerful grip
+upon the people which the organizations of society and governments gave,
+made it hereditary. Yet in this country, nothing was hereditary but the
+prosperity and happiness of the whole people.
+
+It was not a surprise to me that astronomy was an unknown science in
+Mizora, as neither sun, moon, nor stars were visible there. "The moon's
+pale beams" never afford material for a blank line in poetry; neither do
+scientific discussions rage on the formation of Saturn's rings, or the
+spots on the sun. They knew they occupied a hollow sphere, bounded North
+and South by impassible oceans. Light was a property of the atmosphere.
+A circle of burning mist shot forth long streamers of light from the
+North, and a similar phenomena occurred in the South.
+
+The recitation of my geography lesson would have astonished a pupil from
+the outer world. They taught that a powerful current of electricity
+existed in the upper regions of the atmosphere. It was the origin of
+their atmospheric heat and light, and their change of seasons. The
+latter appeared to me to coincide with those of the Arctic zone, in one
+particular. The light of the sun during the Arctic summer is reflected
+by the atmosphere, and produces that mellow, golden, rapturous light
+that hangs like a veil of enchantment over the land of Mizora for six
+months in the year. It was followed by six months of the shifting
+iridescence of the Aurora Borealis.
+
+As the display of the Aurora Borealis originated, and was most brilliant
+at what appeared to me to be the terminus of the pole, I believed it was
+caused by the meeting at that point of the two great electric currents
+of the earth, the one on its surface, and the one known to the
+inhabitants of Mizora. The heat produced by the meeting of two such
+powerful currents of electricity is, undoubtedly, the cause of the open
+Polar Sea. As the point of meeting is below the vision of the
+inhabitants of the Arctic regions, they see only the reflection of the
+Aurora. Its gorgeous, brilliant, indescribable splendor is known only to
+the inhabitants of Mizora.
+
+At the National College, where it is taught as a regular science, I
+witnessed the chemical production of bread and a preparation resembling
+meat. Agriculture in this wonderful land, was a lost art. No one that I
+questioned had any knowledge of it. It had vanished in the dim past of
+their barbarism. With the exception of vegetables and fruit, which were
+raised in luscious perfection, their food came from the elements. A
+famine among such enlightened people was impossible, and scarcity was
+unknown. Food for the body and food for the mind were without price. It
+was owing to this that poverty was unknown to them, as well as disease.
+The absolute purity of all that they ate preserved an activity of vital
+power long exceeding our span of life. The length of their year,
+measured by the two seasons, was the same as ours, but the women who had
+marked a hundred of them in their lifetime, looked younger and fresher,
+and were more supple of limb than myself, yet I had barely passed my
+twenty-second year.
+
+I wrote out a careful description of the processes by which they
+converted food out of the valueless elements--valueless because of their
+abundance--and put it carefully away for use in my own country. There
+drouth, or excessive rainfalls, produced scarcity, and sometimes famine.
+The struggle of the poor was for food, to the exclusion of all other
+interests. Many of them knew not what proper and health-giving
+nourishment was. But here in Mizora, the daintiest morsels came from the
+chemists laboratory, cheap as the earth under her feet.
+
+I now began to enjoy the advantages of conversation, which added greatly
+to my happiness and acquirements. I formed an intimate companionship
+with the daughter of the Preceptress of the National College, and to her
+was addressed the questions I asked about things that impressed me. She
+was one of the most beautiful beings that it had been my lot to behold.
+Her eyes were dark, almost the purplish blue of a pansy, and her hair
+had a darker tinge than is common in Mizora, as if it had stolen the
+golden edge of a ripe chestnut. Her beauty was a constant charm to me.
+
+The National College contained a large and well filled gallery. Its
+pictures and statuary were varied, not confined to historical portraits
+and busts as was the one at the College of Experimental Science. Yet it
+possessed a number of portraits of women exclusively of the blonde type.
+Many of them were ideal in loveliness. This gallery also contained the
+masterpieces of their most celebrated sculptors. They were all studies
+of the female form. I am a connoisseur in art, and nothing that I had
+ever seen before could compare with these matchless marbles, bewitching
+in every delicate contour, alluring in softness, but grand and majestic
+in pose and expression.
+
+But I haunted this gallery for other reasons than its artistic
+attractions. I was searching for the portrait of a man, or something
+suggesting his presence. I searched in vain. Many of the paintings were
+on a peculiar transparent substance that gave to the subject a
+startlingly vivid effect. I afterward learned that they were
+imperishable, the material being a translucent adamant of their own
+manufacture. After a picture was painted upon it, another piece of
+adamant was cemented over it.
+
+Each day, as my acquaintance with the peculiar institutions and
+character of the inhabitants of Mizora increased, my perplexity and a
+certain air of mystery about them increased with it. It was impossible
+for me not to feel for them a high degree of respect, admiration, and
+affection. They were ever gentle, tender, and kind to solicitude. To
+accuse them of mystery were a paradox; and yet they _were_ a mystery. In
+conversation, manners and habits, they were frank to singularity. It was
+just as common an occurrence for a poem to be read and commented on by
+its author, as to hear it done by another. I have heard a poetess call
+attention to the beauties of her own production, and receive praise or
+adverse criticism with the same charming urbanity.
+
+Ambition of the most intense earnestness was a natural characteristic,
+but was guided by a stern and inflexible justice. Envy and malice were
+unknown to them. It was, doubtless, owing to their elevated moral
+character that courts and legal proceedings had become unnecessary. If a
+discussion arose between parties involving a question of law, they
+repaired to the Public Library, where the statute books were kept, and
+looked up the matter themselves, and settled it as the law directed.
+Should they fail to interpret the law alike, a third party was selected
+as referee, but accepted no pay.
+
+Indolence was as much a disgrace to them as is the lack of virtue to the
+women of my country, hence every citizen, no matter how wealthy, had
+some regular trade, business or profession. I found those occupations we
+are accustomed to see accepted by the people of inferior birth and
+breeding, were there filled by women of the highest social rank, refined
+in manner and frequently of notable intellectual acquirements. It grew,
+or was the result of the custom of selecting whatever vocation they felt
+themselves competent to most worthily fill, and as no social favor or
+ignominy rested on any kind of labor, the whole community of Mizora was
+one immense family of sisters who knew no distinction of birth or
+position among themselves.
+
+There were no paupers and no charities, either public or private, to be
+found in the country. The absence of poverty such as I knew existed in
+all civilized nations upon the face of the earth, was largely owing to
+the cheapness of food. But there was one other consideration that bore
+vitally upon it. The dignity and necessity of labor was early and
+diligently impressed upon the mind. The Preceptress said to me:
+
+"Mizora is a land of industry. Nature has taught us the duty of work.
+Had some of us been born with minds fully matured, or did knowledge come
+to some as old age comes to all, we might think that a portion was
+intended to live without effort. But we are all born equal, and labor is
+assigned to all; and the one who seeks labor is wiser than the one who
+lets labor seek her."
+
+Citizens, I learned, were not restrained from accumulating vast wealth
+had they the desire and ability to do so, but custom imposed upon them
+the most honorable processes. If a citizen should be found guilty of
+questionable business transactions, she suffered banishment to a lonely
+island and the confiscation of her entire estate, both hereditary and
+acquired. The property confiscated went to the public schools in the
+town or city where she resided; but never was permitted to augment
+salaries. I discovered this in the statute books, but not in the memory
+of any one living had it been found necessary to inflict such a
+punishment.
+
+"Our laws," said Wauna, "are simply established legal advice. No law can
+be so constructed as to fit every case so exactly that a criminal mind
+could not warp it into a dishonest use. But in a country like ours,
+where civilization has reached that state of enlightenment that needs no
+laws, we are simply guided by custom."
+
+The love of splendor and ornament was a pronounced characteristic of
+these strange people. But where gorgeous colors were used, they were
+always of rich quality. The humblest homes were exquisitely ornamented,
+and often displayed a luxury that, with us, would have been considered
+an evidence of wealth.
+
+They took the greatest delight in their beauty, and were exceedingly
+careful of it. A lovely face and delicate complexion, they averred,
+added to one's refinement. The art of applying an artificial bloom and
+fairness to the skin, which I had often seen practiced in my own
+country, appeared to be unknown to them. But everything savoring of
+deception was universally condemned. They made no concealment of the
+practice they resorted to for preserving their complexions, and so
+universal and effectual were they, that women who, I was informed, had
+passed the age allotted to the grandmothers in my country, had the
+smooth brow and pink bloom of cheek that belongs to a more youthful
+period of life. There was, however, a distinction between youth and old
+age. The hair was permitted to whiten, but the delicate complexion of
+old age, with its exquisite coloring, excited in my mind as much
+admiration as astonishment.
+
+I cannot explain why I hesitated to press my first inquiry as to where
+the men were. I had put the question to Wauna one day, but she professed
+never to have heard of such beings. It silenced me--for a time.
+
+"Perhaps it is some extinct animal," she added, naively. "We have so
+many new things to study and investigate, that we pay but little
+attention to ancient history."
+
+I bided my time and put the query in another form.
+
+"Where is your other parent?"
+
+She regarded me with innocent surprise. "You talk strangely. I have but
+one parent. How could I have any more?"
+
+"You ought to have two."
+
+She laughed merrily. "You have a queer way of jesting. I have but one
+mother, one adorable mother. How could I have two?" and she laughed
+again.
+
+I saw that there was some mystery I could not unravel at present, and
+fearing to involve myself in some trouble, refrained from further
+questioning on the subject. I nevertheless kept a close observance of
+all that passed, and seized every opportunity to investigate a mystery
+that began to harass me with its strangeness.
+
+Soon after my conversation with Wauna, I attended an entertainment at
+which a great number of guests were present. It was a literary festival
+and, after the intellectual delicacies were disposed of, a banquet
+followed of more than royal munificence. Toasts were drank, succeeded by
+music and dancing and all the gayeties of a festive occasion, yet none
+but the fairest of fair women graced the scene. Is it strange,
+therefore, that I should have regarded with increasing astonishment and
+uneasiness a country in all respects alluring to the desires of man--yet
+found him not there in lordly possession?
+
+Beauty and intellect, wealth and industry, splendor and careful economy,
+natures lofty and generous, gentle and loving--why has not Man claimed
+this for himself?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+The Preceptress of the National College appointed her daughter Wanna as
+a guide and instructor to me. I formed a deep and strong attachment for
+her, which, it pains me to remember, was the cause of her unhappy fate.
+In stature she was above the medium height, with a form of the fairest
+earthly loveliness and exquisite grace. Her eyes were so deep a blue,
+that at first I mistook them for brown. Her hair was the color of a ripe
+chestnut frosted with gold, and in length and abundance would cover her
+like a garment. She was vivacious and fond of athletic sports. Her
+strength amazed me. Those beautiful hands, with their tapering fingers,
+had a grip like a vise. They had discovered, in this wonderful land,
+that a body possessing perfectly developed muscles must, by the laws of
+nature, be symmetrical and graceful. They rode a great deal on small,
+two-wheeled vehicles, which they propelled themselves. They gave me one
+on which I accompanied Wauna to all of the places of interest in the
+Capital city and vicinity.
+
+I must mention that Wauna's voice was exceedingly musical, even in that
+land of sweet voices, but she did not excel as a singer.
+
+The infant schools interested me more than all the magnificence and
+grandeur of the college buildings. The quaint courtesy, gentle manners
+and affectionate demeanor of the little ones toward one another, was a
+surprise to me. I had visited infant schools of my own and other
+countries, where I had witnessed the display of human nature,
+unrestrained by mature discretion and policy. Fights, quarrels, kicks,
+screams, the unlawful seizure of toys and trinkets, and other
+misdemeanors, were generally the principal exhibits. But here it was all
+different. I thought, as I looked at them, that should a philanthropist
+from the outside world have chanced unknowingly upon the playground of a
+Mizora infant school, he would have believed himself in a company of
+little angels.
+
+At first, a kindness so universal impressed me as studied; a species of
+refined courtesy in which the children were drilled. But time and
+observation proved to me that it was the natural impulse of the heart,
+an inherited trait of moral culture. In _my_ world, kindness and
+affection were family possessions, extended occasionally to
+acquaintances. Beyond this was courtesy only for the great busy bustling
+mass of humanity called--"the world."
+
+It must not be understood that there was no variety of character in
+Mizora. Just as marked a difference was to be found there as elsewhere;
+but it was elevated and ennobled. Its evil tendencies had been
+eliminated. There were many causes that had made this possible. The
+first, and probably the most influential, was the extreme cheapness of
+living. Food and fuel were items of so small consequence, that poverty
+had become unknown. Added to this, and to me by far the most vital
+reason, was their system of free education. In contemplating the state
+of enlightenment to which Mizora had attained, I became an enthusiast
+upon the subject of education, and resolved, should I ever again reach
+the upper world, to devote all my energies and ability to convincing the
+governments of its importance. I believe it is the duty of every
+government to make its schools and colleges, and everything appertaining
+to education--FREE. To be always starved for knowledge is a more pitiful
+craving than to hunger for bread. One dwarfs the body; the other the
+mind.
+
+The utmost care was bestowed upon the training and education of the
+children. There was nothing that I met with in that beautiful and happy
+country I longed more to bring with me to the inhabitants of my world,
+than their manner of rearing children. The most scrupulous attention was
+paid to their diet and exercise, both mental and physical. The result
+was plump limbs, healthy, happy faces and joyous spirits. In all the
+fifteen years that I spent in Mizora, I never saw a tear of sorrow fall
+from children's eyes. Admirable sanitary regulations exist in all the
+cities and villages of the land, which insures them pure air. I may
+state here that every private-house looks as carefully to the condition
+of its atmosphere, as we do to the material neatness of ours.
+
+The only intense feeling that I could discover among these people was
+the love between parent and child. I visited the theater where the
+tragedy of the play was the destruction of a daughter by shipwreck in
+view of the distracted mother. The scenery was managed with wonderful
+realism. The thunder of the surf as it beat upon the shore, the
+frightful carnival of wind and waves that no human power could still,
+and the agony of the mother watching the vessel break to pieces upon the
+rock and her child sink into the boiling water to rise no more, was
+thrilling beyond my power to describe. I lost control of my feelings.
+The audience wept and applauded; and when the curtain fell, I could
+scarcely believe it had only been a play. The love of Mizora women for
+their children is strong and deep. They consider the care of them a
+sacred duty, fraught with the noblest results of life. A daughter of
+scholarly attainments and noble character is a credit to her mother.
+That selfish mother who looks upon her children as so many afflictions
+is unknown to Mizora. If a mother should ever feel her children as
+burdens upon her, she would never give it expression, as any dereliction
+of duty would be severely rebuked by the whole community, if not
+punished by banishment. Corporal punishment was unknown.
+
+I received an invitation from a lady prominent in literature and science
+to make her a visit. I accepted with gratification, as it would afford
+me the opportunity I coveted to become acquainted with the domestic life
+of Mizora, and perhaps penetrate its greatest mystery, for I must
+confess that the singular dearth of anything and everything resembling
+Man, never ceased to prey upon my curiosity.
+
+The lady was the editor and proprietor of the largest and most widely
+known scientific and literary magazine in the country. She was the
+mother of eight children, and possessed one of the largest fortunes and
+most magnificent residences in the country.
+
+The house stood on an elevation, and was a magnificent structure of grey
+granite, with polished cornices. The porch floors were of clouded
+marble. The pillars supporting its roof were round shafts of the same
+material, with vines of ivy, grape and rose winding about them, carved
+and colored into perfect representations of the natural shrubs.
+
+The drawing-room, which was vast and imposing in size and appearance,
+had a floor of pure white marble. The mantels and window-sills were of
+white onyx, with delicate vinings of pink and green. The floor was
+strewn with richly colored mats and rugs. Luxurious sofas and chairs
+comprised the only furniture. Each corner contained a piece of fine
+statuary. From the centre of the ceiling depended a large gold basin of
+beautiful design and workmanship, in which played a miniature fountain
+of perfumed water that filled the air with a delicate fragrance. The
+walls were divided into panels of polished and unpolished granite. On
+the unpolished panels hung paintings of scenery. The dull, gray color of
+the walls brought out in sharp and tasteful relief the few costly and
+elegant adornments of the room: a placid landscape with mountains dimly
+outlining the distance. A water scene with a boat idly drifting,
+occupied by a solitary figure watching the play of variegated lights
+upon the tranquil waters. Then came a wild and rugged mountain scene
+with precipices and a foaming torrent. Then a concert of birds amusingly
+treated.
+
+The onyx marble mantel-piece contained but a single ornament--an
+orchestra. A coral vase contained a large and perfect tiger lily, made
+of gold. Each stamen supported a tiny figure carved out of ivory,
+holding a musical instrument. When they played, each figure appeared
+instinct with life, like the mythical fairies of my childhood; and the
+music was so sweet, yet faint, that I readily imagined the charmed ring
+and tiny dancers keeping time to its rhythm.
+
+The drawing-room presented a vista of arches draped in curtains of a
+rare texture, though I afterward learned they were spun glass. The one
+that draped the entrance to the conservatory looked like sea foam with
+the faint blush of day shining through it. The conservatory was in the
+shape of a half sphere, and entirely of glass. From its dome, more than
+a hundred feet above our heads, hung a globe of white fire that gave
+forth a soft clear light. Terminating, as it did, the long vista of
+arches with their transparent hangings of cobweb texture, it presented a
+picture of magnificence and beauty indescribably.
+
+The other apartments displayed the same taste and luxury. The
+sitting-room contained an instrument resembling a grand piano.
+
+The grounds surrounding this elegant home were adorned with natural and
+artificial beauties, Grottoes, fountains, lakes, cascades, terraces of
+flowers, statuary, arbors and foliage in endless variety, that rendered
+it a miniature paradise. In these grounds, darting in and out among the
+avenues, playing hide-and-seek behind the statuary, or otherwise amusing
+themselves, I met eight lovely children, ranging from infancy to young
+maidenhood. The glowing cheeks and eyes, and supple limbs spoke of
+perfect health and happiness. When they saw their mother coming, they
+ran to meet her, the oldest carrying the two-year old baby. The stately
+woman greeted each with a loving kiss. She showed in loving glance and
+action how dear they all were to her. For the time being she unbent,
+and became a child herself in the interest she took in their prattle and
+mirth. A true mother and happy children.
+
+I discovered that each department of this handsome home was under the
+care of a professional artist. I remarked to my hostess that I had
+supposed her home was the expression of her own taste.
+
+"So it is," she replied; "but it requires an equally well educated taste
+to carry out my designs. The arrangement and ornamentation of my grounds
+were suggested by me, and planned and executed by my landscape artist."
+
+After supper we repaired to the general sitting-room. The eldest
+daughter had been deeply absorbed in a book before we came in. She
+closed and left it upon a table. I watched for an opportunity to
+carelessly pick it up and examine it. It was a novel I felt sure, for
+she appeared to resign it reluctantly out of courtesy to her guest. I
+might, from it, gather some clue to the mystery of the male sex. I took
+up the book and opened it. It was The Conservation of Force and The
+Phenomena of Nature. I laid it down with a sigh of discomfiture.
+
+The next evening, my hostess gave a small entertainment, and what was my
+amazement, not to say offense, to perceive the cook, the chamber-maid,
+and in fact all the servants in the establishment, enter and join in the
+conversation and amusement. The cook was asked to sing, for, with the
+exception of myself--and I tried to conceal it--no one appeared to take
+umbrage at her presence. She sat down to the piano and sang a pretty
+ballad in a charming manner. Her voice was cultivated and musical, as
+are all the voices in Mizora, but it was lacking in the qualities that
+make a great singer, yet it had a plaintive sweetness that was very
+attractive.
+
+I was dumbfounded at her presumption. In my country such a thing is
+unknown as a servant entertaining guests in such a capacity, and
+especially among people of my rank and position in the world.
+
+I repelled some advances she made me with a hauteur and coldness that it
+mortified me afterward to remember. Instead of being _my_ inferior, I
+was her's, and she knew it; but neither by look, tone nor action did she
+betray her consciousness of it. I had to acknowledge that her hands were
+more delicately modeled than mine, and her bearing had a dignity and
+elegance that might have been envied by the most aristocratic dame of my
+own land. Knowing that the Mizora people were peculiar in their social
+ideas, I essayed to repress my indignation at the time, but later I
+unburdened myself to Wauna who, with her usual sweetness and
+gentleness, explained to me that her occupation was a mere matter of
+choice with her.
+
+"She is one of the most distinguished chemists of this nation. She
+solved the problem of making bread out of limestone of a much finer
+quality than had been in use before."
+
+"Don't tell me that you gave me a stone when I asked for bread!" I
+exclaimed.
+
+"We have not done that," replied Wauna; "but we have given you what you
+took for bread, but which is manufactured out of limestone and the
+refuse of the marble quarries."
+
+I looked at her in such inane astonishment that she hastened to add:
+
+"I will take you to one of the large factories some day. They are always
+in the mountains where the stone is abundant. You can there see loaves
+by the thousands packed in great glass tanks for shipment to the
+different markets. And they do not cost the manufacturer above one
+centime per hundred."
+
+"And what royalty does the discoverer get for this wonder of chemistry?"
+
+"None. Whenever anything of that kind is discovered in our country, it
+is purchased outright by the government, and then made public for the
+benefit of all. The competition among manufacturers consists in the care
+and exactness with which they combine the necessary elements. There is
+quite a difference in the taste and quality of our bread as it comes
+from different factories."
+
+"Why doesn't such a talented person quit working in another woman's
+kitchen and keep herself like a lady?" I inquired, all the prejudice of
+indolent wealth against labor coming up in my thoughts.
+
+"She has a taste for that kind of work," replied Wauna, "instead of for
+making dresses, or carving gems, or painting. She often says she could
+not make a straight line if she tried, yet she can put together with
+such nicety and chemical skill the elements that form an omelette or a
+custard, that she has become famous. She teaches all who desire to
+learn, but none seem to equal her. She was born with a genius for
+cooking and nothing else. Haven't you seen her with a long glass tube
+testing the vessels of vegetables and fruit that were cooking?"
+
+"Yes," I answered. "It was from that that I supposed her occupation
+menial."
+
+"Visitors from other cities," continued Wauna, "nearly always inquire
+for her first."
+
+Perceiving the mistake that I had made, I ventured an apology for my
+behavior toward her, and Wauna replied, with a frankness that nearly
+crushed me:
+
+"We all noticed it, but do not fear a retaliation," she added sweetly.
+"We know that you are from a civilization that we look back upon as one
+of barbarism."
+
+I acknowledged that if any superciliousness existed in Mizora while I
+was there, I must have had it.
+
+The guests departed without refreshments having been served. I explained
+the custom of entertainment in my country, which elicited expressions of
+astonishment. It would be insulting to offer refreshments of any kind to
+a guest between the regular hours for dining, as it would imply a desire
+on your part to impair their health. Such was the explanation of what in
+my country would be deemed a gross neglect of duty. Their custom was
+probably the result of two causes: an enlightened knowledge of the laws
+of health, and the extreme cheapness of all luxuries of the table which
+the skill of the chemist had made available to every class of people in
+the land.
+
+The word "servant" did not exist in the language of Mizora; neither had
+they an equivalent for it in the sense in which we understand and use
+the word. I could not tell a servant--for I must use the word to be
+understood--from a professor in the National College. They were all
+highly-educated, refined, lady-like and lovely. Their occupations were
+always matters of choice, for, as there was nothing in them to detract
+from their social position, they selected the one they knew they had the
+ability to fill. Hence those positions _we_ are accustomed to regard as
+menial, were there filled by ladies of the highest culture and
+refinement; consequently the domestic duties of a Mizora household moved
+to their accomplishment with the ease and regularity of fine machinery.
+
+It was long before I could comprehend the dignity they attached to the
+humblest vocations. They had one proverb that embraced it all: "Labor is
+the necessity of life." I studied this peculiar phase of Mizora life,
+and at last comprehended that in this very law of social equality lay
+the foundation of their superiority. Their admirable system of adapting
+the mind to the vocation in which it was most capable of excelling, and
+endowing that with dignity and respect, and, at the same time,
+compelling the highest mental culture possible, had produced a nation
+in the enjoyment of universal refinement, and a higher order of
+intelligence than any yet known to the outside world.
+
+The standard of an ordinary education was to me astonishingly high. The
+reason for it was easily understood when informed that the only
+aristocracy of the country was that of intellect. Scholars, artists,
+scientists, literateurs, all those excelling in intellectual gifts or
+attainments, were alone regarded as superiors by the masses.
+
+In all the houses that I had visited I had never seen a portrait hung in
+a room thrown open to visitors. On inquiry, I was informed that it was a
+lack of taste to make a portrait conspicuous.
+
+"You meet faces at all times," said my informant, "but you cannot at all
+times have a variety of scenery before you. How monotonous it would be
+with a drawing-room full of women, and the walls filled with their
+painted representatives. We never do it."
+
+"Then where do you keep your family portraits?"
+
+"Ours is in a gallery upstairs."
+
+I requested to be shown this, and was conducted to a very long apartment
+on the third floor, devoted exclusively to relics and portraits of
+family ancestry. There were over three thousand portraits of blond
+women, which my hostess' daughter informed me represented her
+grandmothers for ages back. Not one word did she say about her
+grandfathers.
+
+I may mention here that no word existed in their dictionaries that was
+equivalent to the word "man." I had made myself acquainted with this
+fact as soon as I had acquired sufficient knowledge of their language.
+My astonishment at it cannot be described. It was a mystery that became
+more and more perplexing. Never in the closest intimacy that I could
+secure could I obtain the slightest clue, the least suggestion relating
+to the presence of man. My friend's infant, scarcely two years old,
+prattled of everything but a father.
+
+I cannot explain a certain impressive dignity about the women of Mizora
+that, in spite of their amiability and winning gentleness, forbade a
+close questioning into private affairs. My hostess never spoke of her
+business. It would have been a breach of etiquette to have questioned
+her about it. I could not bring myself to intrude the question of the
+marked absence of men, when not the slightest allusion was ever made to
+them by any citizen.
+
+So time passed on, confirming my high opinion of them, and yet I knew
+and felt and believed that some strange and incomprehensible mystery
+surrounded them, and when I had abandoned all hope of a solution to it,
+it solved itself in the most unexpected and yet natural manner, and I
+was more astonished at the solution than I was at the mystery.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+Their domestic life was so harmonious and perfect that it was a
+perpetual pleasure to contemplate.
+
+Human nature finds its sweetest pleasure, its happiest content, within
+its own home circle; and in Mizora I found no exception to the rule. The
+arrangement and adornment of every house in Mizora were evidently for
+the comfort and happiness of its inmates. To purchase anything for
+merely outside show, or to excite the envy or jealousy of a neighbor,
+was never thought of by an inhabitant of Mizora.
+
+The houses that were built to rent excited my admiration quite as much
+as did the private residences. They all seemed to have been designed
+with two special objects in view--beauty and comfort. Houses built to
+rent in large cities were always in the form of a hollow square,
+inclosing a commodious and handsomely decorated park. The back was
+adorned with an upper and lower piazza opening upon the park. The suites
+of rooms were so arranged as to exclusively separate their occupants
+from all others. The park was undivided. The center was occupied by a
+fountain large enough to shoot its spray as high as the uppermost
+piazza. The park was furnished with rustic seats and shade trees,
+frequently of immense size, branched above its smooth walks and
+promenades, where baby wagons, velocipedes and hobby horses on wheels
+could have uninterrupted sport.
+
+Suburban residences, designed for rent, were on a similar but more
+amplified plan. The houses were detached, but the grounds were in
+common. Many private residences were also constructed on the same plan.
+Five or six acres would be purchased by a dozen families who were not
+rich enough to own large places separately. A separate residence would
+be built for each family, but the ground would be laid off and
+ornamented like a private park. Each of the dozen families would thus
+have a beautiful view and the privilege of the whole ground. In this
+way, cascades, fountains, rustic arbors, rockeries, aquariums, tiny
+lakes, and every variety of landscape ornamenting, could be supplied at
+a comparatively small cost to each family.
+
+Should any one wish to sell, they disposed of their house and
+one-twelfth of the undivided ground, and a certain per cent. of the
+value of its ornaments. The established custom was never to remove or
+alter property thus purchased without the consent of the other
+shareholders. Where a people had been educated to regard justice and
+conscience as their law, such an arrangement could be beneficial to an
+entire city.
+
+Financial ability does not belong to every one, and this plan of uniting
+small capitals gave opportunity to the less wealthy classes to enjoy all
+the luxuries that belong to the rich. In fact some of the handsomest
+parks I saw in Mizora were owned and kept up in this manner. Sometimes
+as many as twenty families united in the purchase of an estate, and
+constructed artificial lakes large enough to sail upon. Artificial
+cascades and fountains of wonderful size and beauty were common
+ornaments in all the private and public parks of the city. I noticed in
+all the cities that I visited the beauty and charm of the public parks,
+which were found in all sections.
+
+The walks were smoothly paved and shaded by trees of enormous size. They
+were always frequented by children, who could romp and play in these
+sylvan retreats of beauty in perfect security.
+
+The high state of culture arrived at by the Mizora people rendered a
+luxurious style of living a necessity to all. Many things that I had
+been brought up to regard as the exclusive privileges of the rich, were
+here the common pleasure of every one. There was no distinction of
+classes; no genteel-poverty people, who denied themselves necessities
+that they might appear to have luxuries. There was not a home in Mizora
+that I entered--and I had access to many--that did not give the
+impression of wealth in all its appointments.
+
+I asked the Preceptress to explain to me how I might carry back to the
+people of my country this social happiness, this equality of physical
+comfort and luxury; and she answered me with emphasis:
+
+"Educate them. Convince the rich that by educating the poor, they are
+providing for their own safety. They will have fewer prisons to build,
+fewer courts to sustain. Educated Labor will work out its own salvation
+against Capital. Let the children of toil start in life with exactly
+the same educational advantages that are enjoyed by the rich. Give them
+the same physical and moral training, and let the rich pay for it by
+taxes."
+
+I shook my head "They will never submit to it," was my reluctant
+admission.
+
+"Appeal to their selfishness," urged the Preceptress "Get them to open
+their college doors and ask all to come and be taught without money and
+without price. The power of capital is great, but stinted and ignorant
+toil will rise against its oppression, and innocence and guilt will
+alike suffer from its fury. Have you never known such an occurrence?"
+
+"Not in my day or country," I answered "But the city in which I was
+educated has such a history. Its gutters flowed with human blood, the
+blood of its nobles."
+
+She inclined her head significantly. "It will be repeated," she said
+sadly, "unless you educate them. Give their bright and active minds the
+power of knowledge. They will use it wisely, for their own and their
+country's welfare."
+
+I doubted my ability to do this, to contend against rooted and inherited
+prejudice, but I resolved to try. I did not need to be told that the
+rich and powerful had a monopoly of intellect: Nature was not partial to
+them, for the children of the poor, I well knew, were often handsomer
+and more intellectual than the offspring of wealth and aristocratic
+birth.
+
+I have before spoken of the positions occupied by those who performed
+what I had been bred to regard as menial work. At first, the mere fact
+of the person who presided over the kitchen being presented to me as an
+equal, was outraging to all my hereditary dignity and pride of birth. No
+one could be more pronounced in a consciousness of inherited nobility
+than I. I had been taught from infancy to regard myself as a superior
+being, merely because the accident of birth had made me so, and the
+arrogance with which I had treated some of my less favored schoolmates
+reverted to me with mortifying regret, when, having asked Wauna to point
+out to me the nobly born, she looked at me with her sweet expression of
+candor and innocence and said:
+
+"We have no nobility of birth. As I once before told you, intellect is
+our only standard of excellence. It alone occupies an exalted place and
+receives the homage of our people."
+
+In a subsequent conversation with her mother, the Preceptress, she said:
+
+"In remote ages, great honor and deference was paid to all who were
+born of rulers, and the designation 'noble blood,' was applied to them.
+At one time in the history of our country they could commit any outrage
+upon society or morals without fear of punishment, simply because they
+belonged to the aristocracy. Even a heinous murder would be unnoticed if
+perpetrated by one of them. Nature alone did not favor them Imbecile and
+immoral minds fell to the lot of the aristocrat as often as to the lowly
+born. Nature's laws are inflexible and swerve not for any human wish.
+They outraged them by the admixture of kindred blood, and degeneracy was
+often the result. A people should always have for their chief ruler the
+highest and noblest intellect among them, but in those dark ages they
+were too often compelled to submit to the lowest, simply because it had
+been _born_ to the position. But," she added, with a sweet smile,
+"_that_ time lies many centuries behind us, and I sometimes think we had
+better forget it entirely."
+
+My first meeting with the domestics of my friend's house impressed me
+with their high mental culture, refinement and elegance. Certainly no
+"grande dame" of my own country but would have been proud of their
+beauty and graceful dignity.
+
+Prejudice, however deeply ingrained, could not resist the custom of a
+whole country, and especially such a one as Mizora, so I soon found
+myself on a familiar footing with my friend's "artist"--for the name by
+which they were designated as a class had very nearly the same meaning.
+
+Cooking was an art, and one which the people of Mizora had cultivated to
+the highest excellence. It is not strange, when their enlightenment is
+understood, that they should attach as much honor to it as the people of
+my country do to sculpture, painting and literature. The Preceptress
+told me that such would be the case with my people when education became
+universal and the poor could start in life with the same intellectual
+culture as the rich. The chemistry of food and its importance in
+preserving a youthful vigor and preventing disease, would then be
+understood and appreciated by all classes, and would receive the
+deference it deserved.
+
+"You will never realize," said the Preceptress earnestly, "the
+incalculable benefit that will accrue to your people from educating your
+poor. Urge that Government to try it for just twenty years, long enough
+for a generation to be born and mature. The bright and eager intellects
+of poverty will turn to Chemistry to solve the problems of cheap Light,
+cheap Fuel and cheap Food. When you can clothe yourselves from the
+fibre of the trees, and warm and light your dwellings from the water of
+your rivers, and eat of the stones of the earth, Poverty and Disease
+will be as unknown to your people as it is to mine."
+
+"If I should preach that to them, they would call me a maniac."
+
+"None but the ignorant will do so. From your description of the great
+thinkers of your country, I am inclined to believe there are minds among
+you advanced enough to believe in it."
+
+I remembered how steamboats and railroads and telegraphy had been
+opposed and ridiculed until proven practicable, and I took courage and
+resolved to follow the advice of my wise counselor.
+
+I had long felt a curiosity to behold the inner workings of a domestic's
+life, and one day ventured to ask my friend's permission to enter her
+kitchen. Surprise was manifested at such a request, when I began to
+apologize and explain. But my hostess smiled and said:
+
+"My kitchen is at all times as free to my guests as my drawing room."
+
+Every kitchen in Mizora is on the same plan and conducted the same way.
+To describe one, therefore, is to describe all. I undertook to explain
+that in my country, good breeding forbade a guest entering the host's
+kitchen, and frequently its appearance, and that of the cook's, would
+not conduce to gastric enjoyment of the edibles prepared in it.
+
+My first visit happened to be on scrubbing day, and I was greatly amused
+to see a little machine, with brushes and sponges attached, going over
+the floor at a swift rate, scouring and sponging dry as it went. Two
+vessels, one containing soap suds and the other clear water, were
+connected by small feed pipes with the brushes. As soon as the drying
+sponge became saturated, it was lifted by an ingenious yet simple
+contrivance into a vessel and pressed dry, and was again dropped to the
+floor.
+
+I inquired how it was turned to reverse its progress so as to clean the
+whole floor, and was told to watch when it struck the wall. I did so,
+and saw that the jar not only reversed the machine, but caused it to
+spring to the right about two feet, which was its width, and again begin
+work on a new line, to be again reversed in the same manner when it
+struck the opposite wall. Carpeted floors were swept by a similar
+contrivance.
+
+No wonder the "artists" of the kitchen had such a dainty appearance.
+They dipped their pretty hands in perfumed water and dried them on the
+finest and whitest damask, while machinery did the coarse work.
+
+Mizora, I discovered, was a land of brain workers. In every vocation of
+life machinery was called upon to perform the arduous physical labor.
+The whole domestic department was a marvel of ingenious mechanical
+contrivances. Dishwashing, scouring and cleaning of every description
+were done by machinery.
+
+The Preceptress told me that it was the result of enlightenment, and it
+would become the custom in my country to make machinery perform the
+laborious work when they learned the value of universal and advanced
+knowledge.
+
+I observed that the most exact care was given to the preparation of
+food. Every cook was required to be a chemist of the highest excellence;
+another thing that struck me as radically different from the custom in
+vogue in my country.
+
+Everything was cooked by hot air and under cover, so that no odor was
+perceptible in the room. Ventilating pipes conveyed the steam from
+cooking food out of doors. Vegetables and fruits appeared to acquire a
+richer flavor when thus cooked. The seasoning was done by exact weight
+and measure, and there was no stirring or tasting. A glass tube, on the
+principle of a thermometer, determined when each article was done. The
+perfection which they had attained as culinary chemists was a source of
+much gratification to me, both in the taste of food so delicious and
+palatable, and in its wholesome effect on my constitution. As to its
+deliciousness, a meal prepared by a Mizora cook could rival the fabled
+feasts of the gods. Its beneficial effects upon me were manifested in a
+healthier tone of body and an an increase of animal spirits, a
+pleasurable feeling of content and amiability.
+
+The Preceptress told me that the first step toward the eradication of
+disease was in the scientific preparation of food, and the establishment
+of schools where cooking was taught as an art to all who applied, and
+without charge. Placed upon a scientific basis it became respectable.
+
+"To eliminate from our food the deleterious earthy matter is our
+constant aim. To that alone do we owe immunity from old age far in
+advance of that period of life when your people become decrepit and
+senile. The human body is like a lamp-wick, which filters the oil while
+it furnishes light. In time the wick becomes clogged and useless and is
+thrown away. If the oil could be made perfectly pure, the wick would not
+fill up."
+
+She gave this homely explanation with a smile and the air of a grown
+person trying to convey to the immature mind of a child an explanation
+of some of Nature's phenomena.
+
+I reflected upon their social condition and arrived at the conviction
+that there is no occupation in life but what has its usefulness and
+necessity, and, when united to culture and refinement, its dignity. A
+tree has a million leaves, yet each individual leaf, insignificant as it
+may appear, has its special share of work to perform in helping the tree
+to live and perfect its fruit. So should every citizen of a government
+contribute to its vitality and receive a share of its benefits.
+
+"Will the time ever come," I asked myself, "when my own country will see
+this and rise to a social, if not intellectual equality." And the
+admonition of the Preceptress would recur to my mind:
+
+"Educate them. Educate them, and enlightenment will solve for them every
+problem in Sociology."
+
+My observations in Mizora led me to believe that while Nature will
+permit and encourage the outgrowth of equality in refinement, she gives
+birth to a more decided prominence in the leadership of intellect.
+
+The lady who conducted me through the culinary department, and pointed
+out the machinery and explained its use and convenience, had the same
+grace and dignity of manner as the hostess displayed when exhibiting to
+me the rare plants in her conservatory.
+
+The laundry was a separate business. No one unconnected with it as a
+profession had anything to do with its duties. I visited several of the
+large city laundries and was informed that all were conducted alike.
+Steam was employed in the cleaning process, and the drying was done by
+hot air impregnated with ozone. This removed from white fabrics every
+vestige of discoloration or stain. I saw twelve dozen fine damask
+table-cloths cleaned, dried and ironed in thirty minutes. All done by
+machinery. They emerged from the rollers that ironed them looking like
+new pieces of goods, so pure was their color, and so glossy their
+finish.
+
+I inquired the price for doing them up, and was told a cent a piece.
+Twelve cents per dozen was the established price for doing up clothes.
+Table-cloths and similar articles were ironed between rollers
+constructed to admit their full width. Other articles of more
+complicated make, were ironed by machines constructed to suit them. Some
+articles were dressed by having hot air forced rapidly through them.
+Lace curtains, shawls, veils, spreads, tidies and all similar articles,
+were by this process made to look like new, and at a cost that I thought
+ought certainly to reduce the establishment to beggary or insolvency.
+But here chemistry again was the magician that had made such cheap labor
+profitable. And such advanced knowledge of chemistry was the result of
+universal education.
+
+Ladies sent their finest laces to be renewed without fear of having them
+reduced to shreds. In doing up the frailest laces, nothing but hot air
+impregnated with ozone was employed. These were consecutively forced
+through the fabric after it was carefully stretched. Nothing was ever
+lost or torn, so methodical was the management of the work.
+
+I asked why cooking was not established as the laundry was, as a
+distinct public business, and was told that it had been tried a number
+of times, but had always been found impracticable. One kind of work in a
+laundry would suit everyone, but one course of cooking could not. Tastes
+and appetites differed greatly. What was palatable to one would be
+disliked by another, and to prepare food for a large number of
+customers, without knowing or being able to know exactly what the demand
+would be, had always resulted in large waste, and as the people of
+Mizora were the most rigid and exacting economists, it was not to be
+wondered at that they had selected the most economical plan. Every
+private cook could determine accurately the amount of food required for
+the household she prepared it for, and knowing their tastes she could
+cater to all without waste.
+
+"We, as yet," said my distinguished instructor, "derive all our fruit
+and vegetables from the soil. We have orchards and vineyards and gardens
+which we carefully tend, and which our knowledge of chemistry enables us
+to keep in health and productiveness. But there is always more or less
+earthy matter in all food derived from cultivating the soil, and the
+laboratories are now striving to produce artificial fruit and vegetables
+that will satisfy the palate and be free from deleterious matter."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+One of the most curious and pleasing sights in Mizora was the flower
+gardens and conservatories. Roses of all sizes and colors and shades of
+color were there. Some two feet across were placed by the side of others
+not exceeding the fourth of an inch in order to display the disparity in
+size.
+
+To enter into a minute description of all the discoveries made by the
+Mizora people in fruit and floriculture, would be too tedious; suffice
+to say they had laid their hands upon the beautiful and compelled nature
+to reveal to them the secret of its formation. The number of petals,
+their color, shape and size, were produced as desired. The only thing
+they could neither create nor destroy was its perfume. I questioned the
+Preceptress as to the possibility of its ever being discovered? She
+replied:
+
+"It is the one secret of the rose that Nature refuses to reveal. I do
+not believe we shall ever possess the power to increase or diminish the
+odor of a flower. I believe that Nature will always reserve to herself
+the secret of its creation. The success that we enjoy in the wonderful
+cultivation of our fruits and flowers was one of our earliest scientific
+conquests."
+
+I learned that their orchards never failed to yield a bounteous harvest.
+They had many fruits that were new to me, and some that were new and
+greatly improved species of kinds that I had already seen and eaten in
+my own or other countries. Nothing that they cultivated was ever without
+its own peculiar beauty as well as usefulness. Their orchards, when the
+fruit was ripe, presented a picture of unique charm. Their trees were
+always trained into graceful shapes, and when the ripe fruit gleamed
+through the dark green foliage, every tree looked like a huge bouquet. A
+cherry tree that I much admired, and the fruit of which I found
+surpassingly delicious, I must allow myself to describe. The cherries
+were not surprisingly large, but were of the colors and transparency of
+honey. They were seedless, the tree having to be propagated from slips.
+When the fruit was ripe the tree looked like a huge ball of pale amber
+gems hiding in the shadows of dark pointed leaves.
+
+Their grape arbors were delightful pictures in their season of maturity.
+Some vines had clusters of fruit three feet long; but these I was told
+were only to show what they _could_ do in grape culture. The usual and
+marketable size of a bunch was from one to two pounds weight. The fruit
+was always perfect that was offered for sale.
+
+Science had provided the fruit growers of Mizora with permanent
+protections from all kinds of blight or decay.
+
+When I considered the wholesomeness of all kinds of food prepared for
+the inhabitants of this favored land. I began to think they might owe a
+goodly portion of their exceptional health to it, and a large share of
+their national amiability to their physical comfort. I made some such
+observation to the Preceptress, and she admitted its correctness.
+
+"The first step that my people made toward the eradication of disease
+was in the preparation of healthy food; not for the rich, who could
+obtain it themselves, but for the whole nation."
+
+I asked for further information and she added:
+
+"Science discovered that mysterious and complicated diseases often had
+their origin in adulterated food. People suffered and died, ignorant of
+what produced their disease. The law, in the first place, rigidly
+enforced the marketing of clean and perfect fruit, and a wholesome
+quality of all other provisions. This was at first difficult to do, as
+in those ancient days, (I refer to a very remote period of our history)
+in order to make usurious profit, dealers adulterated all kinds of food;
+often with poisonous substances. When every state took charge of its
+markets and provided free schools for cooking, progress took a rapid
+advance. Do you wonder at it? Reflect then. How could I force my mind
+into complete absorption of some new combination of chemicals, while the
+gastric juice in my stomach was battling with sour or adulterated food?
+Nature would compel me to pay some attention to the discomfort of my
+digestive organs, and it might happen at a time when I was on the verge
+of a revelation in science, which might be lost. You may think it an
+insignificant matter to speak of in connection with the grand
+enlightenment that we possess; but Nature herself is a mass of little
+things. Our bodies, strong and supple as they are, are nothing but a
+union of tiny cells. It is by the investigation of little things that we
+have reached the great ones."
+
+I felt a keen desire to know more about their progress toward universal
+health, feeling assured that the history of the extirpation of disease
+must be curious and instructive. I had been previously made acquainted
+with the fact that disease was really unknown to them, save in its
+historical existence. To cull this isolated history from their vast
+libraries of past events, would require a great deal of patient and
+laborious research, and the necessary reading of a great deal of matter
+that I could not be interested in, and that could not beside be of any
+real value to me, so I requested the Preceptress to give me an
+epitomized history of it in her own language, merely relating such facts
+as might be useful to me, and that I could comprehend, for I may as well
+bring forward the fact that, in comparison to theirs, my mind was as a
+savages would be to our civilization.
+
+Their brain was of a finer intellectual fiber. It possessed a wider,
+grander, more majestic receptivity. They absorbed ideas that passed over
+me like a cloud. Their imaginations were etherealized. They reached into
+what appeared to be materialless space, and brought from it substances I
+had never heard of before, and by processes I could not comprehend. They
+divided matter into new elements and utilized them. They disintegrated
+matter, added to it new properties and produced a different material. I
+saw the effects and uses of their chemistry, but that was all.
+
+There are minds belonging to my own age, as there have been to all ages,
+that are intellectually in advance of it. They live in a mental and
+prophetic world of their own, and leave behind them discoveries,
+inventions and teachings that benefit and ennoble the generations to
+come. Could such a mind have chanced upon Mizora, as I chanced upon it,
+it might have consorted with its intellect, and brought from the
+companionship ideas that I could not receive, and sciences that I can
+find no words in my language to represent. The impression that my own
+country might make upon a savage, may describe my relation to Mizora.
+What could an uncivilized mind say of our railroads, or magnificent
+cathedrals, our palaces, our splendor, our wealth, our works of art.
+They would be as difficult of representation as were the lofty aims, the
+unselfishness in living, the perfect love, honor and intellectual
+grandeur, and the universal comfort and luxury found in Mizora, were to
+me. To them the cultivation of the mind was an imperative duty, that
+neither age nor condition retarded. To do good, to be approved by their
+own conscience, was their constant pleasure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+It was during my visit at my friend's house that I first witnessed the
+peculiar manner in which the markets in Mizora are conducted.
+Everything, as usual, was fastidiously neat and clean. The fruit and
+vegetables were fresh and perfect. I examined quantities of them to
+satisfy myself, and not a blemish or imperfection could be found on any.
+None but buyers were attending market. Baskets of fruit, bunches of
+vegetables and, in fact, everything exhibited for sale, had the quality
+and the price labeled upon it. Small wicker baskets were near to receive
+the change. When a buyer had selected what suited her, she dropped the
+label and the change in the basket. I saw one basket filled with gold
+and silver coin, yet not one would be missing when the owner came to
+count up the sales. Sometimes a purchaser was obliged to change a large
+piece of money, but it was always done accurately.
+
+There was one singular trait these people possessed that, in conjunction
+with their other characteristics, may seem unnatural: they would give
+and exact the last centime (a quarter of a cent) in a trade. I noticed
+this peculiarity so frequently that I inquired the reason for it, and
+when I had studied it over I decided that, like all the other rules that
+these admirable people had established, it was wise. Said my friend:
+
+"We set a just value on everything we prepare for sale. Anything above
+or below that, would be unjust to buyer or seller."
+
+The varieties of apples, pears, peaches and other fruits had their names
+attached, with the quality, sweet, sour, or slightly acid. In no
+instance was it found to be incorrectly stated. I came to one stall that
+contained nothing but glass jars of butter and cream. The butter was a
+rich buff color, like very fine qualities I had seen in my own country.
+The cream, an article I am fond of drinking, looked so tempting I longed
+to purchase a glass for that purpose. The lady whom I accompanied (my
+hostess' cook) informed me that it was artificially prepared. The butter
+and cheese were chemical productions. Different laboratories produced
+articles of varying flavor, according to the chemist's skill. Although
+their construction was no secret, yet some laboratories enjoyed special
+reputation for their butter and cheese owing to the accuracy with which
+their elements were combined.
+
+She gave me quite a history about artificial food, also how they kept
+fruits and vegetables in their natural state for years without decaying
+or losing their flavor, so that when eaten they were nearly as fine as
+when freshly gathered. After hearing that the cream was manufactured, I
+resolved to taste it. Dropping my coin into the basket, I took up a
+glass and drank it. A look of disgust crossed the countenance of my
+companion.
+
+"Do you not drink this?" I asked in surprise, as I set down the empty
+vessel. "It is truly delicious."
+
+"At regular meal times we all use it, and sometimes drink it in
+preference to other beverages--but never in public. You will never see a
+citizen of Mizora eating in public. Look all over this market and you
+will not discover one person, either adult or child, eating or drinking,
+unless it be water."
+
+I could not; and I felt keenly mortified at my mistake. Yet in my own
+country and others that, according to our standard, are highly
+civilized, a beverage is made from the juice of the corn that is not
+only drank in public places, but its effects, which are always
+unbecoming, are exhibited also, and frequently without reproof. However,
+I said nothing to my companion about this beverage. It bears no
+comparison in color or taste to that made in Mizora. I could not have
+distinguished the latter from the finest dairy cream.
+
+The next place of interest that I visited were their mercantile bazars
+or stores. Here I found things looking quite familiar. The goods were
+piled upon shelves behind counters, and numerous clerks were in
+attendance. It was the regular day for shopping among the Mizora ladies,
+and the merchants had made a display of their prettiest and richest
+goods. I noticed the ladies were as elegantly dressed as if for a
+reception, and learned that it was the custom. They would meet a great
+many friends and acquaintances, and dressed to honor the occasion.
+
+It was my first shopping experience in Mizora, and I quite mortified
+myself by removing my glove and rubbing and examining closely the goods
+I thought of purchasing. I entirely ignored the sweet voice of the
+clerk that was gently informing me that it was "pure linen" or "pure
+wool," so habituated had I become in my own country to being my own
+judge of the quality of the goods I was purchasing, regardless always of
+the seller's recommendation of it. I found it difficult, especially in
+such circumstances, to always remember their strict adherence to honesty
+and fair dealing. I felt rebuked when I looked around and saw the
+actions of the other ladies in buying.
+
+In manufactured goods, as in all other things, not the slightest
+cheatery is to be found. Woolen and cotton mixtures were never sold for
+pure wool. Nobody seemed to have heard of the art of glossing muslin
+cuffs and collars and selling them for pure linen.
+
+Fearing that I had wounded the feelings of the lady in attendance upon
+me, I hastened to apologize by explaining the peculiar methods of trade
+that were practiced in my own country. They were immediately pronounced
+barbarous.
+
+I noticed that ladies in shopping examined colors and effects of
+trimmings or combinations, but never examined the quality. Whatever the
+attendant said about _that_ was received as a fact.
+
+The reason for the absence of attendants in the markets and the presence
+of them in mercantile houses was apparent at once. The market articles
+were brought fresh every day, while goods were stored.
+
+Their business houses and their manner of shopping were unlike anything
+I had ever met with before. The houses were all built in a hollow
+square, enclosing a garden with a fountain in the center. These were
+invariably roofed over with glass, as was the entire building. In winter
+the garden was as warm as the interior of the store. It was adorned with
+flowers and shrubs. I often saw ladies and children promenading in these
+pretty inclosures, or sitting on their rustic sofas conversing, while
+their friends were shopping in the store. The arrangement gave perfect
+light and comfort to both clerks and customers, and the display of rich
+and handsome fabrics was enhanced by the bit of scenery beyond. In
+summer the water for the fountain was artificially cooled.
+
+Every clerk was provided with a chair suspended by pulleys from strong
+iron rods fastened above. They could be raised or lowered at will; and
+when not occupied, could be drawn up out of the way. After the goods
+were purchased, they were placed in a machine that wrapped and tied them
+ready for delivery.
+
+A dining-room was always a part of every store. I desired to be shown
+this, and found it as tasteful and elegant in its appointments as a
+private one would be. Silver and china and fine damask made it inviting
+to the eye, and I had no doubt the cooking corresponded as well with the
+taste.
+
+The streets of Mizora were all paved, even the roads through the
+villages were furnished an artificial cover, durable, smooth and
+elastic. For this purpose a variety of materials were used. Some had
+artificial stone, in the manufacture of which Mizora could surpass
+nature's production. Artificial wood they also made and used for
+pavements, as well as cement made of fine sand. The latter was the least
+durable, but possessed considerable elasticity and made a very fine
+driving park. They were experimenting when I came away on sanded glass
+for road beds. The difficulty was to overcome its susceptibility to
+attrition. After business hours every street was swept by a machine. The
+streets and sidewalks, in dry weather, were as free from soil as the
+floor of a private-house would be.
+
+Animals and domestic fowls had long been extinct in Mizora. This was one
+cause of the weird silence that so impressed me on my first view of
+their capital city. Invention had superceded the usefulness of animals
+in all departments: in the field and the chemistry of food. Artificial
+power was utilized for all vehicles.
+
+The vehicle most popular with the Mizora ladies for shopping and culling
+purposes, was a very low carriage, sometimes with two seats, sometimes
+with one. They were upholstered with the richest fabrics, were
+exceedingly light and graceful in shape, and not above three feet from
+the ground. They were strong and durable, though frequently not
+exceeding fifty pounds in weight. The wheel was the curious and
+ingenious part of the structure, for in its peculiar construction lay
+the delight of its motion. The spokes were flat bands of steel, curved
+outward to the tire. The carriage had no spring other than these spokes,
+yet it moved like a boat gliding down stream with the current. I was
+fortunate enough to preserve a drawing of this wheel, which I hope some
+day to introduce in my own land. The carriages were propelled by
+compressed air or electricity; and sometimes with a mechanism that was
+simply pressed with the foot. I liked the compressed air best. It was
+most easily managed by me. The Mizora ladies preferred electricity, of
+which I was always afraid. They were experimenting with a new propelling
+power during my stay that was to be acted upon by light, but it had not
+come into general use, although I saw some vehicles that were propelled
+by it. They moved with incredible speed, so rapid indeed, that the
+upper part of the carriage had to be constructed of glass, and securely
+closed while in motion, to protect the occupant. It was destined, I
+heard some of their scientists say, to become universal, as it was the
+most economical power yet discovered. They patiently tried to explain it
+to me, but my faculties were not receptive to such advanced philosophy,
+and I had to abandon the hope of ever introducing it into my own
+country.
+
+There was another article manufactured in Mizora that excited my wonder
+and admiration. It was elastic glass. I have frequently mentioned the
+unique uses that they made of it, and I must now explain why. They had
+discovered a process to render it as pliable as rubber. It was more
+useful than rubber could be, for it was almost indestructible. It had
+superceded iron in many ways. All cooking utensils were made of it. It
+entered largely into the construction and decoration of houses. All
+cisterns and cellars had an inner lining of it. All underground pipes
+were made of it, and many things that are the necessities and luxuries
+of life.
+
+They spun it into threads as fine and delicate as a spider's gossamer,
+and wove it into a network of clear or variegated colors that dazzled
+the eye to behold. Innumerable were the lovely fabrics made of it. The
+frailest lace, in the most intricate and aerial patterns, that had the
+advantage of never soiling, never tearing, and never wearing out.
+Curtains for drawing-room arches were frequently made of it. Some of
+them looked like woven dew drops.
+
+One set of curtains that I greatly admired, and was a long time ignorant
+of what they were made of, were so unique, I must do myself the pleasure
+to describe them. They hung across the arch that led to the glass
+conservatory attached to my friend's handsome dwelling. Three very thin
+sheets of glass were woven separately and then joined at the edges so
+ingeniously as to defy detection. The inside curtain was one solid
+color: crimson. Over this was a curtain of snow flakes, delicate as
+those aerial nothings of the sky, and more durable than any fabric
+known. Hung across the arched entrance to a conservatory, with a great
+globe of white fire shining through it, it was lovely as the blush of
+Aphrodite when she rose from the sea, veiled in its fleecy foam.
+
+They also possessed the art of making glass highly refractive. Their
+table-ware surpassed in beauty all that I had ever previously seen. I
+saw tea cups as frail looking as soap bubbles, possessing the delicate
+iridescence of opals. Many other exquisite designs were the product of
+its flexibility and transparency. The first article that attracted my
+attention was the dress of an actress on the stage. It was lace, made of
+gossamer threads of amber in the design of lilies and leaves, and was
+worn over black velvet.
+
+The wonderful water scene that I beheld at the theatre was produced by
+waves made of glass and edged with foam, a milky glass spun into tiny
+bubbles. They were agitated by machinery that caused them to roll with a
+terribly natural look. The blinding flashes of lightning had been the
+display of genuine electricity.
+
+Nothing in the way of artistic effect could call forth admiration or
+favorable comment unless it was so exact an imitation of nature as to
+not be distinguished from the real without the closest scrutiny. In
+private life no one assumed a part. All the acting I ever saw in Mizora
+was done upon the stage.
+
+I could not appreciate their mental pleasures, any more than a savage
+could delight in a nocturne of Chopin. Yet one was the intellectual
+ecstasy of a sublime intelligence, and the other the harmonious rapture
+of a divinely melodious soul. I must here mention that the processes of
+chemical experiment in Mizora differed materially from those I had
+known. I had once seen and tasted a preparation called artificial cream
+that had been prepared by a friend of my fathers, an eminent English
+chemist. It was simply a combination of the known properties of cream
+united in the presence of gentle heat. But in Mizora they took certain
+chemicals and converted them into milk, and cream, and cheese, and
+butter, and every variety of meat, in a vessel that admitted neither air
+nor light. They claimed that the elements of air and light exercised a
+material influence upon the chemical production of foods, that they
+could not be made successfully by artificial processes when exposed to
+those two agents. Their earliest efforts had been unsuccessful of exact
+imitation, and a perfect result had only been obtained by closely
+counterfeiting the processes of nature.
+
+The cream prepared artificially that I had tasted in London, was the
+same color and consistency as natural cream, but it lacked its relish.
+The cream manufactured in Mizora was a perfect imitation of the finest
+dairy product.
+
+It was the same with meats; they combined the elements, and the article
+produced possessed no detrimental flavor. It was a more economical way
+of obtaining meat than by fattening animals.
+
+They were equally fortunate in the manufacture of clothing. Every
+mountain was a cultivated forest, from which they obtained every variety
+of fabric; silks, satins, velvets, laces, woolen goods, and the richest
+articles of beauty and luxury, in which to array themselves, were put
+upon the market at a trifling cost, compared to what they were
+manufactured at in my own country. Pallid and haggard women and
+children, working incessantly for a pittance that barely sustained
+existence, was the ultimatum that the search after the cause of cheap
+prices arrived at in my world, but here it traveled from one bevy of
+beautiful workwoman to another until it ended at the Laboratory where
+Science sat throned, the grand, majestic, humane Queen of this thrice
+happy land.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+Whenever I inquired:
+
+"From whence comes the heat that is so evenly distributed throughout the
+dwellings and public buildings of Mizora?" they invariably pointed to
+the river. I asked in astonishment:
+
+"From water comes fire?"
+
+And they answered: "Yes."
+
+I had long before this time discovered that Mizora was a nation of very
+wonderful people, individually and collectively; and as every revelation
+of their genius occurred, I would feel as though I could not be
+surprised at any marvelous thing that they should claim to do, but I was
+really not prepared to believe that they could set the river on fire.
+Yet I found that such was, scientifically, the fact. It was one of their
+most curious and, at the same time, useful appliances of a philosophical
+discovery.
+
+They separated water into its two gases, and then, with their ingenious
+chemical skill, converted it into an economical fuel.
+
+Their coal mines had long been exhausted, as had many other of nature's
+resources for producing artificial heat. The dense population made it
+impracticable to cultivate forests for fuel. Its rapid increase demanded
+of Science the discovery of a fuel that could be consumed without loss
+to them, both in the matter consumed and in the expense of procuring it.
+Nothing seemed to answer their purpose so admirably as water. Water,
+when decomposed, becomes gas. Convert the gas into heat and it becomes
+water again. A very great heat produces only a small quantity of water:
+hence the extreme utility of water as a heat producing agent.
+
+The heating factories were all detached buildings, and generally, if at
+all practicable, situated near a river, or other body of water. Every
+precaution against accident was stringently observed.
+
+There were several processes for decomposing the water explained to me,
+but the one preferred, and almost universally used by the people of
+Mizora, was electricity. The gases formed at the opposite poles of the
+electrical current, were received in large glass reservoirs, especially
+constructed for them.
+
+In preparing the heat that gave such a delightful temperature to the
+dwellings and public buildings of their vast cities, glass was always
+the material used in the construction of vessels and pipes. Glass pipes
+conveyed the separate gases of hydrogen and oxygen into an apartment
+especially prepared for the purpose, and united them upon ignited
+carbon. The heat produced was intense beyond description, and in the
+hands of less experienced and capable chemists, would have proved
+destructful to life and property. The hardest rock would melt in its
+embrace; yet, in the hands of these wonderful students of Nature, it was
+under perfect control and had been converted into one of the most
+healthful and agreeable agents of comfort and usefulness known. It was
+regulated with the same ease and convenience with which we increase or
+diminish the flames of a gas jet. It was conducted, by means of glass
+pipes, to every dwelling in the city. One factory supplied sufficient
+heat for over half a million inhabitants.
+
+I thought I was not so far behind Mizora in a knowledge of heating with
+hot air; yet, when I saw the practical application of their method, I
+could see no resemblance to that in use in my own world. In winter,
+every house in Mizora had an atmosphere throughout as balmy as the
+breath of the young summer. Country-houses and farm dwellings were all
+supplied with the same kind of heat.
+
+In point of economy it could not be surpassed. A city residence,
+containing twenty rooms of liberal size and an immense conservatory, was
+heated entire, at a cost of four hundred centimes a year. One dollar per
+annum for fuel.
+
+There was neither smoke, nor soot, nor dust. Instead of entering a room
+through a register, as I had always seen heated air supplied, it came
+through numerous small apertures in the walls of a room quite close to
+the floor, thus rendering its supply imperceptible, and making a draft
+of cold air impossible.
+
+The extreme cheapness of artificial heat made a conservatory a necessary
+luxury of every dwelling. The same pipes that supplied the dwelling
+rooms with warmth, supplied the hot-house also, but it was conveyed to
+the plants by a very different process.
+
+They used electricity in their hot-houses to perfect their fruit, but
+in what way I could not comprehend; neither could I understand their
+method of supplying plants and fruits with carbonic acid gas. They
+manufactured it and turned it into their hot-houses during sleeping
+hours. No one was permitted to enter until the carbon had been absorbed.
+They had an instrument resembling a thermometer which gave the exact
+condition of the atmosphere. They were used in every house, as well as
+in the conservatories. The people of Mizora were constantly
+experimenting with those two chemical agents, electricity and carbonic
+acid gas, in their conservatories. They confidently believed that with
+their service, they could yet produce fruit from their hot-houses, that
+would equal in all respects the season grown article.
+
+They produced very fine hot-house fruit. It was more luscious than any
+artificially ripened fruit that I had ever tasted in my own country, yet
+it by no means compared with their season grown fruit. Their preserved
+fruit I thought much more natural in flavor than their hot-house fruit.
+
+Many of their private greenhouses were on a grand scale and contained
+fruit as well as flowers. A family that could not have a hot-house for
+fresh vegetables, with a few fruit trees in it, would be poor indeed.
+Where a number of families had united in purchasing extensive grounds,
+very fine conservatories were erected, their expense being divided among
+the property holders, and their luxuries enjoyed in common.
+
+So methodical were all the business plans of the Mizora people, and so
+strictly just were they in the observance of all business and social
+duties that no ill-feeling or jealousy could arise from a combination of
+capital in private luxuries. Such combinations were formed and carried
+out upon strictly business principles.
+
+If the admirable economy with which every species of work was carried on
+in Mizora could be thoroughly comprehended, the universality of luxuries
+need not be wondered at. They were drilled in economy from a very early
+period. It was taught them as a virtue.
+
+Machinery, with them, had become the slave of invention. I lived long
+enough in Mizora to comprehend that the absence of pauperism, genteel
+and otherwise, was largely due to the ingenious application of machinery
+to all kinds of physical labor. When the cost of producing luxuries
+decreases, the value of the luxuries produced must decrease with it. The
+result is they are within reach of the narrowest incomes. A life
+surrounded by refinement must absorb some of it.
+
+I had a conversation with the Preceptress upon this subject, and she
+said:
+
+"Some natures are so undecided in character that they become only what
+their surroundings make them. Others only partially absorb tastes and
+sentiments that form the influence about them. They maintain a decided
+individuality; yet they are most always noticeably marked with the
+general character of their surroundings. It is very, very seldom that a
+nature is fixed from infancy in one channel."
+
+I told her that I knew of a people whose minds from infancy to mature
+age, never left the grooves they were born in. They belonged to every
+nationality, and had palaces built for them, and attendants with
+cultivated intelligences employed to wait upon them.
+
+"Are their minds of such vast importance to their nation? You have never
+before alluded to intellect so elevated as to command such royal
+homage." My friend spoke with awakened interest.
+
+"They are of no importance at all," I answered, humiliated at having
+alluded to them. "Some of them have not sufficient intelligence to even
+feed themselves."
+
+"And what are they?" she inquired anxiously.
+
+"They are idiots; human vegetables."
+
+"And you build palaces for them, and hire servants to feed and tend
+them, while the bright, ambitious children of the poor among you,
+struggle and suffer for mental advancement. How deplorably short-sighted
+are the wise ones of your world. Truly it were better in your country to
+be born an idiot than a poor genius." She sighed and looked grave.
+
+"What should we do with them?" I inquired.
+
+"What do you do with the useless weeds in your garden," she asked
+significantly. "Do you carefully tend them, while drouth and frost and
+lack of nourishment cause your choice plants to wither and die?"
+
+"We are far behind you," I answered humbly. "But barbarous as you think
+we are, no epithet could be too scathing, too comprehensive of all that
+was vicious and inhuman, to apply to a person who should dare to assail
+the expense of those institutions, or suggest that they be converted to
+the cultivation of intellect that _could_ be improved."
+
+My friend looked thoughtful for a long time, then she resumed her
+discourse at the point where I had so unfortunately interrupted it.
+
+"No people," she said, "can rise to universal culture as long as they
+depend upon hand labor to produce any of the necessities of life. The
+absence of a demand for hand labor gives rise to an increasing demand
+for brain labor, and the natural and inevitable result is an increased
+mental activity. The discovery of a fuel that is furnished at so small a
+cost and with really no labor but what machinery performs, marks one
+grand era in our mental progress."
+
+In mentioning the numerous uses made of glass in Mizora, I must not
+forget to give some notice to their water supply in large cities. Owing
+to their cleanly advantages, the filtering and storing of rain-water in
+glass-lined cisterns supplied many family uses. But drinking water was
+brought to their large cities in a form that did not greatly differ from
+those I was already familiar with, excepting in cleanliness. Their
+reservoirs were dug in the ground and lined with glass, and a perfectly
+fitting cover placed on the top. They were constructed so that the water
+that passed through the glass feed pipes to the city should have a
+uniform temperature, that of ordinary spring water. The water in the
+covered reservoirs was always filtered and tested before passing into
+the distributing pipes.
+
+No citizen of Mizora ever hied to the country for pure water and fresh
+air. Science supplied both in a densely populated city.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+When a question as to the existence of social distinctions would be
+asked the citizens of Mizora, the invariable answer would be--there were
+none; yet a long and intimate acquaintance with them assured me that
+there were. They had an aristocracy; but of so peculiar and amiable a
+kind that it deserves a special mention. It took a long time for me to
+comprehend the exact condition of their society in this respect. That
+there were really no dividing lines between the person who superintended
+the kitchen and the one who paid her for it, in a social point of view,
+I could plainly see; yet there were distinctions; and rather sharply
+defined ones too.
+
+In order to explain more lucidly the peculiar social life of Mizora, I
+will ask you to remember some Charity Fair you have attended, perhaps
+participated in, and which had been gotten up and managed by women of
+the highest social rank. If in a country where titles and social
+positions were hereditary, it then represented the highest aristocracy
+of blood. Grand dames there departed from the routine of their daily
+lives and assumed the lowlier occupations of others. They stood behind
+counters, in booths, and sold fancy articles, or dispensed ices and
+lemonade, or waited upon customers at the refreshment tables; bringing
+in trays of eatables, gathering up and removing empty dishes; performing
+labor that, under the ordinary circumstances of life, they would not
+perform in their own homes, and for their own kindred. It was all done
+with the same conscious dignity and ease that characterized the
+statelier duties of their every day life. One fact was apparent to all:
+they were gentlewomen still. The refinement of their home education, and
+the charm of nourished beauty were, perhaps, more prominent in contrast
+with their assumed avocation.
+
+The Charity Fair, with its clerks and waiter girls and flower sellers
+called from the highest society, was a miniature picture of the actual
+every-day social life of Mizora. The one who ordered a dinner at their
+finest hotel, had it served to her by one who occupied the same social
+standing. Yet there _was_ a difference; but it was the difference of
+mind.
+
+The student in Sociology discovers that in all grades of society,
+congenial natures gravitate to a center. A differentiation of the
+highest mental quality was the result of this law in Mizora, and its
+co-ordinate part, their aristocracy.
+
+The social organism did not need legislation to increase its benefits;
+it turned to Science, and, through Science, to Nature. The Laboratory of
+the Chemist was the focus that drew the attention of all minds. Mizora
+might be called a great school of Nature, whose pupils studied her every
+phase, and pried into her secrets with persistent activity, and obeyed
+her instructions as an imperative duty. They observed Nature to be an
+economist, and practiced economy with scrupulous exactness.
+
+They had observed that in all grades of animal life, from the lowest
+form to the highest, wherever sociality had produced unity a leader was
+evolved, a superiority that differed in power according to the grade of
+development. In the earlier histories, the leaders were chosen for their
+prowess in arms. Great warriors became rulers, and soldiers were the
+aristocracy of the land. As civilization progressed and learning became
+more widely disseminated, the military retired before the more
+intellectual aristocracy of statemanship. Politics was the grand
+entrance to social eminence.
+
+"But," said my friend, "_we_ have arrived at a higher, nobler, grander
+age. The military and political supremacies lived out their usefulness
+and decayed. A new era arrived. The differentia of mind evolved an
+aristocracy."
+
+Science has long been recognized as the greatest benefactor of our race.
+Its investigators and teachers are our only acknowledged superiors and
+leaders.
+
+Generally the grandest intellects and those which retain their creative
+power the longest, are of exceptionally slow development. Precocity is
+short lived, and brilliant rather than strong. This I knew to be true of
+my own race.
+
+In Mizora, a mind that developed late lost none of the opportunities
+that belong exclusively to the young of my own and other countries of
+the outer world. Their free schools and colleges were always open:
+always free. For this reason, it was no unusual thing for a person in
+Mizora to begin life at the very lowest grade and rise to its supreme
+height. Whenever the desire awakened, there was a helping hand extended
+on every side.
+
+The distinction between the aristocracy and the lower class, or the
+great intellects and the less, was similar to the relative positions of
+teacher and pupil. I recognized in this social condition the great media
+of their marvelous approach to perfection. This aristocracy was never
+arrogant, never supercilious, never aggressive. It was what the
+philosophers of our world are: tolerant, humane, sublime.
+
+In all communities of civilized nations marked musical talent will form
+social relations distinct from, but not superior to, other social
+relations. The leader of a musical club might also be the leader of
+another club devoted to exclusive literary pursuits; and both clubs
+possess equal social respect. Those who possess musical predilections,
+seek musical associations; those who are purely literary, seek their
+congenials. This is true of all other mental endowments or tastes; that
+which predominates will seek its affinity; be it in science, literature,
+politics, music, painting, or sculpture. Social organizations naturally
+grow out of other business pursuits and vocations of all grades and
+kinds. The society of Mizora was divided only by such distinctions. The
+scientific mind had precedence of all others. In the social world, they
+found more congenial pleasure in one another, and they mingled more
+frequently among themselves. Other professions and vocations followed
+their example for the same reason. Yet neither was barred by social
+caste from seeking society where she would. If the artisan sought social
+intercourse with a philosopher, she was expected to have prepared
+herself by mental training to be congenial. When a citizen of Mizora
+became ambitious to rise, she did not have to struggle with every
+species of opposition, and contend against rebuff and repulse. Correct
+language, refined tastes, dignified and graceful manners were the common
+acquirements of all. Mental culture of so high an order--I marveled that
+a lifetime should be long enough to acquire it in--was universal.
+
+Under such conditions social barriers could not be impregnable. In a
+world divided by poverty and opulence into all their intermediate
+grades, wealth must inevitably be pre-eminent. It represents refined and
+luxurious environments, and, if mind be there, intellectual pre-eminence
+also. Where wealth alone governs society it has its prerogatives.
+
+The wealth that affords the most luxurious entertainments must be the
+wealth that rules. Its privilege--its duty rather--is to ignore all
+applicants to fraternization that cannot return what it receives. Where
+mind is the sole aristocracy it makes demands as rigid, though
+different, and mind was the aristocracy of Mizora. With them education
+is never at an end. I spoke of having graduated at a renowned school for
+young ladies, and when I explained that to graduate meant to finish
+one's education, it elicited a peal of silvery mirth.
+
+"_We_ never graduate," said Wauna. "There is my mamma's mother, two
+centuries old, and still studying. I paid her a visit the other day and
+she took me into her laboratory. She is a manufacturer of lenses, and
+has been experimenting on microscopes. She has one now that possesses a
+truly wonderful power. The leaf of a pear tree, that she had allowed to
+become mouldy, was under the lens, and she told me to look.
+
+"A panorama of life and activity spread out before me in such magnitude
+that I can only compare it to the feeling one must possess who could be
+suspended in air and look down upon our world for a cycle of time.
+
+"Immense plains were visible with animals grazing upon them, that fought
+with and devoured one another. They perished and sank away and immense
+forests sprang up like magic. They were inhabited by insects and tiny
+creatures resembling birds. A sigh of air moved the leaf and a tiny drop
+of water, scarcely discernible to the naked eye rolled over the forests
+and plains, and before it passed to the other side of the leaf a great
+lake covered the spot. My great-great-grandmother has an acute conductor
+of sound that she has invented, so exquisite in mechanism as to reveal
+the voice of the tiniest insect. She put it to my ear, and the bellowing
+of the animals in battle, the chirp of the insects and the voices of the
+feathered mites could be clearly heard, but attenuated like the delicate
+note of two threads of spun glass clashed together."
+
+"And what good," I asked, "can all this knowledge do you? Your
+great-great-grandmother has condensed the learning of two centuries to
+evolve this one discovery. Is it not so?"
+
+"Yes," replied Wauna, and her look and tone were both solemn. "You ask
+me what good it can do? Reflect! If the history of a single leaf is so
+vast and yet ephemeral, what may not be the history of a single world?
+What, after all, are we when such an infinitesimal space can contain
+such wonderful transactions in a second of time."
+
+I shuddered at the thought she raised in my mind. But inherited beliefs
+are not easily dissipated, so I only sought to change the subject.
+
+"But what is the use of studying _all_ the time. There should be some
+period in your lives when you should be permitted to rest from your
+labors. It is truly irksome to me to see everybody still eager to learn
+more. The artist of the kitchen was up to the National College yesterday
+attending a lecture on chemistry. The artist who arranges my rooms is up
+there to-day listening to one on air. I can not understand why, having
+learned to make beds and cook to perfection, they should not be content
+with their knowledge and their work."
+
+"If you were one of us you would know," said Wauna. "It is a duty with
+us to constantly seek improvement. The culinary artist at the house
+where you are visiting, is a very fine chemist. She has a predilection
+for analyzing the construction of food. She may some day discover how
+_to_ produce vegetables from the elements.
+
+"The artist who arranges your room is attending a lecture on air because
+her vocation calls for an accurate knowledge of it. She attends to the
+atmosphere in the whole house, and sees that it is in perfect health
+sustaining condition. Your hostess has a particular fondness for flowers
+and decorates all her rooms with them. All plants are not harmless
+occupants of livingrooms. Some give forth exhalations that are really
+noxious. That artist has so accurate a knowledge of air that she can
+keep the atmosphere of your home in a condition of perfect purity; yet
+she knows that her education is not finished. She is constantly studying
+and advancing. The time may come when she, too, will add a grand
+discovery to science.
+
+"Had my ancestors thought as you do, and rested on an inferior
+education, I should not represent the advanced stage of development that
+I do. As it is, when my mind reaches the age of my mother's, it will
+have a larger comprehensiveness than hers. She already discerns it. My
+children will have intellects of a finer grade than mine. This is our
+system of mind culture. The intellect is of slower development than the
+body, and takes longer to decay. The gradations of advancement from one
+intellectual basis to another, in a social body, requires centuries to
+mark a distinct change in the earlier ages of civilization, but we have
+now arrived at a stage when advancement is clearly perceptible between
+one generation and the next."
+
+Wauna's mother added:
+
+"Universal education is the great destroyer of castes. It is the
+conqueror of poverty and the foundation of patriotism. It purifies and
+strengthens national, as well as individual character. In the earlier
+history of our race, there were social conditions that rendered many
+lives wretched, and that the law would not and, in the then state of
+civilization, could not reach. They were termed "domestic miseries," and
+disappeared only under the influence of our higher intellectual
+development. The nation that is wise will educate its children."
+
+"Alas! alas!" was my own silent thought. "When will my country rise to
+so grand an idea. When will wealth open the doors of colleges,
+academies, and schools, and make the Fountain of Knowledge as free as
+the God-given water we drink."
+
+And there rose a vision in my mind--one of those day dreams when fancy
+upon the wing takes some definite course--and I saw in my own land a
+Temple of Learning rise, grand in proportion, complete in detail, with a
+broad gateway, over whose wide-open majestic portal was the significant
+inscription: "ENTER WHO WILL: NO WARDER STANDS WATCH AT THE GATE."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+The Government of Mizora not being of primary importance in the
+estimation of the people, I have not made more than a mere mention of it
+heretofore. In this respect I have conformed to the generally expressed
+taste of the Mizora people. In my own country the government and the
+aristocracy were identical. The government offices and emoluments were
+the highest pinnacles of ambition.
+
+I mentioned the disparity of opinion between Mizora and all other
+countries I had known in regard to this. I could not understand why
+politics in Mizora should be of so small importance. The answer was,
+that among an educated and highly enlightened people, the government
+will take care of itself. Having been perfected by wise experience, the
+people allow it to glide along in the grooves that time has made for it.
+
+In form, the government of Mizora was a Federal Republic. The term of
+office in no department exceeded the limit of five years. The
+Presidential term of office was for five years.
+
+They had one peculiar--exceedingly peculiar--law in regard to politics.
+No candidate could come before the public seeking office before having a
+certificate from the State College to which she belonged, stating her
+examination and qualifications to fill such an office.
+
+Just like examining for school-teachers, I thought. And why not? Making
+laws for a State is of far more importance than making them for a few
+dozen scholars. I remembered to have heard some of my American
+acquaintances say that in their country it was not always qualifications
+that get a candidate into office. Some of the ways were devious and not
+suitable for publicity. Offices were frequently filled by incompetent
+men. There had been congressmen and other offices of higher and more
+responsible duties, filled by persons who could not correctly frame a
+sentence in their native language, who could not spell the simplest
+words as they were spelled in the dictionary, unless it were an
+accident.
+
+To seek the office of President, or any other position under the General
+Government, required an examination and certificate from the National
+College. The examinations were always public, and conducted in such a
+manner that imposture was impossible. Constituents could attend if they
+chose, and decide upon the qualifications of a favorite candidate. In
+all the public schools, politics--to a certain extent--formed part of
+the general education of every child. Beyond that, any one having a
+predilection for politics could find in the State Colleges and National
+Colleges the most liberal advantages for acquiring a knowledge of
+political economy, political arithmetic, and the science of government.
+
+Political campaigns, (if such a term could be applicable to the politics
+of Mizora) were of the mildest possible character. The papers published
+the names of the candidates and their examinations in full. The people
+read and decided upon their choice, and, when the time came, voted. And
+that was the extent of the campaign enthusiasm.
+
+I must mention that the examinations on the science of government were
+not conducted as are ordinary examinations in any given study that
+consists of questions and answers. That was the preliminary part. There
+followed a thorough, practical test of their ability to discharge the
+duties of office with wisdom. No matter which side the sympathies or
+affections might be enlisted upon, the stern decree of justice was what
+the Mizorean abided by. From earliest infancy their minds were trained
+in that doctrine. In the discharge of all public duties especially, it
+seemed to be the paramount consideration. Certainly no government
+machinery ever could move with more ease, or give greater satisfaction
+to the people, than that of Mizora.
+
+They never appeared to be excited or uneasy about the result of the
+elections. I never heard an animated political argument, such as I used
+to read about in America. I asked a politician one day what she thought
+of the probable success of the opposite party. She replied that it would
+not make any difference to the country as both candidates were perfectly
+competent to fill the office.
+
+"Do you never make disparaging statements about the opposing candidate?"
+was my inquiry.
+
+"How could we?" she asked in surprise, "when there are none to make."
+
+"You might assume a few for the time being; just to make her lose
+votes."
+
+"That would be a crime worthy of barbarians."
+
+"Do you never have any party issues?"
+
+"No. There is never anything to make an issue of. We all work for the
+good of the people, and the whole people. There is no greed of glory or
+gain; no personal ambition to gratify. Were I to use any artifice to
+secure office or popularity, I should be instantly deprived of public
+esteem and notice. I do my duty conscientiously; _that_ is the aim of
+public life. I work for the public good and my popularity comes as it is
+earned and deserved. I have no fear of being slighted or underrated.
+Every politician feels and acts the same way."
+
+"Have politicians ever bought votes with money, or offered bribes by
+promising positions that it would be in their official power to grant
+when elected?"
+
+"Never! There is not a citizen of Mizora who would not scorn an office
+obtained in such a way. The profession of politics, while not to be
+compared in importance with the sciences, is yet not devoid of dignity.
+It is not necessary to make new laws. They were perfected long ago, and
+what has been proven good we have no desire to change. We manage the
+government according to a conscientious interpretation of the law. We
+have repealed laws that were in force when our Republic was young, and
+dropped them from the statute books. They were laws unworthy of our
+civilization. We have laws for the protection of property and to
+regulate public morals, and while our civilization is in a state of
+advancement that does not require them, yet we think it wisdom to let
+them remain. The people know that we have such laws and live up to them
+without surveillance. They would abide by the principles of justice set
+forth in them just as scrupulously if we should repeal them.
+
+"You spoke of bribes. In remote ages, when our country was emerging from
+a state of semi-barbarism, such things were in common practice.
+Political chicanery was a name given to various underhand and dishonest
+maneuvers to gain office and public power. It was frequently the case
+that the most responsible positions in the Government would be occupied
+by the basest characters, who used their power only for fraud to enrich
+themselves and their friends by robbing the people. They deceived the
+masses by preaching purity. They were never punished. If they were
+accused and brought to trial, the wealth they had stolen from the
+government purchased their acquittal, and then they posed as martyrs.
+The form of government was then, as now, a Federal Republic, but the
+people had very little to do with it. They were merely the tools of
+unscrupulous politicians. In those days a sensitively honest person
+would not accept office, because the name politician was a synonym for
+flexible principles. It was derogatory to one's character to seek
+office."
+
+"Was dishonesty more prominent in one party than another?" I asked,
+thinking how very Americanish this history sounded.
+
+"We, who look back upon the conditions of those times and view it with
+dispassionate judgment, can perceive corruption in both political
+parties. The real welfare of the country was the last thing considered
+by a professional politician. There was always something that was to
+benefit the people brought forward as a party issue, and used as a means
+of working up the enthusiasm or fears of the people, and usually dropped
+after the election.
+
+"The candidate for election in those days might be guilty of heinous
+crimes, yet the party covered them all, and over that covering the
+partisan newspaper spread every virtue in the calendar. A stranger to
+the country and its customs reading one of their partisan newspapers
+during a political campaign, might conclude that the party _it_
+advocated was composed of only the virtues of the country, and their
+leader an epitome of the supremest excellence.
+
+"Reading in the same paper a description of the opposing party, the
+stranger might think it composed of only the degraded and disreputable
+portion of the nation, and its leader the scum of all its depravity. If
+curiosity should induce a perusal of some partisan paper of the other
+party, the same thing could be read in its columns, with a change of
+names. It would be the opposite party that was getting represented in
+the most despicable character, and _their_ leader was the only one who
+possessed enough honesty and talent to keep the country from going to
+wreck. The other party leader was the one who was guilty of all the
+crimes in the calendar. A vast number of people were ignorant enough to
+cling blindly to one party and to believe every word published by its
+partisan papers. This superstitious party faith was what the
+unscrupulous politicians handled dexterously for their own selfish ends.
+It was not until education became universal, and a higher culture was
+forced upon the majority--the working classes--that politics began to
+purify itself, and put on the dignity of real virtue, and receive the
+respect that belongs to genuine justice.
+
+"The people became disgusted with defamatory political literature, and
+the honorable members of both parties abjured it altogether. In such a
+government as this, two great parties could not exist, where one was
+altogether bad and the other altogether good. It became apparent to the
+people that there was good in both parties, and they began to elect it
+irrespective of party prejudice. Politicians began to work for their
+country instead of themselves and their party, and politics took the
+noble position that the rights of humanity designed it for. I have been
+giving you quite a history of our ancient politics. Our present
+condition is far different. As the people became enlightened to a higher
+degree, the government became more compact. It might now be compared to
+a large family. There are one hundred States in the Union. There was a
+time when every State made its own laws for its own domestic government.
+One code of laws is now enforced in every State. In going from one State
+to another citizens now suffer no inconvenience from a confusion of
+laws. Every State owes allegiance to the General Government. No State or
+number of States could set up an independent government without
+obtaining the consent and legal dissolution from the General Government.
+But such a thing will never be thought of. We have prospered as a great
+united Nation. Our union has been our strength, our prosperity."
+
+I visited with Wauna a number of the States' Capitals. In architecture
+the Mizora people display an excellent taste. Their public buildings
+might all be called works of art. Their government buildings,
+especially, were on a scale of magnificent splendor. The hollow square
+seemed to be a favorite form. One very beautiful capitol building was of
+crystal glass, with facing and cornices of marble onyx. It looked more
+like a gigantic gem than anything I could compare it to, especially when
+lighted up by great globes of white fire suspended from every ceiling.
+
+Upon my entrance into Mizora, I was led into the belief that I had
+arrived at a female seminary, because the dining and sleeping
+accommodations for the stateswoman were all in the Capitol building. I
+observed that the State Capitols were similarly accommodated. In Mizora
+the home is the heart of all joy, and wherever a Mizora woman goes, she
+endeavors to surround herself with its comforts and pleasures. That was
+the reason that the splendid Capitol building had its home-like
+appointments, was a Nation of women exclusively--at least as far as I
+had as yet been able to discover.
+
+Another reason for the homes of all officials of the Government being
+within the public buildings, was because all the personal expenses,
+excepting clothing, were paid by the Government. The salaries of
+Government positions were not large, compared with those of the
+sciences; but as their social and political dues were paid out of the
+public treasury, the salaries might be considered as net profit. This
+custom had originated many centuries in the past. In those early days,
+when a penurious character became an incumbent of public office, the
+social obligations belonging to it were often but niggardly requited.
+Sometimes business embarrassments and real necessity demanded economy;
+so, at last, the Government assumed all the expenses contingent upon
+every office, from the highest to the lowest. By this means the occupant
+of a Government office was freed from every care but those of state.
+
+The number and style of all social entertainments that were obligatory
+of the occupant of a public office, were regulated by law. As the people
+of Mizora believed in enjoyment, the entertainments provided by the
+Government as the necessary social dues of its officers, were not few,
+nor scantily furnished.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+The artificial light in Mizora puzzled me longest to understand. When I
+first noticed it, it appeared to me to have no apparent source. At the
+touch of a delicate hand, it blazed forth like a star in the center of
+the ceiling. It diffused a soft and pleasing brilliancy that lent a
+charm to everything it revealed. It was a dreamy daylight, and was
+produced by electricity.
+
+In large halls, like a theatre or opera house, the light fell in a soft
+and penetrating radiance from the center of the dome. Its source was not
+visible to either audience or actresses, and, in consequence, occasioned
+no discomfort to the eyes. The light that illuminated the stage was
+similarly arranged. The footlights were not visible. They were in the
+rear of the stage. The light came upward like the rays of the setting
+sun, revealing the setting of the stage with vivid distinctness. I can
+best describe the effect of this singular arrangement by calling
+attention to the appearance of the sun when declining behind a small
+elevation. How sharply every object is outlined before it? How soft and
+delicate is the light in which everything is bathed? Every cloud that
+floats has all of its fleecy loveliness limned with a radiant clearness.
+
+I was very desirous to know how this singular effect was produced, and
+at my request was taken to the stage. An opening in the back part of it
+was covered with pink colored glass. Powerful electric lights from below
+the stage were reflected through this glass upon it. The glass was
+highly refractive and so perfectly translucent, I at first thought there
+was none there, and when I stood upon its edge, and looked down into a
+fiery gulf below, I instinctively thought of the "Lost People," who are
+said to wander amid torturing yet unconsumable flames. But, happily, the
+ones I gazed upon were harmless ones.
+
+The street lights of Mizora were at a considerable elevation from the
+ground. They were in, or over, the center of the street, and of such
+diffuse brilliancy as to render the city almost as light as day. They
+were in the form of immense globes of soft, white fire, and during the
+six months that answered to the Mizora night, were kept constantly
+burning. It was during this period that the Aurora Borealis shone with
+such marvelous brilliancy.
+
+Generally, its display was heralded by an arc of delicate green-tinted
+light, that spanned the heavens. The green tint deepened into emerald,
+assuming a delicate rose hue as it faded upward into rays that diverged
+from the top until the whole resembled a gigantic crown. Every ray
+became a panorama of gorgeous colors, resembling tiny sparks, moving
+hither and thither with inconceivable swiftness. Sometimes a veil of
+mist of delicate green hue depended from the base of the crown, and
+swayed gently back and forth. As soon as the swaying motion commenced,
+the most gorgeous colors were revealed. Myriads of sparks, no larger
+than snow-flakes, swarmed across the delicate green curtain in every
+conceivable color and shade, but always of that vapory, vivid softness
+that is indescribable. The dancing colors resembled gems encased in a
+film of mist.
+
+One display that I witnessed I shall attempt to describe. The arc of
+delicate green appeared first, and shot upward diverging rays of all the
+warm, rich hues of red. They formed a vast crown, outlined with a
+delicate halo of fire. A veil of misty green fluttered down from its
+base, and, instantly, tiny crowns, composed of every brilliant color,
+with a tracery of fire defining every separate one, began to chase one
+another back and forth with bewildering rapidity. As the veil swayed to
+and fro, it seemed to shake the crowns into skeins of fire, each thread
+strung with countless minute globes of every conceivable color and hue.
+Those fiery threads, aerial as thistle down, wove themselves in and out
+in a tangled mass of gorgeous beauty. Suddenly the beads of color fell
+in a shower of gems, topaz and emerald, ruby and sapphire, amethyst and
+pearly crystals of dew. I looked upward, where the rays of variegated
+colors were sweeping the zenith, and high above the first crown was a
+second more vivid still. Myriads of rainbows, the colors broad and
+intense, fluttered from its base, the whole outlined by a halo of fire.
+It rolled together in a huge scroll, and, in an instant, fell apart a
+shower of flakes, minute as snow, but of all the gorgeous, dazzling hues
+of earth and sky combined. They disappeared in the mystery of space to
+instantly form into a fluttering, waving banner of delicate green mist
+and--vanish; only to repeat itself.
+
+The display of the Aurora Borealis was always an exhibition of
+astonishing rapidity of motion of intense colors. The most glorious
+sunset--where the vapory billows of the sky have caught the bloom of the
+dying Autumn--cannot rival it. All the precious gems of earth appear to
+have dissolved into mist, to join in a wild and aerial dance. The people
+of Mizora attributed it entirely to electricity.
+
+Although the sun never rose or set in Mizora, yet for six months in a
+year, that country had the heart of a voluptuous summer. It beat with a
+strong, warm pulse of life through all nature. The orchards budded and
+bloomed, and mellowed into perfect fruition their luscious globes. The
+fields laughed in the warm, rich light, and smiled on the harvest. I
+could feel my own blood bound as with a new lease of life at the first
+breath of spring.
+
+The winters of Mizora had clouds and rain and sleet and snow, and
+sometimes, especially near the circular sea, the fury of an Arctic snow
+storm; but so well prepared were they that it became an amusement.
+Looking into the chaos of snow flakes, driven hither and thither by
+fierce winds, the pedestrians in the street presented no painful
+contrast to the luxury of your own room, with its balmy breath and
+cheerful flowers. You saw none but what were thoroughly clad, and you
+knew that they were hurrying to homes that were bright and attractive,
+if not as elegant as yours; where loving welcomes were sure to greet
+them and happiness would sit with them at the feast; for the heart that
+is pure has always a kingly guest for its company.
+
+A wonderful discovery that the people of Mizora had made was the power
+to annihilate space as an impediment to conversation. They claimed that
+the atmosphere had regular currents of electricity that were accurately
+known to them. They talked to them by means of simply constructed
+instruments, and the voice would be as audible and as easily recognized
+at three thousand miles distant as at only three feet. Stations were
+built similar to our telegraph offices, but on high elevations. I
+understood that they could not be used upon the surface. Every private
+and public house, however, had communication with the general office,
+and could converse with friends at a distance whenever desirable. Public
+speakers made constant use of it, but in connection with another
+extraordinary apparatus which I regret my inability to perfectly
+describe.
+
+I saw it first from the dress circle of a theater. It occupied the whole
+rear of the stage, and from where I sat, looked like a solid wall of
+polished metal. But it had a wonderful function, for immediately in
+front of it, moving, speaking and gesturing, was the figure of a popular
+public lecturer, so life-like in appearance that I could scarcely be
+convinced that it was only a reflection. Yet such it was, and the
+original was addressing an audience in person more than a thousand miles
+distant.
+
+It was no common thing for a lecturer to address a dozen or more
+audiences at the same time, scattered over an area of thousands of
+miles, and every one listening to and observing what appeared to be the
+real speaker. In fact, public speakers in Mizora never traveled on pure
+professional business. It was not necessary. They prepared a room in
+their own dwelling with the needful apparatus, and at the time specified
+delivered a lecture in twenty different cities.
+
+I was so interested in this very remarkable invention that I made
+vigorous mental exertions to comprehend it sufficiently to explain its
+mechanism and philosophical principles intelligently; but I can only say
+that it was one of the wonders those people produced with electricity.
+The mechanism was simple, but the science of its construction and
+workings I could not comprehend. The grasp of my mind was not broad
+enough. The instrument that transmitted the voice was entirely separate.
+
+I must not neglect to mention that all kinds of public entertainments,
+such as operas, concerts and dramas, could be and were repeated to
+audiences at a distance from where the real transaction was taking
+place. I attended a number of operas that were only the reflex of others
+that were being presented to audiences far distant.
+
+These repetitions were always marvels of accuracy of vividness.
+
+Small reflecting apparatus were to be found in every dwelling and
+business house. It is hardly necessary to state that letter-writing was
+an unknown accomplishment in Mizora. The person who desired to converse
+with another, no matter how far distant, placed herself in communication
+with her two instruments and signaled. Her friend appeared upon the
+polished metal surface like the figure in a mirror, and spoke to her
+audibly, and looked at her with all the naturalness of reality.
+
+I have frequently witnessed such interviews between Wauna and her
+mother, when we were visiting distant cities. It was certainly a more
+satisfactory way of communicating than by letter. The small apparatus
+used by private families and business houses were not like those used in
+public halls and theaters. In the former, the reflection was exactly
+similar to the image of a mirror; in the latter, the figure was
+projected upon the stage. It required more complicated machinery to
+produce, and was not practicable for small families or business houses.
+I now learned that on my arrival in Mizora I had been taken to one of
+the largest apparatus and put in communication with it. I was informed
+by Wauna that I had been exhibited to every college and school in the
+country by reflex representation. She said that she and her mother had
+seen me distinctly and heard my voice. The latter had been so
+uncongenial in accent and tone that she had hesitated about becoming my
+instructor on that account. It was my evident appreciation of my
+deficiencies as compared to them that had enlisted her sympathy.
+
+Now, in my own country, my voice had attracted attention by its
+smoothness and modulation, and I was greatly surprised to hear Wauna
+speak of its unmusical tone as really annoying. But then in Mizora there
+are no voices but what are sweet enough to charm the birds.
+
+In the journeys that Wauna and I took during the college vacation, we
+were constantly meeting strangers, but they never appeared the least
+surprised at my dark hair and eyes, which were such a contrast to all
+the other hair and eyes to be met with in Mizora, that I greatly
+wondered at it until I learned of the power of the reflector. I
+requested permission to examine one of the large ones used in a theater,
+and it was granted me. Wauna accompanied me and signaled to a friend of
+hers. As if by magic a form appeared and moved across the stage. It
+bowed to me, smiled and motioned with its hand, to all appearances a
+material body. I asked Wauna to approach it, which she did, and passed
+her hand through it. There was nothing that resisted her touch, yet I
+plainly saw the figure, and recognized it as the perfect representation
+of a friend of Wauna's, an actress residing in a distant city. When I
+ascended the stage, the figure vanished, and I understood that it could
+be visible only at a certain distance from the reflector.
+
+In traveling great distances, or even short ones where great speed was
+desired, the Mizoraens used air ships; but only for the transportation
+of passengers and the very lightest of freight. Heavy articles could not
+be as conveniently carried by them as by railroads. Their railroads were
+constructed and conducted on a system so perfect that accidents were
+never known. Every engineer had an electric signal attached to the
+engine, that could signal a train three miles distant.
+
+The motive power for nearly all engines was compressed air. Electricity,
+which was recognized by Mizora scientists as a force of great
+intensity, was rarely used as a propelling power on railroads. Its use
+was attended by possible danger, but compressed air was not. Electricity
+produced the heat that supplied the air ships and railroads with that
+very necessary comfort. In case there should be an accident, as a
+collision, or thrown from the track, heat could not be a source of
+danger when furnished by electricity. But I never heard of a railroad
+accident during the whole fifteen years that I spent in Mizora.
+
+Air-ships, however, were not exempt from danger, although the
+precautions against it were ingenious and carefully observed. The Mizora
+people could tell the approach of a storm, and the exact time it would
+arrive. They had signal stations established for the purpose, all over
+the country.
+
+But, though they were skilled mechanics, and far in advance of my own
+world, and the limits of my comprehension in their scientific
+discoveries and appliances, they had not yet discovered the means of
+subduing the elements, or driving unharmed through their fury. When
+nature became convulsed with passion, they guarded themselves against
+it, but did not endeavor to thwart it.
+
+Their air-ships were covered, and furnished with luxurious seats. The
+whole upper part of the car was composed of very thin glass. They
+traveled with, to me, astonishing rapidity. Towns and cities flew away
+beneath us like birds upon the wing. I grew frightened and apprehensive,
+but Wauna chatted away with her friends with the most charming
+unconcern.
+
+I was looking down, when I perceived, by the increasing size of objects
+below, that we were descending. The conductor entered almost
+immediately, and announced that we were going down to escape an
+approaching storm. A signal had been received and the ship was at once
+lowered.
+
+I felt intensely relieved to step again on solid earth, and hoped I
+might escape another trial of the upper regions. But after waiting until
+the storm was over we again entered the ship. I was ashamed to refuse
+when everyone else showed no fear.
+
+In waiting for the storm to pass we were delayed so long that our
+journey could have been performed almost as speedily by rail. I wondered
+why they had not invented some means by which they could drive through a
+tempest in perfect safety. As usual, I addressed my inquiries to Wauna.
+She answered:
+
+"So frail a thing as an air-ship must necessarily be, when compared with
+the strength of a storm, is like a leaf in the wind. We have not yet
+discovered, and we have but little expectation of discovering, any means
+by which we can defy the storms that rage in the upper deeps.
+
+"The electricity that we use for heat is also a source of danger during
+a storm. Our policy is to evade a peril we cannot control or destroy.
+Hence, when we receive a signal that a storm is approaching we get out
+of its way. Our railroad carriages, having no danger to fear from them,
+ride right through the storm."
+
+The people of Mizora, I perceived, possessed a remarkable acuteness of
+vision. They could see the odor emanating from flowers and fruit. They
+described it to me as resembling attenuated mist. They also named other
+colors in the solar spectrum than those known to me. When I first heard
+them speak of them, I thought it a freak of the imagination; but I
+afterward noticed artists, and persons who had a special taste for
+colors, always detected them with greater readiness. The presence of
+these new colors were apparent to all with whom I spoke upon the
+subject. When I mentioned my own inability to discern them, Wauna said
+that it was owning to my inferior mental development.
+
+"A child," she said, "if you will observe, is first attracted by red,
+the most glaring color known. The untutored mind will invariably select
+the gaudiest colors for personal adornment. It is the gentle, refined
+taste of civilization that chooses the softened hues and colors."
+
+"But you, as a nation, are remarkable for rich warm colors in your
+houses and often in your dress," I said.
+
+"But they are never glaring," she replied. "If you will notice, the most
+intense colors are always so arranged as to present a halo, instead of
+sharply defined brilliancy. If a gorgeous color is worn as a dress, it
+will be covered with filmy lace. You have spoken of the splendor of the
+Aurora Borealis. It is nature's most gorgeous robe, and intense as the
+primal colors are, they are never glaring. They glow in a film of vapor.
+We have made them our study. Art, with us, has never attempted to
+supercede nature."
+
+The sense of smell was also exceedingly sensitive with the Mizora
+people. They detected odors so refined that I was not aware of them. I
+have often seen a chemist take a bottle of perfumery and name its
+ingredients from the sense of smell only. No one appeared surprised at
+the bluntness of my senses. When I spoke of this Wauna tried to explain
+it.
+
+"We are a more delicately organized race of beings than you are. Our
+intellects, and even sense that we possess, is of a higher and finer
+development. We have some senses that you do not possess, and are unable
+to comprehend their exquisite delicacy. One of them I shall endeavor to
+explain to you by describing it as impression. We possess it in a highly
+refined state, both mentally and physically. Our sensitiveness to
+changes of temperature, I have noticed, is more marked than yours. It is
+acute with all of my people. For this reason, although we are free from
+disease, our bodies could not sustain, as readily as yours could, a
+sudden and severe shock to their normal temperature, such as a marked
+change in the atmosphere would occasion. We are, therefore, extremely
+careful to be always appropriately clothed. That is a physical
+impression. It is possessed by you also, but more obtusely.
+
+"Our sensitiveness to mental pleasure and pain you would pronounce
+morbid on account of its intensity. The happiness we enjoy in the
+society of those who are congenial, or near and dear to us through
+family ties, is inconceivable to you. The touch of my mother's hand
+carries a thrill of rapture with it.
+
+"We feel, intuitively, the happiness or disappointment of those we are
+with. Our own hopes impress us with their fulfillment or frustration,
+before we know what will actually occur. This feeling is entirely
+mental, but it is evidence of a highly refined mentality. We could not
+be happy unless surrounded, as we are, by cultivated and elegant
+pleasures. They are real necessities to us.
+
+"Our appreciation of music, I notice, has a more exquisite delicacy than
+yours. You desire music, but it is the simpler operas that delight you
+most. Those fine and delicate harmonies that we so intensely enjoy, you
+appear incapable of appreciating."
+
+I have previously spoken of their elegance in dress, and their fondness
+for luxury and magnificence. On occasions of great ceremony their
+dresses were furnished with very long trains. The only prominent
+difference that I saw in their state dresses, and the rare and costly
+ones I had seen in my own and other countries, was in the waist. As the
+women of Mizora admired a large waist, their dresses were generally
+loose and flowing. Ingenuity, however, had fashioned them into graceful
+and becoming outlines. On occasions of great state and publicity,
+comfortably fitting girdles confined the dress at the waist.
+
+I attended the Inaugural of a Professor of Natural History in the
+National College. The one who had succeeded to this honor was widely
+celebrated for her erudition. It was known that the ceremony would be a
+grand affair, and thousands attended it.
+
+I there witnessed another of these marvelous achievements in science
+that were constantly surprising me in Mizora. The inauguration took
+place in a large hall, the largest I had ever seen. It would accommodate
+two hundred thousand people, and was filled to repletion. I was seated
+far back in the audience, and being a little short-sighted anyway, I
+expected to be disappointed both in seeing and hearing the ceremonies.
+What was my astonishment then, when they began, to discover that I could
+see distinctly every object upon the stage, and hear with perfect
+accuracy every word that was uttered.
+
+Upon expressing myself to Wauna as being greatly pleased that my
+eyesight and hearing had improved so wonderfully and unexpectedly, she
+laughed merrily, and asked me if I had noticed a curious looking band of
+polished steel that curved outward from the proscenium, and encircled
+its entire front? I had noticed it, but supposed it to be connected with
+some different arrangement they might have made concerning the
+footlights. Wauna informed me that I owed my improved hearing to that.
+
+"But my eyesight," I asked, "how do you account for its unusual
+penetrativeness?"
+
+"Have you ever noticed some seasons of the year display a noticeably
+marked transparency of the atmosphere that revealed objects at great
+distances with unusual clearness? Well, we possess a knowledge of air
+that enables us to qualify it with that peculiar magnifying condition.
+On occasions like this we make use of it. This hall was built after the
+discovery, and was specially prepared for its use. It is seldom employed
+in smaller halls."
+
+Just then a little flutter of interest upon the stage attracted my
+attention, and I saw the candidate for the professorship entering,
+accompanied by the Faculty of the National College.
+
+She wore a sea-green velvet robe with a voluminous train. The bottom of
+the dress was adorned with a wreath or band of water lilies, embroidered
+in seed pearls. A white lace overdress of filmiest texture fell over the
+velvet, almost touching the wreath of lilies, and looked as though it
+was made of sea foam. A girdle of large pink pearls confined the robe at
+the waist. Natural flowers were on her bosom and in her hair.
+
+The stage was superbly decorated with flowers and shells. A large chair,
+constructed of beautiful shells and cushioned with green velvet, rested
+upon a dais of coral. It was the chair of honor. Behind it was a curtain
+of sea-moss. I afterward learned that the moss was attached to a film of
+glass too delicate to detect without handling.
+
+In the midst of these charming surroundings stood the applicant for
+honor. Her deep blue eyes glowed with the joy of triumph. On the
+delicate cheek and lip burned the carmine hue of perfect health. The
+golden hair even seemed to have caught a brighter lustre in its coiled
+masses. The uplifted hand and arm no marble goddess could have matched,
+for this had the color and charm of life. As she stood revealed by the
+strong light that fell around her, every feature ennobled with the glory
+of intellect, she appeared to me a creature of unearthly loveliness, as
+something divine.
+
+I spoke to Wauna of the rare beauty and elegance of her dress.
+
+"She looks like a fabled Naiad just risen from the deep," was my
+criticism on her.
+
+"Her dress," answered Wauna, "is intended to be emblematical of Nature.
+The sea-green robe, the water lilies of pearls, the foamy lace are all
+from Nature's Cradle of Life."
+
+"How poetical!" I exclaimed.
+
+But then Mizora is full of that charming skill that blends into perfect
+harmony the beautiful and useful in life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+On my return to college, after the close of vacation, I devoted myself
+exclusively to history. It began with their first President; and from
+the evidence of history itself, I knew that the Nation was enjoying a
+high state of culture when its history began.
+
+No record of a more primitive race was to be found in all the Library,
+assiduously as I searched for it. I read with absorbing interest their
+progress toward perfect enlightenment, their laborious searchings into
+science that had resulted in such marvelous achievements. But earnestly
+as I sought for it, and anxiously as I longed for it, I found and heard
+no mention of a race of men. From the most intimate intercourse with the
+people of Mizora, I could discover no attempt at concealment in
+anything, yet the inquiry _would_ crowd itself upon me. "Where are the
+men?" And as constantly would I be forced to the conclusion that Mizora
+was either a land of mystery beyond the scope of the wildest and
+weirdest fancy, or else they were utterly oblivious of such a race. And
+the last conclusion was most improbable of all.
+
+Man, in my country, was a necessity of government, law, and protection.
+His importance, (as I viewed it from inherited ideas) was incalculable.
+It _could_ not be possible that he had no existence in a country so
+eminently adapted to his desires and ability.
+
+The expression, "domestic misery," that the Preceptress made use of one
+day in conversation with me, haunted my imagination with a persistent
+suspicion of mystery. It had a familiar sound to me. It intimated
+knowledge of a world _I_ knew so well; where ill-nature, malice, spite,
+envy, deceit, falsehood and dishonesty, made life a continual anxiety.
+
+Locks, bolts and bars shut out the thief who coveted your jewels; but no
+bolts nor bars, however ingeniously constructed or strongly made, could
+keep out the thief who coveted your character. One little word from a
+pretended friend might consummate the sorrow of your whole life, and be
+witnessed by the perpetrator without a pang--nay, even with exultation.
+
+There were other miseries I thought of that were common in my country.
+There were those we love. Some who are woven into our lives and
+affections by the kinship of blood; who grow up weak and vacillating,
+and are won away, sometimes through vice, to estrangement. Our hearts
+ache not the less painfully that they have ceased to be worthy of a
+throb; or that they have been weak enough to become estranged, to
+benefit some selfish alien.
+
+There were other sorrows in that world that I had come from, that
+brought anguish alike to the innocent and the guilty. It was the sorrow
+of premature death. Diseases of all kinds made lives wretched; or tore
+them asunder with death. How many hearts have ached with cankering pain
+to see those who are vitally dear, wasting away slowly, but surely, with
+unrelievable suffering; and to know that life but prolongs their misery,
+and death relieves it only with inconsolable grief for the living.
+
+Who has looked into a pair of youthful eyes, so lovely that imagination
+could not invent for them another charm, and saw the misty film of death
+gather over them, while your heart ached with regret as bitter as it was
+unavailing. The soft snows of winter have fallen--a veil of purity--over
+the new made graves of innocence and youth, and its wild winds have been
+the saddest requiem. The dews of summer have wept with your tears, and
+its zephyrs have sighed over the mouldering loveliness of youth.
+
+I had known no skill in my world that could snatch from death its
+unlawful prey of youth. But here, in this land so eminently blessed, no
+one regarded death as a dreaded invader of their household.
+
+"_We cannot die until we get old_," said Wauna, naively.
+
+And looking upon their bounding animal spirits, their strong supple
+frames, and the rich, red blood of perfect health, mantling their cheeks
+with its unsurpassable bloom, one would think that disease must have
+strong grasp indeed that could destroy them.
+
+But these were not all the sorrows that my own country knew. Crimes,
+with which we had no personal connection, shocked us with their horrible
+details. They crept, like noxious vapors, into the moral atmosphere of
+the pure and good; tainting the weak, and annoying the strong.
+
+There were other sorrows in my country that were more deplorable still.
+It was the fate of those who sought to relieve the sufferings of the
+many by an enforced government reform. Misguided, imprudent and
+fanatical they might be, but their aim at least was noble. The wrongs
+and sufferings of the helpless and oppressed had goaded them to action
+for their relief.
+
+But, alas! The pale and haggard faces of thousands of those patriot
+souls faded and wasted in torturing slowness in dungeons of rayless
+gloom. Or their emaciated and rheumatic frames toiled in speechless
+agony amid the horrors of Siberia's mines.
+
+In _this_ land they would have been recognized as aspiring natures,
+spreading their wings for a nobler flight, seeking a higher and grander
+life. The smile of beauty would have urged them on. Hands innumerable
+would have given them a cordial and encouraging grasp. But in the land
+they had sought to benefit and failed, they suffered in silence and
+darkness, and died forgotten or cursed.
+
+My heart and my brain ached with memory, and the thought again occurred:
+"_Could_ the Preceptress ever have known such a race of people?"
+
+I looked at her fair, calm brow, where not a wrinkle marred the serene
+expression of intellect, although I had been told that more than a
+hundred years had touched with increasing wisdom its broad surface. The
+smile that dwelt in her eyes, like the mystic sprite in the fountain,
+had not a suspicion of sadness in them. A nature so lofty as hers, where
+every feeling had a generous and noble existence and aim, could not have
+known without anguish the race of people _I_ knew so well. Their sorrows
+would have tinged her life with a continual sadness.
+
+The words of Wauna had awakened a new thought. I knew that their mental
+life was far above mine, and that in all the relations of life, both
+business and social, they exhibited a refinement never attained by my
+people. I had supposed these qualities to be an endowment of nature, and
+not a development sought and labored for by themselves. But my
+conversation with Wauna had given me a different impression, and the
+thought of a future for my own country took possession of me.
+
+"Could it ever emerge from its horrors, and rise through gradual but
+earnest endeavor to such perfection? Could a higher civilization crowd
+its sufferings out of existence and, in time, memory?"
+
+I had never thought of my country having a claim upon me other than what
+I owed to my relatives and society. But in Mizora, where the very
+atmosphere seemed to feed one's brain with grander and nobler ideas of
+life and humanity, my nature had drank the inspiration of good deeds and
+impulses, and had given the desire to work for something beside myself
+and my own kindred. I resolved that if I should ever again behold my
+native country, I would seek the good of all its people along with that
+of my nearest and dearest of kin. But how to do it was a matter I could
+not arrange. I felt reluctant to ask either Wauna or her mother. The
+guileless frankness of Wauna's nature was an impassable barrier to the
+confidence of crimes and wretchedness. One glance of horror from her
+dark, sweet eyes, would have chilled me into painful silence and
+sorrowful regret.
+
+The mystery that had ever surrounded these lovely and noble blonde women
+had driven me into an unnatural reserve in regard to my own people and
+country. I had always perceived the utter absence of my allusion to the
+masculine gender, and conceiving that it must be occasioned by some more
+than ordinary circumstances, I refrained from intruding my curiosity.
+
+That the singular absence of men was connected with nothing criminal or
+ignoble on their part I felt certain; but that it was associated with
+something weird and mysterious I had now become convinced. My efforts to
+discover their whereabouts had been earnest and untiring. I had visited
+a number of their large cities, and had enjoyed the hospitality of many
+private homes. I had examined every nook and corner of private and
+public buildings, (for in Mizora nothing ever has locks) and in no place
+had I ever discovered a trace or suggestion of man.
+
+Women and girls were everywhere. Their fair faces and golden heads
+greeted me in every town and city. Sometimes a pair of unusually dark
+blue eyes, like the color of a velvet-leaved pansy, looked out from an
+exquisitely tinted face framed in flossy golden hair, startling me with
+its unnatural loveliness, and then I would wonder anew:
+
+"Why is such a paradise for man so entirely devoid of him?"
+
+I even endeavored to discover from the conversation of young girls some
+allusion to the male sex. But listen as attentively and discreetly as I
+could, not one allusion did I hear made to the mysteriously absent
+beings. I was astonished that young girls, with cheeks like the downy
+bloom of a ripe peach, should chatter and laugh merrily over every
+conversational topic but that of the lords of society. The older and the
+wiser among women might acquire a depreciating idea of their worth, but
+innocent and inexperienced girlhood was apt to surround that name with a
+halo of romance and fancied nobility that the reality did not always
+possess. What, then, was my amazement to find _them_ indifferent and
+wholly neglectful of that (to me) very important class of beings.
+
+Conjecture at last exhausted itself, and curiosity became indifferent.
+Mizora, as a nation, or an individual representative, was incapable of
+dishonor. Whatever their secret I should make no farther effort to
+discover it. Their hospitality had been generous and unreserved. Their
+influence upon my character--morally--had been an incalculable benefit.
+I had enjoyed being among them. The rhythm of happiness that swept like
+a strain of sweet music through all their daily life, touched a chord in
+my own nature that responded.
+
+And when I contrasted the prosperity of Mizora--a prosperity that
+reached every citizen in its vast territory--with the varied phases of
+life that are found in my own land, it urged me to inquire if there
+could be hope for such happiness within its borders.
+
+To the Preceptress, whose sympathies I knew were broad as the lap of
+nature, I at last went with my desire and perplexities. A sketch of my
+country's condition was the inevitable prelude. I gave it without once
+alluding to the presence of Man. She listened quietly and attentively.
+Her own land lay like a charming picture before her. I spoke of its
+peaceful happiness, its perfected refinement, its universal wealth, and
+paramount to all its other blessings, its complete ignorance of social
+ills. With them, love did not confine itself to families, but encircled
+the Nation in one embrace. How dismal, in contrast, was the land that
+had given me birth.
+
+"But one eminent distinction exists among us as a people," I added in
+conclusion. "We are not all of one race."
+
+I paused and looked at the Preceptress. She appeared lost in reverie.
+Her expression was one of solicitude and approached nearer to actual
+pain than anything I had ever noticed upon it before. She looked up and
+caught my eye regarding her. Then she quietly asked:
+
+"_Are there men in your country?_"
+
+
+
+
+PART SECOND.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+I answered in the affirmative, and further added that I had a husband
+and a son.
+
+The effect of a confession so simple, and so natural, wounded and amazed
+me.
+
+The Preceptress started back with a look of loathing and abhorrence; but
+it was almost instantly succeeded by one of compassion.
+
+"You have much to learn," she said gently, "and I desire not to judge
+you harshly. _You_ are the product of a people far back in the darkness
+of civilization. _We_ are a people who have passed beyond the boundary
+of what was once called Natural Law. But, more correctly, we have become
+mistresses of Nature's peculiar processes. We influence or control them
+at will. But before giving you any further explanation I will show you
+the gallery containing the portraits of our very ancient ancestors."
+
+She then conducted me into a remote part of the National College, and
+sliding back a panel containing a magnificent painting, she disclosed a
+long gallery, the existence of which I had never suspected, although I
+knew their custom of using ornamented sliding panels instead of doors.
+Into this I followed her with wonder and increasing surprise. Paintings
+on canvas, old and dim with age; paintings on porcelain, and a peculiar
+transparent material, of which I have previously spoken, hung so thick
+upon the wall you could not have placed a hand between them. They were
+all portraits of men. Some were represented in the ancient or mediaeval
+costumes of my own ancestry, and some in garbs resembling our modern
+styles.
+
+Some had noble countenances, and some bore on their painted visages the
+unmistakable stamp of passion and vice. It is not complimentary to
+myself to confess it, but I began to feel an odd kind of companionship
+in this assembly of good and evil looking men, such as I had not felt
+since entering this land of pre-eminently noble and lovely women.
+
+As I gazed upon them, arrayed in the armor of some stern warrior, or the
+velvet doublet of some gay cavalier, the dark eyes of a debonair knight
+looked down upon me with familiar fellowship. There was pride of birth,
+and the passion of conquest in every line of his haughty, sensuous face.
+I seemed to breathe the same moral atmosphere that had surrounded me in
+the outer world.
+
+_They_ had lived among noble and ignoble deeds I felt sure. _They_ had
+been swayed by conflicting desires. _They_ had known temptation and
+resistance, and reluctant compliance. _They_ had experienced the
+treachery and ingratitude of humanity, and had dealt in it themselves.
+_They_ had known joy as I had known it, and their sorrow had been as my
+sorrows. _They_ had loved as I had loved, and sinned as I had sinned,
+and suffered as I had suffered.
+
+I wept for the first time since my entrance into Mizora, the bitter
+tears of actual experience, and endeavored to convey to the Preceptress
+some idea of the painful emotion that possessed me.
+
+"I have noticed," she said, "in your own person and the descriptions you
+have given of your native country, a close resemblance to the people and
+history of our nation in ages far remote. These portraits are very old.
+The majority of them were painted many thousands of years ago. It is
+only by our perfect knowledge of color that we are enabled to preserve
+them. Some have been copied by expert artists upon a material
+manufactured by us for that purpose. It is a transparent adamant that
+possesses no refractive power, consequently the picture has all the
+advantage of a painting on canvas, with the addition of perpetuity. They
+can never fade nor decay."
+
+"I am astonished at the existence of this gallery," I exclaimed. "I have
+observed a preference for sliding panels instead of doors, and that they
+were often decorated with paintings of rare excellence, but I had never
+suspected the existence of this gallery behind one of them."
+
+"Any student," said the Preceptress, "who desires to become conversant
+with our earliest history, can use this gallery. It is not a secret, for
+nothing in Mizora is concealed; but we do not parade its existence, nor
+urge upon students an investigation of its history. They are so far
+removed from the moral imbecility that dwarfed the nature of these
+people, that no lesson can be learned from their lives; and their time
+can be so much more profitably spent in scientific research and study."
+
+"You have not, then, reached the limits of scientific knowledge?" I
+wonderingly inquired, for, to me, they had already overstepped its
+imaginary pale.
+
+"When we do we shall be able to create intellect at will. We govern to a
+certain extent the development of physical life; but the formation of
+the brain--its intellectual force, or capacity I should say--is beyond
+our immediate skill. Genius is yet the product of long cultivation."
+
+I had observed that dark hair and eyes were as indiscriminately mingled
+in these portraits as I had been accustomed to find them in the living
+people of my own and other countries. I drew the Preceptress' attention
+to it.
+
+"We believe that the highest excellence of moral and mental character is
+alone attainable by a fair race. The elements of evil belong to the dark
+race."
+
+"And were the people of this country once of mixed complexions?"
+
+"As you see in the portraits? Yes," was the reply.
+
+"And what became of the dark complexions?"
+
+"We eliminated them."
+
+I was too astonished to speak and stood gazing upon the handsome face of
+a young man in a plumed hat and lace-frilled doublet. The dark eyes had
+a haughty look, like a man proud of his lineage and his sex.
+
+"Let us leave this place," said the Preceptress presently. "It always
+has a depressing effect upon me."
+
+"In what way?" I asked.
+
+"By the degradation of the human race that they force me to recall."
+
+I followed her out to a seat on one of the small porticoes.
+
+In candidly expressing herself about the dark complexions, my companion
+had no intention or thought of wounding my feelings. So rigidly do they
+adhere to the truth in Mizora that it is of all other things
+pre-eminent, and is never supposed to give offense. The Preceptress but
+gave expression to the belief inculcated by centuries of the teachings
+and practices of her ancestors. I was not offended. It was her
+conviction. Besides, I had the consolation of secretly disagreeing with
+her. I am still of the opinion that their admirable system of
+government, social and political, and their encouragement and provision
+for universal culture of so high an order, had more to do with the
+formation of superlative character than the elimination of the dark
+complexion.
+
+The Preceptress remained silent a long time, apparently absorbed in the
+beauty of the landscape that stretched before us. The falling waters of
+a fountain was all the sound we heard. The hour was auspicious. I was so
+eager to develop a revelation of the mystery about these people that I
+became nervous over my companion's protracted silence. I felt a delicacy
+in pressing inquiries concerning information that I thought ought to be
+voluntarily given. Inquisitiveness was regarded as a gross rudeness by
+them, and I could frame no question that I did not fear would sound
+impertinent. But at last patience gave way and, at the risk of
+increasing her commiseration for my barbarous mental condition, I asked:
+
+"Are you conversant with the history of the times occupied by the
+originals of the portraits we have just seen?"
+
+"I am," she replied.
+
+"And would you object to giving me a condensed recital of it?"
+
+"Not if it can do you any good?"
+
+"What has become of their descendants--of those portraits?"
+
+"They became extinct thousands of years ago."
+
+She became silent again, lost in reverie. The agitation of my mind was
+not longer endurable. I was too near the acme of curiosity to longer
+delay. I threw reserve aside and not without fear and trembling faltered
+out:
+
+"Where are the men of this country? Where do they stay?"
+
+_"There are none_," was the startling reply. "_The race became extinct
+three thousand years ago._"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+I trembled at the suggestion of my own thoughts. Was this an enchanted
+country? Where the lovely blonde women fairies--or some weird beings of
+different specie, human only in form? Or was I dreaming?
+
+"I do not believe I understand you," I said. "I never heard of a country
+where there were no men. In my land they are so very, very important."
+
+"Possibly," was the placid answer.
+
+"And you are really a nation of women?"
+
+"Yes," she said. "And have been for the last three thousand years."
+
+"Will you tell me how this wonderful change came about?"
+
+"Certainly. But in order to do it, I must go back to our very remote
+ancestry. The civilization that I shall begin with must have resembled
+the present condition of your own country as you describe it. Prisons
+and punishments were prevalent throughout the land."
+
+I inquired how long prisons and places of punishment had been abolished
+in Mizora.
+
+"For more than two thousand years," she replied. "I have no personal
+knowledge of crime. When I speak of it, it is wholly from an historical
+standpoint. A theft has not been committed in this country for many many
+centuries. And those minor crimes, such as envy, jealousy, malice and
+falsehood, disappeared a long time ago. You will not find a citizen in
+Mizora who possesses the slightest trace of any of them.
+
+"Did they exist in earlier times?"
+
+"Yes. Our oldest histories are but records of a succession of dramas in
+which the actors were continually striving for power and exercising all
+of those ancient qualities of mind to obtain it. Plots, intrigues,
+murders and wars, were the active employments of the very ancient rulers
+of our land. As soon as death laid its inactivity upon one actor,
+another took his place. It might have continued so; and we might still
+be repeating the old tragedy but for one singular event. In the history
+of your own people you have no doubt observed that the very thing
+plotted, intrigued and labored for, has in accomplishment proved the
+ruin of its projectors. You will remark this in the history I am about
+to relate.
+
+"Main ages ago this country was peopled by two races--male and female.
+The male race were rulers in public and domestic life. Their supremacy
+had come down from pre-historic time, when strength of muscle was the
+only master. Woman was a beast of burden. She was regarded as inferior
+to man, mentally as well as physically. This idea prevailed through
+centuries of the earlier civilization, even after enlightenment had
+brought to her a chivalrous regard from men. But this regard was
+bestowed only upon the women of their own household, by the rich and
+powerful. Those women who had not been fortunate enough to have been
+born in such a sphere of life toiled early and late, in sorrow and
+privation, for a mere pittance that was barely sufficient to keep the
+flame of life from going out. Their labor was more arduous than men's,
+and their wages lighter.
+
+"The government consisted of an aristocracy, a fortunate few, who were
+continually at strife with one another to gain supremacy of power, or an
+acquisition of territory. Wars, famine and pestilence were of frequent
+occurrence. Of the subjects, male and female, some had everything to
+render life a pleasure, while others had nothing. Poverty, oppression
+and wretchedness was the lot of the many. Power, wealth and luxury the
+dower of the few.
+
+"Children came into the world undesired even by those who were able to
+rear them, and often after an attempt had been made to prevent their
+coming alive. Consequently numbers of them were deformed, not only
+physically, but mentally. Under these conditions life was a misery to
+the larger part of the human race, and to end it by self-destruction was
+taught by their religion to be a crime punishable with eternal torment
+by quenchless fire.
+
+"But a revolution was at hand. Stinted toil rose up, armed and wrathful,
+against opulent oppression. The struggle was long and tragical, and was
+waged with such rancor and desperate persistence by the
+insurrectionists, that their women and children began to supply the
+places vacated by fallen fathers, husbands and brothers. It ended in
+victory for them. They demanded a form of government that should be the
+property of all. It was granted, limiting its privileges to adult male
+citizens.
+
+"The first representative government lasted a century. In that time
+civilization had taken an advance far excelling the progress made in
+three centuries previous. So surely does the mind crave freedom for its
+perfect development. The consciousness of liberty is an ennobling
+element in human nature. No nation can become universally moral until it
+is absolutely FREE.
+
+"But this first Republic had been diseased from its birth. Slavery had
+existed in certain districts of the nation. It was really the remains of
+a former and more degraded state of society which the new government, in
+the exultation of its own triumphant inauguration, neglected or lacked
+the wisdom to remedy. A portion of the country refused to admit slavery
+within its territory, but pledged itself not to interfere with that
+which had. Enmities, however, arose between the two sections, which,
+after years of repression and useless conciliation, culminated in
+another civil war. Slavery had resolved to absorb more territory, and
+the free territory had resolved that it should not. The war that
+followed in consequence severed forever the fetters of the slave and was
+the primary cause of the extinction of the male race.
+
+"The inevitable effect of slavery is enervating and demoralizing. It is
+a canker that eats into the vitals of any nation that harbors it, no
+matter what form it assumes. The free territory had all the vigor,
+wealth and capacity for long endurance that self-dependence gives. It
+was in every respect prepared for a long and severe struggle. Its forces
+were collected in the name of the united government.
+
+"Considering the marked inequality of the combatants the war would
+necessarily have been of short duration. But political corruption had
+crept into the trust places of the government, and unscrupulous
+politicians and office-seekers saw too many opportunities to harvest
+wealth from a continuation of the war. It was to their interest to
+prolong it, and they did. They placed in the most responsible positions
+of the army, military men whose incapacity was well known to them, and
+sustained them there while the country wept its maimed and dying sons.
+
+"The slave territory brought to the front its most capable talent. It
+would have conquered had not the resources against which it contended
+been almost unlimited. Utterly worn out, every available means of supply
+being exhausted, it collapsed from internal weakness.
+
+"The general government, in order to satisfy the clamors of the
+distressed and impatient people whose sons were being sacrificed, and
+whose taxes were increasing, to prolong the war had kept removing and
+reinstating military commanders, but always of reliable incapacity.
+
+"A man of mediocre intellect and boundless self-conceit happened to be
+the commander-in-chief of the government army when the insurrection
+collapsed. The politicians, whose nefarious scheming had prolonged the
+war, saw their opportunity for furthering their own interests by
+securing his popularity. They assumed him to be the greatest military
+genius that the world had ever produced; as evidenced by his success
+where so many others had failed. It was known that he had never risked a
+battle until he was assured that his own soldiers were better equipped
+and outnumbered the enemy. But the politicians asserted that such a
+precaution alone should mark him as an extraordinary military genius.
+The deluded people accepted him as a hero.
+
+"The politicians exhausted their ingenuity in inventing honors for him.
+A new office of special military eminence, with a large salary attached,
+was created for him. He was burdened with distinctions and emoluments,
+always worked by the politicians, for their benefit. The nation,
+following the lead of the political leaders, joined in their adulation.
+It failed to perceive the dangerous path that leads to anarchy and
+despotism--the worship of one man. It had unfortunately selected one who
+was cautious and undemonstrative, and who had become convinced that he
+really was the greatest prodigy that the world had ever produced.
+
+"He was made President, and then the egotism and narrow selfishness of
+the man began to exhibit itself. He assumed all the prerogatives of
+royalty that his position would permit. He elevated his obscure and
+numerous relatives to responsible offices. Large salaries were paid them
+and intelligent clerks hired by the Government to perform their official
+duties.
+
+"Corruption spread into every department, but the nation was blind to
+its danger. The few who did perceive the weakness and presumption of the
+hero were silenced by popular opinion.
+
+"A second term of office was given him, and then the real character of
+the man began to display itself before the people. The whole nature of
+the man was selfish and stubborn. The strongest mental trait possessed
+by him was cunning.
+
+"His long lease of power and the adulation of his political
+beneficiaries, acting upon a superlative self-conceit, imbued him with
+the belief that he had really rendered his country a service so
+inestimable that it would be impossible for it to entirely liquidate it.
+He exalted to unsuitable public offices his most intimate friends. They
+grew suddenly exclusive and aristocratic, forming marriages with eminent
+families.
+
+"He traveled about the country with his entire family, at the expense of
+the Government, to gradually prepare the people for the ostentation of
+royalty. The cities and towns that he visited furnished fetes,
+illuminations, parades and every variety of entertainment that could be
+thought of or invented for his amusement or glorification. Lest the
+parade might not be sufficiently gorgeous or demonstrative he secretly
+sent agents to prepare the programme and size of his reception, always
+at the expense of the city he intended to honor with his presence.
+
+"He manifested a strong desire to subvert the will of the people to his
+will. When informed that a measure he had proposed was unconstitutional,
+he requested that the constitution be changed. His intimate friends he
+placed in the most important and trustworthy positions under the
+Government, and protected them with the power of his own office.
+
+"Many things that were distasteful and unlawful in a free government
+were flagrantly flaunted in the face of the people, and were followed by
+other slow, but sure, approaches to the usurpation of the liberties of
+the Nation. He urged the Government to double his salary as President,
+and it complied.
+
+"There had long existed a class of politicians who secretly desired to
+convert the Republic into an Empire, that they might secure greater
+power and opulence. They had seen in the deluded enthusiasm of the
+people for one man, the opportunity for which they had long waited and
+schemed. He was unscrupulous and ambitious, and power had become a
+necessity to feed the cravings of his vanity.
+
+"The Constitution of the country forbade the office of President to be
+occupied by one man for more than two terms. The Empire party proposed
+to amend it, permitting the people to elect a President for any number
+of terms, or for life if they choose. They tried to persuade the people
+that the country owed the greatest General of all time so distinctive an
+honor. They even claimed that it was necessary to the preservation of
+the Government; that his popularity could command an army to sustain him
+if he called for it.
+
+"But the people had begun to penetrate the designs of the hero, and
+bitterly denounced his resolution to seek a third term of power. The
+terrible corruptions that had been openly protected by him, had
+advertised him as criminally unfit for so responsible an office. But,
+alas! the people had delayed too long. They had taken a young elephant
+into the palace. They had petted and fed him and admired his bulky
+growth, and now they could not remove him without destroying the
+building.
+
+"The politicians who had managed the Government so long, proved that
+they had more power than the people They succeeded, by practices that
+were common with politicians in those days, in getting him nominated for
+a third term. The people, now thoroughly alarmed, began to see their
+past folly and delusion. They made energetic efforts to defeat his
+election. But they were unavailing. The politicians had arranged the
+ballot, and when the counts were published, the hero was declared
+President for life. When too late the deluded people discovered that
+they had helped dig the grave for the corpse of their civil liberty, and
+those who were loyal and had been misled saw it buried with unavailing
+regret. The undeserved popularity bestowed upon a narrow and selfish
+nature had been its ruin. In his inaugural address he declared that
+nothing but the will of the people governed him. He had not desired the
+office; public life was distasteful to him, yet he was willing to
+sacrifice himself for the good of his country.
+
+"Had the people been less enlightened, they might have yielded without a
+murmur; but they had enjoyed too long the privileges of a free
+Government to see it usurped without a struggle. Tumult and disorder
+prevailed over the country. Soldiers were called out to protect the new
+Government, but numbers of them refused to obey. The consequence was
+they fought among themselves. A dissolution of the Government was the
+result. The General they had lauded so greatly failed to bring order out
+of chaos; and the schemers who had foisted him into power, now turned
+upon him with the fury of treacherous natures when foiled of their prey.
+Innumerable factions sprung up all over the land, each with a leader
+ambitious and hopeful of subduing the whole to his rule. They fought
+until the extermination of the race became imminent, when a new and
+unsuspected power arose and mastered.
+
+"The female portion of the nation had never had a share in the
+Government. Their privileges were only what the chivalry or kindness of
+the men permitted. In law, their rights were greatly inferior. The evils
+of anarchy fell with direct effect upon them. At first, they organized
+for mutual protection from the lawlessness that prevailed. The
+organizations grew, united and developed into military power. They used
+their power wisely, discreetly, and effectively. With consummate skill
+and energy they gathered the reins of Government in their own hands.
+
+"Their first aim had been only to force the country into peace. The
+anarchy that reigned had demoralized society, and they had suffered
+most. They had long pleaded for an equality of citizenship with men, but
+had pleaded in vain. They now remembered it, and resolved to keep the
+Government that their wisdom and power had restored. They had been
+hampered in educational progress. Colleges and all avenues to higher
+intellectual development had been rigorously closed against them. The
+professional pursuits of life were denied them. But a few, with sublime
+courage and energy, had forced their way into them amid the revilings of
+some of their own sex and opposition of the men. It was these brave
+spirits who had earned their liberal cultivation with so much
+difficulty, that had organized and directed the new power. They
+generously offered to form a Government that should be the property of
+all intelligent adult citizens, not criminal.
+
+"But these wise women were a small minority. The majority were ruled by
+the remembrance of past injustice. _They_ were now the power, and
+declared their intention to hold the Government for a century.
+
+"They formed a Republic, in which they remedied many of the defects that
+had marred the Republic of men. They constituted the Nation an integer
+which could never be disintegrated by States' Rights ideas or the
+assumption of State sovereignty.
+
+"They proposed a code of laws for the home government of the States,
+which every State in the Union ratified as their State Constitution,
+thus making a uniformity and strength that the Republic of men had never
+known or suspected attainable.
+
+"They made it a law of every State that criminals could be arrested in
+any State they might flee to, without legal authority, other than that
+obtained in the vicinity of the crime. They made a law that criminals,
+tried and convicted of crime, could not be pardoned without the sanction
+of seventy-five out of one hundred educated and disinterested people,
+who should weigh the testimony and render their decision under oath. It
+is scarcely necessary to add that few criminals ever were pardoned. It
+removed from the office of Governor the responsibility of pardoning, or
+rejecting pardons as a purely personal privilege. It abolished the
+power of rich criminals to bribe their escape from justice; a practice
+that had secretly existed in the former Republic.
+
+"In forming their Government, the women, who were its founders, profited
+largely by the mistakes or wisdom displayed in the Government of men.
+Neither the General Government, nor the State Government, could be
+independent of the other. A law of the Union could not become such until
+ratified by every State Legislature. A State law could not become
+constitutional until ratified by Congress.
+
+"In forming the State Constitutions, laws were selected from the
+different State Constitutions that had proven wise for State Government
+during the former Republic. In the Republic of men, each State had made
+and ratified its own laws, independent of the General Government. The
+consequence was, no two States possessed similar laws.
+
+"To secure strength and avoid confusion was the aim of the founders of
+the new Government. The Constitution of the National Government provided
+for the exclusion of the male sex from all affairs and privileges for a
+period of one hundred years.
+
+"_At the end of that time not a representative of the sex was in
+existence._"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+I expressed my astonishment at her revelation. Their social life existed
+under conditions that were incredible to me. Would it be an impertinence
+to ask for an explanation that I might comprehend? Or was it really the
+one secret they possessed and guarded from discovery, a mystery that
+must forever surround them with a halo of doubt, the suggestion of
+uncanny power? I spoke as deprecatingly as I could. The Preceptress
+turned upon me a calm but penetrating gaze.
+
+"Have we impressed you as a mysterious people?" she asked.
+
+"Very, very much!" I exclaimed. "I have at times been oppressed by it."
+
+"You never mentioned it," she said, kindly.
+
+"I could not find an opportunity to," I said.
+
+"It is the custom in Mizora, as you have no doubt observed, never to
+make domestic affairs a topic of conversation outside of the family, the
+only ones who would be interested in them; and this refinement has kept
+you from the solution of our social system. I have no hesitancy in
+gratifying your wish to comprehend it. The best way to do it is to let
+history lead up to it, if you have the patience to listen."
+
+I assured her that I was anxious to hear all she chose to tell. She then
+resumed:
+
+"The prosperity of the country rapidly increased under the rule of the
+female Presidents. The majority of them were in favor of a high state of
+morality, and they enforced it by law and practice. The arts and
+sciences were liberally encouraged and made rapid advancement. Colleges
+and schools flourished vigorously, and every branch of education was now
+open to women.
+
+"During the Republic of men, the government had founded and sustained a
+military and naval academy, where a limited number of the youth of the
+country were educated at government expense. The female government
+re-organized the institutions, substituting the youth of their own sex.
+They also founded an academy of science, which was supplied with every
+facility for investigation and progress. None but those having a marked
+predilection for scientific research could obtain admission, and then it
+was accorded to demonstrated ability only. This drew to the college the
+best female talent in the country. The number of applicants was not
+limited.
+
+"Science had hitherto been, save by a _very_ few, an untrodden field to
+women, but the encouragement and rare facilities offered soon revealed
+latent talent that developed rapidly. Scarcely half a century had
+elapsed before the pupils of the college had effected by their
+discoveries some remarkable changes in living, especially in the
+prevention and cure of diseases.
+
+"However prosperous they might become, they could not dwell in political
+security with a portion of the citizens disfranchised. The men were
+resolved to secure their former power. Intrigues and plots against the
+government were constantly in force among them. In order to avert
+another civil war, it was finally decided to amend the constitution, and
+give them an equal share in the ballot. They had no sooner obtained that
+than the old practices of the former Republic were resorted to to secure
+their supremacy in government affairs. The women looked forward to their
+former subjugation as only a matter of time, and bitterly regretted
+their inability to prevent it. But at the crisis, a prominent scientist
+proposed to let the race die out. Science had revealed the Secret of
+Life."
+
+She ceased speaking, as though I fully understood her.
+
+"I am more bewildered than ever," I exclaimed. "I cannot comprehend
+you."
+
+"Come with me," she said.
+
+I followed her into the Chemist's Laboratory. She bade me look into a
+microscope that she designated, and tell her what I saw.
+
+"An exquisitely minute cell in violent motion," I answered.
+
+"Daughter," she said, solemnly, "you are now looking upon the germ of
+_all_ Life, be it animal or vegetable, a flower or a human being, it has
+that one common beginning. We have advanced far enough in Science to
+control its development. Know that the MOTHER is the only important part
+of all life. In the lowest organisms no other sex is apparent."
+
+I sat down and looked at my companion in a frame of mind not easily
+described. There was an intellectual grandeur in her look and mien that
+was impressive. Truth sat, like a coronet, upon her brow. The revelation
+I had so longed for, I now almost regretted. It separated me so far from
+these beautiful, companionable beings.
+
+"Science has instructed you how to supercede Nature," I said, finally.
+
+"By no means. It has only taught us how to make her obey us. We cannot
+_create_ Life. We cannot develop it. But we can control Nature's
+processes of development as we will. Can you deprecate such a power?
+Would not your own land be happier without idiots, without lunatics,
+without deformity and disease?"
+
+"You will give me little hope of any radical change in my own lifetime
+when I inform you that deformity, if extraordinary, becomes a source of
+revenue to its possessor."
+
+"All reforms are of slow growth," she said. "The moral life is the
+highest development of Nature. It is evolved by the same slow processes,
+and like the lower life, its succeeding forms are always higher ones.
+Its ultimate perfection will be mind, where all happiness shall dwell,
+where pleasure shall find fruition, and desire its ecstasy.
+
+"It is the duty of every generation to prepare the way for a higher
+development of the next, as we see demonstrated by Nature in the
+fossilized remains of long extinct animal life, a preparatory condition
+for a higher form in the next evolution. If you do not enjoy the fruit
+of your labor in your own lifetime, the generation that follows you will
+be the happier for it. Be not so selfish as to think only of your own
+narrow span of life."
+
+"By what means have you reached so grand a development?" I asked.
+
+"By the careful study of, and adherence to, Nature's laws. It was long
+years--I should say centuries--before the influence of the coarser
+nature of men was eliminated from the present race.
+
+"We devote the most careful attention to the Mothers of our race. No
+retarding mental or moral influences are ever permitted to reach her. On
+the contrary, the most agreeable contacts with nature, all that can
+cheer and ennoble in art or music surround her. She is an object of
+interest and tenderness to all who meet her. Guarded from unwholesome
+agitation, furnished with nourishing and proper diet--both mental and
+physical--the child of a Mizora mother is always an improvement upon
+herself. With us, childhood has no sorrows. We believe, and the present
+condition of our race proves, that a being environed from its birth with
+none but elevating influences, will grow up amiable and intelligent
+though inheriting unfavorable tendencies.
+
+"On this principle we have ennobled our race and discovered the means of
+prolonging life and youthful loveliness far beyond the limits known by
+our ancestors.
+
+"Temptation and necessity will often degrade a nature naturally inclined
+and desirous to be noble. We early recognized this fact, and that a
+nature once debased by crime would transmit it to posterity. For this
+reason we never permitted a convict to have posterity."
+
+"But how have you become so beautiful?" I asked. "For, in all my
+journeys, I have not met an uncomely face or form. On the contrary, all
+the Mizora women have perfect bodies and lovely features."
+
+"We follow the gentle guidance of our mother, Nature. Good air and
+judicious exercise for generations and generations before us have
+helped. Our ancestors knew the influence of art, sculpture, painting and
+music, which they were trained to appreciate."
+
+"But has not nature been a little generous to you?" I inquired.
+
+"Not more so than she will be to any people who follow her laws. When
+you first came here you had an idea that you could improve nature by
+crowding your lungs and digestive organs into a smaller space than she,
+the maker of them, intended them to occupy.
+
+"If you construct an engine, and then cram it into a box so narrow and
+tight that it cannot move, and then crowd on the motive power, what
+would you expect?
+
+"Beautiful as you think my people, and as they really are, yet, by
+disregarding nature's laws, or trying to thwart her intentions, in a few
+generations to come, perhaps even in the next, we could have coarse
+features and complexions, stoop shoulders and deformity.
+
+"It has required patience, observation and care on the part of our
+ancestors to secure to us the priceless heritage of health and perfect
+bodies. Your people can acquire them by the same means."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+     As to Physical causes, I am inclined to doubt altogether of their
+     operation in this particular; nor do I think that men owe anything
+     of their temper or genius to the air, food, or climate.--_Bacon._
+
+
+I listened with the keenest interest to this curious and instructive
+history; and when the Preceptress had ceased speaking. I expressed my
+gratitude for her kindness. There were many things about which I desired
+information, but particularly their method of eradicating disease and
+crime. These two evils were the prominent afflictions of all the
+civilized nations I knew. I believed that I could comprehend enough of
+their method of extirpation to benefit my own country. Would she kindly
+give it?
+
+"I shall take Disease first," she said, "as it is a near relative of
+Crime. You look surprised. You have known life-long and incurable
+invalids who were not criminals. But go to the squalid portion of any of
+your large cities, where Poverty and Disease go hand in hand, where the
+child receives its life and its first nourishment from a haggard and
+discontented mother. Starvation is her daily dread. The little
+tendernesses that make home the haven of the heart, are never known to
+her. Ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-cherished, all that _might_ be refined
+and elevated in her nature, if properly cultivated, is choked into
+starveling shapes by her enemy--Want.
+
+"If you have any knowledge of nature, ask yourself if such a condition
+of birth and infancy is likely to produce a noble, healthy human being?
+Do your agriculturists expect a stunted, neglected tree to produce rare
+and luscious fruit?"
+
+I was surprised at the Preceptress' graphic description of wretchedness,
+so familiar to all the civilized nations that I knew, and asked:
+
+"Did such a state of society ever exist in this country?"
+
+"Ages ago it was as marked a social condition of this land as it is of
+your own to-day. The first great move toward eradicating disease was in
+providing clean and wholesome food for the masses. It required the
+utmost rigor of the law to destroy the pernicious practice of
+adulteration. The next endeavor was to crowd poverty out of the land. In
+order to do this the Labor question came first under discussion, and
+resulted in the establishment in every state of a Board of Arbitration
+that fixed the price of labor on a per cent, of the profits of the
+business. Public and private charities were forbidden by law as having
+an immoral influence upon society. Charitable institutions had long been
+numerous and fashionable, and many persons engaged in them as much for
+their own benefit as that of the poor. It was not always the honest and
+benevolent ones who became treasurers, nor were the funds always
+distributed among the needy and destitute, or those whom they were
+collected for. The law put a stop to the possibility of such frauds, and
+of professional impostors seeking alms. Those who needed assistance were
+supplied with work--respectable, independent work--furnished by the city
+or town in which they resided. A love of industry, its dignity and
+independence, was carefully instilled into every young mind. There is no
+country but what ought to provide for everyone of its citizens a
+comfortable, if not luxurious, home by humane legislation on the labor
+question.
+
+"The penitentiaries were reconstructed by the female government. One
+half the time formerly allotted to labor was employed in compulsory
+education. Industrial schools were established in every State, where all
+the mechanical employments were taught free. Objects of charity were
+sent there and compelled to become self supporting. These industrial
+schools finally became State Colleges, where are taught, free, all the
+known branches of knowledge, intellectual and mechanical.
+
+"Pauperism disappeared before the wide reaching influence of these
+industrial schools, but universal affluence had not come. It could not
+exist until education had become universal.
+
+"With this object in view, the Government forbade the employment of any
+citizen under the age of twenty-one, and compelled their attendance at
+school up to that time. At the same time a law was passed that
+authorized the furnishing of all school-room necessaries out of the
+public funds. If a higher education were desired the State Colleges
+furnished it free of all expenses contingent.
+
+"All of these measures had a marked influence in improving the
+condition of society, but not all that was required. The necessity for
+strict sanitary laws became obvious. Cities and towns and even farms
+were visited, and everything that could breed malaria, or produce impure
+air, was compelled to be removed. Personal and household cleanliness at
+last became an object of public interest, and inspectors were appointed
+who visited families and reported the condition of their homes. All
+kinds of out-door sports and athletic exercises were encouraged and
+became fashionable.
+
+"All of these things combined, made a great improvement in the health
+and vigor of our race, but still hereditary diseases lingered.
+
+"There were many so enfeebled by hereditary disease they had not enough
+energy to seek recuperation, and died, leaving offspring as wretched,
+who in turn followed their parents' example.
+
+"Statistics were compiled, and physician's reports circulated, until a
+law was passed prohibiting the perpetuity of diseased offspring. But,
+although disease became less prevalent, it did not entirely disappear.
+The law could only reach the most deplorable afflictions, and was
+eventually repealed.
+
+"As the science of therapeutics advanced, all diseases--whether
+hereditary or acquired--were found to be associated with abnormal
+conditions of the blood. A microscopic examination of a drop of blood
+enabled the scientist to determine the character and intensity of any
+disease, and at last to effect its elimination from the system.
+
+"The blood is the primal element of the body. It feeds the flesh, the
+nerves, the muscles, the brain. Disease cannot exist when it is in a
+natural condition. Countless experiments have determined the exact
+properties of healthy blood and how to produce it. By the use of this
+knowledge we have eliminated hereditary diseases, and developed into a
+healthy and moral people. For people universally healthy is sure of
+being moral. Necessity begets crime. It is the _wants_ of the ignorant
+and debased that suggests theft. It is a diseased fancy, or a mind
+ignorant of the laws that govern the development of human nature, that
+could attribute to offspring hated before birth: infancy and childhood
+neglected; starved, ill-used in every way, a disposition and character,
+amiable and humane and likely to become worthy members of society. The
+reverse is almost inevitable. Human nature relapses into the lower and
+baser instincts of its earlier existence, when neglected, ill-used and
+_ignorant_. All of those lovely traits of character which excite the
+enthusiast, such as gratitude, honor, charity are the results of
+education only. They are not the natural instincts of the human mind,
+but the cultivated ones.
+
+"The most rigid laws were passed in regard to the practice of medicine.
+No physician could become a practitioner until examined and authorized
+to do so by the State Medical College. In order to prevent favoritism,
+or the furnishing of diplomas to incompetent applicants, enormous
+penalties were incurred by any who would sign such. The profession long
+ago became extinct. Every mother is a family physician. That is, she
+obeys the laws of nature in regard to herself and her children, and they
+never need a doctor.
+
+"Having become healthy and independent of charity, crime began to
+decrease naturally. The conditions that had bred and fostered petty
+crimes having ceased to exist, the natures that had inherited them rose
+above their influence in a few generations, and left honorable
+posterity.
+
+"But crime in its grossest form is an ineradicable hereditary taint.
+Generation after generation may rise and disappear in a family once
+tainted with it, without displaying it, and then in a most unexpected
+manner it will spring up in some descendant, violent and unconquerable.
+
+"We tried to eliminate it as we had disease, but failed. It was an
+inherited molecular structure of the brain. Science could not
+reconstruct it. The only remedy was annihilation. Criminals had no
+posterity."
+
+"I am surprised," I interrupted, "that possessing the power to control
+the development of the body, you should not do so with the mind."
+
+"If we could we would produce genius that could discover the source of
+all life. We can control Cause and Effect, but we cannot create Cause.
+We do not even know its origin. What the perfume is to the flower, the
+intellect is to the body; a secret that Nature keeps to herself. For a
+thousand years our greatest minds have sought to discover its source,
+and we are as far from it to-day as we were a thousand years ago."
+
+"How then have you obtained your mental superiority?" I inquired.
+
+"By securing to our offspring perfect, physical and mental health.
+Science has taught us how to evolve intellect by following demonstrated
+laws. I put a seed into the ground and it comes up a little green slip,
+that eventually becomes a tree. When I planted the seed in congenial
+soil, and watered and tended the slip, I assisted Nature. But I did not
+create the seed nor supply the force that made it develop into a tree,
+nor can I define that force."
+
+"What has produced the exquisite refinement of your people?"
+
+"Like everything else, it is the result of gradual development aiming
+at higher improvement. By following strictly the laws that govern the
+evolution of life, we control the formation of the body and brain.
+Strong mental traits become intensified by cultivation from generation
+to generation and finally culminate in one glorious outburst of power,
+called Genius. But there is one peculiarity about mind. It resembles
+that wonderful century plant which, after decades of developing, flowers
+and dies. Genius is the long unfolding bloom of mind, and leaves no
+posterity. We carefully prepare for the future development of Genius. We
+know that our children will be neither deformed nor imbecile, but we
+watch the unfolding of their intellects with the interest of a new
+revelation. We guide them with the greatest care.
+
+"I could take a child of your people with inherited weakness of body and
+mind. I should rear it on proper food and exercise--both mental and
+physical--and it would have, when matured, a marked superiority to its
+parents. It is not what Nature has done for us, it is what we have done
+for her, that makes us a race of superior people."
+
+"The qualities of mind that are the general feature of your people," I
+remarked, "are so very high, higher than our estimate of Genius. How was
+it arrived at?"
+
+"By the processes I have just explained. Genius is always a leader. A
+genius with us has a subtlety of thought and perception beyond your
+power of appreciation. All organized social bodies move intellectually
+in a mass, with their leader just ahead of them."
+
+"I have visited, as a guest, a number of your families, and found their
+homes adorned with paintings and sculpture that would excite wondering
+admiration in my own land as rare works of art, but here they are only
+the expression of family taste and culture. Is that a quality of
+intellect that has been evolved, or is it a natural endowment of your
+race?"
+
+"It is not an endowment, but has been arrived at by the same process of
+careful cultivation. Do you see in those ancient portraits a variety of
+striking colors? There is not a suggestion of harmony in any of them. On
+the contrary, they all display violent contrasts of color. The originals
+of them trod this land thousands of years ago. Many of the colors, we
+know, were unknown to them. Color is a faculty of the mind that is
+wholly the result of culture. In the early ages of society, it was known
+only in the coarsest and most brilliant hues. A conception and
+appreciation of delicate harmonies in color is evidence of a superior
+and refined mentality. If you will notice it, the illiterate of your
+own land have no taste for or idea of the harmony of color. It is the
+same with sound. The higher we rise in culture, the more difficult we
+are to please in music. Our taste becomes critical."
+
+I had been revolving some things in my mind while the Preceptress was
+speaking, and I now ventured to express them. I said:
+
+"You tell me that generations will come and go before a marked change
+can occur in a people. What good then would it do me or mine to study
+and labor and investigate in or to teach my people how to improve? They
+can not comprehend progress. They have not learned by contact, as I have
+in Mizora, how to appreciate it. I should only waste life and happiness
+in trying to persuade them to get out of the ruts they have traveled so
+long; they think there are no other roads. I should be reviled, and
+perhaps persecuted. My doctrines would be called visionary and
+impracticable. I think I had better use my knowledge for my own kindred,
+and let the rest of the world find out the best way it can."
+
+The Preceptress looked at me with mild severity. I never before had seen
+so near an approach to rebuke in her grand eyes.
+
+"What a barbarous, barbarous idea!" she exclaimed. "Your country will
+never rise above its ignorance and degradation, until out of its mental
+agony shall be evolved a nature kindled with an ambition that burns for
+Humanity instead of self. It will be the nucleus round which will gather
+the timid but anxious, and _then_ will be lighted that fire which no
+waters can quench. It burns for the liberty of thought. Let human nature
+once feel the warmth of its beacon fires, and it will march onward,
+defying all obstacles, braving all perils till it be won. Human nature
+is ever reaching for the unattained. It is that little spark within us
+that has an undying life. When we can no longer use it, it flies
+elsewhere."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+I had long contemplated a trip to the extreme southern boundary of
+Mizora. I had often inquired about it, and had always been answered that
+it was defined by an impassable ocean. I had asked them to describe it
+to me, for the Mizora people have a happy faculty of employing tersely
+expressive language when necessary; but I was always met with the
+surprising answer that no tongue in Mizora was eloquent enough to
+portray the wonders that bounded Mizora on the south. So I requested the
+Preceptress to permit Wauna to accompany me as a guide and companion; a
+request she readily complied with.
+
+"Will you be afraid or uneasy about trusting her on so long a journey
+with no companion or protector but me?" I asked.
+
+The Preceptress smiled at my question.
+
+"Why should I be afraid, when in all the length and breadth of our land
+there is no evil to befall her, or you either. Strangers are friends in
+Mizora, in one sense of the word, when they meet. You will both travel
+as though among time endeared associates. You will receive every
+attention, courtesy and kindness that would be bestowed upon near and
+intimate acquaintances. No, in this land, mothers do not fear to send
+their daughters alone and unrecommended among strangers."
+
+When speed was required, the people of Mizora traveled altogether by air
+ships. But when the pleasure of landscape viewing, and the delight and
+exhilaration of easy progress is desired, they use either railroad cars
+or carriages.
+
+Wauna and I selected an easy and commodious carriage. It was propelled
+by compressed air, which Wauna said could be obtained whenever we needed
+a new supply at any village or country seat.
+
+Throughout the length and breadth of Mizora the roads were artificially
+made. Cities, towns, and villages were provided with paved streets,
+which the public authorities kept in a condition of perfect cleanliness.
+The absence of all kinds of animals rendered this comparatively easy. In
+alluding to this once in the presence of the Preceptress, she startled
+me by the request that I should suggest to my people the advantage to be
+derived from substituting machinery for animal labor.
+
+"The association of animals is degrading," she asserted. "And you, who
+still live by tilling the soil, will find a marked change economically
+in dispensing with your beasts of burden. Fully four-fifths that you
+raise on your farms is required to feed your domestic animals. If your
+agriculture was devoted entirely to human food, it would make it more
+plentiful for the poor."
+
+I did not like to tell her that I knew many wealthy people who housed
+and fed their domestic animals better than they did their tenants. She
+would have been disgusted with such a state of barbarism.
+
+Country roads in Mizora were usually covered with a cement that was
+prepared from pulverized granite. They were very durable and very hard.
+Owing to their solidity, they were not as agreeable for driving as
+another kind of cement they manufactured. I have previously spoken of
+the peculiar style of wheel that was used on all kinds of light
+conveyances in Mizora, and rendered their progress over any road the
+very luxury of motion.
+
+In our journey, Wauna took me to a number of factories, where the
+wonderful progress they had made in science continually surprised and
+delighted me. The spider and the silkworm had yielded their secret to
+these indefatigable searchers into nature's mysteries. They could spin a
+thread of gossamer, or of silk from their chemicals, of any width and
+length, and with a rapidity that was magical. Like everything else of
+that nature in Mizora, these discoveries had been purchased by the
+Government, and then made known to all.
+
+They also manufactured ivory that I could not tell from the real
+article. I have previously spoken of their success in producing various
+kinds of marble and stone. A beautiful table that I saw made out of
+artificial ivory, had a painting upon the top of it. A deep border,
+composed of delicate, convoluted shells, extended round the top of the
+table and formed the shores of a mimic ocean, with coral reefs and tiny
+islands, and tangled sea-weeds and shining fishes sporting about in the
+pellucid water. The surface was of highly polished smoothness, and I was
+informed that the picture was _not_ a painting but was formed of
+colored particles of ivory that had been worked in before the drying or
+solidifying process had been applied. In the same way they formed main
+beautiful combinations of marbles. The magnificent marble columns that
+supported the portico of my friend's house were all of artificial make.
+The delicate green leaves and creeping vines of ivy, rose, and
+eglantine, with their spray-like blossoms, were colored in the
+manufacturing process and chiseled out of the solid marble by the
+skillful hand of the artist.
+
+It would be difficult for me to even enumerate all the beautiful arts
+and productions of arts that I saw in Mizora. Our journey was full of
+incidents of this kind.
+
+Every city and town that we visited was like the introduction of a new
+picture. There was no sameness between any of them. Each had aimed at
+picturesqueness or stately magnificence, and neither had failed to
+obtain it. Looking back as I now do upon Mizora, it presents itself to
+me as a vast and almost limitless landscape, variegated with grand
+cities, lovely towns and villages, majestic hills and mountains crowned
+with glittering snows, or deep, delightful valleys veiled in scented
+vines.
+
+Kindness, cordiality and courtesy met us on every side. It was at first
+quite novel for me to mingle among previously unheard-of people with
+such sociability, but I did as Wauna did, and I found it not only
+convenient but quite agreeable.
+
+"I am the daughter of the Preceptress of the National College," said
+Wauna; and that was the way she introduced herself.
+
+I noticed with what honor and high esteem the name of the Preceptress
+was regarded. As soon as it was known that the daughter of the
+Preceptress had arrived, the citizens of whatever city we had stopped in
+hastened to extend to her every courtesy and favor possible for them to
+bestow. She was the daughter of the woman who held the highest and most
+enviable position in the Nation. A position that only great intellect
+could secure in that country.
+
+As we neared the goal of our journey, I noticed an increasing warmth of
+the atmosphere, and my ears were soon greeted with a deep, reverberating
+roar like continuous thunder. I have seen and heard Niagara, but a
+thousand Niagaras could not equal that deafening sound. The heat became
+oppressive. The light also from a cause of which I shall soon speak.
+
+We ascended a promontory that jutted out from the main land a quarter of
+a mile, perhaps more. Wauna conducted me to the edge of the cliff and
+told me to look down. An ocean of whirlpools was before us. The
+maddened dashing and thundering of the mighty waters, and the awe they
+inspired no words can paint. Across such an abyss of terrors it was
+certain no vessel could sail. We took our glasses and scanned the
+opposite shore, which appeared to be a vast cataract as though the ocean
+was pouring over a precipice of rock. Wauna informed me that where the
+shore was visible it was a perpendicular wall of smooth rock.
+
+Over head an arc of fire spanned the zenith from which depended curtains
+of rainbows waving and fluttering, folding and floating out again with a
+rapid and incessant motion. I asked Wauna why they had not crossed in
+air-ships, and she said they had tried it often but had always failed.
+
+"In former times," she said, "when air-ships first came into use it was
+frequently attempted, but no voyager ever returned. We have long since
+abandoned the attempt, for now we know it to be impossible."
+
+I looked again at that display of uncontrollable power. As I gazed it
+seemed to me I would be drawn down by the resistless fascination of
+terror. I grasped Wauna and she gently turned my face to the smiling
+landscape behind us. Hills and valleys, and sparkling cities veiled in
+foliage, with their numberless parks and fountains and statues sleeping
+in the soft light, gleaming lakes and wandering rivers that glittered
+and danced in the glorious atmosphere like prisoned sunbeams, greeted us
+like the alluring smile of love, and yet, for the first time since
+entering this lovely land, I felt myself a prisoner. Behind me was an
+impassable barrier. Before me, far beyond this gleaming vision of
+enchantment, lay another road whose privations and dangers I dreaded to
+attempt.
+
+I felt as a bird might feel who has been brought from the free expanse
+of its wild forest-home, and placed in a golden cage where it drinks
+from a jeweled cup and eats daintier food than it could obtain in its
+own rude haunts. It pines for that precarious life; its very dangers and
+privations fill its breast with desire. I began to long with unutterable
+impatience to see once more the wild, rough scenes of my own nativity.
+Memory began to recall them with softening touches. My heart yearned for
+my own; debased as compared with Mizora though they be, there was the
+congeniality of blood between us. I longed to see my own little one
+whose dimpled hands I had unclasped from my neck in that agonized
+parting. Whenever I saw a Mizora mother fondling her babe, my heart
+leapt with quick desire to once more hold my own in such loving embrace.
+The mothers of Mizora have a devotional love for their children. Their
+smiles and prattle and baby wishes are listened to with loving
+tenderness, and treated as matters of importance.
+
+I was sitting beside a Mizora mother one evening, listening to some
+singing that I truly thought no earthly melody could surpass. I asked
+the lady if ever she had heard anything sweeter, and she answered,
+earnestly:
+
+"Yes, the voices of my own children."
+
+On our homeward journey, Wauna took me to a lake from the center of
+which we could see, with our glasses, a green island rising high above
+the water like an emerald in a silver setting.
+
+"That," said Wauna, directing my attention to it, "is the last vestige
+of a prison left in Mizora. Would you like to visit it?"
+
+I expressed an eager willingness to behold so curious a sight, and
+getting into a small pleasure boat, we started toward it. Boats are
+propelled in Mizora either by electricity or compressed air, and glide
+through the water with soundless swiftness.
+
+As we neared the island I could perceive the mingling of natural and
+artificial attractions. We moored our boat at the foot of a flight of
+steps, hewn from the solid rock. On reaching the top, the scene spread
+out like a beautiful painting. Grottos, fountains, and cascades, winding
+walks and vine-covered bowers charmed us as we wandered about. In the
+center stood a medium-sized residence of white marble. We entered
+through a door opening on a wide piazza. Art and wealth and taste had
+adorned the interior with a generous hand. A library studded with books
+closely shut behind glass doors had a wide window that commanded an
+enchanting view of the lake, with its rippling waters sparkling and
+dimpling in the light. On one side of the mantelpiece hung a full length
+portrait of a lady, painted with startling naturalness.
+
+"That," said Wauna, solemnly, "was the last prisoner in Mizora."
+
+I looked with interested curiosity at a relic so curious in this land.
+It was a blonde woman with lighter colored eyes than is at all common in
+Mizora. Her long, blonde hair hung straight and unconfined over a dress
+of thick, white material. Her attitude and expression were dejected and
+sorrowful. I had visited prisons in my own land where red-handed murder
+sat smiling with indifference. I had read in newspapers, labored
+eloquence that described the stoicism of some hardened criminal as a
+trait of character to be admired. I had read descriptions where mistaken
+eloquence exerted itself to waken sympathy for a criminal who had never
+felt sympathy for his helpless and innocent victims, and I had felt
+nothing but creeping horror for it all. But gazing at this picture of
+undeniable repentance, tears of sympathy started to my eyes. Had she
+been guilty of taking a fellow-creature's life?
+
+"Is she still living?" I asked by way of a preface.
+
+"Oh, no, she has been dead for more than a century," answered Wauna.
+
+"Was she confined here very long?"
+
+"For life," was the reply.
+
+"I should not believe," I said, "that a nature capable of so deep a
+repentance could be capable of so dark a crime as murder."
+
+"Murder!" exclaimed Wauna in horror. "There has not been a murder
+committed in this land for three thousand years."
+
+It was my turn to be astonished.
+
+"Then tell me what dreadful crime she committed."
+
+"She struck her child," said Wauna, sadly; "her little innocent,
+helpless child that Nature gave her to love and cherish, and make noble
+and useful and happy."
+
+"Did she inflict a permanent injury?" I asked, with increased
+astonishment at this new phase of refinement in the Mizora character.
+
+"No one can tell the amount of injury a blow does to a child. It may
+immediately show an obvious physical one; it may later develop a mental
+one. It may never seem to have injured it at all, and yet it may have
+shocked a sensitive nature and injured it permanently. Crime is evolved
+from perverted natures, and natures become perverted from ill-usage. It
+merges into a peculiar structure of the brain that becomes hereditary."
+
+"What became of the prisoner's child?"
+
+"It was adopted by a young lady who had just graduated at the State
+College of the State in which the mother resided. It was only five years
+old, and its mother's name was never mentioned to it or to anyone else.
+Long before that, the press had abolished the practice of giving any
+prominence to crime. That pernicious eloquence that in uncivilized ages
+had helped to nourish crime by a maudlin sympathy for the criminal, had
+ceased to exist. The young lady called the child daughter, and it called
+her mother."
+
+"Did the real mother never want to see her child?"
+
+"That is said to be a true picture of her," said Wauna; "and who can
+look at it and not see sorrow and remorse."
+
+"How could you be so stern?" I asked, in wondering astonishment.
+
+"Pity has nothing to do with crime," said Wauna, firmly. "You must look
+to humanity, and not to the sympathy one person excites when you are
+aiding enlightenment. That woman wandered about these beautiful grounds,
+or sat in this elegant home a lonely and unsympathized-with prisoner.
+She was furnished with books, magazines and papers, and every physical
+comfort. Sympathy for her lot was never offered her. Childhood is
+regarded by my people as the only period of life that is capable of
+knowing perfect happiness, and among us it is a crime greater than the
+heinousness of murder in your country, to deprive a human being of its
+childhood--in which cluster the only unalloyed sweets of life.
+
+"A human being who remembers only pain, rebukes treatment in childhood,
+has lost the very flavor of existence, and the person who destroyed it
+is a criminal indeed."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+There was one peculiarity about Mizora that I noticed soon after my
+arrival, but for various reasons have refrained from speaking of before
+now. It was the absence of houses devoted to religious worship.
+
+In architecture Mizora displayed the highest perfection. Their colleges,
+art galleries, public libraries, opera houses, and all their public
+buildings were grand and beautiful. Never in any country, had I beheld
+such splendor in design and execution. Their superior skill in this
+respect, led me to believe that their temples of worship must be on a
+scale of magnificence beyond all my conceiving. I was eager to behold
+them. I looked often upon my first journeyings about their cities to
+discover them, but whenever I noticed an unusually imposing building,
+and asked what it was, it was always something else. I was frequently on
+the point of asking them to conduct me to some church that resembled my
+own in worship, (for I was brought up in strict compliance with the
+creeds, dogmas, and regulations of the Russo Greek Church) but I
+refrained, hoping that in time, I should be introduced to their
+religious ceremonies.
+
+When time passed on, and no invitation was extended me, and I saw no
+house nor preparation for religious worship, nor even heard mention of
+any, I asked Wauna for an explanation. She appeared not to comprehend
+me, and I asked the question:
+
+"Where do you perform your religious rites and ceremonies?"
+
+She looked at me with surprise.
+
+"You ask me such strange questions that sometimes I am tempted to
+believe you a relic of ancient mythology that has drifted down the
+centuries and landed on our civilized shores, or else have been gifted
+with a marvelous prolongation of life, and have emerged upon us from
+some cavern where you have lived, or slept for ages in unchanged
+possession of your ancient superstition."
+
+"Have you, then," I asked in astonishment, "no religious temples
+devoted to worship?"
+
+"Oh, yes, we have temples where we worship daily. Do you see that
+building?" nodding toward the majestic granite walls of the National
+College. "That is one of our most renowned temples, where the highest
+and the noblest in the land meet and mingle familiarly with the humblest
+in daily worship."
+
+"I understand all that you wish to imply by that," I replied. "But have
+you no building devoted to divine worship; no temple that belongs
+specially to your Deity; to the Being that created you, and to whom you
+owe eternal gratitude and homage?"
+
+"We have;" she answered grandly, with a majestic wave of her hand, and
+in that mellow, musical voice that was sweeter than the chanting of
+birds, she exclaimed:
+
+
+     "This vast cathedral, boundless as our wonder;
+       Whose shining lamps yon brilliant mists[A] supply;
+     Its choir the winds, and waves; its organ thunder;
+       Its dome the sky."
+
+[Footnote A: Aurora Borealis]
+
+"Do you worship Nature?" I asked.
+
+"If we did, we should worship ourselves, for we are a part of Nature."
+
+"But do you not recognize an invisible and incomprehensible Being that
+created you, and who will give your spirit an abode of eternal bliss, or
+consign it to eternal torments according as you have glorified and
+served him?"
+
+"I am an atom of Nature;" said Wauna, gravely. "If you want me to answer
+your superstitious notions of religion, I will, in one sentence,
+explain, that the only religious idea in Mizora is: Nature is God, and
+God is Nature. She is the Great Mother who gathers the centuries in her
+arms, and rocks their children into eternal sleep upon her bosom."
+
+"But how," I asked in bewildered astonishment, "how can you think of
+living without creeds, and confessionals? How can you prosper without
+prayer? How can you be upright, and honest, and true to yourselves and
+your friends without praying for divine grace and strength to sustain
+you? How can you be noble, and keep from envying your neighbors,
+without a prayer for divine grace to assist you to resist such
+temptation?"
+
+"Oh, daughter of the dark ages," said Wauna, sadly, "turn to the
+benevolent and ever-willing Science. She is the goddess who has led us
+out of ignorance and superstition; out of degradation and disease, and
+every other wretchedness that superstitious, degraded humanity has
+known. She has lifted us above the low and the little, the narrow and
+mean in human thought and action, and has placed us in a broad, free,
+independent, noble, useful and grandly happy life."
+
+"You have been favored by divine grace," I reiterated, "although you
+refuse to acknowledge it."
+
+She smiled compassionately as she answered:
+
+"She is the divinity who never turned a deaf ear to earnest and
+persistent effort in a sensible direction. But prayers to her must be
+_work_, resolute and conscientious _work_. She teaches that success in
+this world can only come to those who work for it. In your superstitious
+belief you pray for benefits you have never earned, possibly do not
+deserve, but expect to get simply because you pray for them. Science
+never betrays such partiality. The favors she bestows are conferred only
+upon the industrious."
+
+"And you deny absolutely the efficacy of prayer?" I asked.
+
+"If I could obtain anything by prayer alone, I would pray that my
+inventive faculty should be enlarged so that I might conceive and
+construct an air-ship that could cleave its way through that chaos of
+winds that is formed when two storms meet from opposite directions. It
+would rend to atoms one of our present make. But prayer will never
+produce an improved air-ship. We must dig into science for it. Our
+ancestors did not pray for us to become a race of symmetrically-shaped
+and universally healthy people, and expect that to effect a result. They
+went to work on scientific principles to root out disease and crime and
+want and wretchedness, and every degrading and retarding influence."
+
+"Prayer never saved one of my ancestors from premature death," she
+continued, with a resolution that seemed determined to tear from my mind
+every fabric of faith in the consolations of divine interposition that
+had been a special part of my education, and had become rooted into my
+nature. "Disease, when it fastened upon the vitals of the young and
+beautiful and dearly-loved was stronger and more powerful than all the
+agonized prayers that could be poured from breaking hearts. But science,
+when solicited by careful study and experiment and investigation,
+offered the remedy. And _now_, we defy disease and have no fear of death
+until our natural time comes, and _then_ it will be the welcome rest
+that the worn-out body meets with gratitude."
+
+"But when you die," I exclaimed, "do you not believe you have an after
+life?"
+
+"When I die," replied Wauna, "my body will return to the elements from
+whence it came. Thought will return to the force which gave it. The
+power of the brain is the one mystery that surrounds life. We know that
+the brain is a mechanical structure and acted upon by force; but how to
+analyze that force is still beyond our reach. You see that huge engine?
+We made it. It is a fine piece of mechanism. We know what it was made to
+do. We turn on the motive power, and it moves at the rate of a mile a
+minute if we desire it. Why should it move? Why might it not stand
+still? You say because of a law of nature that under the circumstances
+compels it to move. Our brain is like that engine--a wonderful piece of
+mechanism, and when the blood drives it, it displays the effects of
+force which we call Thought. We can see the engine move and we know what
+law of nature it obeys in moving. But the brain is a more mysterious
+structure, for the force which compels it to action we cannot analyze.
+The superstitious ancients called this mystery the soul."
+
+"And do you discard that belief?" I asked, trembling and excited to hear
+such sacrilegious talk from youth so beautiful and pure.
+
+"What our future is to be after dissolution no one knows," replied
+Wauna, with the greatest calmness and unconcern. "A thousand theories
+and systems of religion have risen and fallen in the history of the
+human family, and become the superstitions of the past. The elements
+that compose this body may construct the delicate beauty of a flower, or
+the green robe that covers the bosom of Mother Earth, but we cannot
+know."
+
+"But that beautiful belief in a soul," I cried, in real anguish, "How
+can you discard it? How sever the hope that after death, we are again
+united to part no more? Those who have left us in the spring time of
+life, the bloom on their young cheeks suddenly paled by the cold touch
+of death, stand waiting to welcome us to an endless reunion."
+
+"Alas, for your anguish, my friend," said Wauna, with pityng tenderness.
+"Centuries ago _my_ people passed through that season of mental pain.
+That beautiful visionary idea of a soul must fade, as youth and beauty
+fade, never to return; for Nature nowhere teaches the existence of such
+a thing. It was a belief born of that agony of longing for happiness
+without alloy, which the children of earth in the long-ago ages hoped
+for, but never knew. Their lot was so barren of beauty and happiness,
+and the desire for it is, now and always has been, a strong trait of
+human character. The conditions of society in those earlier ages
+rendered it impossible to enjoy this life perfectly, and hope and
+longing pictured an imaginary one for an imaginary part of the body
+called the Soul. Progress and civilization have brought to us the ideal
+heaven of the ancients, and we receive from Nature no evidence of any
+other."
+
+"But I do believe there is another," I declared. "And we ought to be
+prepared for it."
+
+Wauna smiled. "What better preparation could you desire, then, than good
+works in this?" she asked.
+
+"You should pray, and do penance for your sins," was my reply.
+
+"Then," said Wauna, "we are doing the wisest penance every day. We are
+studying, investigating, experimenting in order that those who come
+after us may be happier than we. Every day Science is yielding us some
+new knowledge that will make living in the future still easier than
+now."
+
+"I cannot conceive," I said, "how you are to be improved upon."
+
+"When we manufacture fruit and vegetables from the elements, can you not
+perceive how much is to be gained? Old age and death will come later,
+and the labor of cultivation will be done away. Such an advantage will
+not be enjoyed during my lifetime. But we will labor to effect it for
+future generations."
+
+"Your whole aim in life, then, is to work for the future of your race,
+instead of the eternal welfare of your own soul?" I questioned, in
+surprise.
+
+"If Nature," said Wauna, "has provided us a future life, if that
+mysterious something that we call Thought is to be clothed in an
+etherealized body, and live in a world where decay is unknown, I have no
+fear of my reception there. Live _this_ life usefully and nobly, and no
+matter if a prayer has never crossed your lips your happiness will be
+assured. A just and kind action will help you farther on the road to
+heaven than all the prayers that you can utter, and all the pains and
+sufferings that you can inflict upon the flesh, for it will be that much
+added to the happiness of this world. The grandest epitaph that could be
+written is engraved upon a tombstone in yonder cemetery. The subject was
+one of the pioneers of progress in a long-ago century, when progress
+fought its way with difficulty through ignorance and superstition. She
+suffered through life for the boldness of her opinions, and two
+centuries after, when they had become popular, a monument was erected to
+her memory, and has been preserved through thousands of years as a motto
+for humanity. The epitaph is simply this: 'The world is better for her
+having lived in it.'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+Not long after my conversation with Wauna, mentioned in the previous
+chapter, an event happened in Mizora of so singular and unexpected a
+character for that country that it requires a particular description. I
+refer to the death of a young girl, the daughter of the Professor of
+Natural History in the National College, whose impressive inaugural
+ceremonies I had witnessed with so much gratification. The girl was of a
+venturesome disposition, and, with a number of others, had gone out
+rowing. The boats they used in Mizora for that purpose were mere cockle
+shells. A sudden squall arose from which all could have escaped, but the
+reckless daring of this young girl cost her her life. Her boat was
+capsized, and despite the exertions made by her companions, she was
+drowned.
+
+Her body was recovered before the news was conveyed to the mother. As
+the young companions surrounded it in the abandon of grief that tender
+and artless youth alone feels, had I not known that not a tie of
+consanguinity existed between them, I might have thought them a band of
+sisters mourning their broken number. It was a scene I never expect and
+sincerely hope never to witness again. It made the deeper impression
+upon me because I knew the expressions of grief were all genuine.
+
+I asked Wauna if any of the dead girl's companions feared that her
+mother might censure them for not making sufficient effort to save her
+when her boat capsized. She looked at me with astonishment.
+
+"Such a thought," she said, "will never occur to her nor to any one else
+in Mizora. I have not asked the particulars, but I know that everything
+was done that could have been done to save her. There must have been
+something extraordinarily unusual about the affair for all Mizora girls
+are expert swimmers, and there is not one but would put forth any
+exertion to save a companion."
+
+I afterward learned that such had really been the case.
+
+It developed upon the Preceptress to break the news to the afflicted
+mother. It was done in the seclusion of her own home. There was no
+manifestation of morbid curiosity among acquaintances, neighbors and
+friends. The Preceptress and one or two others of her nearest and most
+intimate friends called at the house during the first shock of her
+bereavement.
+
+After permission had been given to view the remains, Wauna and I called
+at the house, but only entered the drawing-room. On a low cot, in an
+attitude of peaceful repose, lay the breathless sleeper. Her mother and
+sisters had performed for her the last sad offices of loving duty, and
+lovely indeed had they made the last view we should have of their dear
+one.
+
+There was to be no ceremony at the house, and Wauna and I were in the
+cemetery when the procession entered. As we passed through the city, I
+noticed that every business house was closed. The whole city was
+sympathizing with sorrow. I never before saw so vast a concourse of
+people. The procession was very long and headed by the mother, dressed
+and veiled in black. Behind her were the sisters carrying the body. It
+rested upon a litter composed entirely of white rosebuds. The sisters
+wore white, their faces concealed by white veils. Each wore a white
+rosebud pinned upon her bosom. They were followed by a long procession
+of young girls, schoolmates and friends of the dead. They were all
+dressed in white, but were not veiled. Each one carried a white rosebud.
+
+The sisters placed the litter upon rests at the side of the grave, and
+clasping hands with their mother, formed a semicircle about it. They
+were all so closely veiled that their features could not be seen, and no
+emotion was visible. The procession of young girls formed a circle
+inclosing the grave and the mourners, and began chanting a slow and
+sorrowful dirge. No words can paint the pathos and beauty of such a
+scene. My eye took in every detail that displayed that taste for the
+beautiful that compels the Mizora mind to mingle it with every incident
+of life. The melody sounded like a chorus of birds chanting, in perfect
+unison, a weird requiem over some dead companion.
+
+
+                           DIRGE
+
+     She came like the Spring in its gladness
+     We received her with joy--we rejoiced in her promise
+     Sweet was her song as the bird's,
+     Her smile was as dew to the thirsty rose.
+     But the end came ere morning awakened,
+     While Dawn yet blushed in its bridal veil,
+     The leafy music of the woods was hushed in snowy shrouds.
+     Spring withered with the perfume in her hands;
+     A winter sleet has fallen upon the buds of June;
+     The ice-winds blow where yesterday zephyrs disported:
+     Life is not consummated
+     The rose has not blossomed, the fruit has perished in the flower,
+     The bird lies frozen under its mother's breast
+     Youth sleeps in round loveliness when age should lie withered and
+       weary, and full of honor.
+     Then the grave would be welcome, and our tears would fall not.
+     The grave is not for the roses of youth;
+     We mourn the early departed.
+     Youth sleeps without dreams--
+     Without an awakening.
+
+
+At the close of the chant, the mother first and then each sister took
+from her bosom the white rosebud and dropped it into the grave. Then
+followed her schoolmates and companions who each dropped in the bud she
+carried. A carpet of white rosebuds was thus formed, on which the body,
+still reclining upon its pillow of flowers, was gently lowered.
+
+The body was dressed in white, and over all fell a veil of fine white
+tulle. A more beautiful sight I can never see than that young, lovely
+girl in her last sleep with the emblems of youth, purity and swift decay
+forming her pillow, and winding-sheet. Over this was placed a film of
+glass that rested upon the bottom and sides of the thin lining that
+covered the bottom and lower sides of the grave. The remainder of the
+procession of young girls then came forward and dropped their rosebuds
+upon it, completely hiding from view the young and beautiful dead.
+
+The eldest sister then took a handful of dust and casting it into the
+grave, said in a voice broken, yet audible: "Mingle ashes with ashes,
+and dust with its original dust. To the earth whence it was taken,
+consign we the body of our sister." Each sister then threw in a handful
+of dust, and then with their mother entered their carriage, which
+immediately drove them home.
+
+A beautiful silver spade was sticking in the soft earth that had been
+taken from the grave. The most intimate of the dead girls friends took a
+spadeful of earth and threw it into the open grave. Her example was
+followed by each one of the remaining companions until the grave was
+filled. Then clasping hands, they chanted a farewell to their departed
+companion and playmate. After which they strewed the grave with flowers
+until it looked like a bed of beauty, and departed.
+
+I was profoundly impressed by the scene. Its solemnity, its beauty, and
+the universal expression of sorrow it had called forth. A whole city
+mourned the premature death of gifted and lovely youth. Alas! In my own
+unhappy country such an event would have elicited but a passing phrase
+of regret from all except the immediate family of the victim; for
+_there_ sorrow is a guest at every heart, and leaves little room for
+sympathy with strangers.
+
+The next day the mother was at her post in the National College; the
+daughters were at their studies, all seemingly calm and thoughtful, but
+showing no outward signs of grief excepting to the close observer. The
+mother was performing her accustomed duties with seeming cheerfulness,
+but now and then her mind would drop for a moment in sorrowful
+abstraction to be recalled with resolute effort and be fastened once
+more upon the necessary duty of life.
+
+The sisters I often saw in those abstracted moods, and frequently saw
+them wiping away silent but unobtrusive tears. I asked Wauna for the
+meaning of such stoical reserve, and the explanation was as curious as
+were all the other things that I met with in Mizora.
+
+"If you notice the custom of different grades of civilization in your
+own country," said Wauna, "you will observe that the lower the
+civilization the louder and more ostentatious is the mourning. True
+refinement is unobtrusive in everything, and while we do not desire to
+repress a natural and inevitable feeling of sorrow, we do desire to
+conceal and conquer it, for the reason that death is a law of nature
+that we cannot evade. And, although the death of a young person has not
+occurred in Mizora in the memory of any living before this, yet it is
+not without precedent. We are very prudent, but we cannot guard entirely
+against accident. It has cast a gloom over the whole city, yet we
+refrain from speaking of it, and strive to forget it because it cannot
+be helped."
+
+"And can you see so young, so fair a creature perish without wanting to
+meet her again?"
+
+"Whatever sorrow we feel," replied Wauna, solemnly, "we deeply realize
+how useless it is to repine. We place implicit faith in the revelations
+of Nature, and in no circumstances does she bid us expect a life beyond
+that of the body. That is a life of individual consciousness."
+
+"How much more consoling is the belief of my people," I replied,
+triumphantly. "Their belief in a future reunion would sustain them
+through the sorrow of parting in this. It has been claimed that some
+have lived pure lives solely in the hope of meeting some one whom they
+loved, and who had died in youth and innocence."
+
+Wauna smiled.
+
+"You do not all have then the same fate in anticipation for your future
+life?" she asked.
+
+"Oh, no!" I answered. "The good and the wicked are divided."
+
+"Tell me some incident in your own land that you have witnessed, and
+which illustrates the religious belief of your country."
+
+"The belief that we have in a future life has often furnished a theme
+for the poets of my own and other countries. And sometimes a quaint and
+pretty sentiment is introduced into poetry to express it."
+
+"I should like to hear some such poetry. Can you recite any?"
+
+"I remember an incident that gave birth to a poem that was much admired
+at the time, although I can recall but the two last stanzas of it. A
+rowing party, of which I was a member, once went out upon a lake to view
+the sunset. After we had returned to shore, and night had fallen upon
+the water in impenetrable darkness, it was discovered that one of the
+young men who had rowed out in a boat by himself was not with us. A
+storm was approaching, and we all knew that his safety lay in getting
+ashore before it broke. We lighted a fire, but the blaze could not be
+seen far in such inky darkness. We hallooed, but received no answer, and
+finally ceased our efforts. Then one of the young ladies who possessed a
+very high and clear soprano voice, began singing at the very top of her
+power. It reached the wanderer in the darkness, and he rowed straight
+toward it. From that time on he became infatuated with the singer,
+declaring that her voice had come to him in his despair like an angel's
+straight from heaven.
+
+"She died in less than a year, and her last words to him were: 'Meet me
+in heaven.' He had always been recklessly inclined, but after that he
+became a model of rectitude and goodness. He wrote a poem that was
+dedicated to her memory. In it he described himself as a lone wanderer
+on a strange sea in the darkness of a gathering storm and no beacon to
+guide him, when suddenly he hears a voice singing which guides him safe
+to shore. He speaks of the beauty of the singer and how dear she became
+to him, but he still hears the song calling him across the ocean of
+death."
+
+"Repeat what you remember of it," urged Wauna.
+
+
+     "That face and form, have long since gone
+       Beyond where the day was lifted:
+     But the beckoning song still lingers on,
+       An angels earthward drifted.
+
+     And when death's waters, around me roar
+       And cares, like the birds, are winging:
+     If I steer my bark to Heaven's shore
+       'Twill be by an angel's singing."
+
+
+"Poor child of superstition," said Wauna, sadly. "Your belief has
+something pretty in it, but for your own welfare, and that of your
+people, you must get rid of it as we have got rid of the offspring of
+Lust. Our children come to us as welcome guests through portals of the
+holiest and purest affection. That love which you speak of, I know
+nothing about. I would not know. It is a degradation which mars your
+young life and embitters the memories of age. We have advanced beyond
+it. There is a cruelty in life," she added, compassionately, "which we
+must accept with stoicism as the inevitable. Justice to your posterity
+demands of you the highest and noblest effort of which your intellect is
+capable."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+The conversation that I had with Wauna gave me so much uneasiness that I
+sought her mother. I cannot express the shock I felt at hearing such
+youthful and innocent lips speak of the absurdity of religious forms,
+ceremonies, and creeds. She regarded my belief in them as a species of
+barbarism. But she had not convinced me. _I was resolved not to be
+convinced._ I believed she was in error.
+
+Surely, I thought, a country so far advanced in civilization, and
+practicing such unexampled rectitude, must, according to my religious
+teaching, have been primarily actuated by religious principles which
+they had since abandoned. My only surprise was that they had not
+relapsed into immorality, after destroying church and creed, and I began
+to feel anxious to convince them of the danger I felt they were
+incurring in neglecting prayer and supplication at the throne to
+continue them in their progress toward perfection of mental and moral
+culture.
+
+I explained my feelings to the Preceptress with great earnestness and
+anxiety for their future, intimating that I believed their immunity from
+disaster had been owing to Divine sufferance. "For no nation," I added,
+quoting from my memory of religious precepts, "can prosper without
+acknowledging the Christian religion."
+
+She listened to me with great attention, and when I had finished, asked:
+
+"How do you account for our long continuance in prosperity and progress,
+for it is more than a thousand years since we rooted out the last
+vestige of what you term religion, from the mind. We have had a long
+immunity from punishment. To what do you attribute it?"
+
+I hesitated to explain what had been in my mind, but finally faltered
+out something about the absence of the male sex. I then had to explain
+that the prisons and penitentiaries of my own land, and of all other
+civilized lands that I knew of, were almost exclusively occupied by the
+male sex. Out of eight hundred penitentiary prisoners, not more than
+twenty or thirty would be women; and the majority of them could trace
+_their_ crimes to man's infidelity.
+
+"And what do you do to reform them?" inquired the Preceptress.
+
+"We offer them the teachings of Christianity. All countries, however,
+differ widely in this respect. The government of my country is not as
+generous to prisoners as that of some others. In the United States every
+penitentiary is supplied with a minister who expounds the Gospel to the
+prisoners every Sunday; that is once every seven days."
+
+"And what do they do the rest of the time?"
+
+"They work."
+
+"Are they ignorant?"
+
+"Oh, yes, indeed;" I replied, earnestly. "You could not find one scholar
+in ten thousand of them. Their education is either very limited, or
+altogether deficient."
+
+"Do the buildings they are confined in cost a great deal?"
+
+"Vast sums of money are represented by them; and it often costs a
+community a great deal of money to send a criminal to the penitentiary.
+In some States the power to pardon rests entirely with the governor, and
+it frequently occurs that a desperate criminal, who has cost a county a
+great deal of money to get rid of him, will be pardoned by the governor,
+to please a relative, or, as it is sometimes believed, for a bribe."
+
+"And do the people never think of educating their criminals instead of
+working them?
+
+"That would be an expense to the government," I replied.
+
+"If they would divide the time, and compel them to study half a day as
+rigorously as they make them work, it would soon make a vast change in
+their morals. Nothing so ennobles the mind as a broad and thorough
+education."
+
+"They are all compelled to listen to religious instruction once a week,"
+I answered. "That surely ought to make some improvement in them. I
+remember hearing an American lady relate her attendance at chapel
+service in a State penitentiary one Sunday. The minister's education was
+quite limited, as she could perceive from the ungrammatical language he
+used, but he preached sound orthodox doctrine. The text selected had a
+special application to his audience: 'Depart from me ye accursed, into
+everlasting torment prepared for the Devil and his angels.' There were
+eight hundred prisoners, and the minister assured them, in plain
+language, that such would surely be their sentence unless they
+repented."
+
+"And that is what you call the consolations of religion, is it?" asked
+the Preceptress with an expression that rather disconcerted me; as
+though my zeal and earnestness entirely lacked the light of knowledge
+with which she viewed it.
+
+"That is religious instruction;" I answered. "The minister exhorted the
+prisoners to pray and be purged of their sins. And it was good advice."
+
+"But they might aver," persisted the Preceptress, "that they had prayed
+to be restrained from crime, and their prayers had not been answered."
+
+"They didn't pray with enough faith, then;" I assured her in the
+confidence of my own belief. "That is wherein I think my own church is
+so superior to the other religions of the world," I added, proudly. "We
+can get the priest to absolve us from sin, and then we know we are rid
+of it, when he tells us so."
+
+"But what assurance have you that the priest can do so?" asked the
+Preceptress.
+
+"Because it is his duty to do so."
+
+"Education will root out more sin than all your creeds can," gravely
+answered the Preceptress. "Educate your convicts and train them into
+controlling and subduing their criminal tendencies by _their own will_,
+and it will have more effect on their morals than all the prayers ever
+uttered. Educate them up to that point where they can perceive for
+themselves the happiness of moral lives, and then you may trust them to
+temptation without fear. The ideas you have expressed about dogmas,
+creeds and ceremonies are not new to us, though, as a nation, we do not
+make a study of them. They are very, very ancient. They go back to the
+first records of the traditionary history of man. And the farther you go
+back the deeper you plunge into ignorance and superstition.
+
+"The more ignorant the human mind, the more abject was its slavery to
+religion. As history progresses toward a more diffuse education of the
+masses, the forms, ceremonies and beliefs in religion are continually
+changing to suit the advancement of intelligence; and when intelligence
+becomes universal, they will be renounced altogether. What is true of
+the history of one people will be true of the history of another.
+Religions are not necessary to human progress. They are really clogs. My
+ancestors had more trouble to extirpate these superstitious ideas from
+the mind than they had in getting rid of disease and crime. There were
+several reasons for this difficulty. Disease and crime were self-evident
+evils, that the narrowest intelligence could perceive; but beliefs in
+creeds and superstitions were perversions of judgment, resulting from a
+lack of thorough mental training. As soon, however, as education of a
+high order became universal, it began to disappear. No mind of
+philosophical culture can adhere to such superstitions.
+
+"Many ages the people made idols, and, decking them with rich ornaments,
+placed them in magnificent temples specially built for them and the
+rites by which they worshipped them. There have existed many variations
+of this kind of idolatry that are marked by the progressive stages of
+civilization. Some nations of remote antiquity were highly cultured in
+art and literature, yet worshipped gods of their own manufacture, or
+imaginary gods, for everything. Light and darkness, the seasons, earth,
+air, water, all had a separate deity to preside over and control their
+special services. They offered sacrifices to these deities as they
+desired their co-operation or favor in some enterprise to be undertaken.
+
+"In remote antiquity, we read of a great General about to set out upon
+the sea to attack the army of another nation. In order to propitiate the
+god of the ocean, he had a fine chariot built to which were harnessed
+two beautiful white horses. In the presence of a vast concourse of
+people collected to witness the ceremony, he drove them into the sea.
+When they sank out of sight it was supposed that the god had accepted
+the present, and would show his gratitude for it by favoring winds and
+peaceful weather.
+
+"A thousand years afterward history speaks of the occurrence derisively,
+as an absurd superstition, and at the same time they believed in and
+lauded a more absurd and cruel religion. They worshipped an imaginary
+being who had created and possessed absolute control of everything. Some
+of the human family it had pleased him to make eminently good, while
+others he made eminently bad. For those whom he had created with evil
+desires, he prepared a lake of molten fire into which they were to be
+cast after death to suffer endless torture for doing what they had been
+expressly created to do. Those who had been created good were to be
+rewarded for following out their natural inclinations, by occupying a
+place near the Deity, where they were to spend eternity in singing
+praises to him.
+
+"He could, however, be persuaded by prayer from following his original
+intentions. Very earnest prayer had caused him to change his mind, and
+send rain when he had previously concluded to visit the country with
+drouth.
+
+"Two nations at war with each other, and believing in the same Deity,
+would pray for a pestilence to visit their enemy. Death was universally
+regarded as a visitation of Providence for some offense committed
+against him instead of against the laws of nature.
+
+"Some believed that prayer and donations to the church or priest, could
+induce the Deity to take their relatives from the lake of torment and
+place them in his own presence. The Deity was prayed to on every
+occasion, and for every trivial object. The poor and indolent prayed for
+him to send them food and clothes. The sick prayed for health, the
+foolish for wisdom, and the revengeful besought the Deity to consign all
+their enemies to the burning lake.
+
+"The intelligent and humane began to doubt the necessity of such
+dreadful and needless torment for every conceivable misdemeanor, and it
+was modified, and eventually dropped altogether. Education finally
+rooted out every phase of superstition from the minds of the people, and
+now we look back and smile at the massive and magnificent structures
+erected to the worship of a Deity who could be coaxed to change his mind
+by prayer."
+
+I did not tell the Preceptress that she had been giving me a history of
+my own ancestry; but I remarked the resemblance with the joyous hope
+that in the future of my own unhappy country lay the possibility of a
+civilization so glorious, the ideal heaven of which every sorrowing
+heart had dreamed. But always with the desire to believe it had a
+spiritual eternity.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+I have described the peculiar ceremony attending the burial of youth in
+Mizora. Old age, in some respects, had a similar ceremony, but the
+funeral of an aged person differed greatly from what I had witnessed at
+the grave of youth. Wauna and I attended the funeral of a very aged
+lady. Death in Mizora was the gradual failing of mental and physical
+vigor. It came slowly, and unaccompanied with pain. It was received
+without regret, and witnessed without tears.
+
+The daughters performed the last labor that the mother required. They
+arrayed her body for burial and bore it to the grave. If in that season
+of the year, autumn leaves hid the bier, and formed the covering and
+pillow of her narrow bed. If not in the fall, full-blown roses and
+matured flowers were substituted.
+
+The ceremony was conducted by the eldest daughter, assisted by the
+others. No tears were shed; no mourning worn; no sorrowful chanting. A
+solemn dirge was sung indicative of decay. A dignified solemnity
+befitting the farewell to a useful life was manifest in all the
+proceedings; but no demonstrations of sorrow were visible. The mourners
+were unveiled, and performed the last services for their mother with
+calmness. I was so astonished at the absence of mourning that I asked an
+explanation of Wauna.
+
+"Why should we mourn," was the surprising answer, "for what is
+inevitable? Death must come, and, in this instance, it came in its
+natural way. There is nothing to be regretted or mourned over, as there
+was in the drowning of my young friend. Her life was suddenly arrested
+while yet in the promise of its fruitfulness. There was cause for grief,
+and the expressions and emblems of mourning were proper and appropriate.
+But here, mourning would be out of place, for life has fulfilled its
+promises. Its work is done, and nature has given the worn-out body rest.
+That is all."
+
+That sympathy and regret which the city had expressed for the young
+dead was manifested only in decorum and respectful attendance at the
+funeral. No one appeared to feel that it was an occasion for mourning.
+How strange it all seemed to me, and yet there was a philosophy about it
+that I could not help but admire. Only I wished that they believed as I
+did, that all of those tender associations would be resumed beyond the
+grave. If only they could be convinced. I again broached the subject to
+Wauna. I could not relinquish the hope of converting her to my belief.
+She was so beautiful, so pure, and I loved her so dearly. I could not
+give up my hope of an eternal reunion. I appealed to her sympathy.
+
+"What hope," I asked, "can you offer those whose lives have been only
+successive phases of unhappiness? Why should beings be created only to
+live a life of suffering, and then die, as many, very many, of my people
+do? If they had no hope of a spiritual life, where pain and sorrow are
+to be unknown, the burdens of this life could not be borne."
+
+"You have the same consolation," replied Wauna, "as the Preceptress had
+in losing her daughter. That daring spirit that cost her her life, was
+the pride of her mother. She possessed a promising intellect, yet her
+mother accepts her death as one of the sorrowful phases of life, and
+bravely tries to subdue its pain. Long ages behind us, as my mother has
+told you, the history of all human life was but a succession of woes.
+Our own happy state has been evolved by slow degrees out of that
+sorrowful past. Human progress is marked by blood and tears, and the
+heart's bitterest anguish. We, as a people, have progressed almost
+beyond the reach of sorrow, but you are in the midst of it. You must
+work for the future, though you cannot be of it."
+
+"I cannot," I declared, "reconcile myself to your belief. I am separated
+from my child. To think I am never to see it in this world, nor through
+endless ages, would drive me insane with despair. What consolation can
+your belief offer _me_?"
+
+"In this life, you may yearn for your child, but after this life you
+sleep," answered Wauna, sententiously. "And how sweet that sleep! No
+dreams; no waking to work and trial; no striving after perfection; no
+planning for the morrow. It is oblivion than which there can be no
+happier heaven."
+
+"Would not meeting with those you have loved be happier?" I asked, in
+amazement.
+
+"There would be happiness; and there would be work, too."
+
+"But my religion does not believe in work in heaven," I answered.
+
+"Then it has not taken the immutable laws of Nature into consideration,"
+said Wauna. "If Nature has prepared a conscious existence for us after
+this body decays, she has prepared work for us, you may rest assured. It
+might be a grander, nobler work; but it would be work, nevertheless.
+Then, how restful, in contrast, is our religion. It is eternal,
+undisturbable rest for both body and brain. Besides, as you say
+yourself, you cannot be sure of meeting those whom you desire to meet in
+that other country. They may be the ones condemned to eternal suffering
+for their sins. Think you I could enjoy myself in any surroundings, when
+I knew that those who were dear to me in this life, were enduring
+torment that could have no end. Give me oblivion rather than such a
+heaven.
+
+"Our punishment comes in this world; but it is not so much through sin
+as ignorance. The savages lived lives of misery, occasioned by their
+lack of intelligence. Humanity must always suffer for the mistakes it
+makes. Misery belongs to the ignorant; happiness to the wise. That is
+our doctrine of reward and punishment."
+
+"And you believe that my people will one day reject all religions?"
+
+"When they are advanced enough," she answered. "You say you have
+scholars among you already, who preach their inconsistencies. What do
+you call them?"
+
+"Philosophers," was my reply.
+
+"They are your prophets," said Wauna. "When they break the shackles that
+bind you to creeds and dogmas, they will have done much to advance you.
+To rely on one's own _will_ power to do right is the only safe road to
+morality, and your only heaven."
+
+I left Wauna and sought a secluded spot by the river. I was shocked
+beyond measure at her confession. It had the earnestness, and, to me,
+the cruelty of conviction. To live without a spiritual future in
+anticipation was akin to depravity, to crime and its penalty of prison
+life forever. Yet here was a people, noble, exalted beyond my
+conceiving, living in the present, and obeying only a duty to posterity.
+I recalled a painting I had once seen that always possessed for me a
+horrible fascination. In a cave, with his foot upon the corpse of a
+youth, sat the crowned and sceptered majesty of Death. The waters of
+oblivion encompassed the throne and corpse, which lay with its head and
+feet bathed in its waters--for out of the Unknown had life come, and to
+the Unknown had it departed. Before me, in vision, swept the mighty
+stream of human life from which I had been swept to these strange
+shores. All its sufferings, its delusions; its baffled struggles; its
+wrongs, came upon me with a sense of spiritual agony in them that
+religion--my religion, which was their only consolation--must vanish in
+the crucible of Science. And that Science was the magician that was to
+purify and exalt the world. To live in the Present; to die in it and
+become as the dust; a mere speck, a flash of activity in the far,
+limitless expanse of Nature, of Force, of Matter in which a spiritual
+ideal had no part. It was horrible to think of. The prejudices of
+inherited religious faith, the contracted forces of thought in which I
+had been born and reared could not be uprooted or expanded without pain.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+I had begun to feel an intense longing to return to my own country, but
+it was accompanied by a desire, equally as strong, to carry back to that
+woe-burdened land some of the noble lessons and doctrines I had learned
+in this. I saw no means of doing it that seemed so available as a
+companion,--a being, born and bred in an atmosphere of honor and grandly
+humane ideas and actions.
+
+My heart and my judgment turned to Wauna. She was endeared to me by long
+and gentle association. She was self-reliant and courageous, and
+possessed a strong will. Who, of all my Mizora acquaintances, was so
+well adapted to the service I required.
+
+When I broached the subject to her, Wauna expressed herself as really
+pleased with the idea; but when we went to the Preceptress, she
+acknowledged a strong reluctance to the proposition. She said:
+
+"Wauna can form no conception of the conditions of society in your
+country. They are far, very far, behind our own. They will, I fear,
+chafe her own nature more than she can improve theirs. Still, if I
+thought she could lead your people into a broader intelligence, and
+start them on the way upward to enlightenment and real happiness, I
+would let her go. The moment, however, that she desires to return she
+must be aided to do so."
+
+I pledged myself to abide by any request the Preceptress might make of
+me. Wauna's own inclinations greatly influenced her mother, and finally
+we obtained her consent. Our preparations were carefully made. The
+advanced knowledge of chemistry in Mizora placed many advantages in our
+way. Our boat was an ingenious contrivance with a thin glass top that
+could be removed and folded away until needed to protect us from the
+rigors of the Arctic climate.
+
+I had given an accurate description of the rapids that would oppose us,
+and our boat was furnished with a motive power sufficient to drive us
+through them at a higher rate of speed than what they moved at. It was
+built so as to be easily converted into a sled, and runners were made
+that could be readily adjusted. We were provided with food and clothing
+prepared expressly for the severe change to and rigors of the Arctic
+climate through which we must pass.
+
+I was constantly dreading the terrors of that long ice-bound journey,
+but the Preceptress appeared to be little concerned about it. When I
+spoke of its severities, she said for us to observe her directions, and
+we should not suffer. She asked me if I had ever felt uncomfortable in
+any of the air-ship voyages I had taken, and said that the cold of the
+upper regions through which I had passed in their country was quite as
+intense as any I could meet within a lower atmosphere of my own.
+
+The newspapers had a great deal to say about the departure of the
+Preceptress' daughter on so uncertain a mission, and to that strange
+land of barbarians which I represented. When the day arrived for our
+departure, immense throngs of people from all parts of the country lined
+the shore, or looked down upon us from their anchored air-ships.
+
+The last words of farewell had been spoken to my many friends and
+benefactors. Wauna had bidden a multitude of associates good-bye, and
+clasped her mother's hand, which she held until the boat parted from the
+shore. Years have passed since that memorable parting, but the look of
+yearning love in that Mizora mother's eyes haunts me still. Long and
+vainly has she watched for a boat's prow to cleave that amber mist and
+bear to her arms that vision of beauty and tender love I took away from
+her. My heart saddens at the thought of her grief and long, long waiting
+that only death will end.
+
+We pointed the boat's prow toward the wide mysterious circle of amber
+mists, and then turned our eyes for a last look at Mizora. Wauna stood
+silent and calm, earnestly gazing into the eyes of her mother, until the
+shore and the multitude of fair faces faded like a vision of heaven from
+our views.
+
+"O beautiful Mizora!" cried the voice of my heart. "Shall I ever again
+see a land so fair, where natures so noble and aims so lofty have their
+abiding place? Memory will return to you though my feet may never again
+tread your delightful shores. Farewell, sweet ideal land of my Soul, of
+Humanity, farewell!"
+
+My thoughts turned to that other world from which I had journeyed so
+long. Would the time ever come when it, too, would be a land of
+universal intelligence and happiness? When the difference of nations
+would be settled by argument instead of battle? When disease, deformity
+and premature death would be unknown? When locks, and bolts and bars
+would be useless?
+
+I hoped so much from the personal influence of Wauna. So noble, so
+utterly unconscious of wrong, she must surely revolutionize human nature
+whenever it came in contact with her own.
+
+I pictured to myself my own dear land--dear, despite its many phases of
+wretchedness--smiling in universal comfort and health. I imagined its
+political prisons yawning with emptiness, while their haggard and
+decrepit and sorrowful occupants hobbled out into the sunshine of
+liberty, and the new life we were bringing to them. Fancy flew abroad on
+the wings of hope, dropping the seeds of progress wherever it passed.
+
+The poor should be given work, and justly paid for it, instead of being
+supported by charity. The charity that had fostered indolence in its
+mistaken efforts to do good, should be employed to train poverty to
+skillful labor and economy in living. And what a world of good that one
+measure would produce! The poor should possess exactly the same
+educational advantages that were supplied to the rich. In this _one_
+measure, if I could only make it popular, I would see the golden promise
+of the future of my country. "Educate your poor and they will work out
+their own salvation. Educated Labor can dictate its rights to Capital."
+
+How easy of accomplishment it all seemed to me, who had seen the
+practical benefits arising to a commonwealth that had adopted these
+mottoes. I doubted not that the wiser and better of my own people would
+aid and encourage me. Free education would lead to other results.
+
+Riches should be accumulated only by vast and generous industries that
+reached a helping hand to thousands of industrious poor, instead of
+grinding them out of a few hundred of poorly-paid and over-worked
+artisans. Education in the hands of the poor would be a powerful agent
+with which they would alleviate their own condition, and defend
+themselves against oppression and knavery.
+
+The prisons should be supplied with schools as well as work-rooms, where
+the intellect should be trained and cultivated, and where moral idiocy,
+by the stern and rigorous law of Justice to Innocence, should be forced
+to deny itself posterity.
+
+No philanthropical mind ever spread the wings of its fancy for a broader
+flight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+Our journey was a perilous one with all our precautions. The passage
+through the swiftest part of the current almost swamped our boat. The
+current that opposed us was so strong, that when we increased our speed
+our boat appeared to be cleaving its way through a wall of waters. Wauna
+was perfectly calm, and managed the motor with the steadiest nerves. Her
+courage inspired me, though many a time I despaired of ever getting out
+of the rapids. When we did, and looked up at the star-gemmed canopy that
+stretches above my own world, and abroad over the dark and desolate
+waste of waters around us, it gave me an impression of solemn and weird
+magnificence. It was such a contrast to the vivid nights of Mizora, to
+which my eyes had so long been accustomed, that it came upon me like a
+new scene.
+
+The stars were a source of wonder and ceaseless delight to Wauna. "It
+looks," she said, "as though a prodigal hand had strewn the top of the
+atmosphere with diamonds."
+
+The journey over fields of ice and snow was monotonous, but, owing to
+the skill and knowledge of Mizora displayed in our accoutrements, it was
+deprived of its severities. The wind whistled past us without any other
+greeting than its melancholy sound. We looked out from our snug quarters
+on the dismal hills of snow and ice without a sensation of distress. The
+Aurora Borealis hung out its streamers of beauty, but they were pale
+compared to what Wauna had seen in her own country. The Esquimaux she
+presumed were animals.
+
+We traveled far enough south to secure passage upon a trading-vessel
+bound for civilized shores. The sun came up with his glance of fire and
+his banners of light, laying his glorious touch on cloud and water, and
+kissing the cheek with his warmth. He beamed upon us from the zenith,
+and sank behind the western clouds with a lingering glance of beauty.
+The moon came up like the ghost of the sun, casting a weird yet tender
+beauty on every object. To Wauna it was a revelation of magnificence in
+nature beyond her contriving.
+
+"How grand," she exclaimed, "are the revelations of nature in your
+world! To look upon them, it seems to me, would broaden and deepen the
+mind with the very vastness of their splendor. Nature has been more
+bountiful to you than to Mizora. The day with its heart of fire, and the
+night with its pale beauty are grander than ours. They speak of vast and
+incomprehensible power."
+
+When I took Wauna to the observatory, and she looked upon the countless
+multitudes of worlds and suns revolving in space so far away that a sun
+and its satellites looked like a ball of mist, she said that words could
+not describe her sensations.
+
+"To us," she said, "the leaves of Nature's book are the winds and waves,
+the bud and bloom and decay of seasons. But here every leaf is a world.
+A mighty hand has sprinkled the suns like fruitful seeds across the
+limitless fields of space. Can human nature contemplate a scene so grand
+that reaches so far beyond the grasp of mind, and not feel its own
+insignificance, and the littleness of selfish actions? And yet you can
+behold these myriads of worlds and systems of worlds wheeling in the dim
+infinity of space--a spectacle awful in its vastness--and turn to the
+practice of narrow superstitions?"
+
+At last the shores of my native land greeted my longing eyes, and the
+familiar scenes of my childhood drew near. But when, after nearly twenty
+years absence, I stood on the once familiar spot, the graves of my
+heart's dear ones were all that was mine. My little one had died soon
+after my exile. My father had soon followed. Suspected, and finally
+persecuted by the government, my husband had fled the country, and,
+nearly as I could discover, had sought that universal asylum for the
+oppressed of all nations--the United States. And thither I turned my
+steps.
+
+In my own country and in France, the friends who had known me in
+girlhood were surprised at my youthful appearance. I did not explain the
+cause of it to them, nor did I mention the people or country from whence
+I had come. Wauna was my friend and a foreigner--that was all.
+
+The impression she made was all that I had anticipated. Her unusual
+beauty and her evident purity attracted attention wherever she went. The
+wonderful melody of her singing was much commented upon, but in Mizora
+she had been considered but an indifferent singer. But I had made a
+mistake in my anticipation of her personal influence. The gentleness
+and delicacy of her character received the tenderest respect. None who
+looked upon that face or met the glance of the dark soft eyes ever
+doubted that the nature that animated them was pure and beautiful. Yet
+it was the respect felt for a character so exceptionably superior that
+imitation and emulation would be impossible.
+
+"She is too far above the common run of human nature," said one
+observer. "I should not be surprised if her spirit were already pluming
+its wings for a heavenly flight. Such natures never stay long among us."
+
+The remark struck my heart with a chill of depression. I looked at Wauna
+and wondered why I had noticed sooner the shrinking outlines of the once
+round cheek. Too gentle to show disgust, too noble to ill-treat, the
+spirit of Wauna was chafing under the trying associations. Men and women
+alike regarded her as an impossible character, and I began to realize
+with a sickening regret that I had made a mistake. In my own country, in
+France and England, her beauty was her sole attraction to men. The lofty
+ideal of humanity that she represented was smiled at or gently ignored.
+
+"The world would be a paradise," said one philosopher, "if such
+characters were common. But one is like a seed in the ocean; it cannot
+do much good."
+
+When we arrived in the United States, its activity and evident progress
+impressed Wauna with a feeling more nearly akin to companionship. Her
+own character received a juster appreciation.
+
+"The time is near," she said, "when the New World will be the teacher of
+the Old in the great lesson of Humanity. You will live to see it
+demonstrate to the world the justice and policy of giving to every child
+born under its flag the highest mental, moral and physical training
+known to the present age. You can hardly realize what twenty-five years
+of free education will bring to it. They are already on the right path,
+but they are still many centuries behind my own country in civilization,
+in their government and modes of dispensing justice. Yet their free
+schools, as yet imperfect, are, nevertheless, fruitful seeds of
+progress."
+
+Yet here the nature of Wauna grew restless and homesick, and she at last
+gave expression to her longing for home.
+
+"I am not suited to your world," she said, with a look of deep sorrow in
+her lovely eyes. "None of my people are. We are too finely organized. I
+cannot look with any degree of calmness upon the practices of your
+civilization. It is a common thing to see mothers ill-treat their own
+helpless little ones. The pitiful cries of the children keep ringing in
+my ears. Cannot mothers realize that they are whipping a mean spirit
+into their offspring instead of out. I have heard the most enlightened
+deny their own statements when selfishness demanded it. I cannot mention
+the half of the things I witness daily that grates upon my feelings. I
+cannot reform them. It is not for such as I to be a reformer. Those who
+need reform are the ones to work for it."
+
+Sorrowfully I bade adieu to my hopes and my search for Alexis, and
+prepared to accompany Wauna's return. We embarked on a whaling vessel,
+and having reached its farthest limit, we started on our perilous
+journey north; perilous for the lack of our boat, of which we could hear
+nothing. It had been left in charge of a party of Esquimaux, and had
+either been destroyed, or was hidden. Our progress, therefore, depended
+entirely upon the Esquimaux. The tribe I had journeyed so far north with
+had departed, and those whom I solicited to accompany us professed to be
+ignorant of the sea I mentioned. Like all low natures, the Esquimaux are
+intensely selfish. Nothing could induce them to assist us but the most
+apparent benefit to themselves; and this I could not assure them. The
+homesickness, and coarse diet and savage surroundings told rapidly on
+the sensitive nature of Wauna. In a miserable Esquimaux hut, on a pile
+of furs, I saw the flame of a beautiful and grandly noble life die out.
+My efforts were hopeless; my anguish keen. O Humanity, what have I
+sacrificed for you!
+
+"Oh, Wauna," I pleaded, as I saw the signs of dissolution approaching,
+"shall I not pray for you?"
+
+"Prayers cannot avail me," she replied, as her thin hands reached and
+closed over one of mine. "I had hoped once more to see the majestic
+hills and smiling valleys of my own sweet land, but I shall not. If I
+could only go to sleep in the arms of my mother. But the Great Mother of
+us all will soon receive me in her bosom. And oh! my friend, promise me
+that her dust shall cover me from the sight of men. When my mother
+rocked me to slumber on her bosom, and soothed me with her gentle
+lullaby, she little dreamed that I should suffer and die first. If you
+ever reach Mizora, tell her only that I sleep the sleep of oblivion. She
+will know. Let the memory of my suffering die with me."
+
+"Oh, Wauna," I exclaimed, in anguish, "you surely have a soul. How can
+anything so young, so pure, so beautiful, be doomed to annihilation?"
+
+"We are not annihilated," was the calm reply. "And as to beauty, are
+the roses not beautiful? Yet they die and you say it is the end of the
+year's roses. The birds are harmless, and their songs make the woods
+melodious with the joy of life, yet they die, and you say they have no
+after life. We are like the roses, but our lives are for a century and
+more. And when our lives are ended, the Great Mother gathers us in. We
+are the harvest of the centuries."
+
+When the dull, gray light of the Arctic morning broke, it fell gently
+upon the presence of Death.
+
+With the assistance of the Esquimaux, a grave was dug, and a rude wooden
+cross erected on which I wrote the one word "Wauna," which, in the
+language of Mizora, means "Happiness."
+
+
+The world to which I have returned is many ages behind the civilization
+of Mizora.
+
+Though we cannot hope to attain their perfection in our generation, yet
+many, very many, evils could be obliterated were we to follow their
+laws. Crime is as hereditary as disease.
+
+No savant now denies the transmittable taint of insanity and
+consumption. There are some people in the world now, who, knowing the
+possibility of afflicting offspring with hereditary disease, have lived
+in ascetic celibacy. But where do we find a criminal who denies himself
+offspring, lest he endow posterity with the horrible capacity for murder
+that lies in his blood?
+
+The good, the just, the noble, close heart and eyes to the sweet
+allurements of domestic life, lest posterity suffer physically or
+mentally by them. But the criminal has no restraints but what the law
+enforces. Ignorance, poverty and disease, huddled in dens of
+wretchedness, where they multiply with reckless improvidence, sometimes
+fostered by mistaken charity.
+
+The future of the world, if it be grand and noble, will be the result of
+UNIVERSAL EDUCATION, FREE AS THE GOD-GIVEN WATER WE DRINK.
+
+In the United States I await the issue of universal liberty. In this
+refuge for oppression, my husband found a grave. Childless, homeless and
+friendless, in poverty and obscurity, I have written the story of my
+wanderings. The world's fame can never warm a heart already dead to
+happiness; but out of the agony of one human life, may come a lesson for
+many. Life is a tragedy even under the most favorable conditions.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mizora: A Prophecy, by Mary E. Bradley
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mizora: A Prophecy, by Mary E. Bradley
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Mizora: A Prophecy
+       A MSS. Found Among the Private Papers of the Princess Vera Zarovitch
+
+Author: Mary E. Bradley
+
+Release Date: March 4, 2008 [EBook #24750]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MIZORA: A PROPHECY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Greg Weeks, George P. Snoga, Martin Pettit and
+the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+http://www.pgdp.net
+
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+
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+
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+</pre>
+
+
+<h1>MIZORA:</h1>
+
+<h2>A PROPHECY.</h2>
+
+<h3>A MSS. FOUND AMONG THE PRIVATE PAPERS OF THE</h3>
+
+<h2><span class="smcap">Princess Vera Zarovitch</span>;</h2>
+
+<p class="center"><i>Being a true and faithful account of her Journey to the<br />Interior of the
+Earth, with a careful description of<br />the Country and its Inhabitants, their Customs,<br />Manners and Government.</i></p>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h2>WRITTEN BY HERSELF.</h2>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<div class="center"><img src="images/001.png" width='60' height='40' alt="Publishers logo" /></div>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h3>NEW YORK:<br /><i>G. W. Dillingham, Publisher</i>,<br />Successor to G. W. Carleton &amp; Co.
+<br />MDCCCXC.<i>All Rights Reserved.</i></h3>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<hr class="smler" />
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h3>Copyright, 1889</h3>
+
+<h3>by</h3>
+
+<h2>Mary E. Bradley.</h2>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<div class="index">
+<ul>
+<li><a href="#PREFACE">PREFACE.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#PART_FIRST">PART FIRST.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#PART_SECOND">PART SECOND.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IA">CHAPTER I.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IIA">CHAPTER II.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IIIA">CHAPTER III.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IVA">CHAPTER IV.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VA">CHAPTER V.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VIA">CHAPTER VI.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VIIA">CHAPTER VII.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_VIIIA">CHAPTER VIII.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_IXA">CHAPTER IX.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XA">CHAPTER X.</a></li>
+<li><a href="#CHAPTER_XIA">CHAPTER XI.</a></li>
+</ul>
+</div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="PREFACE" id="PREFACE"></a>PREFACE.</h2>
+
+<p>The narrative of Vera Zarovitch, published in the <i>Cincinnati
+Commercial</i> in 1880 and 1881, attracted a great deal of attention. It
+commanded a wide circle of readers, and there was much more said about
+it than is usual when works of fiction run through a newspaper in weekly
+installments. Quite a number of persons who are unaccustomed to
+bestowing consideration upon works of fiction spoke of it, and grew
+greatly interested in it.</p>
+
+<p>I received many messages about it, and letters of inquiry, and some
+ladies and gentlemen desired to know the particulars about the
+production of the story in book form; and were inquisitive about it and
+the author who kept herself in concealment so closely that even her
+husband did not know that she was the writer who was making this stir in
+our limited literary world.</p>
+
+<p>I was myself so much interested in it that it occurred to me to make the
+suggestion that the story ought to have an extensive sale in book form,
+and to write to a publisher; but the lady who wrote the work seemed
+herself a shade indifferent on the subject, and it passed out of my
+hands and out of my mind.</p>
+
+<p>It is safe to say that it made an impression that was remarkable, and
+with a larger audience I do not doubt that it would make its mark as an
+original production wrought out with thoughtful care and literary skill,
+and take high rank.</p>
+
+<p class="right">Yours very truly,&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<br /><br />Murat Halstead.</p>
+
+<p><i>Nov. 14th, 1889.</i></p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="PART_FIRST" id="PART_FIRST"></a>PART FIRST</h2>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2>
+
+<p>Having little knowledge of rhetorical art, and possessing but a limited
+imagination, it is only a strong sense of the duty I owe to Science and
+the progressive minds of the age, that induces me to come before the
+public in the character of an author. True, I have only a simple
+narration of facts to deal with, and am, therefore, not expected to
+present artistic effects, and poetical imagery, nor any of those flights
+of imagination that are the trial and test of genius.</p>
+
+<p>Yet my task is not a light one. I may fail to satisfy my own mind that
+the true merits of the wonderful and mysterious people I discovered,
+have been justly described. I may fail to interest the public; which is
+the one difficulty most likely to occur, and most to be regretted&mdash;not
+for my own sake, but theirs. It is so hard to get human nature out of
+the ruts it has moved in for ages. To tear away their present faith, is
+like undermining their existence. Yet others who come after me will be
+more aggressive than I. I have this consolation: whatever reception may
+be given my narrative by the public, I know that it has been written
+solely for its good. That wonderful civilization I met with in Mizora, I
+may not be able to more than faintly shadow forth here, yet from it, the
+present age may form some idea of that grand, that ideal life that is
+possible for our remote posterity. Again and again has religious
+enthusiasm pictured a life to be eliminated from the grossness and
+imperfections of our material existence. The Spirit&mdash;the Mind&mdash;that
+mental gift, by or through which we think, reason, and suffer, is by one
+tragic and awful struggle to free itself from temporal blemishes and
+difficulties, and become spiritual and perfect. Yet, who, sweeping the
+limitless fields of space with a telescope, glancing at myriads of
+worlds that a lifetime could not count, or gazing through a microscope
+at a tiny world in a drop of water, has dreamed that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> patient Science
+and practice could evolve for the living human race, the ideal life of
+exalted knowledge: the life that I found in Mizora; that Science had
+made real and practicable. The duty that I owe to truth compels me to
+acknowledge that I have not been solicited to write this narrative by my
+friends; nor has it been the pastime of my leisure hours; nor written to
+amuse an invalid; nor, in fact, for any of those reasons which have
+prompted so many men and women to write a book. It is, on the contrary,
+the result of hours of laborious work, undertaken for the sole purpose
+of benefiting Science and giving encouragement to those progressive
+minds who have already added their mite of knowledge to the coming
+future of the race. "We owe a duty to posterity," says Junius in his
+famous letter to the king. A declaration that ought to be a motto for
+every schoolroom, and graven above every legislative hall in the world.
+It should be taught to the child as soon as reason has begun to dawn,
+and be its guide until age has become its master.</p>
+
+<p>It is my desire not to make this story a personal matter; and for that
+unavoidable prominence which is given one's own identity in relating
+personal experiences, an indulgence is craved from whomsoever may peruse
+these pages.</p>
+
+<p>In order to explain how and why I came to venture upon a journey no
+other of my sex has ever attempted, I am compelled to make a slight
+mention of my family and nationality.</p>
+
+<p>I am a Russian: born to a family of nobility, wealth, and political
+power. Had the natural expectations for my birth and condition been
+fulfilled, I should have lived, loved, married and died a Russian
+aristocrat, and been unknown to the next generation&mdash;and this narrative
+would not have been written.</p>
+
+<p>There are some people who seem to have been born for the sole purpose of
+becoming the playthings of Fate&mdash;who are tossed from one condition of
+life to another without wish or will of their own. Of this class I am an
+illustration. Had I started out with a resolve to discover the North
+Pole, I should never have succeeded. But all my hopes, affections,
+thoughts, and desires were centered in another direction, hence&mdash;but my
+narrative will explain the rest.</p>
+
+<p>The tongue of woman has long been celebrated as an unruly member, and
+perhaps, in some of the domestic affairs of life, it has been
+unnecessarily active; yet no one who gives this narrative a perusal, can
+justly deny that it was the primal cause of the grandest discovery of
+the age.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p><p>I was educated in Paris, where my vacations were frequently spent with
+an American family who resided there, and with whom my father had formed
+an intimate friendship. Their house, being in a fashionable quarter of
+the city and patriotically hospitable, was the frequent resort of many
+of their countrymen. I unconsciously acquired a knowledge and admiration
+for their form of government, and some revolutionary opinions in regard
+to my own.</p>
+
+<p>Had I been guided by policy, I should have kept the latter a secret, but
+on returning home, at the expiration of my school days, I imprudently
+gave expression to them in connection with some of the political
+movements of the Russian Government&mdash;and secured its suspicion at once,
+which, like the virus of some fatal disease, once in the system, would
+lose its vitality only with my destruction.</p>
+
+<p>While at school, I had become attached to a young and lovely Polish
+orphan, whose father had been killed at the battle of Grochow when she
+was an infant in her mother's arms. My love for my friend, and sympathy
+for her oppressed people, finally drew me into serious trouble and
+caused my exile from my native land.</p>
+
+<p>I married at the age of twenty the son of my father's dearest friend.
+Alexis and I were truly attached to each other, and when I gave to my
+infant the name of my father and witnessed his pride and delight, I
+thought to my cup of earthly happiness, not one more drop could be
+added.</p>
+
+<p>A desire to feel the cheering air of a milder climate induced me to pay
+my Polish friend a visit. During my sojourn with her occurred the
+anniversary of the tragedy of Grochow, when, according to custom, all
+who had lost friends in the two dreadful battles that had been fought
+there, met to offer prayers for their souls. At her request, I
+accompanied my friend to witness the ceremonies. To me, a silent and
+sympathizing spectator, they were impressive and solemn in the extreme.
+Not less than thirty thousand people were there, weeping and praying on
+ground hallowed by patriot blood. After the prayers were said, the voice
+of the multitude rose in a mournful and pathetic chant. It was rudely
+broken by the appearance of the Russian soldiers.</p>
+
+<p>A scene ensued which memory refuses to forget, and justice forbids me to
+deny. I saw my friend, with the song of sorrow still trembling on her
+innocent lips, fall bleeding, dying from the bayonet thrust of a Russian
+soldier. I clasped the lifeless body in my arms, and in my grief and
+excitement, poured forth upbraidings<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> against the government of my
+country which it would never forgive nor condone. I was arrested, tried,
+and condemned to the mines of Siberia for life.</p>
+
+<p>My father's ancient and princely lineage, my husband's rank, the wealth
+of both families, all were unavailing in procuring a commutation of my
+sentence to some less severe punishment. Through bribery, however, the
+co-operation of one of my jailors was secured, and I escaped in disguise
+to the frontier.</p>
+
+<p>It was my husband's desire that I proceed immediately to France, where
+he would soon join me. But we were compelled to accept whatever means
+chance offered for my escape, and a whaling vessel bound for the
+Northern Seas was the only thing I could secure passage upon with
+safety. The captain promised to transfer me to the first southward bound
+vessel we should meet.</p>
+
+<p>But none came. The slow, monotonous days found me gliding farther and
+farther from home and love. In the seclusion of my little cabin, my fate
+was more endurable than the horrors of Siberia could have been, but it
+was inexpressibly lonesome. On shipboard I sustained the character of a
+youth, exiled for a political offense, and of a delicate constitution.</p>
+
+<p>It is not necessary to the interest of this narrative to enter into the
+details of shipwreck and disaster, which befel us in the Northern Seas.
+Our vessel was caught between ice floes, and we were compelled to
+abandon her. The small boats were converted into sleds, but in such
+shape as would make it easy to re-convert them into boats again, should
+it ever become necessary. We took our march for the nearest Esquimaux
+settlement, where we were kindly received and tendered the hospitality
+of their miserable huts. The captain, who had been ill for some time,
+grew rapidly worse, and in a few days expired. As soon as the approach
+of death became apparent, he called the crew about him, and requested
+them to make their way south as soon as possible, and to do all in their
+power for my health and comfort. He had, he said, been guaranteed a sum
+of money for my safe conduct to France, sufficient to place his family
+in independent circumstances, and he desired that his crew should do all
+in their power to secure it for them.</p>
+
+<p>The next morning I awoke to find myself deserted, the crew having
+decamped with nearly everything brought from the ship.</p>
+
+<p>Being blessed with strong nerves, I stared my situation bravely in the
+face, and resolved to make the best of it. I believed it could be only a
+matter of time when some European or American whaling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> vessel should
+rescue me: and I had the resolution to endure, while hope fed the flame.</p>
+
+<p>I at once proceeded to inure myself to the life of the Esquimaux. I
+habited myself in a suit of reindeer fur, and ate, with compulsory
+appetite, the raw flesh and fat that form their principal food.
+Acclimated by birth to the coldest region of the temperate zone, and
+naturally of a hardy constitution, I found it not so difficult to endure
+the rigors of the Arctic temperature as I had supposed.</p>
+
+<p>I soon discovered the necessity of being an assistance to my new friends
+in procuring food, as their hospitality depends largely upon the state
+of their larder. A compass and a small trunk of instruments belonging to
+the Captain had been either over-looked or rejected by the crew in their
+flight. I secured the esteem of the Esquimaux by using the compass to
+conduct a hunting party in the right direction when a sudden snow-storm
+had obscured the landmarks by which they guide their course. I
+cheerfully assumed a share of their hardships, for with these poor
+children of the North life is a continual struggle with cold and
+starvation. The long, rough journeys which we frequently took over ice
+and ridges of snow in quest of animal food, I found monotonously
+destitute of everything I had experienced in former traveling, except
+fatigue. The wail of the winds, and the desolate landscape of ice and
+snow, never varied. The coruscations of the Aurora Borealis sometimes
+lighted up the dreary waste around us, and the myriad eyes of the
+firmament shone out with a brighter lustre, as twilight shrank before
+the gloom of the long Arctic night.</p>
+
+<p>A description of the winter I spent with the Esquimaux can be of little
+interest to the readers of this narrative. Language cannot convey to
+those who have dwelt always in comfort the feeling of isolation, the
+struggle with despair, that was constantly mine. We were often confined
+to our ice huts for days while the blinding fury of the wind driven snow
+without made the earth look like chaos. Sometimes I crept to the narrow
+entrance and looked toward the South with a feeling of homesickness too
+intense to describe. Away, over leagues of perilous travel, lay
+everything that was dear or congenial; and how many dreary months,
+perhaps years, must pass before I could obtain release from associations
+more dreadful than solitude. It required all the courage I could command
+to endure it.</p>
+
+<p>The whale-fishing opens about the first week in August, and continues
+throughout September. As it drew near, the settlement prepared to move
+farther north, to a locality where they claimed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> whales could be found
+in abundance. I cheerfully assisted in the preparations, for to meet
+some whaling vessel was my only hope of rescue from surroundings that
+made existence a living death.</p>
+
+<p>The dogs were harnessed to sleds heavily laden with the equipments of an
+Esquimaux hut. The woman, as well as the men, were burdened with immense
+packs; and our journey begun. We halted only to rest and sleep. A few
+hours work furnished us a new house out of the ever present ice. We
+feasted on raw meat&mdash;sometimes a freshly killed deer; after which our
+journey was resumed.</p>
+
+<p>As near as I could determine, it was close to the 85&deg; north latitude,
+where we halted on the shore of an open sea. Wild ducks and game were
+abundant, also fish of an excellent quality. Here, for the first time in
+many months, I felt the kindly greeting of a mild breeze as it hailed me
+from the bosom of the water. Vegetation was not profuse nor brilliant,
+but to my long famished eyes, its dingy hue was delightfully refreshing.</p>
+
+<p>Across this sea I instantly felt a strong desire to sail. I believed it
+must contain an island of richer vegetation than the shore we occupied.
+But no one encouraged me or would agree to be my companion. On the
+contrary, they intimated that I should never return. I believed that
+they were trying to frighten me into remaining with them, and declared
+my intention to go alone. Perhaps I might meet in that milder climate
+some of my own race. My friend smiled, and pointing to the South, said,
+as he designated an imaginary boundary:</p>
+
+<p>"Across <i>that</i> no white man's foot has ever stepped."</p>
+
+<p>So I was alone. My resolution, however, was not shaken. A boat was
+constructed, and bidding adieu to my humble companions, I launched into
+an unknown sea.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2>
+
+<p>On and on, and on I rowed until the shore and my late companions were
+lost in the gloomy distance. On and on, and still on, until fatigued
+almost to exhaustion; and still, no land. A feeling of uncontrollable
+lonesomeness took possession of me. Silence reigned supreme. No sound
+greeted me save the swirl of the gently undulating waters against the
+boat, and the melancholy dip of the oars. Overhead, the familiar eyes of
+night were all that pierced the gloom that seemed to hedge me in. My
+feeling of distress increased when I discovered that my boat had struck
+a current and was beyond my control. Visions of a cataract and
+inevitable death instantly shot across my mind. Made passive by intense
+despair, I laid down in the bottom of the boat, to let myself drift into
+whatever fate was awaiting me.</p>
+
+<p>I must have lain there many hours before I realized that I was traveling
+in a circle. The velocity of the current had increased, but not
+sufficiently to insure immediately destruction. Hope began to revive,
+and I sat up and looked about me with renewed courage. Directly before
+me rose a column of mist, so thin that I could see through it, and of
+the most delicate tint of green. As I gazed, it spread into a curtain
+that appeared to be suspended in mid-air, and began to sway gently back
+and forth, as if impelled by a slight breeze, while sparks of fire, like
+countless swarms of fire-flies, darted through it and blazed out into a
+thousand brilliant hues and flakes of color that chased one another
+across and danced merrily up and down with bewildering swiftness.
+Suddenly it drew together in a single fold, a rope of yellow mist, then
+instantly shook itself out again as a curtain of rainbows fringed with
+flame. Myriads of tassels, composed of threads of fire, began to dart
+hither and thither through it, while the rainbow stripes deepened in hue
+until they looked like gorgeous ribbons glowing with intensest radiance,
+yet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> softened by that delicate misty appearance which is a special
+quality of all atmospheric color, and which no pencil can paint, nor the
+most eloquent tongue adequately describe.</p>
+
+<p>The swaying motion continued. Sometimes the curtain approached near
+enough, apparently, to flaunt its fiery fringe almost within my grasp.
+It hung one instant in all its marvelous splendor of colors, then
+suddenly rushed into a compact mass, and shot across the zenith, an arc
+of crimson fire that lit up the gloomy waters with a weird, unearthly
+glare. It faded quickly, and appeared to settle upon the water again in
+a circular wall of amber mist, round which the current was hurrying me
+with rapidly increasing speed. I saw, with alarm, that the circles were
+narrowing A whirlpool was my instant conjecture, and I laid myself down
+in the boat, again expecting every moment to be swept into a seething
+abyss of waters. The spray dashed into my face as the boat plunged
+forward with frightful swiftness. A semi-stupor, born of exhaustion and
+terror, seized me in its merciful embrace.</p>
+
+<p>It must have been many hours that I lay thus. I have a dim recollection
+of my boat going on and on, its speed gradually decreasing, until I was
+amazed to perceive that it had ceased its onward motion and was gently
+rocking on quiet waters. I opened my eyes. A rosy light, like the first
+blush of a new day, permeated the atmosphere. I sat up and looked about
+me. A circular wall of pale amber mist rose behind me; the shores of a
+new and beautiful country stretched before. Toward them, I guided my
+boat with reviving hope and strength.</p>
+
+<p>I entered a broad river, whose current was from the sea, and let myself
+drift along its banks in bewildered delight. The sky appeared bluer, and
+the air balmier than even that of Italy's favored clime. The turf that
+covered the banks was smooth and fine, like a carpet of rich green
+velvet. The fragrance of tempting fruit was wafted by the zephyrs from
+numerous orchards. Birds of bright plumage flitted among the branches,
+anon breaking forth into wild and exultant melody, as if they rejoiced
+to be in so favored a clime.</p>
+
+<p>And truly it seemed a land of enchantment. The atmosphere had a peculiar
+transparency, seemingly to bring out clearly objects at a great
+distance, yet veiling the far horizon in a haze of gold and purple.
+Overhead, clouds of the most gorgeous hues, like precious gems converted
+into vapor, floated in a sky of the serenest azure. The languorous
+atmosphere, the beauty of the heavens, the inviting shores, produced in
+me a feeling of contentment not easily<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> described. To add to my senses
+another enjoyment, my ears were greeted with sounds of sweet music, in
+which I detected the mingling of human voices.</p>
+
+<p>I wondered if I had really drifted into an enchanted country, such as I
+had read about in the fairy books of my childhood.</p>
+
+<p>The music grew louder, yet wondrously sweet, and a large pleasure boat,
+shaped like a fish, glided into view. Its scales glittered like gems as
+it moved gracefully and noiselessly through the water. Its occupants
+were all young girls of the highest type of blonde beauty. It was their
+soft voices, accompanied by some peculiar stringed instruments they
+carried, that had produced the music I had heard. They appeared to
+regard me with curiosity, not unmixed with distrust, for their boat
+swept aside to give me a wide berth.</p>
+
+<p>I uncovered my head, shook down my long black hair, and falling upon my
+knees, lifted my hands in supplication. My plea was apparently
+understood, for turning their boat around, they motioned me to follow
+them. This I did with difficulty, for I was weak, and their boat moved
+with a swiftness and ease that astonished me. What surprised me most was
+its lack of noise.</p>
+
+<p>As I watched its beautiful occupants dressed in rich garments, adorned
+with rare and costly gems, and noted the noiseless, gliding swiftness of
+their boat, an uncomfortable feeling of mystery began to invade my mind,
+as though I really had chanced upon enchanted territory.</p>
+
+<p>As we glided along, I began to be impressed by the weird stillness. No
+sound greeted me from the ripening orchards, save the carol of birds;
+from the fields came no note of harvest labor. No animals were visible,
+nor sound of any. No hum of life. All nature lay asleep in voluptuous
+beauty, veiled in a glorious atmosphere. Everything wore a dreamy look.
+The breeze had a loving, lingering touch, not unlike to the Indian
+Summer of North America. But no Indian Summer ever knew that dark green
+verdure, like the first robe of spring. Wherever the eye turned it met
+something charming in cloud, or sky, or water, or vegetation. Everything
+had felt the magical touch of beauty.</p>
+
+<p>On the right, the horizon was bounded by a chain of mountains, that
+plainly showed their bases above the glowing orchards and verdant
+landscapes. It impressed me as peculiar, that everything appeared to
+rise as it gained in distance. At last the pleasure boat halted at a
+flight of marble steps that touched the water. Ascending these, I gained
+an eminence where a scene of surpassing beauty and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> grandeur lay spread
+before me. Far, far as the eye could follow it, stretched the stately
+splendor of a mighty city. But all the buildings were detached and
+surrounded by lawns and shade trees, their white marble and gray granite
+walls gleaming through the green foliage.</p>
+
+<p>Upon the lawn, directly before us, a number of most beautiful girls had
+disposed themselves at various occupations. Some were reading, some
+sketching, and some at various kinds of needlework. I noticed that they
+were all blondes. I could not determine whether their language possessed
+a peculiarly soft accent, or whether it was an unusual melody of voice
+that made their conversation as musical to the ear as the love notes of
+some amorous wood bird to its mate.</p>
+
+<p>A large building of white marble crowned a slight eminence behind them.
+Its porticos were supported upon the hands of colossal statues of women,
+carved out of white marble with exquisite art and beauty. Shade trees of
+a feathery foliage, like plumes of finest moss, guarded the entrance and
+afforded homes for brilliant-plumaged birds that flew about the porticos
+and alighted on the hands and shoulders of the ladies without fear. Some
+of the trees had a smooth, straight trunk and flat top, bearing a
+striking resemblance to a Chinese umbrella. On either side of the
+marble-paved entrance were huge fountains that threw upward a column of
+water a hundred feet in height, which, dissolving into spray, fell into
+immense basins of clearest crystal. Below the rim of these basins, but
+covered with the crystal, as with a delicate film of ice, was a wreath
+of blood red roses, that looked as though they had just been plucked
+from the stems and placed there for a temporary ornament. I afterward
+learned that it was the work of an artist, and durable as granite.</p>
+
+<p>I supposed I had arrived at a female seminary, as not a man, or the
+suggestion of one, was to be seen. If it were a seminary, it was for the
+wealth of the land, as house, grounds, adornments, and the ladies'
+attire were rich and elegant.</p>
+
+<p>I stood apart from the groups of beautiful creatures like the genus of
+another race, enveloped in garments of fur that had seen much service. I
+presented a marked contrast. The evident culture, refinement, and
+gentleness of the ladies, banished any fear I might have entertained as
+to the treatment I should receive. But a singular silence that pervaded
+everything impressed me painfully. I stood upon the uplifted verge of an
+immense city, but from its broad streets came no sound of traffic, no
+rattle of wheels, no hum of life. Its marble homes of opulence shone
+white and grand through mossy foliage; from innumerable parks the
+fountains sparkled and statues<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> gleamed like rare gems upon a costly
+robe; but over all a silence, as of death, reigned unbroken. The awe and
+the mystery of it pressed heavily upon my spirit, but I could not refuse
+to obey when a lady stepped out of the group, that had doubtless been
+discussing me, and motioned me to follow her.</p>
+
+<p>She led me through the main entrance into a lofty hall that extended
+through the entire building, and consisted of a number of grand arches
+representing scenes in high relief of the finest sculpture. We entered a
+magnificent salon, where a large assembly of ladies regarded me with
+unmistakable astonishment. Every one of them was a blonde. I was
+presented to one, whom I instantly took to be the Lady Superior of the
+College, for I had now settled it in my mind that I was in a female
+seminary, albeit one of unheard of luxury in its appointments.</p>
+
+<p>The lady had a remarkable majesty of demeanor, and a noble countenance.
+Her hair was white with age, but over her features, the rosy bloom of
+youth still lingered, as if loth to depart. She looked at me kindly and
+critically, but not with as much surprise as the others had evinced. I
+may here remark that I am a brunette. My guide, having apparently
+received some instruction in regard to me, led me upstairs into a
+private apartment. She placed before me a complete outfit of female
+wearing apparel, and informed me by signs that I was to put it on. She
+then retired. The apartment was sumptuously furnished in two
+colors&mdash;amber and lazulite. A bath-room adjoining had a beautiful
+porcelain tank with scented water, that produced a delightful feeling of
+exhilaration.</p>
+
+<p>Having donned my new attire, I descended the stairs and met my guide,
+who conducted me into a spacious dining-room. The walls were adorned
+with paintings, principally of fruit and flowers. A large and superb
+picture of a sylvan dell in the side of a rock, was one exception. Its
+deep, cool shadows, and the pellucid water, which a wandering sunbeam
+accidentally revealed, were strikingly realistic. Nearly all of the
+pictures were upon panels of crystal that were set in the wall. The
+light shining through them gave them an exceedingly natural effect. One
+picture that I especially admired, was of a grape vine twining around
+the body and trunk of an old tree. It was inside of the crystal panel,
+and looked so natural that I imagined I could see its leaves and
+tendrils sway in the wind. The occupants of the dining-room were all
+ladies, and again I noted the fact that they were all blondes:
+beautiful, graceful, courteous, and with voices softer and sweeter than
+the strains of an eolian harp.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p><p>The table, in its arrangement and decoration, was the most beautiful
+one I had ever seen. The white linen cloth resembled brocaded satin. The
+knives and forks were gold, with handles of solid amber. The dishes were
+of the finest porcelain. Some of them, particularly the fruit stands,
+looked as though composed of hoar frost. Many of the fruit stands were
+of gold filigree work. They attracted my notice at once, not so much on
+account of the exquisite workmanship and unique design of the dishes, as
+the wonderful fruit they contained. One stand, that resembled a huge
+African lily in design, contained several varieties of plums, as large
+as hen's eggs, and transparent. They were yellow, blue and red. The
+centre of the table was occupied by a fruit stand of larger size than
+the others. It looked like a boat of sea foam fringed with gold moss.
+Over its outer edge hung clusters of grapes of a rich wine color, and
+clear as amethysts. The second row looked like globes of honey, the next
+were of a pale, rose color, and the top of the pyramid was composed of
+white ones, the color and transparency of dew.</p>
+
+<p>The fruit looked so beautiful. I thought it would be a sacrilege to
+destroy the charm it had for the eye; but when I saw it removed by pink
+tipped fingers, whose beauty no art could represent, and saw it
+disappear within such tempting lips. I thought the feaster worthy of the
+feast. Fruit appeared to be the principal part of their diet, and was
+served in its natural state. I was, however, supplied with something
+that resembled beefsteak of a very fine quality. I afterward learned
+that it was chemically prepared meat. At the close of the meal, a cup
+was handed me that looked like the half of a soap bubble with all its
+iridescent beauty sparkling and glancing in the light. It contained a
+beverage that resembled chocolate, but whose flavor could not have been
+surpassed by the fabled nectar of the gods.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+
+<p>I have been thus explicit in detailing the circumstances of my entrance
+into the land of Mizora, or, in other words, the interior of the earth,
+lest some incredulous person might doubt the veracity of this narrative.</p>
+
+<p>It does seem a little astonishing that a woman should have fallen by
+accident, and without intention or desire, upon a discovery that
+explorers and scientists had for years searched for in vain. But such
+was the fact, and, in generosity, I have endeavored to make my accident
+as serviceable to the world in general, and Science in particular, as I
+could, by taking observations of the country, its climate and products,
+and especially its people.</p>
+
+<p>I met with the greatest difficulty in acquiring their language.
+Accustomed to the harsh dialect of the North, my voice was almost
+intractable in obtaining their melodious accentuation. It was,
+therefore, many months before I mastered the difficulty sufficiently to
+converse without embarrassment, or to make myself clearly understood.
+The construction of their language was simple and easily understood, and
+in a short time I was able to read it with ease, and to listen to it
+with enjoyment. Yet, before this was accomplished, I had mingled among
+them for months, listening to a musical jargon of conversation, that I
+could neither participate in, nor understand. All that I could therefore
+discover about them during this time, was by observation. This soon
+taught me that I was not in a seminary&mdash;in our acceptance of the
+term&mdash;but in a College of Experimental Science. The ladies&mdash;girls I had
+supposed them to be&mdash;were, in fact, women and mothers, and had reached
+an age that with us would be associated with decrepitude, wrinkles and
+imbecility. They were all practical chemists, and their work was the
+preparation of food from the elements. No wonder that they possessed the
+suppleness and bloom of eternal youth, when the earthy matter and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>
+impurities that are ever present in our food, were unknown to theirs.</p>
+
+<p>I also discovered that they obtained rain artificially when needed, by
+discharging vast quantities of electricity in the air. I discovered that
+they kept no cattle, nor animals of any kind for food or labor. I
+observed a universal practice of outdoor exercising; the aim seeming to
+be to develop the greatest capacity of lung or muscle. It was
+astonishing the amount of air a Mizora lady could draw into her lungs.
+They called it their brain stimulant, and said that their faculties were
+more active after such exercise. In my country, a cup of strong coffee,
+or some other agreeable beverage, is usually taken into the stomach to
+invigorate or excite the mind.</p>
+
+<p>One thing I remarked as unusual among a people of such cultured taste,
+and that was the size of the ladies' waists. Of all that I measured not
+one was less than thirty inches in circumference, and it was rare to
+meet with one that small. At first I thought a waist that tapered from
+the arm pits would be an added beauty, if only these ladies would be
+taught how to acquire it. But I lived long enough among them to look
+upon a tapering waist as a disgusting deformity. They considered a large
+waist a mark of beauty, as it gave a greater capacity of lung power; and
+they laid the greatest stress upon the size and health of the lungs. One
+little lady, not above five feet in height, I saw draw into her lungs
+two hundred and twenty-five cubic inches of air, and smile proudly when
+she accomplished it. I measured five feet and five inches in height, and
+with the greatest effort I could not make my lungs receive more than two
+hundred cubic inches of air. In my own country I had been called an
+unusually robust girl, and knew, by comparison, that I had a much larger
+and fuller chest than the average among women.</p>
+
+<p>I noticed with greater surprise than anything else had excited in me,
+the marked absence of men. I wandered about the magnificent building
+without hindrance or surveillance. There was not a lock or bolt on any
+door in it. I frequented a vast gallery filled with paintings and
+statues of women, noble looking, beautiful women, but still&mdash;nothing but
+women. The fact that they were all blondes, singular as it might appear,
+did not so much impress me. Strangers came and went, but among the
+multitude of faces I met, I never saw a man's.</p>
+
+<p>In my own country I had been accustomed to regard man as a vital
+necessity. He occupied all governmental offices, and was the arbitrator
+of domestic life. It seemed, therefore, impossible to me for a country
+or government to survive without his assistance and advice. Besides, it
+was a country over which the heart of any man must<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> yearn, however
+insensible he might be to beauty or female loveliness. Wealth was
+everywhere and abundant. The climate as delightful as the most
+fastidious could desire. The products of the orchards and gardens
+surpassed description. Bread came from the laboratory, and not from the
+soil by the sweat of the brow. Toil was unknown; the toil that we know,
+menial, degrading and harassing. Science had been the magician that had
+done away all that. Science, so formidable and austere to our untutored
+minds, had been gracious to these fair beings and opened the door to
+nature's most occult secrets. The beauty of those women it is not in my
+power to describe. The Greeks, in their highest art, never rivalled it,
+for here was a beauty of mind that no art can represent. They enhanced
+their physical charms with attractive costumes, often of extreme
+elegance. They wore gems that flashed a fortune as they passed. The
+rarest was of a pale rose color, translucent as the clearest water, and
+of a brilliancy exceeding the finest diamond. Their voices, in song,
+could only be equaled by a celestial choir. No dryad queen ever floated
+through the leafy aisles of her forest with more grace than they
+displayed in every movement. And all this was for feminine eyes
+alone&mdash;and they of the most enchanting loveliness.</p>
+
+<p>Among all the women that I met during my stay in Mizora&mdash;comprising a
+period of fifteen years&mdash;I saw not one homely face or ungraceful form.
+In my own land the voice of flattery had whispered in my ear praises of
+face and figure, but I felt ill-formed and uncouth beside the perfect
+symmetry and grace of these lovely beings. Their chief beauty appeared
+in a mobility of expression. It was the divine fire of Thought that
+illumined every feature, which, while gazing upon the Aphrodite of
+Praxitiles, we must think was all that the matchless marble lacked.
+Emotion passed over their features like ripples over a stream. Their
+eyes were limpid wells of loveliness, where every impulse of their
+natures were betrayed without reserve.</p>
+
+<p>"It would be a paradise for man."</p>
+
+<p>I made this observation to myself, and as secretly would I propound the
+question:</p>
+
+<p>"Why is he not here in lordly possession?"</p>
+
+<p>In <i>my</i> world man was regarded, or he had made himself regarded, as a
+superior being. He had constituted himself the Government, the Law,
+Judge, Jury and Executioner. He doled out reward or punishment as his
+conscience or judgment dictated. He was active and belligerent always in
+obtaining and keeping every good thing for himself. He was
+indispensable. Yet here was a nation of fair, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span>exceedingly fair women
+doing without him, and practising the arts and sciences far beyond the
+imagined pale of human knowledge and skill.</p>
+
+<p>Of their progress in science I will give some accounts hereafter.</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible to describe the feeling that took possession of me as
+months rolled by, and I saw the active employments of a prosperous
+people move smoothly and quietly along in the absence of masculine
+intelligence and wisdom. Cut off from all inquiry by my ignorance of
+their language, the singular absence of the male sex began to prey upon
+my imagination as a mystery. The more so after visiting a town at some
+distance, composed exclusively of schools and colleges for the youth of
+the country. Here I saw hundreds of children&mdash;<i>and all of them were
+girls</i>. Is it to be wondered at that the first inquiry I made, was:</p>
+
+<p>"Where are the men?"</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2>
+
+<p>To facilitate my progress in the language of Mizora I was sent to their
+National College. It was the greatest favor they could have conferred
+upon me, as it opened to me a wide field of knowledge. Their educational
+system was a peculiar one, and, as it was the chief interest of the
+country. I shall describe it before proceeding farther with this
+narrative.</p>
+
+<p>All institutions for instruction were public, as were, also, the books
+and other accessories. The State was the beneficent mother who furnished
+everything, and required of her children only their time and
+application. Each pupil was compelled to attain a certain degree of
+excellence that I thought unreasonably high, after which she selected
+the science or vocation she felt most competent to master, and to that
+she then devoted herself.</p>
+
+<p>The salaries of teachers were larger than those of any other public
+position. The Principal of the National College had an income that
+exceeded any royal one I had ever heard of; but, as education was the
+paramount interest of Mizora, I was not surprised at it. Their desire
+was to secure the finest talent for educational purposes, and as the
+highest honors and emoluments belonged to such a position, it could not
+be otherwise. To be a teacher in Mizora was to be a person of
+consequence. They were its aristocracy.</p>
+
+<p>Every State had a free college provided for out of the State funds. In
+these colleges every department of Science, Art, or Mechanics was
+furnished with all the facilities for thorough instruction. All the
+expenses of a pupil, including board, clothing, and the necessary
+traveling fares, were defrayed by the State. I may here remark that all
+railroads are owned and controlled by the General Government. The rates
+of transportation were fixed by law, and were uniform throughout the
+country.</p>
+
+<p>The National College which I entered belonged to the General<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>
+Government. Here was taught the highest attainments in the arts and
+sciences, and all industries practised in Mizora. It contained the very
+cream of learning. There the scientist, the philosopher and inventor
+found the means and appliances for study and investigation. There the
+artist and sculptor had their finest work, and often their studios. The
+principals and subordinate teachers and assistants were elected by
+popular vote. The State Colleges were free to those of another State who
+might desire to enter them, for Mizora was like one vast family. It was
+regarded as the duty of every citizen to lend all the aid and
+encouragement in her power to further the enlightenment of others,
+wisely knowing the benefits of such would accrue to her own and the
+general good. The National College was open to all applicants,
+irrespective of age, the only requirements being a previous training to
+enter upon so high a plane of mental culture. Every allurement was held
+out to the people to come and drink at the public fountain where the cup
+was inviting and the waters sweet. "For," said one of the leading
+instructors to me, "education is the foundation of our moral elevation,
+our government, our happiness. Let us relax our efforts, or curtail the
+means and inducements to become educated, and we relax into ignorance,
+and end in demoralization. We know the value of free education. It is
+frequently the case that the greatest minds are of slow development, and
+manifest in the primary schools no marked ability. They often leave the
+schools unnoticed; and when time has awakened them to their mental
+needs, all they have to do is to apply to the college, pass an
+examination, and be admitted. If not prepared to enter the college, they
+could again attend the common schools. We realize in its broadest sense
+the ennobling influence of universal education. The higher the culture
+of a people, the more secure is their government and happiness. A
+prosperous people is always an educated one; and the freer the
+education, the wealthier they become."</p>
+
+<p>The Preceptress of the National College was the leading scientist of the
+country. Her position was more exalted than any that wealth could have
+given her. In fact, while wealth had acknowledged advantages, it held a
+subordinate place in the estimation of the people. I never heard the
+expression "very wealthy," used as a recommendation of a person. It was
+always: "<i>She</i> is a fine scholar, or mechanic, or artist, or musician.
+<i>She</i> excels in landscape gardening, or domestic work. <i>She</i> is a
+first-class chemist." But never "<i>She</i> is rich."</p>
+
+<p>The idea of a Government assuming the responsibility of education, like
+a parent securing the interest of its children, was all so new<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> to me;
+and yet, I confessed to myself, the system might prove beneficial to
+other countries than Mizora. In that world, from whence I had so
+mysteriously emigrated, education was the privilege only of the rich.
+And in no country, however enlightened, was there a system of education
+that would reach all. Charitable institutions were restricted, and
+benefited only a few. My heart beat with enthusiasm when I thought of
+the mission before me. And then I reflected that the philosophers of my
+world were but as children in progress compared to these. Still
+traveling in grooves that had been worn and fixed for posterity by
+bygone ages of ignorance and narrow-mindedness, it would require courage
+and resolution, and more eloquence than I possessed, to persuade them
+out of these trodden paths. To be considered the privileged class was an
+active characteristic of human nature. Wealth, and the powerful grip
+upon the people which the organizations of society and governments gave,
+made it hereditary. Yet in this country, nothing was hereditary but the
+prosperity and happiness of the whole people.</p>
+
+<p>It was not a surprise to me that astronomy was an unknown science in
+Mizora, as neither sun, moon, nor stars were visible there. "The moon's
+pale beams" never afford material for a blank line in poetry; neither do
+scientific discussions rage on the formation of Saturn's rings, or the
+spots on the sun. They knew they occupied a hollow sphere, bounded North
+and South by impassible oceans. Light was a property of the atmosphere.
+A circle of burning mist shot forth long streamers of light from the
+North, and a similar phenomena occurred in the South.</p>
+
+<p>The recitation of my geography lesson would have astonished a pupil from
+the outer world. They taught that a powerful current of electricity
+existed in the upper regions of the atmosphere. It was the origin of
+their atmospheric heat and light, and their change of seasons. The
+latter appeared to me to coincide with those of the Arctic zone, in one
+particular. The light of the sun during the Arctic summer is reflected
+by the atmosphere, and produces that mellow, golden, rapturous light
+that hangs like a veil of enchantment over the land of Mizora for six
+months in the year. It was followed by six months of the shifting
+iridescence of the Aurora Borealis.</p>
+
+<p>As the display of the Aurora Borealis originated, and was most brilliant
+at what appeared to me to be the terminus of the pole, I believed it was
+caused by the meeting at that point of the two great electric currents
+of the earth, the one on its surface, and the one known to the
+inhabitants of Mizora. The heat produced by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> meeting of two such
+powerful currents of electricity is, undoubtedly, the cause of the open
+Polar Sea. As the point of meeting is below the vision of the
+inhabitants of the Arctic regions, they see only the reflection of the
+Aurora. Its gorgeous, brilliant, indescribable splendor is known only to
+the inhabitants of Mizora.</p>
+
+<p>At the National College, where it is taught as a regular science, I
+witnessed the chemical production of bread and a preparation resembling
+meat. Agriculture in this wonderful land, was a lost art. No one that I
+questioned had any knowledge of it. It had vanished in the dim past of
+their barbarism. With the exception of vegetables and fruit, which were
+raised in luscious perfection, their food came from the elements. A
+famine among such enlightened people was impossible, and scarcity was
+unknown. Food for the body and food for the mind were without price. It
+was owing to this that poverty was unknown to them, as well as disease.
+The absolute purity of all that they ate preserved an activity of vital
+power long exceeding our span of life. The length of their year,
+measured by the two seasons, was the same as ours, but the women who had
+marked a hundred of them in their lifetime, looked younger and fresher,
+and were more supple of limb than myself, yet I had barely passed my
+twenty-second year.</p>
+
+<p>I wrote out a careful description of the processes by which they
+converted food out of the valueless elements&mdash;valueless because of their
+abundance&mdash;and put it carefully away for use in my own country. There
+drouth, or excessive rainfalls, produced scarcity, and sometimes famine.
+The struggle of the poor was for food, to the exclusion of all other
+interests. Many of them knew not what proper and health-giving
+nourishment was. But here in Mizora, the daintiest morsels came from the
+chemists laboratory, cheap as the earth under her feet.</p>
+
+<p>I now began to enjoy the advantages of conversation, which added greatly
+to my happiness and acquirements. I formed an intimate companionship
+with the daughter of the Preceptress of the National College, and to her
+was addressed the questions I asked about things that impressed me. She
+was one of the most beautiful beings that it had been my lot to behold.
+Her eyes were dark, almost the purplish blue of a pansy, and her hair
+had a darker tinge than is common in Mizora, as if it had stolen the
+golden edge of a ripe chestnut. Her beauty was a constant charm to me.</p>
+
+<p>The National College contained a large and well filled gallery. Its
+pictures and statuary were varied, not confined to historical portraits<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>
+and busts as was the one at the College of Experimental Science. Yet it
+possessed a number of portraits of women exclusively of the blonde type.
+Many of them were ideal in loveliness. This gallery also contained the
+masterpieces of their most celebrated sculptors. They were all studies
+of the female form. I am a connoisseur in art, and nothing that I had
+ever seen before could compare with these matchless marbles, bewitching
+in every delicate contour, alluring in softness, but grand and majestic
+in pose and expression.</p>
+
+<p>But I haunted this gallery for other reasons than its artistic
+attractions. I was searching for the portrait of a man, or something
+suggesting his presence. I searched in vain. Many of the paintings were
+on a peculiar transparent substance that gave to the subject a
+startlingly vivid effect. I afterward learned that they were
+imperishable, the material being a translucent adamant of their own
+manufacture. After a picture was painted upon it, another piece of
+adamant was cemented over it.</p>
+
+<p>Each day, as my acquaintance with the peculiar institutions and
+character of the inhabitants of Mizora increased, my perplexity and a
+certain air of mystery about them increased with it. It was impossible
+for me not to feel for them a high degree of respect, admiration, and
+affection. They were ever gentle, tender, and kind to solicitude. To
+accuse them of mystery were a paradox; and yet they <i>were</i> a mystery. In
+conversation, manners and habits, they were frank to singularity. It was
+just as common an occurrence for a poem to be read and commented on by
+its author, as to hear it done by another. I have heard a poetess call
+attention to the beauties of her own production, and receive praise or
+adverse criticism with the same charming urbanity.</p>
+
+<p>Ambition of the most intense earnestness was a natural characteristic,
+but was guided by a stern and inflexible justice. Envy and malice were
+unknown to them. It was, doubtless, owing to their elevated moral
+character that courts and legal proceedings had become unnecessary. If a
+discussion arose between parties involving a question of law, they
+repaired to the Public Library, where the statute books were kept, and
+looked up the matter themselves, and settled it as the law directed.
+Should they fail to interpret the law alike, a third party was selected
+as referee, but accepted no pay.</p>
+
+<p>Indolence was as much a disgrace to them as is the lack of virtue to the
+women of my country, hence every citizen, no matter how wealthy, had
+some regular trade, business or profession. I found those occupations we
+are accustomed to see accepted by the people<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> of inferior birth and
+breeding, were there filled by women of the highest social rank, refined
+in manner and frequently of notable intellectual acquirements. It grew,
+or was the result of the custom of selecting whatever vocation they felt
+themselves competent to most worthily fill, and as no social favor or
+ignominy rested on any kind of labor, the whole community of Mizora was
+one immense family of sisters who knew no distinction of birth or
+position among themselves.</p>
+
+<p>There were no paupers and no charities, either public or private, to be
+found in the country. The absence of poverty such as I knew existed in
+all civilized nations upon the face of the earth, was largely owing to
+the cheapness of food. But there was one other consideration that bore
+vitally upon it. The dignity and necessity of labor was early and
+diligently impressed upon the mind. The Preceptress said to me:</p>
+
+<p>"Mizora is a land of industry. Nature has taught us the duty of work.
+Had some of us been born with minds fully matured, or did knowledge come
+to some as old age comes to all, we might think that a portion was
+intended to live without effort. But we are all born equal, and labor is
+assigned to all; and the one who seeks labor is wiser than the one who
+lets labor seek her."</p>
+
+<p>Citizens, I learned, were not restrained from accumulating vast wealth
+had they the desire and ability to do so, but custom imposed upon them
+the most honorable processes. If a citizen should be found guilty of
+questionable business transactions, she suffered banishment to a lonely
+island and the confiscation of her entire estate, both hereditary and
+acquired. The property confiscated went to the public schools in the
+town or city where she resided; but never was permitted to augment
+salaries. I discovered this in the statute books, but not in the memory
+of any one living had it been found necessary to inflict such a
+punishment.</p>
+
+<p>"Our laws," said Wauna, "are simply established legal advice. No law can
+be so constructed as to fit every case so exactly that a criminal mind
+could not warp it into a dishonest use. But in a country like ours,
+where civilization has reached that state of enlightenment that needs no
+laws, we are simply guided by custom."</p>
+
+<p>The love of splendor and ornament was a pronounced characteristic of
+these strange people. But where gorgeous colors were used, they were
+always of rich quality. The humblest homes were exquisitely ornamented,
+and often displayed a luxury that, with us, would have been considered
+an evidence of wealth.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p><p>They took the greatest delight in their beauty, and were exceedingly
+careful of it. A lovely face and delicate complexion, they averred,
+added to one's refinement. The art of applying an artificial bloom and
+fairness to the skin, which I had often seen practiced in my own
+country, appeared to be unknown to them. But everything savoring of
+deception was universally condemned. They made no concealment of the
+practice they resorted to for preserving their complexions, and so
+universal and effectual were they, that women who, I was informed, had
+passed the age allotted to the grandmothers in my country, had the
+smooth brow and pink bloom of cheek that belongs to a more youthful
+period of life. There was, however, a distinction between youth and old
+age. The hair was permitted to whiten, but the delicate complexion of
+old age, with its exquisite coloring, excited in my mind as much
+admiration as astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>I cannot explain why I hesitated to press my first inquiry as to where
+the men were. I had put the question to Wauna one day, but she professed
+never to have heard of such beings. It silenced me&mdash;for a time.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps it is some extinct animal," she added, naively. "We have so
+many new things to study and investigate, that we pay but little
+attention to ancient history."</p>
+
+<p>I bided my time and put the query in another form.</p>
+
+<p>"Where is your other parent?"</p>
+
+<p>She regarded me with innocent surprise. "You talk strangely. I have but
+one parent. How could I have any more?"</p>
+
+<p>"You ought to have two."</p>
+
+<p>She laughed merrily. "You have a queer way of jesting. I have but one
+mother, one adorable mother. How could I have two?" and she laughed
+again.</p>
+
+<p>I saw that there was some mystery I could not unravel at present, and
+fearing to involve myself in some trouble, refrained from further
+questioning on the subject. I nevertheless kept a close observance of
+all that passed, and seized every opportunity to investigate a mystery
+that began to harass me with its strangeness.</p>
+
+<p>Soon after my conversation with Wauna, I attended an entertainment at
+which a great number of guests were present. It was a literary festival
+and, after the intellectual delicacies were disposed of, a banquet
+followed of more than royal munificence. Toasts were drank, succeeded by
+music and dancing and all the gayeties of a festive occasion, yet none
+but the fairest of fair women graced the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> scene. Is it strange,
+therefore, that I should have regarded with increasing astonishment and
+uneasiness a country in all respects alluring to the desires of man&mdash;yet
+found him not there in lordly possession?</p>
+
+<p>Beauty and intellect, wealth and industry, splendor and careful economy,
+natures lofty and generous, gentle and loving&mdash;why has not Man claimed
+this for himself?</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2>
+
+<p>The Preceptress of the National College appointed her daughter Wanna as
+a guide and instructor to me. I formed a deep and strong attachment for
+her, which, it pains me to remember, was the cause of her unhappy fate.
+In stature she was above the medium height, with a form of the fairest
+earthly loveliness and exquisite grace. Her eyes were so deep a blue,
+that at first I mistook them for brown. Her hair was the color of a ripe
+chestnut frosted with gold, and in length and abundance would cover her
+like a garment. She was vivacious and fond of athletic sports. Her
+strength amazed me. Those beautiful hands, with their tapering fingers,
+had a grip like a vise. They had discovered, in this wonderful land,
+that a body possessing perfectly developed muscles must, by the laws of
+nature, be symmetrical and graceful. They rode a great deal on small,
+two-wheeled vehicles, which they propelled themselves. They gave me one
+on which I accompanied Wauna to all of the places of interest in the
+Capital city and vicinity.</p>
+
+<p>I must mention that Wauna's voice was exceedingly musical, even in that
+land of sweet voices, but she did not excel as a singer.</p>
+
+<p>The infant schools interested me more than all the magnificence and
+grandeur of the college buildings. The quaint courtesy, gentle manners
+and affectionate demeanor of the little ones toward one another, was a
+surprise to me. I had visited infant schools of my own and other
+countries, where I had witnessed the display of human nature,
+unrestrained by mature discretion and policy. Fights, quarrels, kicks,
+screams, the unlawful seizure of toys and trinkets, and other
+misdemeanors, were generally the principal exhibits. But here it was all
+different. I thought, as I looked at them, that should a philanthropist
+from the outside world have chanced unknowingly upon the playground of a
+Mizora infant school, he would have believed himself in a company of
+little angels.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></p><p>At first, a kindness so universal impressed me as studied; a species of
+refined courtesy in which the children were drilled. But time and
+observation proved to me that it was the natural impulse of the heart,
+an inherited trait of moral culture. In <i>my</i> world, kindness and
+affection were family possessions, extended occasionally to
+acquaintances. Beyond this was courtesy only for the great busy bustling
+mass of humanity called&mdash;"the world."</p>
+
+<p>It must not be understood that there was no variety of character in
+Mizora. Just as marked a difference was to be found there as elsewhere;
+but it was elevated and ennobled. Its evil tendencies had been
+eliminated. There were many causes that had made this possible. The
+first, and probably the most influential, was the extreme cheapness of
+living. Food and fuel were items of so small consequence, that poverty
+had become unknown. Added to this, and to me by far the most vital
+reason, was their system of free education. In contemplating the state
+of enlightenment to which Mizora had attained, I became an enthusiast
+upon the subject of education, and resolved, should I ever again reach
+the upper world, to devote all my energies and ability to convincing the
+governments of its importance. I believe it is the duty of every
+government to make its schools and colleges, and everything appertaining
+to education&mdash;FREE. To be always starved for knowledge is a more pitiful
+craving than to hunger for bread. One dwarfs the body; the other the
+mind.</p>
+
+<p>The utmost care was bestowed upon the training and education of the
+children. There was nothing that I met with in that beautiful and happy
+country I longed more to bring with me to the inhabitants of my world,
+than their manner of rearing children. The most scrupulous attention was
+paid to their diet and exercise, both mental and physical. The result
+was plump limbs, healthy, happy faces and joyous spirits. In all the
+fifteen years that I spent in Mizora, I never saw a tear of sorrow fall
+from children's eyes. Admirable sanitary regulations exist in all the
+cities and villages of the land, which insures them pure air. I may
+state here that every private-house looks as carefully to the condition
+of its atmosphere, as we do to the material neatness of ours.</p>
+
+<p>The only intense feeling that I could discover among these people was
+the love between parent and child. I visited the theater where the
+tragedy of the play was the destruction of a daughter by shipwreck in
+view of the distracted mother. The scenery was managed with wonderful
+realism. The thunder of the surf as it beat upon the shore, the
+frightful carnival of wind and waves that no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> human power could still,
+and the agony of the mother watching the vessel break to pieces upon the
+rock and her child sink into the boiling water to rise no more, was
+thrilling beyond my power to describe. I lost control of my feelings.
+The audience wept and applauded; and when the curtain fell, I could
+scarcely believe it had only been a play. The love of Mizora women for
+their children is strong and deep. They consider the care of them a
+sacred duty, fraught with the noblest results of life. A daughter of
+scholarly attainments and noble character is a credit to her mother.
+That selfish mother who looks upon her children as so many afflictions
+is unknown to Mizora. If a mother should ever feel her children as
+burdens upon her, she would never give it expression, as any dereliction
+of duty would be severely rebuked by the whole community, if not
+punished by banishment. Corporal punishment was unknown.</p>
+
+<p>I received an invitation from a lady prominent in literature and science
+to make her a visit. I accepted with gratification, as it would afford
+me the opportunity I coveted to become acquainted with the domestic life
+of Mizora, and perhaps penetrate its greatest mystery, for I must
+confess that the singular dearth of anything and everything resembling
+Man, never ceased to prey upon my curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>The lady was the editor and proprietor of the largest and most widely
+known scientific and literary magazine in the country. She was the
+mother of eight children, and possessed one of the largest fortunes and
+most magnificent residences in the country.</p>
+
+<p>The house stood on an elevation, and was a magnificent structure of grey
+granite, with polished cornices. The porch floors were of clouded
+marble. The pillars supporting its roof were round shafts of the same
+material, with vines of ivy, grape and rose winding about them, carved
+and colored into perfect representations of the natural shrubs.</p>
+
+<p>The drawing-room, which was vast and imposing in size and appearance,
+had a floor of pure white marble. The mantels and window-sills were of
+white onyx, with delicate vinings of pink and green. The floor was
+strewn with richly colored mats and rugs. Luxurious sofas and chairs
+comprised the only furniture. Each corner contained a piece of fine
+statuary. From the centre of the ceiling depended a large gold basin of
+beautiful design and workmanship, in which played a miniature fountain
+of perfumed water that filled the air with a delicate fragrance. The
+walls were divided into panels<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> of polished and unpolished granite. On
+the unpolished panels hung paintings of scenery. The dull, gray color of
+the walls brought out in sharp and tasteful relief the few costly and
+elegant adornments of the room: a placid landscape with mountains dimly
+outlining the distance. A water scene with a boat idly drifting,
+occupied by a solitary figure watching the play of variegated lights
+upon the tranquil waters. Then came a wild and rugged mountain scene
+with precipices and a foaming torrent. Then a concert of birds amusingly
+treated.</p>
+
+<p>The onyx marble mantel-piece contained but a single ornament&mdash;an
+orchestra. A coral vase contained a large and perfect tiger lily, made
+of gold. Each stamen supported a tiny figure carved out of ivory,
+holding a musical instrument. When they played, each figure appeared
+instinct with life, like the mythical fairies of my childhood; and the
+music was so sweet, yet faint, that I readily imagined the charmed ring
+and tiny dancers keeping time to its rhythm.</p>
+
+<p>The drawing-room presented a vista of arches draped in curtains of a
+rare texture, though I afterward learned they were spun glass. The one
+that draped the entrance to the conservatory looked like sea foam with
+the faint blush of day shining through it. The conservatory was in the
+shape of a half sphere, and entirely of glass. From its dome, more than
+a hundred feet above our heads, hung a globe of white fire that gave
+forth a soft clear light. Terminating, as it did, the long vista of
+arches with their transparent hangings of cobweb texture, it presented a
+picture of magnificence and beauty indescribably.</p>
+
+<p>The other apartments displayed the same taste and luxury. The
+sitting-room contained an instrument resembling a grand piano.</p>
+
+<p>The grounds surrounding this elegant home were adorned with natural and
+artificial beauties, Grottoes, fountains, lakes, cascades, terraces of
+flowers, statuary, arbors and foliage in endless variety, that rendered
+it a miniature paradise. In these grounds, darting in and out among the
+avenues, playing hide-and-seek behind the statuary, or otherwise amusing
+themselves, I met eight lovely children, ranging from infancy to young
+maidenhood. The glowing cheeks and eyes, and supple limbs spoke of
+perfect health and happiness. When they saw their mother coming, they
+ran to meet her, the oldest carrying the two-year old baby. The stately
+woman greeted each with a loving kiss. She showed in loving glance and
+action how dear they all were to her. For the time being she unbent,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>
+and became a child herself in the interest she took in their prattle and
+mirth. A true mother and happy children.</p>
+
+<p>I discovered that each department of this handsome home was under the
+care of a professional artist. I remarked to my hostess that I had
+supposed her home was the expression of her own taste.</p>
+
+<p>"So it is," she replied; "but it requires an equally well educated taste
+to carry out my designs. The arrangement and ornamentation of my grounds
+were suggested by me, and planned and executed by my landscape artist."</p>
+
+<p>After supper we repaired to the general sitting-room. The eldest
+daughter had been deeply absorbed in a book before we came in. She
+closed and left it upon a table. I watched for an opportunity to
+carelessly pick it up and examine it. It was a novel I felt sure, for
+she appeared to resign it reluctantly out of courtesy to her guest. I
+might, from it, gather some clue to the mystery of the male sex. I took
+up the book and opened it. It was The Conservation of Force and The
+Phenomena of Nature. I laid it down with a sigh of discomfiture.</p>
+
+<p>The next evening, my hostess gave a small entertainment, and what was my
+amazement, not to say offense, to perceive the cook, the chamber-maid,
+and in fact all the servants in the establishment, enter and join in the
+conversation and amusement. The cook was asked to sing, for, with the
+exception of myself&mdash;and I tried to conceal it&mdash;no one appeared to take
+umbrage at her presence. She sat down to the piano and sang a pretty
+ballad in a charming manner. Her voice was cultivated and musical, as
+are all the voices in Mizora, but it was lacking in the qualities that
+make a great singer, yet it had a plaintive sweetness that was very
+attractive.</p>
+
+<p>I was dumbfounded at her presumption. In my country such a thing is
+unknown as a servant entertaining guests in such a capacity, and
+especially among people of my rank and position in the world.</p>
+
+<p>I repelled some advances she made me with a hauteur and coldness that it
+mortified me afterward to remember. Instead of being <i>my</i> inferior, I
+was her's, and she knew it; but neither by look, tone nor action did she
+betray her consciousness of it. I had to acknowledge that her hands were
+more delicately modeled than mine, and her bearing had a dignity and
+elegance that might have been envied by the most aristocratic dame of my
+own land. Knowing that the Mizora people were peculiar in their social
+ideas, I essayed to repress my indignation at the time, but later I
+unburdened myself<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> to Wauna who, with her usual sweetness and
+gentleness, explained to me that her occupation was a mere matter of
+choice with her.</p>
+
+<p>"She is one of the most distinguished chemists of this nation. She
+solved the problem of making bread out of limestone of a much finer
+quality than had been in use before."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't tell me that you gave me a stone when I asked for bread!" I
+exclaimed.</p>
+
+<p>"We have not done that," replied Wauna; "but we have given you what you
+took for bread, but which is manufactured out of limestone and the
+refuse of the marble quarries."</p>
+
+<p>I looked at her in such inane astonishment that she hastened to add:</p>
+
+<p>"I will take you to one of the large factories some day. They are always
+in the mountains where the stone is abundant. You can there see loaves
+by the thousands packed in great glass tanks for shipment to the
+different markets. And they do not cost the manufacturer above one
+centime per hundred."</p>
+
+<p>"And what royalty does the discoverer get for this wonder of chemistry?"</p>
+
+<p>"None. Whenever anything of that kind is discovered in our country, it
+is purchased outright by the government, and then made public for the
+benefit of all. The competition among manufacturers consists in the care
+and exactness with which they combine the necessary elements. There is
+quite a difference in the taste and quality of our bread as it comes
+from different factories."</p>
+
+<p>"Why doesn't such a talented person quit working in another woman's
+kitchen and keep herself like a lady?" I inquired, all the prejudice of
+indolent wealth against labor coming up in my thoughts.</p>
+
+<p>"She has a taste for that kind of work," replied Wauna, "instead of for
+making dresses, or carving gems, or painting. She often says she could
+not make a straight line if she tried, yet she can put together with
+such nicety and chemical skill the elements that form an omelette or a
+custard, that she has become famous. She teaches all who desire to
+learn, but none seem to equal her. She was born with a genius for
+cooking and nothing else. Haven't you seen her with a long glass tube
+testing the vessels of vegetables and fruit that were cooking?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," I answered. "It was from that that I supposed her occupation
+menial."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span></p><p>"Visitors from other cities," continued Wauna, "nearly always inquire
+for her first."</p>
+
+<p>Perceiving the mistake that I had made, I ventured an apology for my
+behavior toward her, and Wauna replied, with a frankness that nearly
+crushed me:</p>
+
+<p>"We all noticed it, but do not fear a retaliation," she added sweetly.
+"We know that you are from a civilization that we look back upon as one
+of barbarism."</p>
+
+<p>I acknowledged that if any superciliousness existed in Mizora while I
+was there, I must have had it.</p>
+
+<p>The guests departed without refreshments having been served. I explained
+the custom of entertainment in my country, which elicited expressions of
+astonishment. It would be insulting to offer refreshments of any kind to
+a guest between the regular hours for dining, as it would imply a desire
+on your part to impair their health. Such was the explanation of what in
+my country would be deemed a gross neglect of duty. Their custom was
+probably the result of two causes: an enlightened knowledge of the laws
+of health, and the extreme cheapness of all luxuries of the table which
+the skill of the chemist had made available to every class of people in
+the land.</p>
+
+<p>The word "servant" did not exist in the language of Mizora; neither had
+they an equivalent for it in the sense in which we understand and use
+the word. I could not tell a servant&mdash;for I must use the word to be
+understood&mdash;from a professor in the National College. They were all
+highly-educated, refined, lady-like and lovely. Their occupations were
+always matters of choice, for, as there was nothing in them to detract
+from their social position, they selected the one they knew they had the
+ability to fill. Hence those positions <i>we</i> are accustomed to regard as
+menial, were there filled by ladies of the highest culture and
+refinement; consequently the domestic duties of a Mizora household moved
+to their accomplishment with the ease and regularity of fine machinery.</p>
+
+<p>It was long before I could comprehend the dignity they attached to the
+humblest vocations. They had one proverb that embraced it all: "Labor is
+the necessity of life." I studied this peculiar phase of Mizora life,
+and at last comprehended that in this very law of social equality lay
+the foundation of their superiority. Their admirable system of adapting
+the mind to the vocation in which it was most capable of excelling, and
+endowing that with dignity and respect, and, at the same time,
+compelling the highest mental culture <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>possible, had produced a nation
+in the enjoyment of universal refinement, and a higher order of
+intelligence than any yet known to the outside world.</p>
+
+<p>The standard of an ordinary education was to me astonishingly high. The
+reason for it was easily understood when informed that the only
+aristocracy of the country was that of intellect. Scholars, artists,
+scientists, literateurs, all those excelling in intellectual gifts or
+attainments, were alone regarded as superiors by the masses.</p>
+
+<p>In all the houses that I had visited I had never seen a portrait hung in
+a room thrown open to visitors. On inquiry, I was informed that it was a
+lack of taste to make a portrait conspicuous.</p>
+
+<p>"You meet faces at all times," said my informant, "but you cannot at all
+times have a variety of scenery before you. How monotonous it would be
+with a drawing-room full of women, and the walls filled with their
+painted representatives. We never do it."</p>
+
+<p>"Then where do you keep your family portraits?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ours is in a gallery upstairs."</p>
+
+<p>I requested to be shown this, and was conducted to a very long apartment
+on the third floor, devoted exclusively to relics and portraits of
+family ancestry. There were over three thousand portraits of blond
+women, which my hostess' daughter informed me represented her
+grandmothers for ages back. Not one word did she say about her
+grandfathers.</p>
+
+<p>I may mention here that no word existed in their dictionaries that was
+equivalent to the word "man." I had made myself acquainted with this
+fact as soon as I had acquired sufficient knowledge of their language.
+My astonishment at it cannot be described. It was a mystery that became
+more and more perplexing. Never in the closest intimacy that I could
+secure could I obtain the slightest clue, the least suggestion relating
+to the presence of man. My friend's infant, scarcely two years old,
+prattled of everything but a father.</p>
+
+<p>I cannot explain a certain impressive dignity about the women of Mizora
+that, in spite of their amiability and winning gentleness, forbade a
+close questioning into private affairs. My hostess never spoke of her
+business. It would have been a breach of etiquette to have questioned
+her about it. I could not bring myself to intrude the question of the
+marked absence of men, when not the slightest allusion was ever made to
+them by any citizen.</p>
+
+<p>So time passed on, confirming my high opinion of them, and yet I knew
+and felt and believed that some strange and incomprehensible<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> mystery
+surrounded them, and when I had abandoned all hope of a solution to it,
+it solved itself in the most unexpected and yet natural manner, and I
+was more astonished at the solution than I was at the mystery.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2>
+
+<p>Their domestic life was so harmonious and perfect that it was a
+perpetual pleasure to contemplate.</p>
+
+<p>Human nature finds its sweetest pleasure, its happiest content, within
+its own home circle; and in Mizora I found no exception to the rule. The
+arrangement and adornment of every house in Mizora were evidently for
+the comfort and happiness of its inmates. To purchase anything for
+merely outside show, or to excite the envy or jealousy of a neighbor,
+was never thought of by an inhabitant of Mizora.</p>
+
+<p>The houses that were built to rent excited my admiration quite as much
+as did the private residences. They all seemed to have been designed
+with two special objects in view&mdash;beauty and comfort. Houses built to
+rent in large cities were always in the form of a hollow square,
+inclosing a commodious and handsomely decorated park. The back was
+adorned with an upper and lower piazza opening upon the park. The suites
+of rooms were so arranged as to exclusively separate their occupants
+from all others. The park was undivided. The center was occupied by a
+fountain large enough to shoot its spray as high as the uppermost
+piazza. The park was furnished with rustic seats and shade trees,
+frequently of immense size, branched above its smooth walks and
+promenades, where baby wagons, velocipedes and hobby horses on wheels
+could have uninterrupted sport.</p>
+
+<p>Suburban residences, designed for rent, were on a similar but more
+amplified plan. The houses were detached, but the grounds were in
+common. Many private residences were also constructed on the same plan.
+Five or six acres would be purchased by a dozen families who were not
+rich enough to own large places separately. A separate residence would
+be built for each family, but the ground would be laid off and
+ornamented like a private park. Each of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> dozen families would thus
+have a beautiful view and the privilege of the whole ground. In this
+way, cascades, fountains, rustic arbors, rockeries, aquariums, tiny
+lakes, and every variety of landscape ornamenting, could be supplied at
+a comparatively small cost to each family.</p>
+
+<p>Should any one wish to sell, they disposed of their house and
+one-twelfth of the undivided ground, and a certain per cent. of the
+value of its ornaments. The established custom was never to remove or
+alter property thus purchased without the consent of the other
+shareholders. Where a people had been educated to regard justice and
+conscience as their law, such an arrangement could be beneficial to an
+entire city.</p>
+
+<p>Financial ability does not belong to every one, and this plan of uniting
+small capitals gave opportunity to the less wealthy classes to enjoy all
+the luxuries that belong to the rich. In fact some of the handsomest
+parks I saw in Mizora were owned and kept up in this manner. Sometimes
+as many as twenty families united in the purchase of an estate, and
+constructed artificial lakes large enough to sail upon. Artificial
+cascades and fountains of wonderful size and beauty were common
+ornaments in all the private and public parks of the city. I noticed in
+all the cities that I visited the beauty and charm of the public parks,
+which were found in all sections.</p>
+
+<p>The walks were smoothly paved and shaded by trees of enormous size. They
+were always frequented by children, who could romp and play in these
+sylvan retreats of beauty in perfect security.</p>
+
+<p>The high state of culture arrived at by the Mizora people rendered a
+luxurious style of living a necessity to all. Many things that I had
+been brought up to regard as the exclusive privileges of the rich, were
+here the common pleasure of every one. There was no distinction of
+classes; no genteel-poverty people, who denied themselves necessities
+that they might appear to have luxuries. There was not a home in Mizora
+that I entered&mdash;and I had access to many&mdash;that did not give the
+impression of wealth in all its appointments.</p>
+
+<p>I asked the Preceptress to explain to me how I might carry back to the
+people of my country this social happiness, this equality of physical
+comfort and luxury; and she answered me with emphasis:</p>
+
+<p>"Educate them. Convince the rich that by educating the poor, they are
+providing for their own safety. They will have fewer prisons to build,
+fewer courts to sustain. Educated Labor will work out its own salvation
+against Capital. Let the children of toil start in life<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> with exactly
+the same educational advantages that are enjoyed by the rich. Give them
+the same physical and moral training, and let the rich pay for it by
+taxes."</p>
+
+<p>I shook my head "They will never submit to it," was my reluctant
+admission.</p>
+
+<p>"Appeal to their selfishness," urged the Preceptress "Get them to open
+their college doors and ask all to come and be taught without money and
+without price. The power of capital is great, but stinted and ignorant
+toil will rise against its oppression, and innocence and guilt will
+alike suffer from its fury. Have you never known such an occurrence?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not in my day or country," I answered "But the city in which I was
+educated has such a history. Its gutters flowed with human blood, the
+blood of its nobles."</p>
+
+<p>She inclined her head significantly. "It will be repeated," she said
+sadly, "unless you educate them. Give their bright and active minds the
+power of knowledge. They will use it wisely, for their own and their
+country's welfare."</p>
+
+<p>I doubted my ability to do this, to contend against rooted and inherited
+prejudice, but I resolved to try. I did not need to be told that the
+rich and powerful had a monopoly of intellect: Nature was not partial to
+them, for the children of the poor, I well knew, were often handsomer
+and more intellectual than the offspring of wealth and aristocratic
+birth.</p>
+
+<p>I have before spoken of the positions occupied by those who performed
+what I had been bred to regard as menial work. At first, the mere fact
+of the person who presided over the kitchen being presented to me as an
+equal, was outraging to all my hereditary dignity and pride of birth. No
+one could be more pronounced in a consciousness of inherited nobility
+than I. I had been taught from infancy to regard myself as a superior
+being, merely because the accident of birth had made me so, and the
+arrogance with which I had treated some of my less favored schoolmates
+reverted to me with mortifying regret, when, having asked Wauna to point
+out to me the nobly born, she looked at me with her sweet expression of
+candor and innocence and said:</p>
+
+<p>"We have no nobility of birth. As I once before told you, intellect is
+our only standard of excellence. It alone occupies an exalted place and
+receives the homage of our people."</p>
+
+<p>In a subsequent conversation with her mother, the Preceptress, she said:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p><p>"In remote ages, great honor and deference was paid to all who were
+born of rulers, and the designation 'noble blood,' was applied to them.
+At one time in the history of our country they could commit any outrage
+upon society or morals without fear of punishment, simply because they
+belonged to the aristocracy. Even a heinous murder would be unnoticed if
+perpetrated by one of them. Nature alone did not favor them Imbecile and
+immoral minds fell to the lot of the aristocrat as often as to the lowly
+born. Nature's laws are inflexible and swerve not for any human wish.
+They outraged them by the admixture of kindred blood, and degeneracy was
+often the result. A people should always have for their chief ruler the
+highest and noblest intellect among them, but in those dark ages they
+were too often compelled to submit to the lowest, simply because it had
+been <i>born</i> to the position. But," she added, with a sweet smile,
+"<i>that</i> time lies many centuries behind us, and I sometimes think we had
+better forget it entirely."</p>
+
+<p>My first meeting with the domestics of my friend's house impressed me
+with their high mental culture, refinement and elegance. Certainly no
+"grande dame" of my own country but would have been proud of their
+beauty and graceful dignity.</p>
+
+<p>Prejudice, however deeply ingrained, could not resist the custom of a
+whole country, and especially such a one as Mizora, so I soon found
+myself on a familiar footing with my friend's "artist"&mdash;for the name by
+which they were designated as a class had very nearly the same meaning.</p>
+
+<p>Cooking was an art, and one which the people of Mizora had cultivated to
+the highest excellence. It is not strange, when their enlightenment is
+understood, that they should attach as much honor to it as the people of
+my country do to sculpture, painting and literature. The Preceptress
+told me that such would be the case with my people when education became
+universal and the poor could start in life with the same intellectual
+culture as the rich. The chemistry of food and its importance in
+preserving a youthful vigor and preventing disease, would then be
+understood and appreciated by all classes, and would receive the
+deference it deserved.</p>
+
+<p>"You will never realize," said the Preceptress earnestly, "the
+incalculable benefit that will accrue to your people from educating your
+poor. Urge that Government to try it for just twenty years, long enough
+for a generation to be born and mature. The bright and eager intellects
+of poverty will turn to Chemistry to solve the problems of cheap Light,
+cheap Fuel and cheap Food. When you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> can clothe yourselves from the
+fibre of the trees, and warm and light your dwellings from the water of
+your rivers, and eat of the stones of the earth, Poverty and Disease
+will be as unknown to your people as it is to mine."</p>
+
+<p>"If I should preach that to them, they would call me a maniac."</p>
+
+<p>"None but the ignorant will do so. From your description of the great
+thinkers of your country, I am inclined to believe there are minds among
+you advanced enough to believe in it."</p>
+
+<p>I remembered how steamboats and railroads and telegraphy had been
+opposed and ridiculed until proven practicable, and I took courage and
+resolved to follow the advice of my wise counselor.</p>
+
+<p>I had long felt a curiosity to behold the inner workings of a domestic's
+life, and one day ventured to ask my friend's permission to enter her
+kitchen. Surprise was manifested at such a request, when I began to
+apologize and explain. But my hostess smiled and said:</p>
+
+<p>"My kitchen is at all times as free to my guests as my drawing room."</p>
+
+<p>Every kitchen in Mizora is on the same plan and conducted the same way.
+To describe one, therefore, is to describe all. I undertook to explain
+that in my country, good breeding forbade a guest entering the host's
+kitchen, and frequently its appearance, and that of the cook's, would
+not conduce to gastric enjoyment of the edibles prepared in it.</p>
+
+<p>My first visit happened to be on scrubbing day, and I was greatly amused
+to see a little machine, with brushes and sponges attached, going over
+the floor at a swift rate, scouring and sponging dry as it went. Two
+vessels, one containing soap suds and the other clear water, were
+connected by small feed pipes with the brushes. As soon as the drying
+sponge became saturated, it was lifted by an ingenious yet simple
+contrivance into a vessel and pressed dry, and was again dropped to the
+floor.</p>
+
+<p>I inquired how it was turned to reverse its progress so as to clean the
+whole floor, and was told to watch when it struck the wall. I did so,
+and saw that the jar not only reversed the machine, but caused it to
+spring to the right about two feet, which was its width, and again begin
+work on a new line, to be again reversed in the same manner when it
+struck the opposite wall. Carpeted floors were swept by a similar
+contrivance.</p>
+
+<p>No wonder the "artists" of the kitchen had such a dainty appearance.
+They dipped their pretty hands in perfumed water and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> dried them on the
+finest and whitest damask, while machinery did the coarse work.</p>
+
+<p>Mizora, I discovered, was a land of brain workers. In every vocation of
+life machinery was called upon to perform the arduous physical labor.
+The whole domestic department was a marvel of ingenious mechanical
+contrivances. Dishwashing, scouring and cleaning of every description
+were done by machinery.</p>
+
+<p>The Preceptress told me that it was the result of enlightenment, and it
+would become the custom in my country to make machinery perform the
+laborious work when they learned the value of universal and advanced
+knowledge.</p>
+
+<p>I observed that the most exact care was given to the preparation of
+food. Every cook was required to be a chemist of the highest excellence;
+another thing that struck me as radically different from the custom in
+vogue in my country.</p>
+
+<p>Everything was cooked by hot air and under cover, so that no odor was
+perceptible in the room. Ventilating pipes conveyed the steam from
+cooking food out of doors. Vegetables and fruits appeared to acquire a
+richer flavor when thus cooked. The seasoning was done by exact weight
+and measure, and there was no stirring or tasting. A glass tube, on the
+principle of a thermometer, determined when each article was done. The
+perfection which they had attained as culinary chemists was a source of
+much gratification to me, both in the taste of food so delicious and
+palatable, and in its wholesome effect on my constitution. As to its
+deliciousness, a meal prepared by a Mizora cook could rival the fabled
+feasts of the gods. Its beneficial effects upon me were manifested in a
+healthier tone of body and an an increase of animal spirits, a
+pleasurable feeling of content and amiability.</p>
+
+<p>The Preceptress told me that the first step toward the eradication of
+disease was in the scientific preparation of food, and the establishment
+of schools where cooking was taught as an art to all who applied, and
+without charge. Placed upon a scientific basis it became respectable.</p>
+
+<p>"To eliminate from our food the deleterious earthy matter is our
+constant aim. To that alone do we owe immunity from old age far in
+advance of that period of life when your people become decrepit and
+senile. The human body is like a lamp-wick, which filters the oil while
+it furnishes light. In time the wick becomes clogged and useless and is
+thrown away. If the oil could be made perfectly pure, the wick would not
+fill up."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span></p><p>She gave this homely explanation with a smile and the air of a grown
+person trying to convey to the immature mind of a child an explanation
+of some of Nature's phenomena.</p>
+
+<p>I reflected upon their social condition and arrived at the conviction
+that there is no occupation in life but what has its usefulness and
+necessity, and, when united to culture and refinement, its dignity. A
+tree has a million leaves, yet each individual leaf, insignificant as it
+may appear, has its special share of work to perform in helping the tree
+to live and perfect its fruit. So should every citizen of a government
+contribute to its vitality and receive a share of its benefits.</p>
+
+<p>"Will the time ever come," I asked myself, "when my own country will see
+this and rise to a social, if not intellectual equality." And the
+admonition of the Preceptress would recur to my mind:</p>
+
+<p>"Educate them. Educate them, and enlightenment will solve for them every
+problem in Sociology."</p>
+
+<p>My observations in Mizora led me to believe that while Nature will
+permit and encourage the outgrowth of equality in refinement, she gives
+birth to a more decided prominence in the leadership of intellect.</p>
+
+<p>The lady who conducted me through the culinary department, and pointed
+out the machinery and explained its use and convenience, had the same
+grace and dignity of manner as the hostess displayed when exhibiting to
+me the rare plants in her conservatory.</p>
+
+<p>The laundry was a separate business. No one unconnected with it as a
+profession had anything to do with its duties. I visited several of the
+large city laundries and was informed that all were conducted alike.
+Steam was employed in the cleaning process, and the drying was done by
+hot air impregnated with ozone. This removed from white fabrics every
+vestige of discoloration or stain. I saw twelve dozen fine damask
+table-cloths cleaned, dried and ironed in thirty minutes. All done by
+machinery. They emerged from the rollers that ironed them looking like
+new pieces of goods, so pure was their color, and so glossy their
+finish.</p>
+
+<p>I inquired the price for doing them up, and was told a cent a piece.
+Twelve cents per dozen was the established price for doing up clothes.
+Table-cloths and similar articles were ironed between rollers
+constructed to admit their full width. Other articles of more
+complicated make, were ironed by machines constructed to suit them. Some
+articles were dressed by having hot air forced rapidly through them.
+Lace curtains, shawls, veils, spreads, tidies and all similar <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>articles,
+were by this process made to look like new, and at a cost that I thought
+ought certainly to reduce the establishment to beggary or insolvency.
+But here chemistry again was the magician that had made such cheap labor
+profitable. And such advanced knowledge of chemistry was the result of
+universal education.</p>
+
+<p>Ladies sent their finest laces to be renewed without fear of having them
+reduced to shreds. In doing up the frailest laces, nothing but hot air
+impregnated with ozone was employed. These were consecutively forced
+through the fabric after it was carefully stretched. Nothing was ever
+lost or torn, so methodical was the management of the work.</p>
+
+<p>I asked why cooking was not established as the laundry was, as a
+distinct public business, and was told that it had been tried a number
+of times, but had always been found impracticable. One kind of work in a
+laundry would suit everyone, but one course of cooking could not. Tastes
+and appetites differed greatly. What was palatable to one would be
+disliked by another, and to prepare food for a large number of
+customers, without knowing or being able to know exactly what the demand
+would be, had always resulted in large waste, and as the people of
+Mizora were the most rigid and exacting economists, it was not to be
+wondered at that they had selected the most economical plan. Every
+private cook could determine accurately the amount of food required for
+the household she prepared it for, and knowing their tastes she could
+cater to all without waste.</p>
+
+<p>"We, as yet," said my distinguished instructor, "derive all our fruit
+and vegetables from the soil. We have orchards and vineyards and gardens
+which we carefully tend, and which our knowledge of chemistry enables us
+to keep in health and productiveness. But there is always more or less
+earthy matter in all food derived from cultivating the soil, and the
+laboratories are now striving to produce artificial fruit and vegetables
+that will satisfy the palate and be free from deleterious matter."</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2>
+
+<p>One of the most curious and pleasing sights in Mizora was the flower
+gardens and conservatories. Roses of all sizes and colors and shades of
+color were there. Some two feet across were placed by the side of others
+not exceeding the fourth of an inch in order to display the disparity in
+size.</p>
+
+<p>To enter into a minute description of all the discoveries made by the
+Mizora people in fruit and floriculture, would be too tedious; suffice
+to say they had laid their hands upon the beautiful and compelled nature
+to reveal to them the secret of its formation. The number of petals,
+their color, shape and size, were produced as desired. The only thing
+they could neither create nor destroy was its perfume. I questioned the
+Preceptress as to the possibility of its ever being discovered? She
+replied:</p>
+
+<p>"It is the one secret of the rose that Nature refuses to reveal. I do
+not believe we shall ever possess the power to increase or diminish the
+odor of a flower. I believe that Nature will always reserve to herself
+the secret of its creation. The success that we enjoy in the wonderful
+cultivation of our fruits and flowers was one of our earliest scientific
+conquests."</p>
+
+<p>I learned that their orchards never failed to yield a bounteous harvest.
+They had many fruits that were new to me, and some that were new and
+greatly improved species of kinds that I had already seen and eaten in
+my own or other countries. Nothing that they cultivated was ever without
+its own peculiar beauty as well as usefulness. Their orchards, when the
+fruit was ripe, presented a picture of unique charm. Their trees were
+always trained into graceful shapes, and when the ripe fruit gleamed
+through the dark green foliage, every tree looked like a huge bouquet. A
+cherry tree that I much admired, and the fruit of which I found
+surpassingly delicious, I must allow myself to describe. The cherries
+were not surprisingly large, but were of the colors and transparency of
+honey. They were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> seedless, the tree having to be propagated from slips.
+When the fruit was ripe the tree looked like a huge ball of pale amber
+gems hiding in the shadows of dark pointed leaves.</p>
+
+<p>Their grape arbors were delightful pictures in their season of maturity.
+Some vines had clusters of fruit three feet long; but these I was told
+were only to show what they <i>could</i> do in grape culture. The usual and
+marketable size of a bunch was from one to two pounds weight. The fruit
+was always perfect that was offered for sale.</p>
+
+<p>Science had provided the fruit growers of Mizora with permanent
+protections from all kinds of blight or decay.</p>
+
+<p>When I considered the wholesomeness of all kinds of food prepared for
+the inhabitants of this favored land. I began to think they might owe a
+goodly portion of their exceptional health to it, and a large share of
+their national amiability to their physical comfort. I made some such
+observation to the Preceptress, and she admitted its correctness.</p>
+
+<p>"The first step that my people made toward the eradication of disease
+was in the preparation of healthy food; not for the rich, who could
+obtain it themselves, but for the whole nation."</p>
+
+<p>I asked for further information and she added:</p>
+
+<p>"Science discovered that mysterious and complicated diseases often had
+their origin in adulterated food. People suffered and died, ignorant of
+what produced their disease. The law, in the first place, rigidly
+enforced the marketing of clean and perfect fruit, and a wholesome
+quality of all other provisions. This was at first difficult to do, as
+in those ancient days, (I refer to a very remote period of our history)
+in order to make usurious profit, dealers adulterated all kinds of food;
+often with poisonous substances. When every state took charge of its
+markets and provided free schools for cooking, progress took a rapid
+advance. Do you wonder at it? Reflect then. How could I force my mind
+into complete absorption of some new combination of chemicals, while the
+gastric juice in my stomach was battling with sour or adulterated food?
+Nature would compel me to pay some attention to the discomfort of my
+digestive organs, and it might happen at a time when I was on the verge
+of a revelation in science, which might be lost. You may think it an
+insignificant matter to speak of in connection with the grand
+enlightenment that we possess; but Nature herself is a mass of little
+things. Our bodies, strong and supple as they are, are nothing but a
+union of tiny cells. It is by the investigation of little things that we
+have reached the great ones."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span></p><p>I felt a keen desire to know more about their progress toward universal
+health, feeling assured that the history of the extirpation of disease
+must be curious and instructive. I had been previously made acquainted
+with the fact that disease was really unknown to them, save in its
+historical existence. To cull this isolated history from their vast
+libraries of past events, would require a great deal of patient and
+laborious research, and the necessary reading of a great deal of matter
+that I could not be interested in, and that could not beside be of any
+real value to me, so I requested the Preceptress to give me an
+epitomized history of it in her own language, merely relating such facts
+as might be useful to me, and that I could comprehend, for I may as well
+bring forward the fact that, in comparison to theirs, my mind was as a
+savages would be to our civilization.</p>
+
+<p>Their brain was of a finer intellectual fiber. It possessed a wider,
+grander, more majestic receptivity. They absorbed ideas that passed over
+me like a cloud. Their imaginations were etherealized. They reached into
+what appeared to be materialless space, and brought from it substances I
+had never heard of before, and by processes I could not comprehend. They
+divided matter into new elements and utilized them. They disintegrated
+matter, added to it new properties and produced a different material. I
+saw the effects and uses of their chemistry, but that was all.</p>
+
+<p>There are minds belonging to my own age, as there have been to all ages,
+that are intellectually in advance of it. They live in a mental and
+prophetic world of their own, and leave behind them discoveries,
+inventions and teachings that benefit and ennoble the generations to
+come. Could such a mind have chanced upon Mizora, as I chanced upon it,
+it might have consorted with its intellect, and brought from the
+companionship ideas that I could not receive, and sciences that I can
+find no words in my language to represent. The impression that my own
+country might make upon a savage, may describe my relation to Mizora.
+What could an uncivilized mind say of our railroads, or magnificent
+cathedrals, our palaces, our splendor, our wealth, our works of art.
+They would be as difficult of representation as were the lofty aims, the
+unselfishness in living, the perfect love, honor and intellectual
+grandeur, and the universal comfort and luxury found in Mizora, were to
+me. To them the cultivation of the mind was an imperative duty, that
+neither age nor condition retarded. To do good, to be approved by their
+own conscience, was their constant pleasure.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2>
+
+<p>It was during my visit at my friend's house that I first witnessed the
+peculiar manner in which the markets in Mizora are conducted.
+Everything, as usual, was fastidiously neat and clean. The fruit and
+vegetables were fresh and perfect. I examined quantities of them to
+satisfy myself, and not a blemish or imperfection could be found on any.
+None but buyers were attending market. Baskets of fruit, bunches of
+vegetables and, in fact, everything exhibited for sale, had the quality
+and the price labeled upon it. Small wicker baskets were near to receive
+the change. When a buyer had selected what suited her, she dropped the
+label and the change in the basket. I saw one basket filled with gold
+and silver coin, yet not one would be missing when the owner came to
+count up the sales. Sometimes a purchaser was obliged to change a large
+piece of money, but it was always done accurately.</p>
+
+<p>There was one singular trait these people possessed that, in conjunction
+with their other characteristics, may seem unnatural: they would give
+and exact the last centime (a quarter of a cent) in a trade. I noticed
+this peculiarity so frequently that I inquired the reason for it, and
+when I had studied it over I decided that, like all the other rules that
+these admirable people had established, it was wise. Said my friend:</p>
+
+<p>"We set a just value on everything we prepare for sale. Anything above
+or below that, would be unjust to buyer or seller."</p>
+
+<p>The varieties of apples, pears, peaches and other fruits had their names
+attached, with the quality, sweet, sour, or slightly acid. In no
+instance was it found to be incorrectly stated. I came to one stall that
+contained nothing but glass jars of butter and cream. The butter was a
+rich buff color, like very fine qualities I had seen in my own country.
+The cream, an article I am fond of drinking, looked so tempting I longed
+to purchase a glass for that purpose. The lady whom I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>accompanied (my
+hostess' cook) informed me that it was artificially prepared. The butter
+and cheese were chemical productions. Different laboratories produced
+articles of varying flavor, according to the chemist's skill. Although
+their construction was no secret, yet some laboratories enjoyed special
+reputation for their butter and cheese owing to the accuracy with which
+their elements were combined.</p>
+
+<p>She gave me quite a history about artificial food, also how they kept
+fruits and vegetables in their natural state for years without decaying
+or losing their flavor, so that when eaten they were nearly as fine as
+when freshly gathered. After hearing that the cream was manufactured, I
+resolved to taste it. Dropping my coin into the basket, I took up a
+glass and drank it. A look of disgust crossed the countenance of my
+companion.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you not drink this?" I asked in surprise, as I set down the empty
+vessel. "It is truly delicious."</p>
+
+<p>"At regular meal times we all use it, and sometimes drink it in
+preference to other beverages&mdash;but never in public. You will never see a
+citizen of Mizora eating in public. Look all over this market and you
+will not discover one person, either adult or child, eating or drinking,
+unless it be water."</p>
+
+<p>I could not; and I felt keenly mortified at my mistake. Yet in my own
+country and others that, according to our standard, are highly
+civilized, a beverage is made from the juice of the corn that is not
+only drank in public places, but its effects, which are always
+unbecoming, are exhibited also, and frequently without reproof. However,
+I said nothing to my companion about this beverage. It bears no
+comparison in color or taste to that made in Mizora. I could not have
+distinguished the latter from the finest dairy cream.</p>
+
+<p>The next place of interest that I visited were their mercantile bazars
+or stores. Here I found things looking quite familiar. The goods were
+piled upon shelves behind counters, and numerous clerks were in
+attendance. It was the regular day for shopping among the Mizora ladies,
+and the merchants had made a display of their prettiest and richest
+goods. I noticed the ladies were as elegantly dressed as if for a
+reception, and learned that it was the custom. They would meet a great
+many friends and acquaintances, and dressed to honor the occasion.</p>
+
+<p>It was my first shopping experience in Mizora, and I quite mortified
+myself by removing my glove and rubbing and examining closely the goods
+I thought of purchasing. I entirely ignored the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> sweet voice of the
+clerk that was gently informing me that it was "pure linen" or "pure
+wool," so habituated had I become in my own country to being my own
+judge of the quality of the goods I was purchasing, regardless always of
+the seller's recommendation of it. I found it difficult, especially in
+such circumstances, to always remember their strict adherence to honesty
+and fair dealing. I felt rebuked when I looked around and saw the
+actions of the other ladies in buying.</p>
+
+<p>In manufactured goods, as in all other things, not the slightest
+cheatery is to be found. Woolen and cotton mixtures were never sold for
+pure wool. Nobody seemed to have heard of the art of glossing muslin
+cuffs and collars and selling them for pure linen.</p>
+
+<p>Fearing that I had wounded the feelings of the lady in attendance upon
+me, I hastened to apologize by explaining the peculiar methods of trade
+that were practiced in my own country. They were immediately pronounced
+barbarous.</p>
+
+<p>I noticed that ladies in shopping examined colors and effects of
+trimmings or combinations, but never examined the quality. Whatever the
+attendant said about <i>that</i> was received as a fact.</p>
+
+<p>The reason for the absence of attendants in the markets and the presence
+of them in mercantile houses was apparent at once. The market articles
+were brought fresh every day, while goods were stored.</p>
+
+<p>Their business houses and their manner of shopping were unlike anything
+I had ever met with before. The houses were all built in a hollow
+square, enclosing a garden with a fountain in the center. These were
+invariably roofed over with glass, as was the entire building. In winter
+the garden was as warm as the interior of the store. It was adorned with
+flowers and shrubs. I often saw ladies and children promenading in these
+pretty inclosures, or sitting on their rustic sofas conversing, while
+their friends were shopping in the store. The arrangement gave perfect
+light and comfort to both clerks and customers, and the display of rich
+and handsome fabrics was enhanced by the bit of scenery beyond. In
+summer the water for the fountain was artificially cooled.</p>
+
+<p>Every clerk was provided with a chair suspended by pulleys from strong
+iron rods fastened above. They could be raised or lowered at will; and
+when not occupied, could be drawn up out of the way. After the goods
+were purchased, they were placed in a machine that wrapped and tied them
+ready for delivery.</p>
+
+<p>A dining-room was always a part of every store. I desired to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> shown
+this, and found it as tasteful and elegant in its appointments as a
+private one would be. Silver and china and fine damask made it inviting
+to the eye, and I had no doubt the cooking corresponded as well with the
+taste.</p>
+
+<p>The streets of Mizora were all paved, even the roads through the
+villages were furnished an artificial cover, durable, smooth and
+elastic. For this purpose a variety of materials were used. Some had
+artificial stone, in the manufacture of which Mizora could surpass
+nature's production. Artificial wood they also made and used for
+pavements, as well as cement made of fine sand. The latter was the least
+durable, but possessed considerable elasticity and made a very fine
+driving park. They were experimenting when I came away on sanded glass
+for road beds. The difficulty was to overcome its susceptibility to
+attrition. After business hours every street was swept by a machine. The
+streets and sidewalks, in dry weather, were as free from soil as the
+floor of a private-house would be.</p>
+
+<p>Animals and domestic fowls had long been extinct in Mizora. This was one
+cause of the weird silence that so impressed me on my first view of
+their capital city. Invention had superceded the usefulness of animals
+in all departments: in the field and the chemistry of food. Artificial
+power was utilized for all vehicles.</p>
+
+<p>The vehicle most popular with the Mizora ladies for shopping and culling
+purposes, was a very low carriage, sometimes with two seats, sometimes
+with one. They were upholstered with the richest fabrics, were
+exceedingly light and graceful in shape, and not above three feet from
+the ground. They were strong and durable, though frequently not
+exceeding fifty pounds in weight. The wheel was the curious and
+ingenious part of the structure, for in its peculiar construction lay
+the delight of its motion. The spokes were flat bands of steel, curved
+outward to the tire. The carriage had no spring other than these spokes,
+yet it moved like a boat gliding down stream with the current. I was
+fortunate enough to preserve a drawing of this wheel, which I hope some
+day to introduce in my own land. The carriages were propelled by
+compressed air or electricity; and sometimes with a mechanism that was
+simply pressed with the foot. I liked the compressed air best. It was
+most easily managed by me. The Mizora ladies preferred electricity, of
+which I was always afraid. They were experimenting with a new propelling
+power during my stay that was to be acted upon by light, but it had not
+come into general use, although I saw some vehicles that were propelled
+by it. They moved with incredible speed, so rapid indeed, that the
+upper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> part of the carriage had to be constructed of glass, and securely
+closed while in motion, to protect the occupant. It was destined, I
+heard some of their scientists say, to become universal, as it was the
+most economical power yet discovered. They patiently tried to explain it
+to me, but my faculties were not receptive to such advanced philosophy,
+and I had to abandon the hope of ever introducing it into my own
+country.</p>
+
+<p>There was another article manufactured in Mizora that excited my wonder
+and admiration. It was elastic glass. I have frequently mentioned the
+unique uses that they made of it, and I must now explain why. They had
+discovered a process to render it as pliable as rubber. It was more
+useful than rubber could be, for it was almost indestructible. It had
+superceded iron in many ways. All cooking utensils were made of it. It
+entered largely into the construction and decoration of houses. All
+cisterns and cellars had an inner lining of it. All underground pipes
+were made of it, and many things that are the necessities and luxuries
+of life.</p>
+
+<p>They spun it into threads as fine and delicate as a spider's gossamer,
+and wove it into a network of clear or variegated colors that dazzled
+the eye to behold. Innumerable were the lovely fabrics made of it. The
+frailest lace, in the most intricate and aerial patterns, that had the
+advantage of never soiling, never tearing, and never wearing out.
+Curtains for drawing-room arches were frequently made of it. Some of
+them looked like woven dew drops.</p>
+
+<p>One set of curtains that I greatly admired, and was a long time ignorant
+of what they were made of, were so unique, I must do myself the pleasure
+to describe them. They hung across the arch that led to the glass
+conservatory attached to my friend's handsome dwelling. Three very thin
+sheets of glass were woven separately and then joined at the edges so
+ingeniously as to defy detection. The inside curtain was one solid
+color: crimson. Over this was a curtain of snow flakes, delicate as
+those aerial nothings of the sky, and more durable than any fabric
+known. Hung across the arched entrance to a conservatory, with a great
+globe of white fire shining through it, it was lovely as the blush of
+Aphrodite when she rose from the sea, veiled in its fleecy foam.</p>
+
+<p>They also possessed the art of making glass highly refractive. Their
+table-ware surpassed in beauty all that I had ever previously seen. I
+saw tea cups as frail looking as soap bubbles, possessing the delicate
+iridescence of opals. Many other exquisite designs were the product of
+its flexibility and transparency. The first article that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>attracted my
+attention was the dress of an actress on the stage. It was lace, made of
+gossamer threads of amber in the design of lilies and leaves, and was
+worn over black velvet.</p>
+
+<p>The wonderful water scene that I beheld at the theatre was produced by
+waves made of glass and edged with foam, a milky glass spun into tiny
+bubbles. They were agitated by machinery that caused them to roll with a
+terribly natural look. The blinding flashes of lightning had been the
+display of genuine electricity.</p>
+
+<p>Nothing in the way of artistic effect could call forth admiration or
+favorable comment unless it was so exact an imitation of nature as to
+not be distinguished from the real without the closest scrutiny. In
+private life no one assumed a part. All the acting I ever saw in Mizora
+was done upon the stage.</p>
+
+<p>I could not appreciate their mental pleasures, any more than a savage
+could delight in a nocturne of Chopin. Yet one was the intellectual
+ecstasy of a sublime intelligence, and the other the harmonious rapture
+of a divinely melodious soul. I must here mention that the processes of
+chemical experiment in Mizora differed materially from those I had
+known. I had once seen and tasted a preparation called artificial cream
+that had been prepared by a friend of my fathers, an eminent English
+chemist. It was simply a combination of the known properties of cream
+united in the presence of gentle heat. But in Mizora they took certain
+chemicals and converted them into milk, and cream, and cheese, and
+butter, and every variety of meat, in a vessel that admitted neither air
+nor light. They claimed that the elements of air and light exercised a
+material influence upon the chemical production of foods, that they
+could not be made successfully by artificial processes when exposed to
+those two agents. Their earliest efforts had been unsuccessful of exact
+imitation, and a perfect result had only been obtained by closely
+counterfeiting the processes of nature.</p>
+
+<p>The cream prepared artificially that I had tasted in London, was the
+same color and consistency as natural cream, but it lacked its relish.
+The cream manufactured in Mizora was a perfect imitation of the finest
+dairy product.</p>
+
+<p>It was the same with meats; they combined the elements, and the article
+produced possessed no detrimental flavor. It was a more economical way
+of obtaining meat than by fattening animals.</p>
+
+<p>They were equally fortunate in the manufacture of clothing. Every
+mountain was a cultivated forest, from which they obtained every variety
+of fabric; silks, satins, velvets, laces, woolen goods, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> the richest
+articles of beauty and luxury, in which to array themselves, were put
+upon the market at a trifling cost, compared to what they were
+manufactured at in my own country. Pallid and haggard women and
+children, working incessantly for a pittance that barely sustained
+existence, was the ultimatum that the search after the cause of cheap
+prices arrived at in my world, but here it traveled from one bevy of
+beautiful workwoman to another until it ended at the Laboratory where
+Science sat throned, the grand, majestic, humane Queen of this thrice
+happy land.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2>
+
+<p>Whenever I inquired:</p>
+
+<p>"From whence comes the heat that is so evenly distributed throughout the
+dwellings and public buildings of Mizora?" they invariably pointed to
+the river. I asked in astonishment:</p>
+
+<p>"From water comes fire?"</p>
+
+<p>And they answered: "Yes."</p>
+
+<p>I had long before this time discovered that Mizora was a nation of very
+wonderful people, individually and collectively; and as every revelation
+of their genius occurred, I would feel as though I could not be
+surprised at any marvelous thing that they should claim to do, but I was
+really not prepared to believe that they could set the river on fire.
+Yet I found that such was, scientifically, the fact. It was one of their
+most curious and, at the same time, useful appliances of a philosophical
+discovery.</p>
+
+<p>They separated water into its two gases, and then, with their ingenious
+chemical skill, converted it into an economical fuel.</p>
+
+<p>Their coal mines had long been exhausted, as had many other of nature's
+resources for producing artificial heat. The dense population made it
+impracticable to cultivate forests for fuel. Its rapid increase demanded
+of Science the discovery of a fuel that could be consumed without loss
+to them, both in the matter consumed and in the expense of procuring it.
+Nothing seemed to answer their purpose so admirably as water. Water,
+when decomposed, becomes gas. Convert the gas into heat and it becomes
+water again. A very great heat produces only a small quantity of water:
+hence the extreme utility of water as a heat producing agent.</p>
+
+<p>The heating factories were all detached buildings, and generally, if at
+all practicable, situated near a river, or other body of water. Every
+precaution against accident was stringently observed.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span></p><p>There were several processes for decomposing the water explained to me,
+but the one preferred, and almost universally used by the people of
+Mizora, was electricity. The gases formed at the opposite poles of the
+electrical current, were received in large glass reservoirs, especially
+constructed for them.</p>
+
+<p>In preparing the heat that gave such a delightful temperature to the
+dwellings and public buildings of their vast cities, glass was always
+the material used in the construction of vessels and pipes. Glass pipes
+conveyed the separate gases of hydrogen and oxygen into an apartment
+especially prepared for the purpose, and united them upon ignited
+carbon. The heat produced was intense beyond description, and in the
+hands of less experienced and capable chemists, would have proved
+destructful to life and property. The hardest rock would melt in its
+embrace; yet, in the hands of these wonderful students of Nature, it was
+under perfect control and had been converted into one of the most
+healthful and agreeable agents of comfort and usefulness known. It was
+regulated with the same ease and convenience with which we increase or
+diminish the flames of a gas jet. It was conducted, by means of glass
+pipes, to every dwelling in the city. One factory supplied sufficient
+heat for over half a million inhabitants.</p>
+
+<p>I thought I was not so far behind Mizora in a knowledge of heating with
+hot air; yet, when I saw the practical application of their method, I
+could see no resemblance to that in use in my own world. In winter,
+every house in Mizora had an atmosphere throughout as balmy as the
+breath of the young summer. Country-houses and farm dwellings were all
+supplied with the same kind of heat.</p>
+
+<p>In point of economy it could not be surpassed. A city residence,
+containing twenty rooms of liberal size and an immense conservatory, was
+heated entire, at a cost of four hundred centimes a year. One dollar per
+annum for fuel.</p>
+
+<p>There was neither smoke, nor soot, nor dust. Instead of entering a room
+through a register, as I had always seen heated air supplied, it came
+through numerous small apertures in the walls of a room quite close to
+the floor, thus rendering its supply imperceptible, and making a draft
+of cold air impossible.</p>
+
+<p>The extreme cheapness of artificial heat made a conservatory a necessary
+luxury of every dwelling. The same pipes that supplied the dwelling
+rooms with warmth, supplied the hot-house also, but it was conveyed to
+the plants by a very different process.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p><p>They used electricity in their hot-houses to perfect their fruit, but
+in what way I could not comprehend; neither could I understand their
+method of supplying plants and fruits with carbonic acid gas. They
+manufactured it and turned it into their hot-houses during sleeping
+hours. No one was permitted to enter until the carbon had been absorbed.
+They had an instrument resembling a thermometer which gave the exact
+condition of the atmosphere. They were used in every house, as well as
+in the conservatories. The people of Mizora were constantly
+experimenting with those two chemical agents, electricity and carbonic
+acid gas, in their conservatories. They confidently believed that with
+their service, they could yet produce fruit from their hot-houses, that
+would equal in all respects the season grown article.</p>
+
+<p>They produced very fine hot-house fruit. It was more luscious than any
+artificially ripened fruit that I had ever tasted in my own country, yet
+it by no means compared with their season grown fruit. Their preserved
+fruit I thought much more natural in flavor than their hot-house fruit.</p>
+
+<p>Many of their private greenhouses were on a grand scale and contained
+fruit as well as flowers. A family that could not have a hot-house for
+fresh vegetables, with a few fruit trees in it, would be poor indeed.
+Where a number of families had united in purchasing extensive grounds,
+very fine conservatories were erected, their expense being divided among
+the property holders, and their luxuries enjoyed in common.</p>
+
+<p>So methodical were all the business plans of the Mizora people, and so
+strictly just were they in the observance of all business and social
+duties that no ill-feeling or jealousy could arise from a combination of
+capital in private luxuries. Such combinations were formed and carried
+out upon strictly business principles.</p>
+
+<p>If the admirable economy with which every species of work was carried on
+in Mizora could be thoroughly comprehended, the universality of luxuries
+need not be wondered at. They were drilled in economy from a very early
+period. It was taught them as a virtue.</p>
+
+<p>Machinery, with them, had become the slave of invention. I lived long
+enough in Mizora to comprehend that the absence of pauperism, genteel
+and otherwise, was largely due to the ingenious application of machinery
+to all kinds of physical labor. When the cost of producing luxuries
+decreases, the value of the luxuries produced must decrease with it. The
+result is they are within reach<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> of the narrowest incomes. A life
+surrounded by refinement must absorb some of it.</p>
+
+<p>I had a conversation with the Preceptress upon this subject, and she
+said:</p>
+
+<p>"Some natures are so undecided in character that they become only what
+their surroundings make them. Others only partially absorb tastes and
+sentiments that form the influence about them. They maintain a decided
+individuality; yet they are most always noticeably marked with the
+general character of their surroundings. It is very, very seldom that a
+nature is fixed from infancy in one channel."</p>
+
+<p>I told her that I knew of a people whose minds from infancy to mature
+age, never left the grooves they were born in. They belonged to every
+nationality, and had palaces built for them, and attendants with
+cultivated intelligences employed to wait upon them.</p>
+
+<p>"Are their minds of such vast importance to their nation? You have never
+before alluded to intellect so elevated as to command such royal
+homage." My friend spoke with awakened interest.</p>
+
+<p>"They are of no importance at all," I answered, humiliated at having
+alluded to them. "Some of them have not sufficient intelligence to even
+feed themselves."</p>
+
+<p>"And what are they?" she inquired anxiously.</p>
+
+<p>"They are idiots; human vegetables."</p>
+
+<p>"And you build palaces for them, and hire servants to feed and tend
+them, while the bright, ambitious children of the poor among you,
+struggle and suffer for mental advancement. How deplorably short-sighted
+are the wise ones of your world. Truly it were better in your country to
+be born an idiot than a poor genius." She sighed and looked grave.</p>
+
+<p>"What should we do with them?" I inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you do with the useless weeds in your garden," she asked
+significantly. "Do you carefully tend them, while drouth and frost and
+lack of nourishment cause your choice plants to wither and die?"</p>
+
+<p>"We are far behind you," I answered humbly. "But barbarous as you think
+we are, no epithet could be too scathing, too comprehensive of all that
+was vicious and inhuman, to apply to a person who should dare to assail
+the expense of those institutions, or suggest that they be converted to
+the cultivation of intellect that <i>could</i> be improved."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span></p><p>My friend looked thoughtful for a long time, then she resumed her
+discourse at the point where I had so unfortunately interrupted it.</p>
+
+<p>"No people," she said, "can rise to universal culture as long as they
+depend upon hand labor to produce any of the necessities of life. The
+absence of a demand for hand labor gives rise to an increasing demand
+for brain labor, and the natural and inevitable result is an increased
+mental activity. The discovery of a fuel that is furnished at so small a
+cost and with really no labor but what machinery performs, marks one
+grand era in our mental progress."</p>
+
+<p>In mentioning the numerous uses made of glass in Mizora, I must not
+forget to give some notice to their water supply in large cities. Owing
+to their cleanly advantages, the filtering and storing of rain-water in
+glass-lined cisterns supplied many family uses. But drinking water was
+brought to their large cities in a form that did not greatly differ from
+those I was already familiar with, excepting in cleanliness. Their
+reservoirs were dug in the ground and lined with glass, and a perfectly
+fitting cover placed on the top. They were constructed so that the water
+that passed through the glass feed pipes to the city should have a
+uniform temperature, that of ordinary spring water. The water in the
+covered reservoirs was always filtered and tested before passing into
+the distributing pipes.</p>
+
+<p>No citizen of Mizora ever hied to the country for pure water and fresh
+air. Science supplied both in a densely populated city.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2>
+
+<p>When a question as to the existence of social distinctions would be
+asked the citizens of Mizora, the invariable answer would be&mdash;there were
+none; yet a long and intimate acquaintance with them assured me that
+there were. They had an aristocracy; but of so peculiar and amiable a
+kind that it deserves a special mention. It took a long time for me to
+comprehend the exact condition of their society in this respect. That
+there were really no dividing lines between the person who superintended
+the kitchen and the one who paid her for it, in a social point of view,
+I could plainly see; yet there were distinctions; and rather sharply
+defined ones too.</p>
+
+<p>In order to explain more lucidly the peculiar social life of Mizora, I
+will ask you to remember some Charity Fair you have attended, perhaps
+participated in, and which had been gotten up and managed by women of
+the highest social rank. If in a country where titles and social
+positions were hereditary, it then represented the highest aristocracy
+of blood. Grand dames there departed from the routine of their daily
+lives and assumed the lowlier occupations of others. They stood behind
+counters, in booths, and sold fancy articles, or dispensed ices and
+lemonade, or waited upon customers at the refreshment tables; bringing
+in trays of eatables, gathering up and removing empty dishes; performing
+labor that, under the ordinary circumstances of life, they would not
+perform in their own homes, and for their own kindred. It was all done
+with the same conscious dignity and ease that characterized the
+statelier duties of their every day life. One fact was apparent to all:
+they were gentlewomen still. The refinement of their home education, and
+the charm of nourished beauty were, perhaps, more prominent in contrast
+with their assumed avocation.</p>
+
+<p>The Charity Fair, with its clerks and waiter girls and flower sellers
+called from the highest society, was a miniature picture of the actual<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>
+every-day social life of Mizora. The one who ordered a dinner at their
+finest hotel, had it served to her by one who occupied the same social
+standing. Yet there <i>was</i> a difference; but it was the difference of
+mind.</p>
+
+<p>The student in Sociology discovers that in all grades of society,
+congenial natures gravitate to a center. A differentiation of the
+highest mental quality was the result of this law in Mizora, and its
+co-ordinate part, their aristocracy.</p>
+
+<p>The social organism did not need legislation to increase its benefits;
+it turned to Science, and, through Science, to Nature. The Laboratory of
+the Chemist was the focus that drew the attention of all minds. Mizora
+might be called a great school of Nature, whose pupils studied her every
+phase, and pried into her secrets with persistent activity, and obeyed
+her instructions as an imperative duty. They observed Nature to be an
+economist, and practiced economy with scrupulous exactness.</p>
+
+<p>They had observed that in all grades of animal life, from the lowest
+form to the highest, wherever sociality had produced unity a leader was
+evolved, a superiority that differed in power according to the grade of
+development. In the earlier histories, the leaders were chosen for their
+prowess in arms. Great warriors became rulers, and soldiers were the
+aristocracy of the land. As civilization progressed and learning became
+more widely disseminated, the military retired before the more
+intellectual aristocracy of statemanship. Politics was the grand
+entrance to social eminence.</p>
+
+<p>"But," said my friend, "<i>we</i> have arrived at a higher, nobler, grander
+age. The military and political supremacies lived out their usefulness
+and decayed. A new era arrived. The differentia of mind evolved an
+aristocracy."</p>
+
+<p>Science has long been recognized as the greatest benefactor of our race.
+Its investigators and teachers are our only acknowledged superiors and
+leaders.</p>
+
+<p>Generally the grandest intellects and those which retain their creative
+power the longest, are of exceptionally slow development. Precocity is
+short lived, and brilliant rather than strong. This I knew to be true of
+my own race.</p>
+
+<p>In Mizora, a mind that developed late lost none of the opportunities
+that belong exclusively to the young of my own and other countries of
+the outer world. Their free schools and colleges were always open:
+always free. For this reason, it was no unusual thing for a person in
+Mizora to begin life at the very lowest grade and rise to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> its supreme
+height. Whenever the desire awakened, there was a helping hand extended
+on every side.</p>
+
+<p>The distinction between the aristocracy and the lower class, or the
+great intellects and the less, was similar to the relative positions of
+teacher and pupil. I recognized in this social condition the great media
+of their marvelous approach to perfection. This aristocracy was never
+arrogant, never supercilious, never aggressive. It was what the
+philosophers of our world are: tolerant, humane, sublime.</p>
+
+<p>In all communities of civilized nations marked musical talent will form
+social relations distinct from, but not superior to, other social
+relations. The leader of a musical club might also be the leader of
+another club devoted to exclusive literary pursuits; and both clubs
+possess equal social respect. Those who possess musical predilections,
+seek musical associations; those who are purely literary, seek their
+congenials. This is true of all other mental endowments or tastes; that
+which predominates will seek its affinity; be it in science, literature,
+politics, music, painting, or sculpture. Social organizations naturally
+grow out of other business pursuits and vocations of all grades and
+kinds. The society of Mizora was divided only by such distinctions. The
+scientific mind had precedence of all others. In the social world, they
+found more congenial pleasure in one another, and they mingled more
+frequently among themselves. Other professions and vocations followed
+their example for the same reason. Yet neither was barred by social
+caste from seeking society where she would. If the artisan sought social
+intercourse with a philosopher, she was expected to have prepared
+herself by mental training to be congenial. When a citizen of Mizora
+became ambitious to rise, she did not have to struggle with every
+species of opposition, and contend against rebuff and repulse. Correct
+language, refined tastes, dignified and graceful manners were the common
+acquirements of all. Mental culture of so high an order&mdash;I marveled that
+a lifetime should be long enough to acquire it in&mdash;was universal.</p>
+
+<p>Under such conditions social barriers could not be impregnable. In a
+world divided by poverty and opulence into all their intermediate
+grades, wealth must inevitably be pre-eminent. It represents refined and
+luxurious environments, and, if mind be there, intellectual pre-eminence
+also. Where wealth alone governs society it has its prerogatives.</p>
+
+<p>The wealth that affords the most luxurious entertainments must be the
+wealth that rules. Its privilege&mdash;its duty rather&mdash;is to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span>ignore all
+applicants to fraternization that cannot return what it receives. Where
+mind is the sole aristocracy it makes demands as rigid, though
+different, and mind was the aristocracy of Mizora. With them education
+is never at an end. I spoke of having graduated at a renowned school for
+young ladies, and when I explained that to graduate meant to finish
+one's education, it elicited a peal of silvery mirth.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>We</i> never graduate," said Wauna. "There is my mamma's mother, two
+centuries old, and still studying. I paid her a visit the other day and
+she took me into her laboratory. She is a manufacturer of lenses, and
+has been experimenting on microscopes. She has one now that possesses a
+truly wonderful power. The leaf of a pear tree, that she had allowed to
+become mouldy, was under the lens, and she told me to look.</p>
+
+<p>"A panorama of life and activity spread out before me in such magnitude
+that I can only compare it to the feeling one must possess who could be
+suspended in air and look down upon our world for a cycle of time.</p>
+
+<p>"Immense plains were visible with animals grazing upon them, that fought
+with and devoured one another. They perished and sank away and immense
+forests sprang up like magic. They were inhabited by insects and tiny
+creatures resembling birds. A sigh of air moved the leaf and a tiny drop
+of water, scarcely discernible to the naked eye rolled over the forests
+and plains, and before it passed to the other side of the leaf a great
+lake covered the spot. My great-great-grandmother has an acute conductor
+of sound that she has invented, so exquisite in mechanism as to reveal
+the voice of the tiniest insect. She put it to my ear, and the bellowing
+of the animals in battle, the chirp of the insects and the voices of the
+feathered mites could be clearly heard, but attenuated like the delicate
+note of two threads of spun glass clashed together."</p>
+
+<p>"And what good," I asked, "can all this knowledge do you? Your
+great-great-grandmother has condensed the learning of two centuries to
+evolve this one discovery. Is it not so?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," replied Wauna, and her look and tone were both solemn. "You ask
+me what good it can do? Reflect! If the history of a single leaf is so
+vast and yet ephemeral, what may not be the history of a single world?
+What, after all, are we when such an infinitesimal space can contain
+such wonderful transactions in a second of time."</p>
+
+<p>I shuddered at the thought she raised in my mind. But inherited<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> beliefs
+are not easily dissipated, so I only sought to change the subject.</p>
+
+<p>"But what is the use of studying <i>all</i> the time. There should be some
+period in your lives when you should be permitted to rest from your
+labors. It is truly irksome to me to see everybody still eager to learn
+more. The artist of the kitchen was up to the National College yesterday
+attending a lecture on chemistry. The artist who arranges my rooms is up
+there to-day listening to one on air. I can not understand why, having
+learned to make beds and cook to perfection, they should not be content
+with their knowledge and their work."</p>
+
+<p>"If you were one of us you would know," said Wauna. "It is a duty with
+us to constantly seek improvement. The culinary artist at the house
+where you are visiting, is a very fine chemist. She has a predilection
+for analyzing the construction of food. She may some day discover how
+<i>to</i> produce vegetables from the elements.</p>
+
+<p>"The artist who arranges your room is attending a lecture on air because
+her vocation calls for an accurate knowledge of it. She attends to the
+atmosphere in the whole house, and sees that it is in perfect health
+sustaining condition. Your hostess has a particular fondness for flowers
+and decorates all her rooms with them. All plants are not harmless
+occupants of livingrooms. Some give forth exhalations that are really
+noxious. That artist has so accurate a knowledge of air that she can
+keep the atmosphere of your home in a condition of perfect purity; yet
+she knows that her education is not finished. She is constantly studying
+and advancing. The time may come when she, too, will add a grand
+discovery to science.</p>
+
+<p>"Had my ancestors thought as you do, and rested on an inferior
+education, I should not represent the advanced stage of development that
+I do. As it is, when my mind reaches the age of my mother's, it will
+have a larger comprehensiveness than hers. She already discerns it. My
+children will have intellects of a finer grade than mine. This is our
+system of mind culture. The intellect is of slower development than the
+body, and takes longer to decay. The gradations of advancement from one
+intellectual basis to another, in a social body, requires centuries to
+mark a distinct change in the earlier ages of civilization, but we have
+now arrived at a stage when advancement is clearly perceptible between
+one generation and the next."</p>
+
+<p>Wauna's mother added:</p>
+
+<p>"Universal education is the great destroyer of castes. It is the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>conqueror of poverty and the foundation of patriotism. It purifies and
+strengthens national, as well as individual character. In the earlier
+history of our race, there were social conditions that rendered many
+lives wretched, and that the law would not and, in the then state of
+civilization, could not reach. They were termed "domestic miseries," and
+disappeared only under the influence of our higher intellectual
+development. The nation that is wise will educate its children."</p>
+
+<p>"Alas! alas!" was my own silent thought. "When will my country rise to
+so grand an idea. When will wealth open the doors of colleges,
+academies, and schools, and make the Fountain of Knowledge as free as
+the God-given water we drink."</p>
+
+<p>And there rose a vision in my mind&mdash;one of those day dreams when fancy
+upon the wing takes some definite course&mdash;and I saw in my own land a
+Temple of Learning rise, grand in proportion, complete in detail, with a
+broad gateway, over whose wide-open majestic portal was the significant
+inscription: "<span class="smcap">Enter who will: no warder stands watch at the gate</span>."</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2>
+
+<p>The Government of Mizora not being of primary importance in the
+estimation of the people, I have not made more than a mere mention of it
+heretofore. In this respect I have conformed to the generally expressed
+taste of the Mizora people. In my own country the government and the
+aristocracy were identical. The government offices and emoluments were
+the highest pinnacles of ambition.</p>
+
+<p>I mentioned the disparity of opinion between Mizora and all other
+countries I had known in regard to this. I could not understand why
+politics in Mizora should be of so small importance. The answer was,
+that among an educated and highly enlightened people, the government
+will take care of itself. Having been perfected by wise experience, the
+people allow it to glide along in the grooves that time has made for it.</p>
+
+<p>In form, the government of Mizora was a Federal Republic. The term of
+office in no department exceeded the limit of five years. The
+Presidential term of office was for five years.</p>
+
+<p>They had one peculiar&mdash;exceedingly peculiar&mdash;law in regard to politics.
+No candidate could come before the public seeking office before having a
+certificate from the State College to which she belonged, stating her
+examination and qualifications to fill such an office.</p>
+
+<p>Just like examining for school-teachers, I thought. And why not? Making
+laws for a State is of far more importance than making them for a few
+dozen scholars. I remembered to have heard some of my American
+acquaintances say that in their country it was not always qualifications
+that get a candidate into office. Some of the ways were devious and not
+suitable for publicity. Offices were frequently filled by incompetent
+men. There had been congressmen and other offices of higher and more
+responsible duties, filled by persons who could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> not correctly frame a
+sentence in their native language, who could not spell the simplest
+words as they were spelled in the dictionary, unless it were an
+accident.</p>
+
+<p>To seek the office of President, or any other position under the General
+Government, required an examination and certificate from the National
+College. The examinations were always public, and conducted in such a
+manner that imposture was impossible. Constituents could attend if they
+chose, and decide upon the qualifications of a favorite candidate. In
+all the public schools, politics&mdash;to a certain extent&mdash;formed part of
+the general education of every child. Beyond that, any one having a
+predilection for politics could find in the State Colleges and National
+Colleges the most liberal advantages for acquiring a knowledge of
+political economy, political arithmetic, and the science of government.</p>
+
+<p>Political campaigns, (if such a term could be applicable to the politics
+of Mizora) were of the mildest possible character. The papers published
+the names of the candidates and their examinations in full. The people
+read and decided upon their choice, and, when the time came, voted. And
+that was the extent of the campaign enthusiasm.</p>
+
+<p>I must mention that the examinations on the science of government were
+not conducted as are ordinary examinations in any given study that
+consists of questions and answers. That was the preliminary part. There
+followed a thorough, practical test of their ability to discharge the
+duties of office with wisdom. No matter which side the sympathies or
+affections might be enlisted upon, the stern decree of justice was what
+the Mizorean abided by. From earliest infancy their minds were trained
+in that doctrine. In the discharge of all public duties especially, it
+seemed to be the paramount consideration. Certainly no government
+machinery ever could move with more ease, or give greater satisfaction
+to the people, than that of Mizora.</p>
+
+<p>They never appeared to be excited or uneasy about the result of the
+elections. I never heard an animated political argument, such as I used
+to read about in America. I asked a politician one day what she thought
+of the probable success of the opposite party. She replied that it would
+not make any difference to the country as both candidates were perfectly
+competent to fill the office.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you never make disparaging statements about the opposing candidate?"
+was my inquiry.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span></p><p>"How could we?" she asked in surprise, "when there are none to make."</p>
+
+<p>"You might assume a few for the time being; just to make her lose
+votes."</p>
+
+<p>"That would be a crime worthy of barbarians."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you never have any party issues?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. There is never anything to make an issue of. We all work for the
+good of the people, and the whole people. There is no greed of glory or
+gain; no personal ambition to gratify. Were I to use any artifice to
+secure office or popularity, I should be instantly deprived of public
+esteem and notice. I do my duty conscientiously; <i>that</i> is the aim of
+public life. I work for the public good and my popularity comes as it is
+earned and deserved. I have no fear of being slighted or underrated.
+Every politician feels and acts the same way."</p>
+
+<p>"Have politicians ever bought votes with money, or offered bribes by
+promising positions that it would be in their official power to grant
+when elected?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never! There is not a citizen of Mizora who would not scorn an office
+obtained in such a way. The profession of politics, while not to be
+compared in importance with the sciences, is yet not devoid of dignity.
+It is not necessary to make new laws. They were perfected long ago, and
+what has been proven good we have no desire to change. We manage the
+government according to a conscientious interpretation of the law. We
+have repealed laws that were in force when our Republic was young, and
+dropped them from the statute books. They were laws unworthy of our
+civilization. We have laws for the protection of property and to
+regulate public morals, and while our civilization is in a state of
+advancement that does not require them, yet we think it wisdom to let
+them remain. The people know that we have such laws and live up to them
+without surveillance. They would abide by the principles of justice set
+forth in them just as scrupulously if we should repeal them.</p>
+
+<p>"You spoke of bribes. In remote ages, when our country was emerging from
+a state of semi-barbarism, such things were in common practice.
+Political chicanery was a name given to various underhand and dishonest
+maneuvers to gain office and public power. It was frequently the case
+that the most responsible positions in the Government would be occupied
+by the basest characters, who used their power only for fraud to enrich
+themselves and their friends by robbing the people. They deceived the
+masses by preaching purity.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> They were never punished. If they were
+accused and brought to trial, the wealth they had stolen from the
+government purchased their acquittal, and then they posed as martyrs.
+The form of government was then, as now, a Federal Republic, but the
+people had very little to do with it. They were merely the tools of
+unscrupulous politicians. In those days a sensitively honest person
+would not accept office, because the name politician was a synonym for
+flexible principles. It was derogatory to one's character to seek
+office."</p>
+
+<p>"Was dishonesty more prominent in one party than another?" I asked,
+thinking how very Americanish this history sounded.</p>
+
+<p>"We, who look back upon the conditions of those times and view it with
+dispassionate judgment, can perceive corruption in both political
+parties. The real welfare of the country was the last thing considered
+by a professional politician. There was always something that was to
+benefit the people brought forward as a party issue, and used as a means
+of working up the enthusiasm or fears of the people, and usually dropped
+after the election.</p>
+
+<p>"The candidate for election in those days might be guilty of heinous
+crimes, yet the party covered them all, and over that covering the
+partisan newspaper spread every virtue in the calendar. A stranger to
+the country and its customs reading one of their partisan newspapers
+during a political campaign, might conclude that the party <i>it</i>
+advocated was composed of only the virtues of the country, and their
+leader an epitome of the supremest excellence.</p>
+
+<p>"Reading in the same paper a description of the opposing party, the
+stranger might think it composed of only the degraded and disreputable
+portion of the nation, and its leader the scum of all its depravity. If
+curiosity should induce a perusal of some partisan paper of the other
+party, the same thing could be read in its columns, with a change of
+names. It would be the opposite party that was getting represented in
+the most despicable character, and <i>their</i> leader was the only one who
+possessed enough honesty and talent to keep the country from going to
+wreck. The other party leader was the one who was guilty of all the
+crimes in the calendar. A vast number of people were ignorant enough to
+cling blindly to one party and to believe every word published by its
+partisan papers. This superstitious party faith was what the
+unscrupulous politicians handled dexterously for their own selfish ends.
+It was not until education became universal, and a higher culture was
+forced upon the majority&mdash;the working classes&mdash;that politics began to
+purify itself, and put on the dignity of real virtue, and receive the
+respect that belongs to genuine justice.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p><p>"The people became disgusted with defamatory political literature, and
+the honorable members of both parties abjured it altogether. In such a
+government as this, two great parties could not exist, where one was
+altogether bad and the other altogether good. It became apparent to the
+people that there was good in both parties, and they began to elect it
+irrespective of party prejudice. Politicians began to work for their
+country instead of themselves and their party, and politics took the
+noble position that the rights of humanity designed it for. I have been
+giving you quite a history of our ancient politics. Our present
+condition is far different. As the people became enlightened to a higher
+degree, the government became more compact. It might now be compared to
+a large family. There are one hundred States in the Union. There was a
+time when every State made its own laws for its own domestic government.
+One code of laws is now enforced in every State. In going from one State
+to another citizens now suffer no inconvenience from a confusion of
+laws. Every State owes allegiance to the General Government. No State or
+number of States could set up an independent government without
+obtaining the consent and legal dissolution from the General Government.
+But such a thing will never be thought of. We have prospered as a great
+united Nation. Our union has been our strength, our prosperity."</p>
+
+<p>I visited with Wauna a number of the States' Capitals. In architecture
+the Mizora people display an excellent taste. Their public buildings
+might all be called works of art. Their government buildings,
+especially, were on a scale of magnificent splendor. The hollow square
+seemed to be a favorite form. One very beautiful capitol building was of
+crystal glass, with facing and cornices of marble onyx. It looked more
+like a gigantic gem than anything I could compare it to, especially when
+lighted up by great globes of white fire suspended from every ceiling.</p>
+
+<p>Upon my entrance into Mizora, I was led into the belief that I had
+arrived at a female seminary, because the dining and sleeping
+accommodations for the stateswoman were all in the Capitol building. I
+observed that the State Capitols were similarly accommodated. In Mizora
+the home is the heart of all joy, and wherever a Mizora woman goes, she
+endeavors to surround herself with its comforts and pleasures. That was
+the reason that the splendid Capitol building had its home-like
+appointments, was a Nation of women exclusively&mdash;at least as far as I
+had as yet been able to discover.</p>
+
+<p>Another reason for the homes of all officials of the Government being
+within the public buildings, was because all the personal <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>expenses,
+excepting clothing, were paid by the Government. The salaries of
+Government positions were not large, compared with those of the
+sciences; but as their social and political dues were paid out of the
+public treasury, the salaries might be considered as net profit. This
+custom had originated many centuries in the past. In those early days,
+when a penurious character became an incumbent of public office, the
+social obligations belonging to it were often but niggardly requited.
+Sometimes business embarrassments and real necessity demanded economy;
+so, at last, the Government assumed all the expenses contingent upon
+every office, from the highest to the lowest. By this means the occupant
+of a Government office was freed from every care but those of state.</p>
+
+<p>The number and style of all social entertainments that were obligatory
+of the occupant of a public office, were regulated by law. As the people
+of Mizora believed in enjoyment, the entertainments provided by the
+Government as the necessary social dues of its officers, were not few,
+nor scantily furnished.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2>
+
+<p>The artificial light in Mizora puzzled me longest to understand. When I
+first noticed it, it appeared to me to have no apparent source. At the
+touch of a delicate hand, it blazed forth like a star in the center of
+the ceiling. It diffused a soft and pleasing brilliancy that lent a
+charm to everything it revealed. It was a dreamy daylight, and was
+produced by electricity.</p>
+
+<p>In large halls, like a theatre or opera house, the light fell in a soft
+and penetrating radiance from the center of the dome. Its source was not
+visible to either audience or actresses, and, in consequence, occasioned
+no discomfort to the eyes. The light that illuminated the stage was
+similarly arranged. The footlights were not visible. They were in the
+rear of the stage. The light came upward like the rays of the setting
+sun, revealing the setting of the stage with vivid distinctness. I can
+best describe the effect of this singular arrangement by calling
+attention to the appearance of the sun when declining behind a small
+elevation. How sharply every object is outlined before it? How soft and
+delicate is the light in which everything is bathed? Every cloud that
+floats has all of its fleecy loveliness limned with a radiant clearness.</p>
+
+<p>I was very desirous to know how this singular effect was produced, and
+at my request was taken to the stage. An opening in the back part of it
+was covered with pink colored glass. Powerful electric lights from below
+the stage were reflected through this glass upon it. The glass was
+highly refractive and so perfectly translucent, I at first thought there
+was none there, and when I stood upon its edge, and looked down into a
+fiery gulf below, I instinctively thought of the "Lost People," who are
+said to wander amid torturing yet unconsumable flames. But, happily, the
+ones I gazed upon were harmless ones.</p>
+
+<p>The street lights of Mizora were at a considerable elevation from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> the
+ground. They were in, or over, the center of the street, and of such
+diffuse brilliancy as to render the city almost as light as day. They
+were in the form of immense globes of soft, white fire, and during the
+six months that answered to the Mizora night, were kept constantly
+burning. It was during this period that the Aurora Borealis shone with
+such marvelous brilliancy.</p>
+
+<p>Generally, its display was heralded by an arc of delicate green-tinted
+light, that spanned the heavens. The green tint deepened into emerald,
+assuming a delicate rose hue as it faded upward into rays that diverged
+from the top until the whole resembled a gigantic crown. Every ray
+became a panorama of gorgeous colors, resembling tiny sparks, moving
+hither and thither with inconceivable swiftness. Sometimes a veil of
+mist of delicate green hue depended from the base of the crown, and
+swayed gently back and forth. As soon as the swaying motion commenced,
+the most gorgeous colors were revealed. Myriads of sparks, no larger
+than snow-flakes, swarmed across the delicate green curtain in every
+conceivable color and shade, but always of that vapory, vivid softness
+that is indescribable. The dancing colors resembled gems encased in a
+film of mist.</p>
+
+<p>One display that I witnessed I shall attempt to describe. The arc of
+delicate green appeared first, and shot upward diverging rays of all the
+warm, rich hues of red. They formed a vast crown, outlined with a
+delicate halo of fire. A veil of misty green fluttered down from its
+base, and, instantly, tiny crowns, composed of every brilliant color,
+with a tracery of fire defining every separate one, began to chase one
+another back and forth with bewildering rapidity. As the veil swayed to
+and fro, it seemed to shake the crowns into skeins of fire, each thread
+strung with countless minute globes of every conceivable color and hue.
+Those fiery threads, aerial as thistle down, wove themselves in and out
+in a tangled mass of gorgeous beauty. Suddenly the beads of color fell
+in a shower of gems, topaz and emerald, ruby and sapphire, amethyst and
+pearly crystals of dew. I looked upward, where the rays of variegated
+colors were sweeping the zenith, and high above the first crown was a
+second more vivid still. Myriads of rainbows, the colors broad and
+intense, fluttered from its base, the whole outlined by a halo of fire.
+It rolled together in a huge scroll, and, in an instant, fell apart a
+shower of flakes, minute as snow, but of all the gorgeous, dazzling hues
+of earth and sky combined. They disappeared in the mystery of space to
+instantly form into a fluttering, waving banner of delicate green mist
+and&mdash;vanish; only to repeat itself.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></p><p>The display of the Aurora Borealis was always an exhibition of
+astonishing rapidity of motion of intense colors. The most glorious
+sunset&mdash;where the vapory billows of the sky have caught the bloom of the
+dying Autumn&mdash;cannot rival it. All the precious gems of earth appear to
+have dissolved into mist, to join in a wild and aerial dance. The people
+of Mizora attributed it entirely to electricity.</p>
+
+<p>Although the sun never rose or set in Mizora, yet for six months in a
+year, that country had the heart of a voluptuous summer. It beat with a
+strong, warm pulse of life through all nature. The orchards budded and
+bloomed, and mellowed into perfect fruition their luscious globes. The
+fields laughed in the warm, rich light, and smiled on the harvest. I
+could feel my own blood bound as with a new lease of life at the first
+breath of spring.</p>
+
+<p>The winters of Mizora had clouds and rain and sleet and snow, and
+sometimes, especially near the circular sea, the fury of an Arctic snow
+storm; but so well prepared were they that it became an amusement.
+Looking into the chaos of snow flakes, driven hither and thither by
+fierce winds, the pedestrians in the street presented no painful
+contrast to the luxury of your own room, with its balmy breath and
+cheerful flowers. You saw none but what were thoroughly clad, and you
+knew that they were hurrying to homes that were bright and attractive,
+if not as elegant as yours; where loving welcomes were sure to greet
+them and happiness would sit with them at the feast; for the heart that
+is pure has always a kingly guest for its company.</p>
+
+<p>A wonderful discovery that the people of Mizora had made was the power
+to annihilate space as an impediment to conversation. They claimed that
+the atmosphere had regular currents of electricity that were accurately
+known to them. They talked to them by means of simply constructed
+instruments, and the voice would be as audible and as easily recognized
+at three thousand miles distant as at only three feet. Stations were
+built similar to our telegraph offices, but on high elevations. I
+understood that they could not be used upon the surface. Every private
+and public house, however, had communication with the general office,
+and could converse with friends at a distance whenever desirable. Public
+speakers made constant use of it, but in connection with another
+extraordinary apparatus which I regret my inability to perfectly
+describe.</p>
+
+<p>I saw it first from the dress circle of a theater. It occupied the whole
+rear of the stage, and from where I sat, looked like a solid wall of
+polished metal. But it had a wonderful function, for immediately<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> in
+front of it, moving, speaking and gesturing, was the figure of a popular
+public lecturer, so life-like in appearance that I could scarcely be
+convinced that it was only a reflection. Yet such it was, and the
+original was addressing an audience in person more than a thousand miles
+distant.</p>
+
+<p>It was no common thing for a lecturer to address a dozen or more
+audiences at the same time, scattered over an area of thousands of
+miles, and every one listening to and observing what appeared to be the
+real speaker. In fact, public speakers in Mizora never traveled on pure
+professional business. It was not necessary. They prepared a room in
+their own dwelling with the needful apparatus, and at the time specified
+delivered a lecture in twenty different cities.</p>
+
+<p>I was so interested in this very remarkable invention that I made
+vigorous mental exertions to comprehend it sufficiently to explain its
+mechanism and philosophical principles intelligently; but I can only say
+that it was one of the wonders those people produced with electricity.
+The mechanism was simple, but the science of its construction and
+workings I could not comprehend. The grasp of my mind was not broad
+enough. The instrument that transmitted the voice was entirely separate.</p>
+
+<p>I must not neglect to mention that all kinds of public entertainments,
+such as operas, concerts and dramas, could be and were repeated to
+audiences at a distance from where the real transaction was taking
+place. I attended a number of operas that were only the reflex of others
+that were being presented to audiences far distant.</p>
+
+<p>These repetitions were always marvels of accuracy of vividness.</p>
+
+<p>Small reflecting apparatus were to be found in every dwelling and
+business house. It is hardly necessary to state that letter-writing was
+an unknown accomplishment in Mizora. The person who desired to converse
+with another, no matter how far distant, placed herself in communication
+with her two instruments and signaled. Her friend appeared upon the
+polished metal surface like the figure in a mirror, and spoke to her
+audibly, and looked at her with all the naturalness of reality.</p>
+
+<p>I have frequently witnessed such interviews between Wauna and her
+mother, when we were visiting distant cities. It was certainly a more
+satisfactory way of communicating than by letter. The small apparatus
+used by private families and business houses were not like those used in
+public halls and theaters. In the former, the reflection was exactly
+similar to the image of a mirror; in the latter, the figure was
+projected upon the stage. It required more complicated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> machinery to
+produce, and was not practicable for small families or business houses.
+I now learned that on my arrival in Mizora I had been taken to one of
+the largest apparatus and put in communication with it. I was informed
+by Wauna that I had been exhibited to every college and school in the
+country by reflex representation. She said that she and her mother had
+seen me distinctly and heard my voice. The latter had been so
+uncongenial in accent and tone that she had hesitated about becoming my
+instructor on that account. It was my evident appreciation of my
+deficiencies as compared to them that had enlisted her sympathy.</p>
+
+<p>Now, in my own country, my voice had attracted attention by its
+smoothness and modulation, and I was greatly surprised to hear Wauna
+speak of its unmusical tone as really annoying. But then in Mizora there
+are no voices but what are sweet enough to charm the birds.</p>
+
+<p>In the journeys that Wauna and I took during the college vacation, we
+were constantly meeting strangers, but they never appeared the least
+surprised at my dark hair and eyes, which were such a contrast to all
+the other hair and eyes to be met with in Mizora, that I greatly
+wondered at it until I learned of the power of the reflector. I
+requested permission to examine one of the large ones used in a theater,
+and it was granted me. Wauna accompanied me and signaled to a friend of
+hers. As if by magic a form appeared and moved across the stage. It
+bowed to me, smiled and motioned with its hand, to all appearances a
+material body. I asked Wauna to approach it, which she did, and passed
+her hand through it. There was nothing that resisted her touch, yet I
+plainly saw the figure, and recognized it as the perfect representation
+of a friend of Wauna's, an actress residing in a distant city. When I
+ascended the stage, the figure vanished, and I understood that it could
+be visible only at a certain distance from the reflector.</p>
+
+<p>In traveling great distances, or even short ones where great speed was
+desired, the Mizoraens used air ships; but only for the transportation
+of passengers and the very lightest of freight. Heavy articles could not
+be as conveniently carried by them as by railroads. Their railroads were
+constructed and conducted on a system so perfect that accidents were
+never known. Every engineer had an electric signal attached to the
+engine, that could signal a train three miles distant.</p>
+
+<p>The motive power for nearly all engines was compressed air. Electricity,
+which was recognized by Mizora scientists as a force of great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>
+intensity, was rarely used as a propelling power on railroads. Its use
+was attended by possible danger, but compressed air was not. Electricity
+produced the heat that supplied the air ships and railroads with that
+very necessary comfort. In case there should be an accident, as a
+collision, or thrown from the track, heat could not be a source of
+danger when furnished by electricity. But I never heard of a railroad
+accident during the whole fifteen years that I spent in Mizora.</p>
+
+<p>Air-ships, however, were not exempt from danger, although the
+precautions against it were ingenious and carefully observed. The Mizora
+people could tell the approach of a storm, and the exact time it would
+arrive. They had signal stations established for the purpose, all over
+the country.</p>
+
+<p>But, though they were skilled mechanics, and far in advance of my own
+world, and the limits of my comprehension in their scientific
+discoveries and appliances, they had not yet discovered the means of
+subduing the elements, or driving unharmed through their fury. When
+nature became convulsed with passion, they guarded themselves against
+it, but did not endeavor to thwart it.</p>
+
+<p>Their air-ships were covered, and furnished with luxurious seats. The
+whole upper part of the car was composed of very thin glass. They
+traveled with, to me, astonishing rapidity. Towns and cities flew away
+beneath us like birds upon the wing. I grew frightened and apprehensive,
+but Wauna chatted away with her friends with the most charming
+unconcern.</p>
+
+<p>I was looking down, when I perceived, by the increasing size of objects
+below, that we were descending. The conductor entered almost
+immediately, and announced that we were going down to escape an
+approaching storm. A signal had been received and the ship was at once
+lowered.</p>
+
+<p>I felt intensely relieved to step again on solid earth, and hoped I
+might escape another trial of the upper regions. But after waiting until
+the storm was over we again entered the ship. I was ashamed to refuse
+when everyone else showed no fear.</p>
+
+<p>In waiting for the storm to pass we were delayed so long that our
+journey could have been performed almost as speedily by rail. I wondered
+why they had not invented some means by which they could drive through a
+tempest in perfect safety. As usual, I addressed my inquiries to Wauna.
+She answered:</p>
+
+<p>"So frail a thing as an air-ship must necessarily be, when compared with
+the strength of a storm, is like a leaf in the wind. We<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> have not yet
+discovered, and we have but little expectation of discovering, any means
+by which we can defy the storms that rage in the upper deeps.</p>
+
+<p>"The electricity that we use for heat is also a source of danger during
+a storm. Our policy is to evade a peril we cannot control or destroy.
+Hence, when we receive a signal that a storm is approaching we get out
+of its way. Our railroad carriages, having no danger to fear from them,
+ride right through the storm."</p>
+
+<p>The people of Mizora, I perceived, possessed a remarkable acuteness of
+vision. They could see the odor emanating from flowers and fruit. They
+described it to me as resembling attenuated mist. They also named other
+colors in the solar spectrum than those known to me. When I first heard
+them speak of them, I thought it a freak of the imagination; but I
+afterward noticed artists, and persons who had a special taste for
+colors, always detected them with greater readiness. The presence of
+these new colors were apparent to all with whom I spoke upon the
+subject. When I mentioned my own inability to discern them, Wauna said
+that it was owning to my inferior mental development.</p>
+
+<p>"A child," she said, "if you will observe, is first attracted by red,
+the most glaring color known. The untutored mind will invariably select
+the gaudiest colors for personal adornment. It is the gentle, refined
+taste of civilization that chooses the softened hues and colors."</p>
+
+<p>"But you, as a nation, are remarkable for rich warm colors in your
+houses and often in your dress," I said.</p>
+
+<p>"But they are never glaring," she replied. "If you will notice, the most
+intense colors are always so arranged as to present a halo, instead of
+sharply defined brilliancy. If a gorgeous color is worn as a dress, it
+will be covered with filmy lace. You have spoken of the splendor of the
+Aurora Borealis. It is nature's most gorgeous robe, and intense as the
+primal colors are, they are never glaring. They glow in a film of vapor.
+We have made them our study. Art, with us, has never attempted to
+supercede nature."</p>
+
+<p>The sense of smell was also exceedingly sensitive with the Mizora
+people. They detected odors so refined that I was not aware of them. I
+have often seen a chemist take a bottle of perfumery and name its
+ingredients from the sense of smell only. No one appeared surprised at
+the bluntness of my senses. When I spoke of this Wauna tried to explain
+it.</p>
+
+<p>"We are a more delicately organized race of beings than you are.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> Our
+intellects, and even sense that we possess, is of a higher and finer
+development. We have some senses that you do not possess, and are unable
+to comprehend their exquisite delicacy. One of them I shall endeavor to
+explain to you by describing it as impression. We possess it in a highly
+refined state, both mentally and physically. Our sensitiveness to
+changes of temperature, I have noticed, is more marked than yours. It is
+acute with all of my people. For this reason, although we are free from
+disease, our bodies could not sustain, as readily as yours could, a
+sudden and severe shock to their normal temperature, such as a marked
+change in the atmosphere would occasion. We are, therefore, extremely
+careful to be always appropriately clothed. That is a physical
+impression. It is possessed by you also, but more obtusely.</p>
+
+<p>"Our sensitiveness to mental pleasure and pain you would pronounce
+morbid on account of its intensity. The happiness we enjoy in the
+society of those who are congenial, or near and dear to us through
+family ties, is inconceivable to you. The touch of my mother's hand
+carries a thrill of rapture with it.</p>
+
+<p>"We feel, intuitively, the happiness or disappointment of those we are
+with. Our own hopes impress us with their fulfillment or frustration,
+before we know what will actually occur. This feeling is entirely
+mental, but it is evidence of a highly refined mentality. We could not
+be happy unless surrounded, as we are, by cultivated and elegant
+pleasures. They are real necessities to us.</p>
+
+<p>"Our appreciation of music, I notice, has a more exquisite delicacy than
+yours. You desire music, but it is the simpler operas that delight you
+most. Those fine and delicate harmonies that we so intensely enjoy, you
+appear incapable of appreciating."</p>
+
+<p>I have previously spoken of their elegance in dress, and their fondness
+for luxury and magnificence. On occasions of great ceremony their
+dresses were furnished with very long trains. The only prominent
+difference that I saw in their state dresses, and the rare and costly
+ones I had seen in my own and other countries, was in the waist. As the
+women of Mizora admired a large waist, their dresses were generally
+loose and flowing. Ingenuity, however, had fashioned them into graceful
+and becoming outlines. On occasions of great state and publicity,
+comfortably fitting girdles confined the dress at the waist.</p>
+
+<p>I attended the Inaugural of a Professor of Natural History in the
+National College. The one who had succeeded to this honor was widely
+celebrated for her erudition. It was known that the ceremony would be a
+grand affair, and thousands attended it.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span></p><p>I there witnessed another of these marvelous achievements in science
+that were constantly surprising me in Mizora. The inauguration took
+place in a large hall, the largest I had ever seen. It would accommodate
+two hundred thousand people, and was filled to repletion. I was seated
+far back in the audience, and being a little short-sighted anyway, I
+expected to be disappointed both in seeing and hearing the ceremonies.
+What was my astonishment then, when they began, to discover that I could
+see distinctly every object upon the stage, and hear with perfect
+accuracy every word that was uttered.</p>
+
+<p>Upon expressing myself to Wauna as being greatly pleased that my
+eyesight and hearing had improved so wonderfully and unexpectedly, she
+laughed merrily, and asked me if I had noticed a curious looking band of
+polished steel that curved outward from the proscenium, and encircled
+its entire front? I had noticed it, but supposed it to be connected with
+some different arrangement they might have made concerning the
+footlights. Wauna informed me that I owed my improved hearing to that.</p>
+
+<p>"But my eyesight," I asked, "how do you account for its unusual
+penetrativeness?"</p>
+
+<p>"Have you ever noticed some seasons of the year display a noticeably
+marked transparency of the atmosphere that revealed objects at great
+distances with unusual clearness? Well, we possess a knowledge of air
+that enables us to qualify it with that peculiar magnifying condition.
+On occasions like this we make use of it. This hall was built after the
+discovery, and was specially prepared for its use. It is seldom employed
+in smaller halls."</p>
+
+<p>Just then a little flutter of interest upon the stage attracted my
+attention, and I saw the candidate for the professorship entering,
+accompanied by the Faculty of the National College.</p>
+
+<p>She wore a sea-green velvet robe with a voluminous train. The bottom of
+the dress was adorned with a wreath or band of water lilies, embroidered
+in seed pearls. A white lace overdress of filmiest texture fell over the
+velvet, almost touching the wreath of lilies, and looked as though it
+was made of sea foam. A girdle of large pink pearls confined the robe at
+the waist. Natural flowers were on her bosom and in her hair.</p>
+
+<p>The stage was superbly decorated with flowers and shells. A large chair,
+constructed of beautiful shells and cushioned with green velvet, rested
+upon a dais of coral. It was the chair of honor. Behind it was a curtain
+of sea-moss. I afterward learned that the moss was attached to a film of
+glass too delicate to detect without handling.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p><p>In the midst of these charming surroundings stood the applicant for
+honor. Her deep blue eyes glowed with the joy of triumph. On the
+delicate cheek and lip burned the carmine hue of perfect health. The
+golden hair even seemed to have caught a brighter lustre in its coiled
+masses. The uplifted hand and arm no marble goddess could have matched,
+for this had the color and charm of life. As she stood revealed by the
+strong light that fell around her, every feature ennobled with the glory
+of intellect, she appeared to me a creature of unearthly loveliness, as
+something divine.</p>
+
+<p>I spoke to Wauna of the rare beauty and elegance of her dress.</p>
+
+<p>"She looks like a fabled Naiad just risen from the deep," was my
+criticism on her.</p>
+
+<p>"Her dress," answered Wauna, "is intended to be emblematical of Nature.
+The sea-green robe, the water lilies of pearls, the foamy lace are all
+from Nature's Cradle of Life."</p>
+
+<p>"How poetical!" I exclaimed.</p>
+
+<p>But then Mizora is full of that charming skill that blends into perfect
+harmony the beautiful and useful in life.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2>
+
+<p>On my return to college, after the close of vacation, I devoted myself
+exclusively to history. It began with their first President; and from
+the evidence of history itself, I knew that the Nation was enjoying a
+high state of culture when its history began.</p>
+
+<p>No record of a more primitive race was to be found in all the Library,
+assiduously as I searched for it. I read with absorbing interest their
+progress toward perfect enlightenment, their laborious searchings into
+science that had resulted in such marvelous achievements. But earnestly
+as I sought for it, and anxiously as I longed for it, I found and heard
+no mention of a race of men. From the most intimate intercourse with the
+people of Mizora, I could discover no attempt at concealment in
+anything, yet the inquiry <i>would</i> crowd itself upon me. "Where are the
+men?" And as constantly would I be forced to the conclusion that Mizora
+was either a land of mystery beyond the scope of the wildest and
+weirdest fancy, or else they were utterly oblivious of such a race. And
+the last conclusion was most improbable of all.</p>
+
+<p>Man, in my country, was a necessity of government, law, and protection.
+His importance, (as I viewed it from inherited ideas) was incalculable.
+It <i>could</i> not be possible that he had no existence in a country so
+eminently adapted to his desires and ability.</p>
+
+<p>The expression, "domestic misery," that the Preceptress made use of one
+day in conversation with me, haunted my imagination with a persistent
+suspicion of mystery. It had a familiar sound to me. It intimated
+knowledge of a world <i>I</i> knew so well; where ill-nature, malice, spite,
+envy, deceit, falsehood and dishonesty, made life a continual anxiety.</p>
+
+<p>Locks, bolts and bars shut out the thief who coveted your jewels; but no
+bolts nor bars, however ingeniously constructed or strongly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> made, could
+keep out the thief who coveted your character. One little word from a
+pretended friend might consummate the sorrow of your whole life, and be
+witnessed by the perpetrator without a pang&mdash;nay, even with exultation.</p>
+
+<p>There were other miseries I thought of that were common in my country.
+There were those we love. Some who are woven into our lives and
+affections by the kinship of blood; who grow up weak and vacillating,
+and are won away, sometimes through vice, to estrangement. Our hearts
+ache not the less painfully that they have ceased to be worthy of a
+throb; or that they have been weak enough to become estranged, to
+benefit some selfish alien.</p>
+
+<p>There were other sorrows in that world that I had come from, that
+brought anguish alike to the innocent and the guilty. It was the sorrow
+of premature death. Diseases of all kinds made lives wretched; or tore
+them asunder with death. How many hearts have ached with cankering pain
+to see those who are vitally dear, wasting away slowly, but surely, with
+unrelievable suffering; and to know that life but prolongs their misery,
+and death relieves it only with inconsolable grief for the living.</p>
+
+<p>Who has looked into a pair of youthful eyes, so lovely that imagination
+could not invent for them another charm, and saw the misty film of death
+gather over them, while your heart ached with regret as bitter as it was
+unavailing. The soft snows of winter have fallen&mdash;a veil of purity&mdash;over
+the new made graves of innocence and youth, and its wild winds have been
+the saddest requiem. The dews of summer have wept with your tears, and
+its zephyrs have sighed over the mouldering loveliness of youth.</p>
+
+<p>I had known no skill in my world that could snatch from death its
+unlawful prey of youth. But here, in this land so eminently blessed, no
+one regarded death as a dreaded invader of their household.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>We cannot die until we get old</i>," said Wauna, naively.</p>
+
+<p>And looking upon their bounding animal spirits, their strong supple
+frames, and the rich, red blood of perfect health, mantling their cheeks
+with its unsurpassable bloom, one would think that disease must have
+strong grasp indeed that could destroy them.</p>
+
+<p>But these were not all the sorrows that my own country knew. Crimes,
+with which we had no personal connection, shocked us with their horrible
+details. They crept, like noxious vapors, into the moral atmosphere of
+the pure and good; tainting the weak, and annoying the strong.</p>
+
+<p>There were other sorrows in my country that were more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> deplorable still.
+It was the fate of those who sought to relieve the sufferings of the
+many by an enforced government reform. Misguided, imprudent and
+fanatical they might be, but their aim at least was noble. The wrongs
+and sufferings of the helpless and oppressed had goaded them to action
+for their relief.</p>
+
+<p>But, alas! The pale and haggard faces of thousands of those patriot
+souls faded and wasted in torturing slowness in dungeons of rayless
+gloom. Or their emaciated and rheumatic frames toiled in speechless
+agony amid the horrors of Siberia's mines.</p>
+
+<p>In <i>this</i> land they would have been recognized as aspiring natures,
+spreading their wings for a nobler flight, seeking a higher and grander
+life. The smile of beauty would have urged them on. Hands innumerable
+would have given them a cordial and encouraging grasp. But in the land
+they had sought to benefit and failed, they suffered in silence and
+darkness, and died forgotten or cursed.</p>
+
+<p>My heart and my brain ached with memory, and the thought again occurred:
+"<i>Could</i> the Preceptress ever have known such a race of people?"</p>
+
+<p>I looked at her fair, calm brow, where not a wrinkle marred the serene
+expression of intellect, although I had been told that more than a
+hundred years had touched with increasing wisdom its broad surface. The
+smile that dwelt in her eyes, like the mystic sprite in the fountain,
+had not a suspicion of sadness in them. A nature so lofty as hers, where
+every feeling had a generous and noble existence and aim, could not have
+known without anguish the race of people <i>I</i> knew so well. Their sorrows
+would have tinged her life with a continual sadness.</p>
+
+<p>The words of Wauna had awakened a new thought. I knew that their mental
+life was far above mine, and that in all the relations of life, both
+business and social, they exhibited a refinement never attained by my
+people. I had supposed these qualities to be an endowment of nature, and
+not a development sought and labored for by themselves. But my
+conversation with Wauna had given me a different impression, and the
+thought of a future for my own country took possession of me.</p>
+
+<p>"Could it ever emerge from its horrors, and rise through gradual but
+earnest endeavor to such perfection? Could a higher civilization crowd
+its sufferings out of existence and, in time, memory?"</p>
+
+<p>I had never thought of my country having a claim upon me other than what
+I owed to my relatives and society. But in Mizora, where the very
+atmosphere seemed to feed one's brain with grander and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> nobler ideas of
+life and humanity, my nature had drank the inspiration of good deeds and
+impulses, and had given the desire to work for something beside myself
+and my own kindred. I resolved that if I should ever again behold my
+native country, I would seek the good of all its people along with that
+of my nearest and dearest of kin. But how to do it was a matter I could
+not arrange. I felt reluctant to ask either Wauna or her mother. The
+guileless frankness of Wauna's nature was an impassable barrier to the
+confidence of crimes and wretchedness. One glance of horror from her
+dark, sweet eyes, would have chilled me into painful silence and
+sorrowful regret.</p>
+
+<p>The mystery that had ever surrounded these lovely and noble blonde women
+had driven me into an unnatural reserve in regard to my own people and
+country. I had always perceived the utter absence of my allusion to the
+masculine gender, and conceiving that it must be occasioned by some more
+than ordinary circumstances, I refrained from intruding my curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>That the singular absence of men was connected with nothing criminal or
+ignoble on their part I felt certain; but that it was associated with
+something weird and mysterious I had now become convinced. My efforts to
+discover their whereabouts had been earnest and untiring. I had visited
+a number of their large cities, and had enjoyed the hospitality of many
+private homes. I had examined every nook and corner of private and
+public buildings, (for in Mizora nothing ever has locks) and in no place
+had I ever discovered a trace or suggestion of man.</p>
+
+<p>Women and girls were everywhere. Their fair faces and golden heads
+greeted me in every town and city. Sometimes a pair of unusually dark
+blue eyes, like the color of a velvet-leaved pansy, looked out from an
+exquisitely tinted face framed in flossy golden hair, startling me with
+its unnatural loveliness, and then I would wonder anew:</p>
+
+<p>"Why is such a paradise for man so entirely devoid of him?"</p>
+
+<p>I even endeavored to discover from the conversation of young girls some
+allusion to the male sex. But listen as attentively and discreetly as I
+could, not one allusion did I hear made to the mysteriously absent
+beings. I was astonished that young girls, with cheeks like the downy
+bloom of a ripe peach, should chatter and laugh merrily over every
+conversational topic but that of the lords of society. The older and the
+wiser among women might acquire a depreciating idea of their worth, but
+innocent and inexperienced girlhood was apt to surround that name with a
+halo of romance and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> fancied nobility that the reality did not always
+possess. What, then, was my amazement to find <i>them</i> indifferent and
+wholly neglectful of that (to me) very important class of beings.</p>
+
+<p>Conjecture at last exhausted itself, and curiosity became indifferent.
+Mizora, as a nation, or an individual representative, was incapable of
+dishonor. Whatever their secret I should make no farther effort to
+discover it. Their hospitality had been generous and unreserved. Their
+influence upon my character&mdash;morally&mdash;had been an incalculable benefit.
+I had enjoyed being among them. The rhythm of happiness that swept like
+a strain of sweet music through all their daily life, touched a chord in
+my own nature that responded.</p>
+
+<p>And when I contrasted the prosperity of Mizora&mdash;a prosperity that
+reached every citizen in its vast territory&mdash;with the varied phases of
+life that are found in my own land, it urged me to inquire if there
+could be hope for such happiness within its borders.</p>
+
+<p>To the Preceptress, whose sympathies I knew were broad as the lap of
+nature, I at last went with my desire and perplexities. A sketch of my
+country's condition was the inevitable prelude. I gave it without once
+alluding to the presence of Man. She listened quietly and attentively.
+Her own land lay like a charming picture before her. I spoke of its
+peaceful happiness, its perfected refinement, its universal wealth, and
+paramount to all its other blessings, its complete ignorance of social
+ills. With them, love did not confine itself to families, but encircled
+the Nation in one embrace. How dismal, in contrast, was the land that
+had given me birth.</p>
+
+<p>"But one eminent distinction exists among us as a people," I added in
+conclusion. "We are not all of one race."</p>
+
+<p>I paused and looked at the Preceptress. She appeared lost in reverie.
+Her expression was one of solicitude and approached nearer to actual
+pain than anything I had ever noticed upon it before. She looked up and
+caught my eye regarding her. Then she quietly asked:</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Are there men in your country?</i>"</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="PART_SECOND" id="PART_SECOND"></a>PART SECOND.</h2>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IA" id="CHAPTER_IA"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2>
+
+<p>I answered in the affirmative, and further added that I had a husband
+and a son.</p>
+
+<p>The effect of a confession so simple, and so natural, wounded and amazed
+me.</p>
+
+<p>The Preceptress started back with a look of loathing and abhorrence; but
+it was almost instantly succeeded by one of compassion.</p>
+
+<p>"You have much to learn," she said gently, "and I desire not to judge
+you harshly. <i>You</i> are the product of a people far back in the darkness
+of civilization. <i>We</i> are a people who have passed beyond the boundary
+of what was once called Natural Law. But, more correctly, we have become
+mistresses of Nature's peculiar processes. We influence or control them
+at will. But before giving you any further explanation I will show you
+the gallery containing the portraits of our very ancient ancestors."</p>
+
+<p>She then conducted me into a remote part of the National College, and
+sliding back a panel containing a magnificent painting, she disclosed a
+long gallery, the existence of which I had never suspected, although I
+knew their custom of using ornamented sliding panels instead of doors.
+Into this I followed her with wonder and increasing surprise. Paintings
+on canvas, old and dim with age; paintings on porcelain, and a peculiar
+transparent material, of which I have previously spoken, hung so thick
+upon the wall you could not have placed a hand between them. They were
+all portraits of men. Some were represented in the ancient or mediaeval
+costumes of my own ancestry, and some in garbs resembling our modern
+styles.</p>
+
+<p>Some had noble countenances, and some bore on their painted visages the
+unmistakable stamp of passion and vice. It is not complimentary to
+myself to confess it, but I began to feel an odd kind of companionship
+in this assembly of good and evil looking men, such<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> as I had not felt
+since entering this land of pre-eminently noble and lovely women.</p>
+
+<p>As I gazed upon them, arrayed in the armor of some stern warrior, or the
+velvet doublet of some gay cavalier, the dark eyes of a debonair knight
+looked down upon me with familiar fellowship. There was pride of birth,
+and the passion of conquest in every line of his haughty, sensuous face.
+I seemed to breathe the same moral atmosphere that had surrounded me in
+the outer world.</p>
+
+<p><i>They</i> had lived among noble and ignoble deeds I felt sure. <i>They</i> had
+been swayed by conflicting desires. <i>They</i> had known temptation and
+resistance, and reluctant compliance. <i>They</i> had experienced the
+treachery and ingratitude of humanity, and had dealt in it themselves.
+<i>They</i> had known joy as I had known it, and their sorrow had been as my
+sorrows. <i>They</i> had loved as I had loved, and sinned as I had sinned,
+and suffered as I had suffered.</p>
+
+<p>I wept for the first time since my entrance into Mizora, the bitter
+tears of actual experience, and endeavored to convey to the Preceptress
+some idea of the painful emotion that possessed me.</p>
+
+<p>"I have noticed," she said, "in your own person and the descriptions you
+have given of your native country, a close resemblance to the people and
+history of our nation in ages far remote. These portraits are very old.
+The majority of them were painted many thousands of years ago. It is
+only by our perfect knowledge of color that we are enabled to preserve
+them. Some have been copied by expert artists upon a material
+manufactured by us for that purpose. It is a transparent adamant that
+possesses no refractive power, consequently the picture has all the
+advantage of a painting on canvas, with the addition of perpetuity. They
+can never fade nor decay."</p>
+
+<p>"I am astonished at the existence of this gallery," I exclaimed. "I have
+observed a preference for sliding panels instead of doors, and that they
+were often decorated with paintings of rare excellence, but I had never
+suspected the existence of this gallery behind one of them."</p>
+
+<p>"Any student," said the Preceptress, "who desires to become conversant
+with our earliest history, can use this gallery. It is not a secret, for
+nothing in Mizora is concealed; but we do not parade its existence, nor
+urge upon students an investigation of its history. They are so far
+removed from the moral imbecility that dwarfed the nature of these
+people, that no lesson can be learned from their lives; and their time
+can be so much more profitably spent in scientific research and study."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p><p>"You have not, then, reached the limits of scientific knowledge?" I
+wonderingly inquired, for, to me, they had already overstepped its
+imaginary pale.</p>
+
+<p>"When we do we shall be able to create intellect at will. We govern to a
+certain extent the development of physical life; but the formation of
+the brain&mdash;its intellectual force, or capacity I should say&mdash;is beyond
+our immediate skill. Genius is yet the product of long cultivation."</p>
+
+<p>I had observed that dark hair and eyes were as indiscriminately mingled
+in these portraits as I had been accustomed to find them in the living
+people of my own and other countries. I drew the Preceptress' attention
+to it.</p>
+
+<p>"We believe that the highest excellence of moral and mental character is
+alone attainable by a fair race. The elements of evil belong to the dark
+race."</p>
+
+<p>"And were the people of this country once of mixed complexions?"</p>
+
+<p>"As you see in the portraits? Yes," was the reply.</p>
+
+<p>"And what became of the dark complexions?"</p>
+
+<p>"We eliminated them."</p>
+
+<p>I was too astonished to speak and stood gazing upon the handsome face of
+a young man in a plumed hat and lace-frilled doublet. The dark eyes had
+a haughty look, like a man proud of his lineage and his sex.</p>
+
+<p>"Let us leave this place," said the Preceptress presently. "It always
+has a depressing effect upon me."</p>
+
+<p>"In what way?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"By the degradation of the human race that they force me to recall."</p>
+
+<p>I followed her out to a seat on one of the small porticoes.</p>
+
+<p>In candidly expressing herself about the dark complexions, my companion
+had no intention or thought of wounding my feelings. So rigidly do they
+adhere to the truth in Mizora that it is of all other things
+pre-eminent, and is never supposed to give offense. The Preceptress but
+gave expression to the belief inculcated by centuries of the teachings
+and practices of her ancestors. I was not offended. It was her
+conviction. Besides, I had the consolation of secretly disagreeing with
+her. I am still of the opinion that their admirable system of
+government, social and political, and their encouragement and provision
+for universal culture of so high an order, had more to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> do with the
+formation of superlative character than the elimination of the dark
+complexion.</p>
+
+<p>The Preceptress remained silent a long time, apparently absorbed in the
+beauty of the landscape that stretched before us. The falling waters of
+a fountain was all the sound we heard. The hour was auspicious. I was so
+eager to develop a revelation of the mystery about these people that I
+became nervous over my companion's protracted silence. I felt a delicacy
+in pressing inquiries concerning information that I thought ought to be
+voluntarily given. Inquisitiveness was regarded as a gross rudeness by
+them, and I could frame no question that I did not fear would sound
+impertinent. But at last patience gave way and, at the risk of
+increasing her commiseration for my barbarous mental condition, I asked:</p>
+
+<p>"Are you conversant with the history of the times occupied by the
+originals of the portraits we have just seen?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am," she replied.</p>
+
+<p>"And would you object to giving me a condensed recital of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not if it can do you any good?"</p>
+
+<p>"What has become of their descendants&mdash;of those portraits?"</p>
+
+<p>"They became extinct thousands of years ago."</p>
+
+<p>She became silent again, lost in reverie. The agitation of my mind was
+not longer endurable. I was too near the acme of curiosity to longer
+delay. I threw reserve aside and not without fear and trembling faltered
+out:</p>
+
+<p>"Where are the men of this country? Where do they stay?"</p>
+
+<p><i>"There are none</i>," was the startling reply. "<i>The race became extinct
+three thousand years ago.</i>"</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IIA" id="CHAPTER_IIA"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2>
+
+<p>I trembled at the suggestion of my own thoughts. Was this an enchanted
+country? Where the lovely blonde women fairies&mdash;or some weird beings of
+different specie, human only in form? Or was I dreaming?</p>
+
+<p>"I do not believe I understand you," I said. "I never heard of a country
+where there were no men. In my land they are so very, very important."</p>
+
+<p>"Possibly," was the placid answer.</p>
+
+<p>"And you are really a nation of women?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she said. "And have been for the last three thousand years."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you tell me how this wonderful change came about?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly. But in order to do it, I must go back to our very remote
+ancestry. The civilization that I shall begin with must have resembled
+the present condition of your own country as you describe it. Prisons
+and punishments were prevalent throughout the land."</p>
+
+<p>I inquired how long prisons and places of punishment had been abolished
+in Mizora.</p>
+
+<p>"For more than two thousand years," she replied. "I have no personal
+knowledge of crime. When I speak of it, it is wholly from an historical
+standpoint. A theft has not been committed in this country for many many
+centuries. And those minor crimes, such as envy, jealousy, malice and
+falsehood, disappeared a long time ago. You will not find a citizen in
+Mizora who possesses the slightest trace of any of them.</p>
+
+<p>"Did they exist in earlier times?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Our oldest histories are but records of a succession of dramas in
+which the actors were continually striving for power and exercising all
+of those ancient qualities of mind to obtain it. Plots, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>intrigues,
+murders and wars, were the active employments of the very ancient rulers
+of our land. As soon as death laid its inactivity upon one actor,
+another took his place. It might have continued so; and we might still
+be repeating the old tragedy but for one singular event. In the history
+of your own people you have no doubt observed that the very thing
+plotted, intrigued and labored for, has in accomplishment proved the
+ruin of its projectors. You will remark this in the history I am about
+to relate.</p>
+
+<p>"Main ages ago this country was peopled by two races&mdash;male and female.
+The male race were rulers in public and domestic life. Their supremacy
+had come down from pre-historic time, when strength of muscle was the
+only master. Woman was a beast of burden. She was regarded as inferior
+to man, mentally as well as physically. This idea prevailed through
+centuries of the earlier civilization, even after enlightenment had
+brought to her a chivalrous regard from men. But this regard was
+bestowed only upon the women of their own household, by the rich and
+powerful. Those women who had not been fortunate enough to have been
+born in such a sphere of life toiled early and late, in sorrow and
+privation, for a mere pittance that was barely sufficient to keep the
+flame of life from going out. Their labor was more arduous than men's,
+and their wages lighter.</p>
+
+<p>"The government consisted of an aristocracy, a fortunate few, who were
+continually at strife with one another to gain supremacy of power, or an
+acquisition of territory. Wars, famine and pestilence were of frequent
+occurrence. Of the subjects, male and female, some had everything to
+render life a pleasure, while others had nothing. Poverty, oppression
+and wretchedness was the lot of the many. Power, wealth and luxury the
+dower of the few.</p>
+
+<p>"Children came into the world undesired even by those who were able to
+rear them, and often after an attempt had been made to prevent their
+coming alive. Consequently numbers of them were deformed, not only
+physically, but mentally. Under these conditions life was a misery to
+the larger part of the human race, and to end it by self-destruction was
+taught by their religion to be a crime punishable with eternal torment
+by quenchless fire.</p>
+
+<p>"But a revolution was at hand. Stinted toil rose up, armed and wrathful,
+against opulent oppression. The struggle was long and tragical, and was
+waged with such rancor and desperate persistence by the
+insurrectionists, that their women and children began to supply the
+places vacated by fallen fathers, husbands and brothers. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> ended in
+victory for them. They demanded a form of government that should be the
+property of all. It was granted, limiting its privileges to adult male
+citizens.</p>
+
+<p>"The first representative government lasted a century. In that time
+civilization had taken an advance far excelling the progress made in
+three centuries previous. So surely does the mind crave freedom for its
+perfect development. The consciousness of liberty is an ennobling
+element in human nature. No nation can become universally moral until it
+is absolutely FREE.</p>
+
+<p>"But this first Republic had been diseased from its birth. Slavery had
+existed in certain districts of the nation. It was really the remains of
+a former and more degraded state of society which the new government, in
+the exultation of its own triumphant inauguration, neglected or lacked
+the wisdom to remedy. A portion of the country refused to admit slavery
+within its territory, but pledged itself not to interfere with that
+which had. Enmities, however, arose between the two sections, which,
+after years of repression and useless conciliation, culminated in
+another civil war. Slavery had resolved to absorb more territory, and
+the free territory had resolved that it should not. The war that
+followed in consequence severed forever the fetters of the slave and was
+the primary cause of the extinction of the male race.</p>
+
+<p>"The inevitable effect of slavery is enervating and demoralizing. It is
+a canker that eats into the vitals of any nation that harbors it, no
+matter what form it assumes. The free territory had all the vigor,
+wealth and capacity for long endurance that self-dependence gives. It
+was in every respect prepared for a long and severe struggle. Its forces
+were collected in the name of the united government.</p>
+
+<p>"Considering the marked inequality of the combatants the war would
+necessarily have been of short duration. But political corruption had
+crept into the trust places of the government, and unscrupulous
+politicians and office-seekers saw too many opportunities to harvest
+wealth from a continuation of the war. It was to their interest to
+prolong it, and they did. They placed in the most responsible positions
+of the army, military men whose incapacity was well known to them, and
+sustained them there while the country wept its maimed and dying sons.</p>
+
+<p>"The slave territory brought to the front its most capable talent. It
+would have conquered had not the resources against which it contended
+been almost unlimited. Utterly worn out, every available means of supply
+being exhausted, it collapsed from internal weakness.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span></p><p>"The general government, in order to satisfy the clamors of the
+distressed and impatient people whose sons were being sacrificed, and
+whose taxes were increasing, to prolong the war had kept removing and
+reinstating military commanders, but always of reliable incapacity.</p>
+
+<p>"A man of mediocre intellect and boundless self-conceit happened to be
+the commander-in-chief of the government army when the insurrection
+collapsed. The politicians, whose nefarious scheming had prolonged the
+war, saw their opportunity for furthering their own interests by
+securing his popularity. They assumed him to be the greatest military
+genius that the world had ever produced; as evidenced by his success
+where so many others had failed. It was known that he had never risked a
+battle until he was assured that his own soldiers were better equipped
+and outnumbered the enemy. But the politicians asserted that such a
+precaution alone should mark him as an extraordinary military genius.
+The deluded people accepted him as a hero.</p>
+
+<p>"The politicians exhausted their ingenuity in inventing honors for him.
+A new office of special military eminence, with a large salary attached,
+was created for him. He was burdened with distinctions and emoluments,
+always worked by the politicians, for their benefit. The nation,
+following the lead of the political leaders, joined in their adulation.
+It failed to perceive the dangerous path that leads to anarchy and
+despotism&mdash;the worship of one man. It had unfortunately selected one who
+was cautious and undemonstrative, and who had become convinced that he
+really was the greatest prodigy that the world had ever produced.</p>
+
+<p>"He was made President, and then the egotism and narrow selfishness of
+the man began to exhibit itself. He assumed all the prerogatives of
+royalty that his position would permit. He elevated his obscure and
+numerous relatives to responsible offices. Large salaries were paid them
+and intelligent clerks hired by the Government to perform their official
+duties.</p>
+
+<p>"Corruption spread into every department, but the nation was blind to
+its danger. The few who did perceive the weakness and presumption of the
+hero were silenced by popular opinion.</p>
+
+<p>"A second term of office was given him, and then the real character of
+the man began to display itself before the people. The whole nature of
+the man was selfish and stubborn. The strongest mental trait possessed
+by him was cunning.</p>
+
+<p>"His long lease of power and the adulation of his political
+beneficiaries, acting upon a superlative self-conceit, imbued him<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> with
+the belief that he had really rendered his country a service so
+inestimable that it would be impossible for it to entirely liquidate it.
+He exalted to unsuitable public offices his most intimate friends. They
+grew suddenly exclusive and aristocratic, forming marriages with eminent
+families.</p>
+
+<p>"He traveled about the country with his entire family, at the expense of
+the Government, to gradually prepare the people for the ostentation of
+royalty. The cities and towns that he visited furnished fetes,
+illuminations, parades and every variety of entertainment that could be
+thought of or invented for his amusement or glorification. Lest the
+parade might not be sufficiently gorgeous or demonstrative he secretly
+sent agents to prepare the programme and size of his reception, always
+at the expense of the city he intended to honor with his presence.</p>
+
+<p>"He manifested a strong desire to subvert the will of the people to his
+will. When informed that a measure he had proposed was unconstitutional,
+he requested that the constitution be changed. His intimate friends he
+placed in the most important and trustworthy positions under the
+Government, and protected them with the power of his own office.</p>
+
+<p>"Many things that were distasteful and unlawful in a free government
+were flagrantly flaunted in the face of the people, and were followed by
+other slow, but sure, approaches to the usurpation of the liberties of
+the Nation. He urged the Government to double his salary as President,
+and it complied.</p>
+
+<p>"There had long existed a class of politicians who secretly desired to
+convert the Republic into an Empire, that they might secure greater
+power and opulence. They had seen in the deluded enthusiasm of the
+people for one man, the opportunity for which they had long waited and
+schemed. He was unscrupulous and ambitious, and power had become a
+necessity to feed the cravings of his vanity.</p>
+
+<p>"The Constitution of the country forbade the office of President to be
+occupied by one man for more than two terms. The Empire party proposed
+to amend it, permitting the people to elect a President for any number
+of terms, or for life if they choose. They tried to persuade the people
+that the country owed the greatest General of all time so distinctive an
+honor. They even claimed that it was necessary to the preservation of
+the Government; that his popularity could command an army to sustain him
+if he called for it.</p>
+
+<p>"But the people had begun to penetrate the designs of the hero, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>and
+bitterly denounced his resolution to seek a third term of power. The
+terrible corruptions that had been openly protected by him, had
+advertised him as criminally unfit for so responsible an office. But,
+alas! the people had delayed too long. They had taken a young elephant
+into the palace. They had petted and fed him and admired his bulky
+growth, and now they could not remove him without destroying the
+building.</p>
+
+<p>"The politicians who had managed the Government so long, proved that
+they had more power than the people They succeeded, by practices that
+were common with politicians in those days, in getting him nominated for
+a third term. The people, now thoroughly alarmed, began to see their
+past folly and delusion. They made energetic efforts to defeat his
+election. But they were unavailing. The politicians had arranged the
+ballot, and when the counts were published, the hero was declared
+President for life. When too late the deluded people discovered that
+they had helped dig the grave for the corpse of their civil liberty, and
+those who were loyal and had been misled saw it buried with unavailing
+regret. The undeserved popularity bestowed upon a narrow and selfish
+nature had been its ruin. In his inaugural address he declared that
+nothing but the will of the people governed him. He had not desired the
+office; public life was distasteful to him, yet he was willing to
+sacrifice himself for the good of his country.</p>
+
+<p>"Had the people been less enlightened, they might have yielded without a
+murmur; but they had enjoyed too long the privileges of a free
+Government to see it usurped without a struggle. Tumult and disorder
+prevailed over the country. Soldiers were called out to protect the new
+Government, but numbers of them refused to obey. The consequence was
+they fought among themselves. A dissolution of the Government was the
+result. The General they had lauded so greatly failed to bring order out
+of chaos; and the schemers who had foisted him into power, now turned
+upon him with the fury of treacherous natures when foiled of their prey.
+Innumerable factions sprung up all over the land, each with a leader
+ambitious and hopeful of subduing the whole to his rule. They fought
+until the extermination of the race became imminent, when a new and
+unsuspected power arose and mastered.</p>
+
+<p>"The female portion of the nation had never had a share in the
+Government. Their privileges were only what the chivalry or kindness of
+the men permitted. In law, their rights were greatly inferior. The evils
+of anarchy fell with direct effect upon them. At first,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> they organized
+for mutual protection from the lawlessness that prevailed. The
+organizations grew, united and developed into military power. They used
+their power wisely, discreetly, and effectively. With consummate skill
+and energy they gathered the reins of Government in their own hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Their first aim had been only to force the country into peace. The
+anarchy that reigned had demoralized society, and they had suffered
+most. They had long pleaded for an equality of citizenship with men, but
+had pleaded in vain. They now remembered it, and resolved to keep the
+Government that their wisdom and power had restored. They had been
+hampered in educational progress. Colleges and all avenues to higher
+intellectual development had been rigorously closed against them. The
+professional pursuits of life were denied them. But a few, with sublime
+courage and energy, had forced their way into them amid the revilings of
+some of their own sex and opposition of the men. It was these brave
+spirits who had earned their liberal cultivation with so much
+difficulty, that had organized and directed the new power. They
+generously offered to form a Government that should be the property of
+all intelligent adult citizens, not criminal.</p>
+
+<p>"But these wise women were a small minority. The majority were ruled by
+the remembrance of past injustice. <i>They</i> were now the power, and
+declared their intention to hold the Government for a century.</p>
+
+<p>"They formed a Republic, in which they remedied many of the defects that
+had marred the Republic of men. They constituted the Nation an integer
+which could never be disintegrated by States' Rights ideas or the
+assumption of State sovereignty.</p>
+
+<p>"They proposed a code of laws for the home government of the States,
+which every State in the Union ratified as their State Constitution,
+thus making a uniformity and strength that the Republic of men had never
+known or suspected attainable.</p>
+
+<p>"They made it a law of every State that criminals could be arrested in
+any State they might flee to, without legal authority, other than that
+obtained in the vicinity of the crime. They made a law that criminals,
+tried and convicted of crime, could not be pardoned without the sanction
+of seventy-five out of one hundred educated and disinterested people,
+who should weigh the testimony and render their decision under oath. It
+is scarcely necessary to add that few criminals ever were pardoned. It
+removed from the office of Governor the responsibility of pardoning, or
+rejecting pardons as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> purely personal privilege. It abolished the
+power of rich criminals to bribe their escape from justice; a practice
+that had secretly existed in the former Republic.</p>
+
+<p>"In forming their Government, the women, who were its founders, profited
+largely by the mistakes or wisdom displayed in the Government of men.
+Neither the General Government, nor the State Government, could be
+independent of the other. A law of the Union could not become such until
+ratified by every State Legislature. A State law could not become
+constitutional until ratified by Congress.</p>
+
+<p>"In forming the State Constitutions, laws were selected from the
+different State Constitutions that had proven wise for State Government
+during the former Republic. In the Republic of men, each State had made
+and ratified its own laws, independent of the General Government. The
+consequence was, no two States possessed similar laws.</p>
+
+<p>"To secure strength and avoid confusion was the aim of the founders of
+the new Government. The Constitution of the National Government provided
+for the exclusion of the male sex from all affairs and privileges for a
+period of one hundred years.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>At the end of that time not a representative of the sex was in
+existence.</i>"</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IIIA" id="CHAPTER_IIIA"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+
+<p>I expressed my astonishment at her revelation. Their social life existed
+under conditions that were incredible to me. Would it be an impertinence
+to ask for an explanation that I might comprehend? Or was it really the
+one secret they possessed and guarded from discovery, a mystery that
+must forever surround them with a halo of doubt, the suggestion of
+uncanny power? I spoke as deprecatingly as I could. The Preceptress
+turned upon me a calm but penetrating gaze.</p>
+
+<p>"Have we impressed you as a mysterious people?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Very, very much!" I exclaimed. "I have at times been oppressed by it."</p>
+
+<p>"You never mentioned it," she said, kindly.</p>
+
+<p>"I could not find an opportunity to," I said.</p>
+
+<p>"It is the custom in Mizora, as you have no doubt observed, never to
+make domestic affairs a topic of conversation outside of the family, the
+only ones who would be interested in them; and this refinement has kept
+you from the solution of our social system. I have no hesitancy in
+gratifying your wish to comprehend it. The best way to do it is to let
+history lead up to it, if you have the patience to listen."</p>
+
+<p>I assured her that I was anxious to hear all she chose to tell. She then
+resumed:</p>
+
+<p>"The prosperity of the country rapidly increased under the rule of the
+female Presidents. The majority of them were in favor of a high state of
+morality, and they enforced it by law and practice. The arts and
+sciences were liberally encouraged and made rapid advancement. Colleges
+and schools flourished vigorously, and every branch of education was now
+open to women.</p>
+
+<p>"During the Republic of men, the government had founded and sustained a
+military and naval academy, where a limited number of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> the youth of the
+country were educated at government expense. The female government
+re-organized the institutions, substituting the youth of their own sex.
+They also founded an academy of science, which was supplied with every
+facility for investigation and progress. None but those having a marked
+predilection for scientific research could obtain admission, and then it
+was accorded to demonstrated ability only. This drew to the college the
+best female talent in the country. The number of applicants was not
+limited.</p>
+
+<p>"Science had hitherto been, save by a <i>very</i> few, an untrodden field to
+women, but the encouragement and rare facilities offered soon revealed
+latent talent that developed rapidly. Scarcely half a century had
+elapsed before the pupils of the college had effected by their
+discoveries some remarkable changes in living, especially in the
+prevention and cure of diseases.</p>
+
+<p>"However prosperous they might become, they could not dwell in political
+security with a portion of the citizens disfranchised. The men were
+resolved to secure their former power. Intrigues and plots against the
+government were constantly in force among them. In order to avert
+another civil war, it was finally decided to amend the constitution, and
+give them an equal share in the ballot. They had no sooner obtained that
+than the old practices of the former Republic were resorted to to secure
+their supremacy in government affairs. The women looked forward to their
+former subjugation as only a matter of time, and bitterly regretted
+their inability to prevent it. But at the crisis, a prominent scientist
+proposed to let the race die out. Science had revealed the Secret of
+Life."</p>
+
+<p>She ceased speaking, as though I fully understood her.</p>
+
+<p>"I am more bewildered than ever," I exclaimed. "I cannot comprehend
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"Come with me," she said.</p>
+
+<p>I followed her into the Chemist's Laboratory. She bade me look into a
+microscope that she designated, and tell her what I saw.</p>
+
+<p>"An exquisitely minute cell in violent motion," I answered.</p>
+
+<p>"Daughter," she said, solemnly, "you are now looking upon the germ of
+<i>all</i> Life, be it animal or vegetable, a flower or a human being, it has
+that one common beginning. We have advanced far enough in Science to
+control its development. Know that the MOTHER is the only important part
+of all life. In the lowest organisms no other sex is apparent."</p>
+
+<p>I sat down and looked at my companion in a frame of mind not easily
+described. There was an intellectual grandeur in her look and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> mien that
+was impressive. Truth sat, like a coronet, upon her brow. The revelation
+I had so longed for, I now almost regretted. It separated me so far from
+these beautiful, companionable beings.</p>
+
+<p>"Science has instructed you how to supercede Nature," I said, finally.</p>
+
+<p>"By no means. It has only taught us how to make her obey us. We cannot
+<i>create</i> Life. We cannot develop it. But we can control Nature's
+processes of development as we will. Can you deprecate such a power?
+Would not your own land be happier without idiots, without lunatics,
+without deformity and disease?"</p>
+
+<p>"You will give me little hope of any radical change in my own lifetime
+when I inform you that deformity, if extraordinary, becomes a source of
+revenue to its possessor."</p>
+
+<p>"All reforms are of slow growth," she said. "The moral life is the
+highest development of Nature. It is evolved by the same slow processes,
+and like the lower life, its succeeding forms are always higher ones.
+Its ultimate perfection will be mind, where all happiness shall dwell,
+where pleasure shall find fruition, and desire its ecstasy.</p>
+
+<p>"It is the duty of every generation to prepare the way for a higher
+development of the next, as we see demonstrated by Nature in the
+fossilized remains of long extinct animal life, a preparatory condition
+for a higher form in the next evolution. If you do not enjoy the fruit
+of your labor in your own lifetime, the generation that follows you will
+be the happier for it. Be not so selfish as to think only of your own
+narrow span of life."</p>
+
+<p>"By what means have you reached so grand a development?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"By the careful study of, and adherence to, Nature's laws. It was long
+years&mdash;I should say centuries&mdash;before the influence of the coarser
+nature of men was eliminated from the present race.</p>
+
+<p>"We devote the most careful attention to the Mothers of our race. No
+retarding mental or moral influences are ever permitted to reach her. On
+the contrary, the most agreeable contacts with nature, all that can
+cheer and ennoble in art or music surround her. She is an object of
+interest and tenderness to all who meet her. Guarded from unwholesome
+agitation, furnished with nourishing and proper diet&mdash;both mental and
+physical&mdash;the child of a Mizora mother is always an improvement upon
+herself. With us, childhood has no sorrows. We believe, and the present
+condition of our race proves, that a being environed from its birth with
+none but elevating <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span>influences, will grow up amiable and intelligent
+though inheriting unfavorable tendencies.</p>
+
+<p>"On this principle we have ennobled our race and discovered the means of
+prolonging life and youthful loveliness far beyond the limits known by
+our ancestors.</p>
+
+<p>"Temptation and necessity will often degrade a nature naturally inclined
+and desirous to be noble. We early recognized this fact, and that a
+nature once debased by crime would transmit it to posterity. For this
+reason we never permitted a convict to have posterity."</p>
+
+<p>"But how have you become so beautiful?" I asked. "For, in all my
+journeys, I have not met an uncomely face or form. On the contrary, all
+the Mizora women have perfect bodies and lovely features."</p>
+
+<p>"We follow the gentle guidance of our mother, Nature. Good air and
+judicious exercise for generations and generations before us have
+helped. Our ancestors knew the influence of art, sculpture, painting and
+music, which they were trained to appreciate."</p>
+
+<p>"But has not nature been a little generous to you?" I inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"Not more so than she will be to any people who follow her laws. When
+you first came here you had an idea that you could improve nature by
+crowding your lungs and digestive organs into a smaller space than she,
+the maker of them, intended them to occupy.</p>
+
+<p>"If you construct an engine, and then cram it into a box so narrow and
+tight that it cannot move, and then crowd on the motive power, what
+would you expect?</p>
+
+<p>"Beautiful as you think my people, and as they really are, yet, by
+disregarding nature's laws, or trying to thwart her intentions, in a few
+generations to come, perhaps even in the next, we could have coarse
+features and complexions, stoop shoulders and deformity.</p>
+
+<p>"It has required patience, observation and care on the part of our
+ancestors to secure to us the priceless heritage of health and perfect
+bodies. Your people can acquire them by the same means."</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IVA" id="CHAPTER_IVA"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2>
+
+<blockquote><p>As to Physical causes, I am inclined to doubt altogether of their
+operation in this particular; nor do I think that men owe anything
+of their temper or genius to the air, food, or climate.&mdash;<i>Bacon.</i></p></blockquote>
+
+<p>I listened with the keenest interest to this curious and instructive
+history; and when the Preceptress had ceased speaking. I expressed my
+gratitude for her kindness. There were many things about which I desired
+information, but particularly their method of eradicating disease and
+crime. These two evils were the prominent afflictions of all the
+civilized nations I knew. I believed that I could comprehend enough of
+their method of extirpation to benefit my own country. Would she kindly
+give it?</p>
+
+<p>"I shall take Disease first," she said, "as it is a near relative of
+Crime. You look surprised. You have known life-long and incurable
+invalids who were not criminals. But go to the squalid portion of any of
+your large cities, where Poverty and Disease go hand in hand, where the
+child receives its life and its first nourishment from a haggard and
+discontented mother. Starvation is her daily dread. The little
+tendernesses that make home the haven of the heart, are never known to
+her. Ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-cherished, all that <i>might</i> be refined
+and elevated in her nature, if properly cultivated, is choked into
+starveling shapes by her enemy&mdash;Want.</p>
+
+<p>"If you have any knowledge of nature, ask yourself if such a condition
+of birth and infancy is likely to produce a noble, healthy human being?
+Do your agriculturists expect a stunted, neglected tree to produce rare
+and luscious fruit?"</p>
+
+<p>I was surprised at the Preceptress' graphic description of wretchedness,
+so familiar to all the civilized nations that I knew, and asked:</p>
+
+<p>"Did such a state of society ever exist in this country?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span></p><p>"Ages ago it was as marked a social condition of this land as it is of
+your own to-day. The first great move toward eradicating disease was in
+providing clean and wholesome food for the masses. It required the
+utmost rigor of the law to destroy the pernicious practice of
+adulteration. The next endeavor was to crowd poverty out of the land. In
+order to do this the Labor question came first under discussion, and
+resulted in the establishment in every state of a Board of Arbitration
+that fixed the price of labor on a per cent, of the profits of the
+business. Public and private charities were forbidden by law as having
+an immoral influence upon society. Charitable institutions had long been
+numerous and fashionable, and many persons engaged in them as much for
+their own benefit as that of the poor. It was not always the honest and
+benevolent ones who became treasurers, nor were the funds always
+distributed among the needy and destitute, or those whom they were
+collected for. The law put a stop to the possibility of such frauds, and
+of professional impostors seeking alms. Those who needed assistance were
+supplied with work&mdash;respectable, independent work&mdash;furnished by the city
+or town in which they resided. A love of industry, its dignity and
+independence, was carefully instilled into every young mind. There is no
+country but what ought to provide for everyone of its citizens a
+comfortable, if not luxurious, home by humane legislation on the labor
+question.</p>
+
+<p>"The penitentiaries were reconstructed by the female government. One
+half the time formerly allotted to labor was employed in compulsory
+education. Industrial schools were established in every State, where all
+the mechanical employments were taught free. Objects of charity were
+sent there and compelled to become self supporting. These industrial
+schools finally became State Colleges, where are taught, free, all the
+known branches of knowledge, intellectual and mechanical.</p>
+
+<p>"Pauperism disappeared before the wide reaching influence of these
+industrial schools, but universal affluence had not come. It could not
+exist until education had become universal.</p>
+
+<p>"With this object in view, the Government forbade the employment of any
+citizen under the age of twenty-one, and compelled their attendance at
+school up to that time. At the same time a law was passed that
+authorized the furnishing of all school-room necessaries out of the
+public funds. If a higher education were desired the State Colleges
+furnished it free of all expenses contingent.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></p><p>"All of these measures had a marked influence in improving the
+condition of society, but not all that was required. The necessity for
+strict sanitary laws became obvious. Cities and towns and even farms
+were visited, and everything that could breed malaria, or produce impure
+air, was compelled to be removed. Personal and household cleanliness at
+last became an object of public interest, and inspectors were appointed
+who visited families and reported the condition of their homes. All
+kinds of out-door sports and athletic exercises were encouraged and
+became fashionable.</p>
+
+<p>"All of these things combined, made a great improvement in the health
+and vigor of our race, but still hereditary diseases lingered.</p>
+
+<p>"There were many so enfeebled by hereditary disease they had not enough
+energy to seek recuperation, and died, leaving offspring as wretched,
+who in turn followed their parents' example.</p>
+
+<p>"Statistics were compiled, and physician's reports circulated, until a
+law was passed prohibiting the perpetuity of diseased offspring. But,
+although disease became less prevalent, it did not entirely disappear.
+The law could only reach the most deplorable afflictions, and was
+eventually repealed.</p>
+
+<p>"As the science of therapeutics advanced, all diseases&mdash;whether
+hereditary or acquired&mdash;were found to be associated with abnormal
+conditions of the blood. A microscopic examination of a drop of blood
+enabled the scientist to determine the character and intensity of any
+disease, and at last to effect its elimination from the system.</p>
+
+<p>"The blood is the primal element of the body. It feeds the flesh, the
+nerves, the muscles, the brain. Disease cannot exist when it is in a
+natural condition. Countless experiments have determined the exact
+properties of healthy blood and how to produce it. By the use of this
+knowledge we have eliminated hereditary diseases, and developed into a
+healthy and moral people. For people universally healthy is sure of
+being moral. Necessity begets crime. It is the <i>wants</i> of the ignorant
+and debased that suggests theft. It is a diseased fancy, or a mind
+ignorant of the laws that govern the development of human nature, that
+could attribute to offspring hated before birth: infancy and childhood
+neglected; starved, ill-used in every way, a disposition and character,
+amiable and humane and likely to become worthy members of society. The
+reverse is almost inevitable. Human nature relapses into the lower and
+baser instincts of its earlier existence, when neglected, ill-used and
+<i>ignorant</i>. All of those lovely traits of character which excite the
+enthusiast, such as gratitude, honor, charity are the results of
+education only. They are not the natural instincts of the human mind,
+but the cultivated ones.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span></p><p>"The most rigid laws were passed in regard to the practice of medicine.
+No physician could become a practitioner until examined and authorized
+to do so by the State Medical College. In order to prevent favoritism,
+or the furnishing of diplomas to incompetent applicants, enormous
+penalties were incurred by any who would sign such. The profession long
+ago became extinct. Every mother is a family physician. That is, she
+obeys the laws of nature in regard to herself and her children, and they
+never need a doctor.</p>
+
+<p>"Having become healthy and independent of charity, crime began to
+decrease naturally. The conditions that had bred and fostered petty
+crimes having ceased to exist, the natures that had inherited them rose
+above their influence in a few generations, and left honorable
+posterity.</p>
+
+<p>"But crime in its grossest form is an ineradicable hereditary taint.
+Generation after generation may rise and disappear in a family once
+tainted with it, without displaying it, and then in a most unexpected
+manner it will spring up in some descendant, violent and unconquerable.</p>
+
+<p>"We tried to eliminate it as we had disease, but failed. It was an
+inherited molecular structure of the brain. Science could not
+reconstruct it. The only remedy was annihilation. Criminals had no
+posterity."</p>
+
+<p>"I am surprised," I interrupted, "that possessing the power to control
+the development of the body, you should not do so with the mind."</p>
+
+<p>"If we could we would produce genius that could discover the source of
+all life. We can control Cause and Effect, but we cannot create Cause.
+We do not even know its origin. What the perfume is to the flower, the
+intellect is to the body; a secret that Nature keeps to herself. For a
+thousand years our greatest minds have sought to discover its source,
+and we are as far from it to-day as we were a thousand years ago."</p>
+
+<p>"How then have you obtained your mental superiority?" I inquired.</p>
+
+<p>"By securing to our offspring perfect, physical and mental health.
+Science has taught us how to evolve intellect by following demonstrated
+laws. I put a seed into the ground and it comes up a little green slip,
+that eventually becomes a tree. When I planted the seed in congenial
+soil, and watered and tended the slip, I assisted Nature. But I did not
+create the seed nor supply the force that made it develop into a tree,
+nor can I define that force."</p>
+
+<p>"What has produced the exquisite refinement of your people?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p><p>"Like everything else, it is the result of gradual development aiming
+at higher improvement. By following strictly the laws that govern the
+evolution of life, we control the formation of the body and brain.
+Strong mental traits become intensified by cultivation from generation
+to generation and finally culminate in one glorious outburst of power,
+called Genius. But there is one peculiarity about mind. It resembles
+that wonderful century plant which, after decades of developing, flowers
+and dies. Genius is the long unfolding bloom of mind, and leaves no
+posterity. We carefully prepare for the future development of Genius. We
+know that our children will be neither deformed nor imbecile, but we
+watch the unfolding of their intellects with the interest of a new
+revelation. We guide them with the greatest care.</p>
+
+<p>"I could take a child of your people with inherited weakness of body and
+mind. I should rear it on proper food and exercise&mdash;both mental and
+physical&mdash;and it would have, when matured, a marked superiority to its
+parents. It is not what Nature has done for us, it is what we have done
+for her, that makes us a race of superior people."</p>
+
+<p>"The qualities of mind that are the general feature of your people," I
+remarked, "are so very high, higher than our estimate of Genius. How was
+it arrived at?"</p>
+
+<p>"By the processes I have just explained. Genius is always a leader. A
+genius with us has a subtlety of thought and perception beyond your
+power of appreciation. All organized social bodies move intellectually
+in a mass, with their leader just ahead of them."</p>
+
+<p>"I have visited, as a guest, a number of your families, and found their
+homes adorned with paintings and sculpture that would excite wondering
+admiration in my own land as rare works of art, but here they are only
+the expression of family taste and culture. Is that a quality of
+intellect that has been evolved, or is it a natural endowment of your
+race?"</p>
+
+<p>"It is not an endowment, but has been arrived at by the same process of
+careful cultivation. Do you see in those ancient portraits a variety of
+striking colors? There is not a suggestion of harmony in any of them. On
+the contrary, they all display violent contrasts of color. The originals
+of them trod this land thousands of years ago. Many of the colors, we
+know, were unknown to them. Color is a faculty of the mind that is
+wholly the result of culture. In the early ages of society, it was known
+only in the coarsest and most brilliant hues. A conception and
+appreciation of delicate harmonies in color is evidence of a superior
+and refined mentality. If you will notice it,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> the illiterate of your
+own land have no taste for or idea of the harmony of color. It is the
+same with sound. The higher we rise in culture, the more difficult we
+are to please in music. Our taste becomes critical."</p>
+
+<p>I had been revolving some things in my mind while the Preceptress was
+speaking, and I now ventured to express them. I said:</p>
+
+<p>"You tell me that generations will come and go before a marked change
+can occur in a people. What good then would it do me or mine to study
+and labor and investigate in or to teach my people how to improve? They
+can not comprehend progress. They have not learned by contact, as I have
+in Mizora, how to appreciate it. I should only waste life and happiness
+in trying to persuade them to get out of the ruts they have traveled so
+long; they think there are no other roads. I should be reviled, and
+perhaps persecuted. My doctrines would be called visionary and
+impracticable. I think I had better use my knowledge for my own kindred,
+and let the rest of the world find out the best way it can."</p>
+
+<p>The Preceptress looked at me with mild severity. I never before had seen
+so near an approach to rebuke in her grand eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"What a barbarous, barbarous idea!" she exclaimed. "Your country will
+never rise above its ignorance and degradation, until out of its mental
+agony shall be evolved a nature kindled with an ambition that burns for
+Humanity instead of self. It will be the nucleus round which will gather
+the timid but anxious, and <i>then</i> will be lighted that fire which no
+waters can quench. It burns for the liberty of thought. Let human nature
+once feel the warmth of its beacon fires, and it will march onward,
+defying all obstacles, braving all perils till it be won. Human nature
+is ever reaching for the unattained. It is that little spark within us
+that has an undying life. When we can no longer use it, it flies
+elsewhere."</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VA" id="CHAPTER_VA"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2>
+
+<p>I had long contemplated a trip to the extreme southern boundary of
+Mizora. I had often inquired about it, and had always been answered that
+it was defined by an impassable ocean. I had asked them to describe it
+to me, for the Mizora people have a happy faculty of employing tersely
+expressive language when necessary; but I was always met with the
+surprising answer that no tongue in Mizora was eloquent enough to
+portray the wonders that bounded Mizora on the south. So I requested the
+Preceptress to permit Wauna to accompany me as a guide and companion; a
+request she readily complied with.</p>
+
+<p>"Will you be afraid or uneasy about trusting her on so long a journey
+with no companion or protector but me?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>The Preceptress smiled at my question.</p>
+
+<p>"Why should I be afraid, when in all the length and breadth of our land
+there is no evil to befall her, or you either. Strangers are friends in
+Mizora, in one sense of the word, when they meet. You will both travel
+as though among time endeared associates. You will receive every
+attention, courtesy and kindness that would be bestowed upon near and
+intimate acquaintances. No, in this land, mothers do not fear to send
+their daughters alone and unrecommended among strangers."</p>
+
+<p>When speed was required, the people of Mizora traveled altogether by air
+ships. But when the pleasure of landscape viewing, and the delight and
+exhilaration of easy progress is desired, they use either railroad cars
+or carriages.</p>
+
+<p>Wauna and I selected an easy and commodious carriage. It was propelled
+by compressed air, which Wauna said could be obtained whenever we needed
+a new supply at any village or country seat.</p>
+
+<p>Throughout the length and breadth of Mizora the roads were artificially
+made. Cities, towns, and villages were provided with paved<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> streets,
+which the public authorities kept in a condition of perfect cleanliness.
+The absence of all kinds of animals rendered this comparatively easy. In
+alluding to this once in the presence of the Preceptress, she startled
+me by the request that I should suggest to my people the advantage to be
+derived from substituting machinery for animal labor.</p>
+
+<p>"The association of animals is degrading," she asserted. "And you, who
+still live by tilling the soil, will find a marked change economically
+in dispensing with your beasts of burden. Fully four-fifths that you
+raise on your farms is required to feed your domestic animals. If your
+agriculture was devoted entirely to human food, it would make it more
+plentiful for the poor."</p>
+
+<p>I did not like to tell her that I knew many wealthy people who housed
+and fed their domestic animals better than they did their tenants. She
+would have been disgusted with such a state of barbarism.</p>
+
+<p>Country roads in Mizora were usually covered with a cement that was
+prepared from pulverized granite. They were very durable and very hard.
+Owing to their solidity, they were not as agreeable for driving as
+another kind of cement they manufactured. I have previously spoken of
+the peculiar style of wheel that was used on all kinds of light
+conveyances in Mizora, and rendered their progress over any road the
+very luxury of motion.</p>
+
+<p>In our journey, Wauna took me to a number of factories, where the
+wonderful progress they had made in science continually surprised and
+delighted me. The spider and the silkworm had yielded their secret to
+these indefatigable searchers into nature's mysteries. They could spin a
+thread of gossamer, or of silk from their chemicals, of any width and
+length, and with a rapidity that was magical. Like everything else of
+that nature in Mizora, these discoveries had been purchased by the
+Government, and then made known to all.</p>
+
+<p>They also manufactured ivory that I could not tell from the real
+article. I have previously spoken of their success in producing various
+kinds of marble and stone. A beautiful table that I saw made out of
+artificial ivory, had a painting upon the top of it. A deep border,
+composed of delicate, convoluted shells, extended round the top of the
+table and formed the shores of a mimic ocean, with coral reefs and tiny
+islands, and tangled sea-weeds and shining fishes sporting about in the
+pellucid water. The surface was of highly polished smoothness, and I was
+informed that the picture was <i>not</i> a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> painting but was formed of
+colored particles of ivory that had been worked in before the drying or
+solidifying process had been applied. In the same way they formed main
+beautiful combinations of marbles. The magnificent marble columns that
+supported the portico of my friend's house were all of artificial make.
+The delicate green leaves and creeping vines of ivy, rose, and
+eglantine, with their spray-like blossoms, were colored in the
+manufacturing process and chiseled out of the solid marble by the
+skillful hand of the artist.</p>
+
+<p>It would be difficult for me to even enumerate all the beautiful arts
+and productions of arts that I saw in Mizora. Our journey was full of
+incidents of this kind.</p>
+
+<p>Every city and town that we visited was like the introduction of a new
+picture. There was no sameness between any of them. Each had aimed at
+picturesqueness or stately magnificence, and neither had failed to
+obtain it. Looking back as I now do upon Mizora, it presents itself to
+me as a vast and almost limitless landscape, variegated with grand
+cities, lovely towns and villages, majestic hills and mountains crowned
+with glittering snows, or deep, delightful valleys veiled in scented
+vines.</p>
+
+<p>Kindness, cordiality and courtesy met us on every side. It was at first
+quite novel for me to mingle among previously unheard-of people with
+such sociability, but I did as Wauna did, and I found it not only
+convenient but quite agreeable.</p>
+
+<p>"I am the daughter of the Preceptress of the National College," said
+Wauna; and that was the way she introduced herself.</p>
+
+<p>I noticed with what honor and high esteem the name of the Preceptress
+was regarded. As soon as it was known that the daughter of the
+Preceptress had arrived, the citizens of whatever city we had stopped in
+hastened to extend to her every courtesy and favor possible for them to
+bestow. She was the daughter of the woman who held the highest and most
+enviable position in the Nation. A position that only great intellect
+could secure in that country.</p>
+
+<p>As we neared the goal of our journey, I noticed an increasing warmth of
+the atmosphere, and my ears were soon greeted with a deep, reverberating
+roar like continuous thunder. I have seen and heard Niagara, but a
+thousand Niagaras could not equal that deafening sound. The heat became
+oppressive. The light also from a cause of which I shall soon speak.</p>
+
+<p>We ascended a promontory that jutted out from the main land a quarter of
+a mile, perhaps more. Wauna conducted me to the edge of the cliff and
+told me to look down. An ocean of whirlpools was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> before us. The
+maddened dashing and thundering of the mighty waters, and the awe they
+inspired no words can paint. Across such an abyss of terrors it was
+certain no vessel could sail. We took our glasses and scanned the
+opposite shore, which appeared to be a vast cataract as though the ocean
+was pouring over a precipice of rock. Wauna informed me that where the
+shore was visible it was a perpendicular wall of smooth rock.</p>
+
+<p>Over head an arc of fire spanned the zenith from which depended curtains
+of rainbows waving and fluttering, folding and floating out again with a
+rapid and incessant motion. I asked Wauna why they had not crossed in
+air-ships, and she said they had tried it often but had always failed.</p>
+
+<p>"In former times," she said, "when air-ships first came into use it was
+frequently attempted, but no voyager ever returned. We have long since
+abandoned the attempt, for now we know it to be impossible."</p>
+
+<p>I looked again at that display of uncontrollable power. As I gazed it
+seemed to me I would be drawn down by the resistless fascination of
+terror. I grasped Wauna and she gently turned my face to the smiling
+landscape behind us. Hills and valleys, and sparkling cities veiled in
+foliage, with their numberless parks and fountains and statues sleeping
+in the soft light, gleaming lakes and wandering rivers that glittered
+and danced in the glorious atmosphere like prisoned sunbeams, greeted us
+like the alluring smile of love, and yet, for the first time since
+entering this lovely land, I felt myself a prisoner. Behind me was an
+impassable barrier. Before me, far beyond this gleaming vision of
+enchantment, lay another road whose privations and dangers I dreaded to
+attempt.</p>
+
+<p>I felt as a bird might feel who has been brought from the free expanse
+of its wild forest-home, and placed in a golden cage where it drinks
+from a jeweled cup and eats daintier food than it could obtain in its
+own rude haunts. It pines for that precarious life; its very dangers and
+privations fill its breast with desire. I began to long with unutterable
+impatience to see once more the wild, rough scenes of my own nativity.
+Memory began to recall them with softening touches. My heart yearned for
+my own; debased as compared with Mizora though they be, there was the
+congeniality of blood between us. I longed to see my own little one
+whose dimpled hands I had unclasped from my neck in that agonized
+parting. Whenever I saw a Mizora mother fondling her babe, my heart
+leapt with quick desire to once more hold my own in such loving embrace.
+The mothers of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> Mizora have a devotional love for their children. Their
+smiles and prattle and baby wishes are listened to with loving
+tenderness, and treated as matters of importance.</p>
+
+<p>I was sitting beside a Mizora mother one evening, listening to some
+singing that I truly thought no earthly melody could surpass. I asked
+the lady if ever she had heard anything sweeter, and she answered,
+earnestly:</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, the voices of my own children."</p>
+
+<p>On our homeward journey, Wauna took me to a lake from the center of
+which we could see, with our glasses, a green island rising high above
+the water like an emerald in a silver setting.</p>
+
+<p>"That," said Wauna, directing my attention to it, "is the last vestige
+of a prison left in Mizora. Would you like to visit it?"</p>
+
+<p>I expressed an eager willingness to behold so curious a sight, and
+getting into a small pleasure boat, we started toward it. Boats are
+propelled in Mizora either by electricity or compressed air, and glide
+through the water with soundless swiftness.</p>
+
+<p>As we neared the island I could perceive the mingling of natural and
+artificial attractions. We moored our boat at the foot of a flight of
+steps, hewn from the solid rock. On reaching the top, the scene spread
+out like a beautiful painting. Grottos, fountains, and cascades, winding
+walks and vine-covered bowers charmed us as we wandered about. In the
+center stood a medium-sized residence of white marble. We entered
+through a door opening on a wide piazza. Art and wealth and taste had
+adorned the interior with a generous hand. A library studded with books
+closely shut behind glass doors had a wide window that commanded an
+enchanting view of the lake, with its rippling waters sparkling and
+dimpling in the light. On one side of the mantelpiece hung a full length
+portrait of a lady, painted with startling naturalness.</p>
+
+<p>"That," said Wauna, solemnly, "was the last prisoner in Mizora."</p>
+
+<p>I looked with interested curiosity at a relic so curious in this land.
+It was a blonde woman with lighter colored eyes than is at all common in
+Mizora. Her long, blonde hair hung straight and unconfined over a dress
+of thick, white material. Her attitude and expression were dejected and
+sorrowful. I had visited prisons in my own land where red-handed murder
+sat smiling with indifference. I had read in newspapers, labored
+eloquence that described the stoicism of some hardened criminal as a
+trait of character to be admired. I had read descriptions where mistaken
+eloquence exerted itself to waken sympathy for a criminal who had never
+felt sympathy for his helpless and innocent victims, and I had felt
+nothing but creeping horror for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> it all. But gazing at this picture of
+undeniable repentance, tears of sympathy started to my eyes. Had she
+been guilty of taking a fellow-creature's life?</p>
+
+<p>"Is she still living?" I asked by way of a preface.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no, she has been dead for more than a century," answered Wauna.</p>
+
+<p>"Was she confined here very long?"</p>
+
+<p>"For life," was the reply.</p>
+
+<p>"I should not believe," I said, "that a nature capable of so deep a
+repentance could be capable of so dark a crime as murder."</p>
+
+<p>"Murder!" exclaimed Wauna in horror. "There has not been a murder
+committed in this land for three thousand years."</p>
+
+<p>It was my turn to be astonished.</p>
+
+<p>"Then tell me what dreadful crime she committed."</p>
+
+<p>"She struck her child," said Wauna, sadly; "her little innocent,
+helpless child that Nature gave her to love and cherish, and make noble
+and useful and happy."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she inflict a permanent injury?" I asked, with increased
+astonishment at this new phase of refinement in the Mizora character.</p>
+
+<p>"No one can tell the amount of injury a blow does to a child. It may
+immediately show an obvious physical one; it may later develop a mental
+one. It may never seem to have injured it at all, and yet it may have
+shocked a sensitive nature and injured it permanently. Crime is evolved
+from perverted natures, and natures become perverted from ill-usage. It
+merges into a peculiar structure of the brain that becomes hereditary."</p>
+
+<p>"What became of the prisoner's child?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was adopted by a young lady who had just graduated at the State
+College of the State in which the mother resided. It was only five years
+old, and its mother's name was never mentioned to it or to anyone else.
+Long before that, the press had abolished the practice of giving any
+prominence to crime. That pernicious eloquence that in uncivilized ages
+had helped to nourish crime by a maudlin sympathy for the criminal, had
+ceased to exist. The young lady called the child daughter, and it called
+her mother."</p>
+
+<p>"Did the real mother never want to see her child?"</p>
+
+<p>"That is said to be a true picture of her," said Wauna; "and who can
+look at it and not see sorrow and remorse."</p>
+
+<p>"How could you be so stern?" I asked, in wondering astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>"Pity has nothing to do with crime," said Wauna, firmly. "You<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> must look
+to humanity, and not to the sympathy one person excites when you are
+aiding enlightenment. That woman wandered about these beautiful grounds,
+or sat in this elegant home a lonely and unsympathized-with prisoner.
+She was furnished with books, magazines and papers, and every physical
+comfort. Sympathy for her lot was never offered her. Childhood is
+regarded by my people as the only period of life that is capable of
+knowing perfect happiness, and among us it is a crime greater than the
+heinousness of murder in your country, to deprive a human being of its
+childhood&mdash;in which cluster the only unalloyed sweets of life.</p>
+
+<p>"A human being who remembers only pain, rebukes treatment in childhood,
+has lost the very flavor of existence, and the person who destroyed it
+is a criminal indeed."</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIA" id="CHAPTER_VIA"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2>
+
+<p>There was one peculiarity about Mizora that I noticed soon after my
+arrival, but for various reasons have refrained from speaking of before
+now. It was the absence of houses devoted to religious worship.</p>
+
+<p>In architecture Mizora displayed the highest perfection. Their colleges,
+art galleries, public libraries, opera houses, and all their public
+buildings were grand and beautiful. Never in any country, had I beheld
+such splendor in design and execution. Their superior skill in this
+respect, led me to believe that their temples of worship must be on a
+scale of magnificence beyond all my conceiving. I was eager to behold
+them. I looked often upon my first journeyings about their cities to
+discover them, but whenever I noticed an unusually imposing building,
+and asked what it was, it was always something else. I was frequently on
+the point of asking them to conduct me to some church that resembled my
+own in worship, (for I was brought up in strict compliance with the
+creeds, dogmas, and regulations of the Russo Greek Church) but I
+refrained, hoping that in time, I should be introduced to their
+religious ceremonies.</p>
+
+<p>When time passed on, and no invitation was extended me, and I saw no
+house nor preparation for religious worship, nor even heard mention of
+any, I asked Wauna for an explanation. She appeared not to comprehend
+me, and I asked the question:</p>
+
+<p>"Where do you perform your religious rites and ceremonies?"</p>
+
+<p>She looked at me with surprise.</p>
+
+<p>"You ask me such strange questions that sometimes I am tempted to
+believe you a relic of ancient mythology that has drifted down the
+centuries and landed on our civilized shores, or else have been gifted
+with a marvelous prolongation of life, and have emerged upon us from
+some cavern where you have lived, or slept for ages in unchanged
+possession of your ancient superstition."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p><p>"Have you, then," I asked in astonishment, "no religious temples
+devoted to worship?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, we have temples where we worship daily. Do you see that
+building?" nodding toward the majestic granite walls of the National
+College. "That is one of our most renowned temples, where the highest
+and the noblest in the land meet and mingle familiarly with the humblest
+in daily worship."</p>
+
+<p>"I understand all that you wish to imply by that," I replied. "But have
+you no building devoted to divine worship; no temple that belongs
+specially to your Deity; to the Being that created you, and to whom you
+owe eternal gratitude and homage?"</p>
+
+<p>"We have;" she answered grandly, with a majestic wave of her hand, and
+in that mellow, musical voice that was sweeter than the chanting of
+birds, she exclaimed:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<div>"This vast cathedral, boundless as our wonder;</div>
+<div class="i1">Whose shining lamps yon brilliant mists<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a> supply;</div>
+<div>Its choir the winds, and waves; its organ thunder;</div>
+<div class="i1">Its dome the sky."</div>
+</div></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> Aurora Borealis</p></div>
+
+<p>"Do you worship Nature?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"If we did, we should worship ourselves, for we are a part of Nature."</p>
+
+<p>"But do you not recognize an invisible and incomprehensible Being that
+created you, and who will give your spirit an abode of eternal bliss, or
+consign it to eternal torments according as you have glorified and
+served him?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am an atom of Nature;" said Wauna, gravely. "If you want me to answer
+your superstitious notions of religion, I will, in one sentence,
+explain, that the only religious idea in Mizora is: Nature is God, and
+God is Nature. She is the Great Mother who gathers the centuries in her
+arms, and rocks their children into eternal sleep upon her bosom."</p>
+
+<p>"But how," I asked in bewildered astonishment, "how can you think of
+living without creeds, and confessionals? How can you prosper without
+prayer? How can you be upright, and honest, and true to yourselves and
+your friends without praying for divine grace and strength to sustain
+you? How can you be noble, and keep from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> envying your neighbors,
+without a prayer for divine grace to assist you to resist such
+temptation?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, daughter of the dark ages," said Wauna, sadly, "turn to the
+benevolent and ever-willing Science. She is the goddess who has led us
+out of ignorance and superstition; out of degradation and disease, and
+every other wretchedness that superstitious, degraded humanity has
+known. She has lifted us above the low and the little, the narrow and
+mean in human thought and action, and has placed us in a broad, free,
+independent, noble, useful and grandly happy life."</p>
+
+<p>"You have been favored by divine grace," I reiterated, "although you
+refuse to acknowledge it."</p>
+
+<p>She smiled compassionately as she answered:</p>
+
+<p>"She is the divinity who never turned a deaf ear to earnest and
+persistent effort in a sensible direction. But prayers to her must be
+<i>work</i>, resolute and conscientious <i>work</i>. She teaches that success in
+this world can only come to those who work for it. In your superstitious
+belief you pray for benefits you have never earned, possibly do not
+deserve, but expect to get simply because you pray for them. Science
+never betrays such partiality. The favors she bestows are conferred only
+upon the industrious."</p>
+
+<p>"And you deny absolutely the efficacy of prayer?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"If I could obtain anything by prayer alone, I would pray that my
+inventive faculty should be enlarged so that I might conceive and
+construct an air-ship that could cleave its way through that chaos of
+winds that is formed when two storms meet from opposite directions. It
+would rend to atoms one of our present make. But prayer will never
+produce an improved air-ship. We must dig into science for it. Our
+ancestors did not pray for us to become a race of symmetrically-shaped
+and universally healthy people, and expect that to effect a result. They
+went to work on scientific principles to root out disease and crime and
+want and wretchedness, and every degrading and retarding influence."</p>
+
+<p>"Prayer never saved one of my ancestors from premature death," she
+continued, with a resolution that seemed determined to tear from my mind
+every fabric of faith in the consolations of divine interposition that
+had been a special part of my education, and had become rooted into my
+nature. "Disease, when it fastened upon the vitals of the young and
+beautiful and dearly-loved was stronger and more powerful than all the
+agonized prayers that could be poured from breaking hearts. But science,
+when solicited by careful study<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> and experiment and investigation,
+offered the remedy. And <i>now</i>, we defy disease and have no fear of death
+until our natural time comes, and <i>then</i> it will be the welcome rest
+that the worn-out body meets with gratitude."</p>
+
+<p>"But when you die," I exclaimed, "do you not believe you have an after
+life?"</p>
+
+<p>"When I die," replied Wauna, "my body will return to the elements from
+whence it came. Thought will return to the force which gave it. The
+power of the brain is the one mystery that surrounds life. We know that
+the brain is a mechanical structure and acted upon by force; but how to
+analyze that force is still beyond our reach. You see that huge engine?
+We made it. It is a fine piece of mechanism. We know what it was made to
+do. We turn on the motive power, and it moves at the rate of a mile a
+minute if we desire it. Why should it move? Why might it not stand
+still? You say because of a law of nature that under the circumstances
+compels it to move. Our brain is like that engine&mdash;a wonderful piece of
+mechanism, and when the blood drives it, it displays the effects of
+force which we call Thought. We can see the engine move and we know what
+law of nature it obeys in moving. But the brain is a more mysterious
+structure, for the force which compels it to action we cannot analyze.
+The superstitious ancients called this mystery the soul."</p>
+
+<p>"And do you discard that belief?" I asked, trembling and excited to hear
+such sacrilegious talk from youth so beautiful and pure.</p>
+
+<p>"What our future is to be after dissolution no one knows," replied
+Wauna, with the greatest calmness and unconcern. "A thousand theories
+and systems of religion have risen and fallen in the history of the
+human family, and become the superstitions of the past. The elements
+that compose this body may construct the delicate beauty of a flower, or
+the green robe that covers the bosom of Mother Earth, but we cannot
+know."</p>
+
+<p>"But that beautiful belief in a soul," I cried, in real anguish, "How
+can you discard it? How sever the hope that after death, we are again
+united to part no more? Those who have left us in the spring time of
+life, the bloom on their young cheeks suddenly paled by the cold touch
+of death, stand waiting to welcome us to an endless reunion."</p>
+
+<p>"Alas, for your anguish, my friend," said Wauna, with pityng tenderness.
+"Centuries ago <i>my</i> people passed through that season of mental pain.
+That beautiful visionary idea of a soul must fade, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> youth and beauty
+fade, never to return; for Nature nowhere teaches the existence of such
+a thing. It was a belief born of that agony of longing for happiness
+without alloy, which the children of earth in the long-ago ages hoped
+for, but never knew. Their lot was so barren of beauty and happiness,
+and the desire for it is, now and always has been, a strong trait of
+human character. The conditions of society in those earlier ages
+rendered it impossible to enjoy this life perfectly, and hope and
+longing pictured an imaginary one for an imaginary part of the body
+called the Soul. Progress and civilization have brought to us the ideal
+heaven of the ancients, and we receive from Nature no evidence of any
+other."</p>
+
+<p>"But I do believe there is another," I declared. "And we ought to be
+prepared for it."</p>
+
+<p>Wauna smiled. "What better preparation could you desire, then, than good
+works in this?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"You should pray, and do penance for your sins," was my reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Then," said Wauna, "we are doing the wisest penance every day. We are
+studying, investigating, experimenting in order that those who come
+after us may be happier than we. Every day Science is yielding us some
+new knowledge that will make living in the future still easier than
+now."</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot conceive," I said, "how you are to be improved upon."</p>
+
+<p>"When we manufacture fruit and vegetables from the elements, can you not
+perceive how much is to be gained? Old age and death will come later,
+and the labor of cultivation will be done away. Such an advantage will
+not be enjoyed during my lifetime. But we will labor to effect it for
+future generations."</p>
+
+<p>"Your whole aim in life, then, is to work for the future of your race,
+instead of the eternal welfare of your own soul?" I questioned, in
+surprise.</p>
+
+<p>"If Nature," said Wauna, "has provided us a future life, if that
+mysterious something that we call Thought is to be clothed in an
+etherealized body, and live in a world where decay is unknown, I have no
+fear of my reception there. Live <i>this</i> life usefully and nobly, and no
+matter if a prayer has never crossed your lips your happiness will be
+assured. A just and kind action will help you farther on the road to
+heaven than all the prayers that you can utter, and all the pains and
+sufferings that you can inflict upon the flesh, for it will be that much
+added to the happiness of this world. The grandest epitaph that could be
+written is engraved upon a tombstone in yonder cemetery. The subject was
+one of the pioneers of progress in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> a long-ago century, when progress
+fought its way with difficulty through ignorance and superstition. She
+suffered through life for the boldness of her opinions, and two
+centuries after, when they had become popular, a monument was erected to
+her memory, and has been preserved through thousands of years as a motto
+for humanity. The epitaph is simply this: 'The world is better for her
+having lived in it.'"</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIIA" id="CHAPTER_VIIA"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2>
+
+<p>Not long after my conversation with Wauna, mentioned in the previous
+chapter, an event happened in Mizora of so singular and unexpected a
+character for that country that it requires a particular description. I
+refer to the death of a young girl, the daughter of the Professor of
+Natural History in the National College, whose impressive inaugural
+ceremonies I had witnessed with so much gratification. The girl was of a
+venturesome disposition, and, with a number of others, had gone out
+rowing. The boats they used in Mizora for that purpose were mere cockle
+shells. A sudden squall arose from which all could have escaped, but the
+reckless daring of this young girl cost her her life. Her boat was
+capsized, and despite the exertions made by her companions, she was
+drowned.</p>
+
+<p>Her body was recovered before the news was conveyed to the mother. As
+the young companions surrounded it in the abandon of grief that tender
+and artless youth alone feels, had I not known that not a tie of
+consanguinity existed between them, I might have thought them a band of
+sisters mourning their broken number. It was a scene I never expect and
+sincerely hope never to witness again. It made the deeper impression
+upon me because I knew the expressions of grief were all genuine.</p>
+
+<p>I asked Wauna if any of the dead girl's companions feared that her
+mother might censure them for not making sufficient effort to save her
+when her boat capsized. She looked at me with astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>"Such a thought," she said, "will never occur to her nor to any one else
+in Mizora. I have not asked the particulars, but I know that everything
+was done that could have been done to save her. There must have been
+something extraordinarily unusual about the affair for all Mizora girls
+are expert swimmers, and there is not one but would put forth any
+exertion to save a companion."</p>
+
+<p>I afterward learned that such had really been the case.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p><p>It developed upon the Preceptress to break the news to the afflicted
+mother. It was done in the seclusion of her own home. There was no
+manifestation of morbid curiosity among acquaintances, neighbors and
+friends. The Preceptress and one or two others of her nearest and most
+intimate friends called at the house during the first shock of her
+bereavement.</p>
+
+<p>After permission had been given to view the remains, Wauna and I called
+at the house, but only entered the drawing-room. On a low cot, in an
+attitude of peaceful repose, lay the breathless sleeper. Her mother and
+sisters had performed for her the last sad offices of loving duty, and
+lovely indeed had they made the last view we should have of their dear
+one.</p>
+
+<p>There was to be no ceremony at the house, and Wauna and I were in the
+cemetery when the procession entered. As we passed through the city, I
+noticed that every business house was closed. The whole city was
+sympathizing with sorrow. I never before saw so vast a concourse of
+people. The procession was very long and headed by the mother, dressed
+and veiled in black. Behind her were the sisters carrying the body. It
+rested upon a litter composed entirely of white rosebuds. The sisters
+wore white, their faces concealed by white veils. Each wore a white
+rosebud pinned upon her bosom. They were followed by a long procession
+of young girls, schoolmates and friends of the dead. They were all
+dressed in white, but were not veiled. Each one carried a white rosebud.</p>
+
+<p>The sisters placed the litter upon rests at the side of the grave, and
+clasping hands with their mother, formed a semicircle about it. They
+were all so closely veiled that their features could not be seen, and no
+emotion was visible. The procession of young girls formed a circle
+inclosing the grave and the mourners, and began chanting a slow and
+sorrowful dirge. No words can paint the pathos and beauty of such a
+scene. My eye took in every detail that displayed that taste for the
+beautiful that compels the Mizora mind to mingle it with every incident
+of life. The melody sounded like a chorus of birds chanting, in perfect
+unison, a weird requiem over some dead companion.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<div class="i10">DIRGE</div></div>
+<div class="stanza">
+<div>She came like the Spring in its gladness</div>
+<div>We received her with joy&mdash;we rejoiced in her promise</div>
+<div>Sweet was her song as the bird's,</div>
+<div>Her smile was as dew to the thirsty rose.</div>
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span><div>But the end came ere morning awakened,</div>
+<div>While Dawn yet blushed in its bridal veil,</div>
+<div>The leafy music of the woods was hushed in snowy shrouds.</div>
+<div>Spring withered with the perfume in her hands;</div>
+<div>A winter sleet has fallen upon the buds of June;</div>
+<div>The ice-winds blow where yesterday zephyrs disported:</div>
+<div>Life is not consummated</div>
+<div>The rose has not blossomed, the fruit has perished in the flower,</div>
+<div>The bird lies frozen under its mother's breast</div>
+<div>Youth sleeps in round loveliness when age should lie withered and weary, and full of honor.</div>
+<div>Then the grave would be welcome, and our tears would fall not.</div>
+<div>The grave is not for the roses of youth;</div>
+<div>We mourn the early departed.</div>
+<div>Youth sleeps without dreams&mdash;</div>
+<div>Without an awakening.</div>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>At the close of the chant, the mother first and then each sister took
+from her bosom the white rosebud and dropped it into the grave. Then
+followed her schoolmates and companions who each dropped in the bud she
+carried. A carpet of white rosebuds was thus formed, on which the body,
+still reclining upon its pillow of flowers, was gently lowered.</p>
+
+<p>The body was dressed in white, and over all fell a veil of fine white
+tulle. A more beautiful sight I can never see than that young, lovely
+girl in her last sleep with the emblems of youth, purity and swift decay
+forming her pillow, and winding-sheet. Over this was placed a film of
+glass that rested upon the bottom and sides of the thin lining that
+covered the bottom and lower sides of the grave. The remainder of the
+procession of young girls then came forward and dropped their rosebuds
+upon it, completely hiding from view the young and beautiful dead.</p>
+
+<p>The eldest sister then took a handful of dust and casting it into the
+grave, said in a voice broken, yet audible: "Mingle ashes with ashes,
+and dust with its original dust. To the earth whence it was taken,
+consign we the body of our sister." Each sister then threw in a handful
+of dust, and then with their mother entered their carriage, which
+immediately drove them home.</p>
+
+<p>A beautiful silver spade was sticking in the soft earth that had been
+taken from the grave. The most intimate of the dead girls friends took a
+spadeful of earth and threw it into the open grave. Her example was
+followed by each one of the remaining <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span>companions until the grave was
+filled. Then clasping hands, they chanted a farewell to their departed
+companion and playmate. After which they strewed the grave with flowers
+until it looked like a bed of beauty, and departed.</p>
+
+<p>I was profoundly impressed by the scene. Its solemnity, its beauty, and
+the universal expression of sorrow it had called forth. A whole city
+mourned the premature death of gifted and lovely youth. Alas! In my own
+unhappy country such an event would have elicited but a passing phrase
+of regret from all except the immediate family of the victim; for
+<i>there</i> sorrow is a guest at every heart, and leaves little room for
+sympathy with strangers.</p>
+
+<p>The next day the mother was at her post in the National College; the
+daughters were at their studies, all seemingly calm and thoughtful, but
+showing no outward signs of grief excepting to the close observer. The
+mother was performing her accustomed duties with seeming cheerfulness,
+but now and then her mind would drop for a moment in sorrowful
+abstraction to be recalled with resolute effort and be fastened once
+more upon the necessary duty of life.</p>
+
+<p>The sisters I often saw in those abstracted moods, and frequently saw
+them wiping away silent but unobtrusive tears. I asked Wauna for the
+meaning of such stoical reserve, and the explanation was as curious as
+were all the other things that I met with in Mizora.</p>
+
+<p>"If you notice the custom of different grades of civilization in your
+own country," said Wauna, "you will observe that the lower the
+civilization the louder and more ostentatious is the mourning. True
+refinement is unobtrusive in everything, and while we do not desire to
+repress a natural and inevitable feeling of sorrow, we do desire to
+conceal and conquer it, for the reason that death is a law of nature
+that we cannot evade. And, although the death of a young person has not
+occurred in Mizora in the memory of any living before this, yet it is
+not without precedent. We are very prudent, but we cannot guard entirely
+against accident. It has cast a gloom over the whole city, yet we
+refrain from speaking of it, and strive to forget it because it cannot
+be helped."</p>
+
+<p>"And can you see so young, so fair a creature perish without wanting to
+meet her again?"</p>
+
+<p>"Whatever sorrow we feel," replied Wauna, solemnly, "we deeply realize
+how useless it is to repine. We place implicit faith in the revelations
+of Nature, and in no circumstances does she bid us expect a life beyond
+that of the body. That is a life of individual consciousness."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span></p><p>"How much more consoling is the belief of my people," I replied,
+triumphantly. "Their belief in a future reunion would sustain them
+through the sorrow of parting in this. It has been claimed that some
+have lived pure lives solely in the hope of meeting some one whom they
+loved, and who had died in youth and innocence."</p>
+
+<p>Wauna smiled.</p>
+
+<p>"You do not all have then the same fate in anticipation for your future
+life?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no!" I answered. "The good and the wicked are divided."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me some incident in your own land that you have witnessed, and
+which illustrates the religious belief of your country."</p>
+
+<p>"The belief that we have in a future life has often furnished a theme
+for the poets of my own and other countries. And sometimes a quaint and
+pretty sentiment is introduced into poetry to express it."</p>
+
+<p>"I should like to hear some such poetry. Can you recite any?"</p>
+
+<p>"I remember an incident that gave birth to a poem that was much admired
+at the time, although I can recall but the two last stanzas of it. A
+rowing party, of which I was a member, once went out upon a lake to view
+the sunset. After we had returned to shore, and night had fallen upon
+the water in impenetrable darkness, it was discovered that one of the
+young men who had rowed out in a boat by himself was not with us. A
+storm was approaching, and we all knew that his safety lay in getting
+ashore before it broke. We lighted a fire, but the blaze could not be
+seen far in such inky darkness. We hallooed, but received no answer, and
+finally ceased our efforts. Then one of the young ladies who possessed a
+very high and clear soprano voice, began singing at the very top of her
+power. It reached the wanderer in the darkness, and he rowed straight
+toward it. From that time on he became infatuated with the singer,
+declaring that her voice had come to him in his despair like an angel's
+straight from heaven.</p>
+
+<p>"She died in less than a year, and her last words to him were: 'Meet me
+in heaven.' He had always been recklessly inclined, but after that he
+became a model of rectitude and goodness. He wrote a poem that was
+dedicated to her memory. In it he described himself as a lone wanderer
+on a strange sea in the darkness of a gathering storm and no beacon to
+guide him, when suddenly he hears a voice singing which guides him safe
+to shore. He speaks of the beauty of the singer and how dear she became
+to him, but he still hears the song calling him across the ocean of
+death."</p>
+
+<p>"Repeat what you remember of it," urged Wauna.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<div>"That face and form, have long since gone</div>
+<div class="i1">Beyond where the day was lifted:</div>
+<div>But the beckoning song still lingers on,</div>
+<div class="i1">An angels earthward drifted.</div>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<div>And when death's waters, around me roar</div>
+<div class="i1">And cares, like the birds, are winging:</div>
+<div>If I steer my bark to Heaven's shore</div>
+<div class="i1">'Twill be by an angel's singing."</div>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"Poor child of superstition," said Wauna, sadly. "Your belief has
+something pretty in it, but for your own welfare, and that of your
+people, you must get rid of it as we have got rid of the offspring of
+Lust. Our children come to us as welcome guests through portals of the
+holiest and purest affection. That love which you speak of, I know
+nothing about. I would not know. It is a degradation which mars your
+young life and embitters the memories of age. We have advanced beyond
+it. There is a cruelty in life," she added, compassionately, "which we
+must accept with stoicism as the inevitable. Justice to your posterity
+demands of you the highest and noblest effort of which your intellect is
+capable."</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIIIA" id="CHAPTER_VIIIA"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2>
+
+<p>The conversation that I had with Wauna gave me so much uneasiness that I
+sought her mother. I cannot express the shock I felt at hearing such
+youthful and innocent lips speak of the absurdity of religious forms,
+ceremonies, and creeds. She regarded my belief in them as a species of
+barbarism. But she had not convinced me. <i>I was resolved not to be
+convinced.</i> I believed she was in error.</p>
+
+<p>Surely, I thought, a country so far advanced in civilization, and
+practicing such unexampled rectitude, must, according to my religious
+teaching, have been primarily actuated by religious principles which
+they had since abandoned. My only surprise was that they had not
+relapsed into immorality, after destroying church and creed, and I began
+to feel anxious to convince them of the danger I felt they were
+incurring in neglecting prayer and supplication at the throne to
+continue them in their progress toward perfection of mental and moral
+culture.</p>
+
+<p>I explained my feelings to the Preceptress with great earnestness and
+anxiety for their future, intimating that I believed their immunity from
+disaster had been owing to Divine sufferance. "For no nation," I added,
+quoting from my memory of religious precepts, "can prosper without
+acknowledging the Christian religion."</p>
+
+<p>She listened to me with great attention, and when I had finished, asked:</p>
+
+<p>"How do you account for our long continuance in prosperity and progress,
+for it is more than a thousand years since we rooted out the last
+vestige of what you term religion, from the mind. We have had a long
+immunity from punishment. To what do you attribute it?"</p>
+
+<p>I hesitated to explain what had been in my mind, but finally faltered
+out something about the absence of the male sex. I then had to explain
+that the prisons and penitentiaries of my own land, and of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> all other
+civilized lands that I knew of, were almost exclusively occupied by the
+male sex. Out of eight hundred penitentiary prisoners, not more than
+twenty or thirty would be women; and the majority of them could trace
+<i>their</i> crimes to man's infidelity.</p>
+
+<p>"And what do you do to reform them?" inquired the Preceptress.</p>
+
+<p>"We offer them the teachings of Christianity. All countries, however,
+differ widely in this respect. The government of my country is not as
+generous to prisoners as that of some others. In the United States every
+penitentiary is supplied with a minister who expounds the Gospel to the
+prisoners every Sunday; that is once every seven days."</p>
+
+<p>"And what do they do the rest of the time?"</p>
+
+<p>"They work."</p>
+
+<p>"Are they ignorant?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, indeed;" I replied, earnestly. "You could not find one scholar
+in ten thousand of them. Their education is either very limited, or
+altogether deficient."</p>
+
+<p>"Do the buildings they are confined in cost a great deal?"</p>
+
+<p>"Vast sums of money are represented by them; and it often costs a
+community a great deal of money to send a criminal to the penitentiary.
+In some States the power to pardon rests entirely with the governor, and
+it frequently occurs that a desperate criminal, who has cost a county a
+great deal of money to get rid of him, will be pardoned by the governor,
+to please a relative, or, as it is sometimes believed, for a bribe."</p>
+
+<p>"And do the people never think of educating their criminals instead of
+working them?</p>
+
+<p>"That would be an expense to the government," I replied.</p>
+
+<p>"If they would divide the time, and compel them to study half a day as
+rigorously as they make them work, it would soon make a vast change in
+their morals. Nothing so ennobles the mind as a broad and thorough
+education."</p>
+
+<p>"They are all compelled to listen to religious instruction once a week,"
+I answered. "That surely ought to make some improvement in them. I
+remember hearing an American lady relate her attendance at chapel
+service in a State penitentiary one Sunday. The minister's education was
+quite limited, as she could perceive from the ungrammatical language he
+used, but he preached sound orthodox doctrine. The text selected had a
+special application to his audience: 'Depart from me ye accursed, into
+everlasting torment prepared for the Devil and his angels.' There were
+eight hundred<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> prisoners, and the minister assured them, in plain
+language, that such would surely be their sentence unless they
+repented."</p>
+
+<p>"And that is what you call the consolations of religion, is it?" asked
+the Preceptress with an expression that rather disconcerted me; as
+though my zeal and earnestness entirely lacked the light of knowledge
+with which she viewed it.</p>
+
+<p>"That is religious instruction;" I answered. "The minister exhorted the
+prisoners to pray and be purged of their sins. And it was good advice."</p>
+
+<p>"But they might aver," persisted the Preceptress, "that they had prayed
+to be restrained from crime, and their prayers had not been answered."</p>
+
+<p>"They didn't pray with enough faith, then;" I assured her in the
+confidence of my own belief. "That is wherein I think my own church is
+so superior to the other religions of the world," I added, proudly. "We
+can get the priest to absolve us from sin, and then we know we are rid
+of it, when he tells us so."</p>
+
+<p>"But what assurance have you that the priest can do so?" asked the
+Preceptress.</p>
+
+<p>"Because it is his duty to do so."</p>
+
+<p>"Education will root out more sin than all your creeds can," gravely
+answered the Preceptress. "Educate your convicts and train them into
+controlling and subduing their criminal tendencies by <i>their own will</i>,
+and it will have more effect on their morals than all the prayers ever
+uttered. Educate them up to that point where they can perceive for
+themselves the happiness of moral lives, and then you may trust them to
+temptation without fear. The ideas you have expressed about dogmas,
+creeds and ceremonies are not new to us, though, as a nation, we do not
+make a study of them. They are very, very ancient. They go back to the
+first records of the traditionary history of man. And the farther you go
+back the deeper you plunge into ignorance and superstition.</p>
+
+<p>"The more ignorant the human mind, the more abject was its slavery to
+religion. As history progresses toward a more diffuse education of the
+masses, the forms, ceremonies and beliefs in religion are continually
+changing to suit the advancement of intelligence; and when intelligence
+becomes universal, they will be renounced altogether. What is true of
+the history of one people will be true of the history of another.
+Religions are not necessary to human progress. They are really clogs. My
+ancestors had more trouble to extirpate these superstitious ideas from
+the mind than they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> had in getting rid of disease and crime. There were
+several reasons for this difficulty. Disease and crime were self-evident
+evils, that the narrowest intelligence could perceive; but beliefs in
+creeds and superstitions were perversions of judgment, resulting from a
+lack of thorough mental training. As soon, however, as education of a
+high order became universal, it began to disappear. No mind of
+philosophical culture can adhere to such superstitions.</p>
+
+<p>"Many ages the people made idols, and, decking them with rich ornaments,
+placed them in magnificent temples specially built for them and the
+rites by which they worshipped them. There have existed many variations
+of this kind of idolatry that are marked by the progressive stages of
+civilization. Some nations of remote antiquity were highly cultured in
+art and literature, yet worshipped gods of their own manufacture, or
+imaginary gods, for everything. Light and darkness, the seasons, earth,
+air, water, all had a separate deity to preside over and control their
+special services. They offered sacrifices to these deities as they
+desired their co-operation or favor in some enterprise to be undertaken.</p>
+
+<p>"In remote antiquity, we read of a great General about to set out upon
+the sea to attack the army of another nation. In order to propitiate the
+god of the ocean, he had a fine chariot built to which were harnessed
+two beautiful white horses. In the presence of a vast concourse of
+people collected to witness the ceremony, he drove them into the sea.
+When they sank out of sight it was supposed that the god had accepted
+the present, and would show his gratitude for it by favoring winds and
+peaceful weather.</p>
+
+<p>"A thousand years afterward history speaks of the occurrence derisively,
+as an absurd superstition, and at the same time they believed in and
+lauded a more absurd and cruel religion. They worshipped an imaginary
+being who had created and possessed absolute control of everything. Some
+of the human family it had pleased him to make eminently good, while
+others he made eminently bad. For those whom he had created with evil
+desires, he prepared a lake of molten fire into which they were to be
+cast after death to suffer endless torture for doing what they had been
+expressly created to do. Those who had been created good were to be
+rewarded for following out their natural inclinations, by occupying a
+place near the Deity, where they were to spend eternity in singing
+praises to him.</p>
+
+<p>"He could, however, be persuaded by prayer from following his original
+intentions. Very earnest prayer had caused him to change<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> his mind, and
+send rain when he had previously concluded to visit the country with
+drouth.</p>
+
+<p>"Two nations at war with each other, and believing in the same Deity,
+would pray for a pestilence to visit their enemy. Death was universally
+regarded as a visitation of Providence for some offense committed
+against him instead of against the laws of nature.</p>
+
+<p>"Some believed that prayer and donations to the church or priest, could
+induce the Deity to take their relatives from the lake of torment and
+place them in his own presence. The Deity was prayed to on every
+occasion, and for every trivial object. The poor and indolent prayed for
+him to send them food and clothes. The sick prayed for health, the
+foolish for wisdom, and the revengeful besought the Deity to consign all
+their enemies to the burning lake.</p>
+
+<p>"The intelligent and humane began to doubt the necessity of such
+dreadful and needless torment for every conceivable misdemeanor, and it
+was modified, and eventually dropped altogether. Education finally
+rooted out every phase of superstition from the minds of the people, and
+now we look back and smile at the massive and magnificent structures
+erected to the worship of a Deity who could be coaxed to change his mind
+by prayer."</p>
+
+<p>I did not tell the Preceptress that she had been giving me a history of
+my own ancestry; but I remarked the resemblance with the joyous hope
+that in the future of my own unhappy country lay the possibility of a
+civilization so glorious, the ideal heaven of which every sorrowing
+heart had dreamed. But always with the desire to believe it had a
+spiritual eternity.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IXA" id="CHAPTER_IXA"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2>
+
+<p>I have described the peculiar ceremony attending the burial of youth in
+Mizora. Old age, in some respects, had a similar ceremony, but the
+funeral of an aged person differed greatly from what I had witnessed at
+the grave of youth. Wauna and I attended the funeral of a very aged
+lady. Death in Mizora was the gradual failing of mental and physical
+vigor. It came slowly, and unaccompanied with pain. It was received
+without regret, and witnessed without tears.</p>
+
+<p>The daughters performed the last labor that the mother required. They
+arrayed her body for burial and bore it to the grave. If in that season
+of the year, autumn leaves hid the bier, and formed the covering and
+pillow of her narrow bed. If not in the fall, full-blown roses and
+matured flowers were substituted.</p>
+
+<p>The ceremony was conducted by the eldest daughter, assisted by the
+others. No tears were shed; no mourning worn; no sorrowful chanting. A
+solemn dirge was sung indicative of decay. A dignified solemnity
+befitting the farewell to a useful life was manifest in all the
+proceedings; but no demonstrations of sorrow were visible. The mourners
+were unveiled, and performed the last services for their mother with
+calmness. I was so astonished at the absence of mourning that I asked an
+explanation of Wauna.</p>
+
+<p>"Why should we mourn," was the surprising answer, "for what is
+inevitable? Death must come, and, in this instance, it came in its
+natural way. There is nothing to be regretted or mourned over, as there
+was in the drowning of my young friend. Her life was suddenly arrested
+while yet in the promise of its fruitfulness. There was cause for grief,
+and the expressions and emblems of mourning were proper and appropriate.
+But here, mourning would be out of place, for life has fulfilled its
+promises. Its work is done, and nature has given the worn-out body rest.
+That is all."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p><p>That sympathy and regret which the city had expressed for the young
+dead was manifested only in decorum and respectful attendance at the
+funeral. No one appeared to feel that it was an occasion for mourning.
+How strange it all seemed to me, and yet there was a philosophy about it
+that I could not help but admire. Only I wished that they believed as I
+did, that all of those tender associations would be resumed beyond the
+grave. If only they could be convinced. I again broached the subject to
+Wauna. I could not relinquish the hope of converting her to my belief.
+She was so beautiful, so pure, and I loved her so dearly. I could not
+give up my hope of an eternal reunion. I appealed to her sympathy.</p>
+
+<p>"What hope," I asked, "can you offer those whose lives have been only
+successive phases of unhappiness? Why should beings be created only to
+live a life of suffering, and then die, as many, very many, of my people
+do? If they had no hope of a spiritual life, where pain and sorrow are
+to be unknown, the burdens of this life could not be borne."</p>
+
+<p>"You have the same consolation," replied Wauna, "as the Preceptress had
+in losing her daughter. That daring spirit that cost her her life, was
+the pride of her mother. She possessed a promising intellect, yet her
+mother accepts her death as one of the sorrowful phases of life, and
+bravely tries to subdue its pain. Long ages behind us, as my mother has
+told you, the history of all human life was but a succession of woes.
+Our own happy state has been evolved by slow degrees out of that
+sorrowful past. Human progress is marked by blood and tears, and the
+heart's bitterest anguish. We, as a people, have progressed almost
+beyond the reach of sorrow, but you are in the midst of it. You must
+work for the future, though you cannot be of it."</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot," I declared, "reconcile myself to your belief. I am separated
+from my child. To think I am never to see it in this world, nor through
+endless ages, would drive me insane with despair. What consolation can
+your belief offer <i>me</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>"In this life, you may yearn for your child, but after this life you
+sleep," answered Wauna, sententiously. "And how sweet that sleep! No
+dreams; no waking to work and trial; no striving after perfection; no
+planning for the morrow. It is oblivion than which there can be no
+happier heaven."</p>
+
+<p>"Would not meeting with those you have loved be happier?" I asked, in
+amazement.</p>
+
+<p>"There would be happiness; and there would be work, too."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p><p>"But my religion does not believe in work in heaven," I answered.</p>
+
+<p>"Then it has not taken the immutable laws of Nature into consideration,"
+said Wauna. "If Nature has prepared a conscious existence for us after
+this body decays, she has prepared work for us, you may rest assured. It
+might be a grander, nobler work; but it would be work, nevertheless.
+Then, how restful, in contrast, is our religion. It is eternal,
+undisturbable rest for both body and brain. Besides, as you say
+yourself, you cannot be sure of meeting those whom you desire to meet in
+that other country. They may be the ones condemned to eternal suffering
+for their sins. Think you I could enjoy myself in any surroundings, when
+I knew that those who were dear to me in this life, were enduring
+torment that could have no end. Give me oblivion rather than such a
+heaven.</p>
+
+<p>"Our punishment comes in this world; but it is not so much through sin
+as ignorance. The savages lived lives of misery, occasioned by their
+lack of intelligence. Humanity must always suffer for the mistakes it
+makes. Misery belongs to the ignorant; happiness to the wise. That is
+our doctrine of reward and punishment."</p>
+
+<p>"And you believe that my people will one day reject all religions?"</p>
+
+<p>"When they are advanced enough," she answered. "You say you have
+scholars among you already, who preach their inconsistencies. What do
+you call them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Philosophers," was my reply.</p>
+
+<p>"They are your prophets," said Wauna. "When they break the shackles that
+bind you to creeds and dogmas, they will have done much to advance you.
+To rely on one's own <i>will</i> power to do right is the only safe road to
+morality, and your only heaven."</p>
+
+<p>I left Wauna and sought a secluded spot by the river. I was shocked
+beyond measure at her confession. It had the earnestness, and, to me,
+the cruelty of conviction. To live without a spiritual future in
+anticipation was akin to depravity, to crime and its penalty of prison
+life forever. Yet here was a people, noble, exalted beyond my
+conceiving, living in the present, and obeying only a duty to posterity.
+I recalled a painting I had once seen that always possessed for me a
+horrible fascination. In a cave, with his foot upon the corpse of a
+youth, sat the crowned and sceptered majesty of Death. The waters of
+oblivion encompassed the throne and corpse, which lay with its head and
+feet bathed in its waters&mdash;for out of the Unknown had life come, and to
+the Unknown had it departed. Before me, in vision, swept the mighty
+stream of human life from which I had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> been swept to these strange
+shores. All its sufferings, its delusions; its baffled struggles; its
+wrongs, came upon me with a sense of spiritual agony in them that
+religion&mdash;my religion, which was their only consolation&mdash;must vanish in
+the crucible of Science. And that Science was the magician that was to
+purify and exalt the world. To live in the Present; to die in it and
+become as the dust; a mere speck, a flash of activity in the far,
+limitless expanse of Nature, of Force, of Matter in which a spiritual
+ideal had no part. It was horrible to think of. The prejudices of
+inherited religious faith, the contracted forces of thought in which I
+had been born and reared could not be uprooted or expanded without pain.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XA" id="CHAPTER_XA"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2>
+
+<p>I had begun to feel an intense longing to return to my own country, but
+it was accompanied by a desire, equally as strong, to carry back to that
+woe-burdened land some of the noble lessons and doctrines I had learned
+in this. I saw no means of doing it that seemed so available as a
+companion,&mdash;a being, born and bred in an atmosphere of honor and grandly
+humane ideas and actions.</p>
+
+<p>My heart and my judgment turned to Wauna. She was endeared to me by long
+and gentle association. She was self-reliant and courageous, and
+possessed a strong will. Who, of all my Mizora acquaintances, was so
+well adapted to the service I required.</p>
+
+<p>When I broached the subject to her, Wauna expressed herself as really
+pleased with the idea; but when we went to the Preceptress, she
+acknowledged a strong reluctance to the proposition. She said:</p>
+
+<p>"Wauna can form no conception of the conditions of society in your
+country. They are far, very far, behind our own. They will, I fear,
+chafe her own nature more than she can improve theirs. Still, if I
+thought she could lead your people into a broader intelligence, and
+start them on the way upward to enlightenment and real happiness, I
+would let her go. The moment, however, that she desires to return she
+must be aided to do so."</p>
+
+<p>I pledged myself to abide by any request the Preceptress might make of
+me. Wauna's own inclinations greatly influenced her mother, and finally
+we obtained her consent. Our preparations were carefully made. The
+advanced knowledge of chemistry in Mizora placed many advantages in our
+way. Our boat was an ingenious contrivance with a thin glass top that
+could be removed and folded away until needed to protect us from the
+rigors of the Arctic climate.</p>
+
+<p>I had given an accurate description of the rapids that would oppose us,
+and our boat was furnished with a motive power sufficient<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> to drive us
+through them at a higher rate of speed than what they moved at. It was
+built so as to be easily converted into a sled, and runners were made
+that could be readily adjusted. We were provided with food and clothing
+prepared expressly for the severe change to and rigors of the Arctic
+climate through which we must pass.</p>
+
+<p>I was constantly dreading the terrors of that long ice-bound journey,
+but the Preceptress appeared to be little concerned about it. When I
+spoke of its severities, she said for us to observe her directions, and
+we should not suffer. She asked me if I had ever felt uncomfortable in
+any of the air-ship voyages I had taken, and said that the cold of the
+upper regions through which I had passed in their country was quite as
+intense as any I could meet within a lower atmosphere of my own.</p>
+
+<p>The newspapers had a great deal to say about the departure of the
+Preceptress' daughter on so uncertain a mission, and to that strange
+land of barbarians which I represented. When the day arrived for our
+departure, immense throngs of people from all parts of the country lined
+the shore, or looked down upon us from their anchored air-ships.</p>
+
+<p>The last words of farewell had been spoken to my many friends and
+benefactors. Wauna had bidden a multitude of associates good-bye, and
+clasped her mother's hand, which she held until the boat parted from the
+shore. Years have passed since that memorable parting, but the look of
+yearning love in that Mizora mother's eyes haunts me still. Long and
+vainly has she watched for a boat's prow to cleave that amber mist and
+bear to her arms that vision of beauty and tender love I took away from
+her. My heart saddens at the thought of her grief and long, long waiting
+that only death will end.</p>
+
+<p>We pointed the boat's prow toward the wide mysterious circle of amber
+mists, and then turned our eyes for a last look at Mizora. Wauna stood
+silent and calm, earnestly gazing into the eyes of her mother, until the
+shore and the multitude of fair faces faded like a vision of heaven from
+our views.</p>
+
+<p>"O beautiful Mizora!" cried the voice of my heart. "Shall I ever again
+see a land so fair, where natures so noble and aims so lofty have their
+abiding place? Memory will return to you though my feet may never again
+tread your delightful shores. Farewell, sweet ideal land of my Soul, of
+Humanity, farewell!"</p>
+
+<p>My thoughts turned to that other world from which I had journeyed so
+long. Would the time ever come when it, too, would be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> a land of
+universal intelligence and happiness? When the difference of nations
+would be settled by argument instead of battle? When disease, deformity
+and premature death would be unknown? When locks, and bolts and bars
+would be useless?</p>
+
+<p>I hoped so much from the personal influence of Wauna. So noble, so
+utterly unconscious of wrong, she must surely revolutionize human nature
+whenever it came in contact with her own.</p>
+
+<p>I pictured to myself my own dear land&mdash;dear, despite its many phases of
+wretchedness&mdash;smiling in universal comfort and health. I imagined its
+political prisons yawning with emptiness, while their haggard and
+decrepit and sorrowful occupants hobbled out into the sunshine of
+liberty, and the new life we were bringing to them. Fancy flew abroad on
+the wings of hope, dropping the seeds of progress wherever it passed.</p>
+
+<p>The poor should be given work, and justly paid for it, instead of being
+supported by charity. The charity that had fostered indolence in its
+mistaken efforts to do good, should be employed to train poverty to
+skillful labor and economy in living. And what a world of good that one
+measure would produce! The poor should possess exactly the same
+educational advantages that were supplied to the rich. In this <i>one</i>
+measure, if I could only make it popular, I would see the golden promise
+of the future of my country. "Educate your poor and they will work out
+their own salvation. Educated Labor can dictate its rights to Capital."</p>
+
+<p>How easy of accomplishment it all seemed to me, who had seen the
+practical benefits arising to a commonwealth that had adopted these
+mottoes. I doubted not that the wiser and better of my own people would
+aid and encourage me. Free education would lead to other results.</p>
+
+<p>Riches should be accumulated only by vast and generous industries that
+reached a helping hand to thousands of industrious poor, instead of
+grinding them out of a few hundred of poorly-paid and over-worked
+artisans. Education in the hands of the poor would be a powerful agent
+with which they would alleviate their own condition, and defend
+themselves against oppression and knavery.</p>
+
+<p>The prisons should be supplied with schools as well as work-rooms, where
+the intellect should be trained and cultivated, and where moral idiocy,
+by the stern and rigorous law of Justice to Innocence, should be forced
+to deny itself posterity.</p>
+
+<p>No philanthropical mind ever spread the wings of its fancy for a broader
+flight.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIA" id="CHAPTER_XIA"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2>
+
+<p>Our journey was a perilous one with all our precautions. The passage
+through the swiftest part of the current almost swamped our boat. The
+current that opposed us was so strong, that when we increased our speed
+our boat appeared to be cleaving its way through a wall of waters. Wauna
+was perfectly calm, and managed the motor with the steadiest nerves. Her
+courage inspired me, though many a time I despaired of ever getting out
+of the rapids. When we did, and looked up at the star-gemmed canopy that
+stretches above my own world, and abroad over the dark and desolate
+waste of waters around us, it gave me an impression of solemn and weird
+magnificence. It was such a contrast to the vivid nights of Mizora, to
+which my eyes had so long been accustomed, that it came upon me like a
+new scene.</p>
+
+<p>The stars were a source of wonder and ceaseless delight to Wauna. "It
+looks," she said, "as though a prodigal hand had strewn the top of the
+atmosphere with diamonds."</p>
+
+<p>The journey over fields of ice and snow was monotonous, but, owing to
+the skill and knowledge of Mizora displayed in our accoutrements, it was
+deprived of its severities. The wind whistled past us without any other
+greeting than its melancholy sound. We looked out from our snug quarters
+on the dismal hills of snow and ice without a sensation of distress. The
+Aurora Borealis hung out its streamers of beauty, but they were pale
+compared to what Wauna had seen in her own country. The Esquimaux she
+presumed were animals.</p>
+
+<p>We traveled far enough south to secure passage upon a trading-vessel
+bound for civilized shores. The sun came up with his glance of fire and
+his banners of light, laying his glorious touch on cloud and water, and
+kissing the cheek with his warmth. He beamed upon us from the zenith,
+and sank behind the western clouds with a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span>lingering glance of beauty.
+The moon came up like the ghost of the sun, casting a weird yet tender
+beauty on every object. To Wauna it was a revelation of magnificence in
+nature beyond her contriving.</p>
+
+<p>"How grand," she exclaimed, "are the revelations of nature in your
+world! To look upon them, it seems to me, would broaden and deepen the
+mind with the very vastness of their splendor. Nature has been more
+bountiful to you than to Mizora. The day with its heart of fire, and the
+night with its pale beauty are grander than ours. They speak of vast and
+incomprehensible power."</p>
+
+<p>When I took Wauna to the observatory, and she looked upon the countless
+multitudes of worlds and suns revolving in space so far away that a sun
+and its satellites looked like a ball of mist, she said that words could
+not describe her sensations.</p>
+
+<p>"To us," she said, "the leaves of Nature's book are the winds and waves,
+the bud and bloom and decay of seasons. But here every leaf is a world.
+A mighty hand has sprinkled the suns like fruitful seeds across the
+limitless fields of space. Can human nature contemplate a scene so grand
+that reaches so far beyond the grasp of mind, and not feel its own
+insignificance, and the littleness of selfish actions? And yet you can
+behold these myriads of worlds and systems of worlds wheeling in the dim
+infinity of space&mdash;a spectacle awful in its vastness&mdash;and turn to the
+practice of narrow superstitions?"</p>
+
+<p>At last the shores of my native land greeted my longing eyes, and the
+familiar scenes of my childhood drew near. But when, after nearly twenty
+years absence, I stood on the once familiar spot, the graves of my
+heart's dear ones were all that was mine. My little one had died soon
+after my exile. My father had soon followed. Suspected, and finally
+persecuted by the government, my husband had fled the country, and,
+nearly as I could discover, had sought that universal asylum for the
+oppressed of all nations&mdash;the United States. And thither I turned my
+steps.</p>
+
+<p>In my own country and in France, the friends who had known me in
+girlhood were surprised at my youthful appearance. I did not explain the
+cause of it to them, nor did I mention the people or country from whence
+I had come. Wauna was my friend and a foreigner&mdash;that was all.</p>
+
+<p>The impression she made was all that I had anticipated. Her unusual
+beauty and her evident purity attracted attention wherever she went. The
+wonderful melody of her singing was much commented upon, but in Mizora
+she had been considered but an indifferent singer. But I had made a
+mistake in my anticipation of her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> personal influence. The gentleness
+and delicacy of her character received the tenderest respect. None who
+looked upon that face or met the glance of the dark soft eyes ever
+doubted that the nature that animated them was pure and beautiful. Yet
+it was the respect felt for a character so exceptionably superior that
+imitation and emulation would be impossible.</p>
+
+<p>"She is too far above the common run of human nature," said one
+observer. "I should not be surprised if her spirit were already pluming
+its wings for a heavenly flight. Such natures never stay long among us."</p>
+
+<p>The remark struck my heart with a chill of depression. I looked at Wauna
+and wondered why I had noticed sooner the shrinking outlines of the once
+round cheek. Too gentle to show disgust, too noble to ill-treat, the
+spirit of Wauna was chafing under the trying associations. Men and women
+alike regarded her as an impossible character, and I began to realize
+with a sickening regret that I had made a mistake. In my own country, in
+France and England, her beauty was her sole attraction to men. The lofty
+ideal of humanity that she represented was smiled at or gently ignored.</p>
+
+<p>"The world would be a paradise," said one philosopher, "if such
+characters were common. But one is like a seed in the ocean; it cannot
+do much good."</p>
+
+<p>When we arrived in the United States, its activity and evident progress
+impressed Wauna with a feeling more nearly akin to companionship. Her
+own character received a juster appreciation.</p>
+
+<p>"The time is near," she said, "when the New World will be the teacher of
+the Old in the great lesson of Humanity. You will live to see it
+demonstrate to the world the justice and policy of giving to every child
+born under its flag the highest mental, moral and physical training
+known to the present age. You can hardly realize what twenty-five years
+of free education will bring to it. They are already on the right path,
+but they are still many centuries behind my own country in civilization,
+in their government and modes of dispensing justice. Yet their free
+schools, as yet imperfect, are, nevertheless, fruitful seeds of
+progress."</p>
+
+<p>Yet here the nature of Wauna grew restless and homesick, and she at last
+gave expression to her longing for home.</p>
+
+<p>"I am not suited to your world," she said, with a look of deep sorrow in
+her lovely eyes. "None of my people are. We are too finely organized. I
+cannot look with any degree of calmness upon the practices of your
+civilization. It is a common thing to see mothers ill-treat<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> their own
+helpless little ones. The pitiful cries of the children keep ringing in
+my ears. Cannot mothers realize that they are whipping a mean spirit
+into their offspring instead of out. I have heard the most enlightened
+deny their own statements when selfishness demanded it. I cannot mention
+the half of the things I witness daily that grates upon my feelings. I
+cannot reform them. It is not for such as I to be a reformer. Those who
+need reform are the ones to work for it."</p>
+
+<p>Sorrowfully I bade adieu to my hopes and my search for Alexis, and
+prepared to accompany Wauna's return. We embarked on a whaling vessel,
+and having reached its farthest limit, we started on our perilous
+journey north; perilous for the lack of our boat, of which we could hear
+nothing. It had been left in charge of a party of Esquimaux, and had
+either been destroyed, or was hidden. Our progress, therefore, depended
+entirely upon the Esquimaux. The tribe I had journeyed so far north with
+had departed, and those whom I solicited to accompany us professed to be
+ignorant of the sea I mentioned. Like all low natures, the Esquimaux are
+intensely selfish. Nothing could induce them to assist us but the most
+apparent benefit to themselves; and this I could not assure them. The
+homesickness, and coarse diet and savage surroundings told rapidly on
+the sensitive nature of Wauna. In a miserable Esquimaux hut, on a pile
+of furs, I saw the flame of a beautiful and grandly noble life die out.
+My efforts were hopeless; my anguish keen. O Humanity, what have I
+sacrificed for you!</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Wauna," I pleaded, as I saw the signs of dissolution approaching,
+"shall I not pray for you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Prayers cannot avail me," she replied, as her thin hands reached and
+closed over one of mine. "I had hoped once more to see the majestic
+hills and smiling valleys of my own sweet land, but I shall not. If I
+could only go to sleep in the arms of my mother. But the Great Mother of
+us all will soon receive me in her bosom. And oh! my friend, promise me
+that her dust shall cover me from the sight of men. When my mother
+rocked me to slumber on her bosom, and soothed me with her gentle
+lullaby, she little dreamed that I should suffer and die first. If you
+ever reach Mizora, tell her only that I sleep the sleep of oblivion. She
+will know. Let the memory of my suffering die with me."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Wauna," I exclaimed, in anguish, "you surely have a soul. How can
+anything so young, so pure, so beautiful, be doomed to annihilation?"</p>
+
+<p>"We are not annihilated," was the calm reply. "And as to beauty,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> are
+the roses not beautiful? Yet they die and you say it is the end of the
+year's roses. The birds are harmless, and their songs make the woods
+melodious with the joy of life, yet they die, and you say they have no
+after life. We are like the roses, but our lives are for a century and
+more. And when our lives are ended, the Great Mother gathers us in. We
+are the harvest of the centuries."</p>
+
+<p>When the dull, gray light of the Arctic morning broke, it fell gently
+upon the presence of Death.</p>
+
+<p>With the assistance of the Esquimaux, a grave was dug, and a rude wooden
+cross erected on which I wrote the one word "Wauna," which, in the
+language of Mizora, means "Happiness."</p>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p>The world to which I have returned is many ages behind the civilization
+of Mizora.</p>
+
+<p>Though we cannot hope to attain their perfection in our generation, yet
+many, very many, evils could be obliterated were we to follow their
+laws. Crime is as hereditary as disease.</p>
+
+<p>No savant now denies the transmittable taint of insanity and
+consumption. There are some people in the world now, who, knowing the
+possibility of afflicting offspring with hereditary disease, have lived
+in ascetic celibacy. But where do we find a criminal who denies himself
+offspring, lest he endow posterity with the horrible capacity for murder
+that lies in his blood?</p>
+
+<p>The good, the just, the noble, close heart and eyes to the sweet
+allurements of domestic life, lest posterity suffer physically or
+mentally by them. But the criminal has no restraints but what the law
+enforces. Ignorance, poverty and disease, huddled in dens of
+wretchedness, where they multiply with reckless improvidence, sometimes
+fostered by mistaken charity.</p>
+
+<p>The future of the world, if it be grand and noble, will be the result of
+<span class="smcap">Universal Education, free as the God-given water we drink</span>.</p>
+
+<p>In the United States I await the issue of universal liberty. In this
+refuge for oppression, my husband found a grave. Childless, homeless and
+friendless, in poverty and obscurity, I have written the story of my
+wanderings. The world's fame can never warm a heart already dead to
+happiness; but out of the agony of one human life, may come a lesson for
+many. Life is a tragedy even under the most favorable conditions.</p>
+
+<p class="tbrk">&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p class="center">THE END</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mizora: A Prophecy, by Mary E. Bradley
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@@ -0,0 +1,6195 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mizora: A Prophecy, by Mary E. Bradley
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Mizora: A Prophecy
+       A MSS. Found Among the Private Papers of the Princess Vera Zarovitch
+
+Author: Mary E. Bradley
+
+Release Date: March 4, 2008 [EBook #24750]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MIZORA: A PROPHECY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Greg Weeks, George P. Snoga, Martin Pettit and
+the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+MIZORA:
+
+A PROPHECY.
+
+
+A MSS. FOUND AMONG THE PRIVATE PAPERS OF THE
+PRINCESS VERA ZAROVITCH;
+
+_Being a true and faithful account of her Journey to the Interior of the
+Earth, with a careful description of the Country and its Inhabitants,
+their Customs, Manners and Government._
+
+
+WRITTEN BY HERSELF.
+
+[Illustration: Publisher's logo]
+
+NEW YORK:
+
+_G. W. Dillingham, Publisher_,
+
+Successor to G. W. Carleton & Co.
+
+MDCCCXC.
+
+_All Rights Reserved._
+
+Copyright, 1889
+by
+Mary E. Bradley.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The narrative of Vera Zarovitch, published in the _Cincinnati
+Commercial_ in 1880 and 1881, attracted a great deal of attention. It
+commanded a wide circle of readers, and there was much more said about
+it than is usual when works of fiction run through a newspaper in weekly
+installments. Quite a number of persons who are unaccustomed to
+bestowing consideration upon works of fiction spoke of it, and grew
+greatly interested in it.
+
+I received many messages about it, and letters of inquiry, and some
+ladies and gentlemen desired to know the particulars about the
+production of the story in book form; and were inquisitive about it and
+the author who kept herself in concealment so closely that even her
+husband did not know that she was the writer who was making this stir in
+our limited literary world.
+
+I was myself so much interested in it that it occurred to me to make the
+suggestion that the story ought to have an extensive sale in book form,
+and to write to a publisher; but the lady who wrote the work seemed
+herself a shade indifferent on the subject, and it passed out of my
+hands and out of my mind.
+
+It is safe to say that it made an impression that was remarkable, and
+with a larger audience I do not doubt that it would make its mark as an
+original production wrought out with thoughtful care and literary skill,
+and take high rank.
+
+                                Yours very truly,
+
+                                    Murat Halstead.
+
+_Nov. 14th, 1889._
+
+
+
+
+PART FIRST
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Having little knowledge of rhetorical art, and possessing but a limited
+imagination, it is only a strong sense of the duty I owe to Science and
+the progressive minds of the age, that induces me to come before the
+public in the character of an author. True, I have only a simple
+narration of facts to deal with, and am, therefore, not expected to
+present artistic effects, and poetical imagery, nor any of those flights
+of imagination that are the trial and test of genius.
+
+Yet my task is not a light one. I may fail to satisfy my own mind that
+the true merits of the wonderful and mysterious people I discovered,
+have been justly described. I may fail to interest the public; which is
+the one difficulty most likely to occur, and most to be regretted--not
+for my own sake, but theirs. It is so hard to get human nature out of
+the ruts it has moved in for ages. To tear away their present faith, is
+like undermining their existence. Yet others who come after me will be
+more aggressive than I. I have this consolation: whatever reception may
+be given my narrative by the public, I know that it has been written
+solely for its good. That wonderful civilization I met with in Mizora, I
+may not be able to more than faintly shadow forth here, yet from it, the
+present age may form some idea of that grand, that ideal life that is
+possible for our remote posterity. Again and again has religious
+enthusiasm pictured a life to be eliminated from the grossness and
+imperfections of our material existence. The Spirit--the Mind--that
+mental gift, by or through which we think, reason, and suffer, is by one
+tragic and awful struggle to free itself from temporal blemishes and
+difficulties, and become spiritual and perfect. Yet, who, sweeping the
+limitless fields of space with a telescope, glancing at myriads of
+worlds that a lifetime could not count, or gazing through a microscope
+at a tiny world in a drop of water, has dreamed that patient Science
+and practice could evolve for the living human race, the ideal life of
+exalted knowledge: the life that I found in Mizora; that Science had
+made real and practicable. The duty that I owe to truth compels me to
+acknowledge that I have not been solicited to write this narrative by my
+friends; nor has it been the pastime of my leisure hours; nor written to
+amuse an invalid; nor, in fact, for any of those reasons which have
+prompted so many men and women to write a book. It is, on the contrary,
+the result of hours of laborious work, undertaken for the sole purpose
+of benefiting Science and giving encouragement to those progressive
+minds who have already added their mite of knowledge to the coming
+future of the race. "We owe a duty to posterity," says Junius in his
+famous letter to the king. A declaration that ought to be a motto for
+every schoolroom, and graven above every legislative hall in the world.
+It should be taught to the child as soon as reason has begun to dawn,
+and be its guide until age has become its master.
+
+It is my desire not to make this story a personal matter; and for that
+unavoidable prominence which is given one's own identity in relating
+personal experiences, an indulgence is craved from whomsoever may peruse
+these pages.
+
+In order to explain how and why I came to venture upon a journey no
+other of my sex has ever attempted, I am compelled to make a slight
+mention of my family and nationality.
+
+I am a Russian: born to a family of nobility, wealth, and political
+power. Had the natural expectations for my birth and condition been
+fulfilled, I should have lived, loved, married and died a Russian
+aristocrat, and been unknown to the next generation--and this narrative
+would not have been written.
+
+There are some people who seem to have been born for the sole purpose of
+becoming the playthings of Fate--who are tossed from one condition of
+life to another without wish or will of their own. Of this class I am an
+illustration. Had I started out with a resolve to discover the North
+Pole, I should never have succeeded. But all my hopes, affections,
+thoughts, and desires were centered in another direction, hence--but my
+narrative will explain the rest.
+
+The tongue of woman has long been celebrated as an unruly member, and
+perhaps, in some of the domestic affairs of life, it has been
+unnecessarily active; yet no one who gives this narrative a perusal, can
+justly deny that it was the primal cause of the grandest discovery of
+the age.
+
+I was educated in Paris, where my vacations were frequently spent with
+an American family who resided there, and with whom my father had formed
+an intimate friendship. Their house, being in a fashionable quarter of
+the city and patriotically hospitable, was the frequent resort of many
+of their countrymen. I unconsciously acquired a knowledge and admiration
+for their form of government, and some revolutionary opinions in regard
+to my own.
+
+Had I been guided by policy, I should have kept the latter a secret, but
+on returning home, at the expiration of my school days, I imprudently
+gave expression to them in connection with some of the political
+movements of the Russian Government--and secured its suspicion at once,
+which, like the virus of some fatal disease, once in the system, would
+lose its vitality only with my destruction.
+
+While at school, I had become attached to a young and lovely Polish
+orphan, whose father had been killed at the battle of Grochow when she
+was an infant in her mother's arms. My love for my friend, and sympathy
+for her oppressed people, finally drew me into serious trouble and
+caused my exile from my native land.
+
+I married at the age of twenty the son of my father's dearest friend.
+Alexis and I were truly attached to each other, and when I gave to my
+infant the name of my father and witnessed his pride and delight, I
+thought to my cup of earthly happiness, not one more drop could be
+added.
+
+A desire to feel the cheering air of a milder climate induced me to pay
+my Polish friend a visit. During my sojourn with her occurred the
+anniversary of the tragedy of Grochow, when, according to custom, all
+who had lost friends in the two dreadful battles that had been fought
+there, met to offer prayers for their souls. At her request, I
+accompanied my friend to witness the ceremonies. To me, a silent and
+sympathizing spectator, they were impressive and solemn in the extreme.
+Not less than thirty thousand people were there, weeping and praying on
+ground hallowed by patriot blood. After the prayers were said, the voice
+of the multitude rose in a mournful and pathetic chant. It was rudely
+broken by the appearance of the Russian soldiers.
+
+A scene ensued which memory refuses to forget, and justice forbids me to
+deny. I saw my friend, with the song of sorrow still trembling on her
+innocent lips, fall bleeding, dying from the bayonet thrust of a Russian
+soldier. I clasped the lifeless body in my arms, and in my grief and
+excitement, poured forth upbraidings against the government of my
+country which it would never forgive nor condone. I was arrested, tried,
+and condemned to the mines of Siberia for life.
+
+My father's ancient and princely lineage, my husband's rank, the wealth
+of both families, all were unavailing in procuring a commutation of my
+sentence to some less severe punishment. Through bribery, however, the
+co-operation of one of my jailors was secured, and I escaped in disguise
+to the frontier.
+
+It was my husband's desire that I proceed immediately to France, where
+he would soon join me. But we were compelled to accept whatever means
+chance offered for my escape, and a whaling vessel bound for the
+Northern Seas was the only thing I could secure passage upon with
+safety. The captain promised to transfer me to the first southward bound
+vessel we should meet.
+
+But none came. The slow, monotonous days found me gliding farther and
+farther from home and love. In the seclusion of my little cabin, my fate
+was more endurable than the horrors of Siberia could have been, but it
+was inexpressibly lonesome. On shipboard I sustained the character of a
+youth, exiled for a political offense, and of a delicate constitution.
+
+It is not necessary to the interest of this narrative to enter into the
+details of shipwreck and disaster, which befel us in the Northern Seas.
+Our vessel was caught between ice floes, and we were compelled to
+abandon her. The small boats were converted into sleds, but in such
+shape as would make it easy to re-convert them into boats again, should
+it ever become necessary. We took our march for the nearest Esquimaux
+settlement, where we were kindly received and tendered the hospitality
+of their miserable huts. The captain, who had been ill for some time,
+grew rapidly worse, and in a few days expired. As soon as the approach
+of death became apparent, he called the crew about him, and requested
+them to make their way south as soon as possible, and to do all in their
+power for my health and comfort. He had, he said, been guaranteed a sum
+of money for my safe conduct to France, sufficient to place his family
+in independent circumstances, and he desired that his crew should do all
+in their power to secure it for them.
+
+The next morning I awoke to find myself deserted, the crew having
+decamped with nearly everything brought from the ship.
+
+Being blessed with strong nerves, I stared my situation bravely in the
+face, and resolved to make the best of it. I believed it could be only a
+matter of time when some European or American whaling vessel should
+rescue me: and I had the resolution to endure, while hope fed the flame.
+
+I at once proceeded to inure myself to the life of the Esquimaux. I
+habited myself in a suit of reindeer fur, and ate, with compulsory
+appetite, the raw flesh and fat that form their principal food.
+Acclimated by birth to the coldest region of the temperate zone, and
+naturally of a hardy constitution, I found it not so difficult to endure
+the rigors of the Arctic temperature as I had supposed.
+
+I soon discovered the necessity of being an assistance to my new friends
+in procuring food, as their hospitality depends largely upon the state
+of their larder. A compass and a small trunk of instruments belonging to
+the Captain had been either over-looked or rejected by the crew in their
+flight. I secured the esteem of the Esquimaux by using the compass to
+conduct a hunting party in the right direction when a sudden snow-storm
+had obscured the landmarks by which they guide their course. I
+cheerfully assumed a share of their hardships, for with these poor
+children of the North life is a continual struggle with cold and
+starvation. The long, rough journeys which we frequently took over ice
+and ridges of snow in quest of animal food, I found monotonously
+destitute of everything I had experienced in former traveling, except
+fatigue. The wail of the winds, and the desolate landscape of ice and
+snow, never varied. The coruscations of the Aurora Borealis sometimes
+lighted up the dreary waste around us, and the myriad eyes of the
+firmament shone out with a brighter lustre, as twilight shrank before
+the gloom of the long Arctic night.
+
+A description of the winter I spent with the Esquimaux can be of little
+interest to the readers of this narrative. Language cannot convey to
+those who have dwelt always in comfort the feeling of isolation, the
+struggle with despair, that was constantly mine. We were often confined
+to our ice huts for days while the blinding fury of the wind driven snow
+without made the earth look like chaos. Sometimes I crept to the narrow
+entrance and looked toward the South with a feeling of homesickness too
+intense to describe. Away, over leagues of perilous travel, lay
+everything that was dear or congenial; and how many dreary months,
+perhaps years, must pass before I could obtain release from associations
+more dreadful than solitude. It required all the courage I could command
+to endure it.
+
+The whale-fishing opens about the first week in August, and continues
+throughout September. As it drew near, the settlement prepared to move
+farther north, to a locality where they claimed whales could be found
+in abundance. I cheerfully assisted in the preparations, for to meet
+some whaling vessel was my only hope of rescue from surroundings that
+made existence a living death.
+
+The dogs were harnessed to sleds heavily laden with the equipments of an
+Esquimaux hut. The woman, as well as the men, were burdened with immense
+packs; and our journey begun. We halted only to rest and sleep. A few
+hours work furnished us a new house out of the ever present ice. We
+feasted on raw meat--sometimes a freshly killed deer; after which our
+journey was resumed.
+
+As near as I could determine, it was close to the 85 deg. north latitude,
+where we halted on the shore of an open sea. Wild ducks and game were
+abundant, also fish of an excellent quality. Here, for the first time in
+many months, I felt the kindly greeting of a mild breeze as it hailed me
+from the bosom of the water. Vegetation was not profuse nor brilliant,
+but to my long famished eyes, its dingy hue was delightfully refreshing.
+
+Across this sea I instantly felt a strong desire to sail. I believed it
+must contain an island of richer vegetation than the shore we occupied.
+But no one encouraged me or would agree to be my companion. On the
+contrary, they intimated that I should never return. I believed that
+they were trying to frighten me into remaining with them, and declared
+my intention to go alone. Perhaps I might meet in that milder climate
+some of my own race. My friend smiled, and pointing to the South, said,
+as he designated an imaginary boundary:
+
+"Across _that_ no white man's foot has ever stepped."
+
+So I was alone. My resolution, however, was not shaken. A boat was
+constructed, and bidding adieu to my humble companions, I launched into
+an unknown sea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+On and on, and on I rowed until the shore and my late companions were
+lost in the gloomy distance. On and on, and still on, until fatigued
+almost to exhaustion; and still, no land. A feeling of uncontrollable
+lonesomeness took possession of me. Silence reigned supreme. No sound
+greeted me save the swirl of the gently undulating waters against the
+boat, and the melancholy dip of the oars. Overhead, the familiar eyes of
+night were all that pierced the gloom that seemed to hedge me in. My
+feeling of distress increased when I discovered that my boat had struck
+a current and was beyond my control. Visions of a cataract and
+inevitable death instantly shot across my mind. Made passive by intense
+despair, I laid down in the bottom of the boat, to let myself drift into
+whatever fate was awaiting me.
+
+I must have lain there many hours before I realized that I was traveling
+in a circle. The velocity of the current had increased, but not
+sufficiently to insure immediately destruction. Hope began to revive,
+and I sat up and looked about me with renewed courage. Directly before
+me rose a column of mist, so thin that I could see through it, and of
+the most delicate tint of green. As I gazed, it spread into a curtain
+that appeared to be suspended in mid-air, and began to sway gently back
+and forth, as if impelled by a slight breeze, while sparks of fire, like
+countless swarms of fire-flies, darted through it and blazed out into a
+thousand brilliant hues and flakes of color that chased one another
+across and danced merrily up and down with bewildering swiftness.
+Suddenly it drew together in a single fold, a rope of yellow mist, then
+instantly shook itself out again as a curtain of rainbows fringed with
+flame. Myriads of tassels, composed of threads of fire, began to dart
+hither and thither through it, while the rainbow stripes deepened in hue
+until they looked like gorgeous ribbons glowing with intensest radiance,
+yet softened by that delicate misty appearance which is a special
+quality of all atmospheric color, and which no pencil can paint, nor the
+most eloquent tongue adequately describe.
+
+The swaying motion continued. Sometimes the curtain approached near
+enough, apparently, to flaunt its fiery fringe almost within my grasp.
+It hung one instant in all its marvelous splendor of colors, then
+suddenly rushed into a compact mass, and shot across the zenith, an arc
+of crimson fire that lit up the gloomy waters with a weird, unearthly
+glare. It faded quickly, and appeared to settle upon the water again in
+a circular wall of amber mist, round which the current was hurrying me
+with rapidly increasing speed. I saw, with alarm, that the circles were
+narrowing A whirlpool was my instant conjecture, and I laid myself down
+in the boat, again expecting every moment to be swept into a seething
+abyss of waters. The spray dashed into my face as the boat plunged
+forward with frightful swiftness. A semi-stupor, born of exhaustion and
+terror, seized me in its merciful embrace.
+
+It must have been many hours that I lay thus. I have a dim recollection
+of my boat going on and on, its speed gradually decreasing, until I was
+amazed to perceive that it had ceased its onward motion and was gently
+rocking on quiet waters. I opened my eyes. A rosy light, like the first
+blush of a new day, permeated the atmosphere. I sat up and looked about
+me. A circular wall of pale amber mist rose behind me; the shores of a
+new and beautiful country stretched before. Toward them, I guided my
+boat with reviving hope and strength.
+
+I entered a broad river, whose current was from the sea, and let myself
+drift along its banks in bewildered delight. The sky appeared bluer, and
+the air balmier than even that of Italy's favored clime. The turf that
+covered the banks was smooth and fine, like a carpet of rich green
+velvet. The fragrance of tempting fruit was wafted by the zephyrs from
+numerous orchards. Birds of bright plumage flitted among the branches,
+anon breaking forth into wild and exultant melody, as if they rejoiced
+to be in so favored a clime.
+
+And truly it seemed a land of enchantment. The atmosphere had a peculiar
+transparency, seemingly to bring out clearly objects at a great
+distance, yet veiling the far horizon in a haze of gold and purple.
+Overhead, clouds of the most gorgeous hues, like precious gems converted
+into vapor, floated in a sky of the serenest azure. The languorous
+atmosphere, the beauty of the heavens, the inviting shores, produced in
+me a feeling of contentment not easily described. To add to my senses
+another enjoyment, my ears were greeted with sounds of sweet music, in
+which I detected the mingling of human voices.
+
+I wondered if I had really drifted into an enchanted country, such as I
+had read about in the fairy books of my childhood.
+
+The music grew louder, yet wondrously sweet, and a large pleasure boat,
+shaped like a fish, glided into view. Its scales glittered like gems as
+it moved gracefully and noiselessly through the water. Its occupants
+were all young girls of the highest type of blonde beauty. It was their
+soft voices, accompanied by some peculiar stringed instruments they
+carried, that had produced the music I had heard. They appeared to
+regard me with curiosity, not unmixed with distrust, for their boat
+swept aside to give me a wide berth.
+
+I uncovered my head, shook down my long black hair, and falling upon my
+knees, lifted my hands in supplication. My plea was apparently
+understood, for turning their boat around, they motioned me to follow
+them. This I did with difficulty, for I was weak, and their boat moved
+with a swiftness and ease that astonished me. What surprised me most was
+its lack of noise.
+
+As I watched its beautiful occupants dressed in rich garments, adorned
+with rare and costly gems, and noted the noiseless, gliding swiftness of
+their boat, an uncomfortable feeling of mystery began to invade my mind,
+as though I really had chanced upon enchanted territory.
+
+As we glided along, I began to be impressed by the weird stillness. No
+sound greeted me from the ripening orchards, save the carol of birds;
+from the fields came no note of harvest labor. No animals were visible,
+nor sound of any. No hum of life. All nature lay asleep in voluptuous
+beauty, veiled in a glorious atmosphere. Everything wore a dreamy look.
+The breeze had a loving, lingering touch, not unlike to the Indian
+Summer of North America. But no Indian Summer ever knew that dark green
+verdure, like the first robe of spring. Wherever the eye turned it met
+something charming in cloud, or sky, or water, or vegetation. Everything
+had felt the magical touch of beauty.
+
+On the right, the horizon was bounded by a chain of mountains, that
+plainly showed their bases above the glowing orchards and verdant
+landscapes. It impressed me as peculiar, that everything appeared to
+rise as it gained in distance. At last the pleasure boat halted at a
+flight of marble steps that touched the water. Ascending these, I gained
+an eminence where a scene of surpassing beauty and grandeur lay spread
+before me. Far, far as the eye could follow it, stretched the stately
+splendor of a mighty city. But all the buildings were detached and
+surrounded by lawns and shade trees, their white marble and gray granite
+walls gleaming through the green foliage.
+
+Upon the lawn, directly before us, a number of most beautiful girls had
+disposed themselves at various occupations. Some were reading, some
+sketching, and some at various kinds of needlework. I noticed that they
+were all blondes. I could not determine whether their language possessed
+a peculiarly soft accent, or whether it was an unusual melody of voice
+that made their conversation as musical to the ear as the love notes of
+some amorous wood bird to its mate.
+
+A large building of white marble crowned a slight eminence behind them.
+Its porticos were supported upon the hands of colossal statues of women,
+carved out of white marble with exquisite art and beauty. Shade trees of
+a feathery foliage, like plumes of finest moss, guarded the entrance and
+afforded homes for brilliant-plumaged birds that flew about the porticos
+and alighted on the hands and shoulders of the ladies without fear. Some
+of the trees had a smooth, straight trunk and flat top, bearing a
+striking resemblance to a Chinese umbrella. On either side of the
+marble-paved entrance were huge fountains that threw upward a column of
+water a hundred feet in height, which, dissolving into spray, fell into
+immense basins of clearest crystal. Below the rim of these basins, but
+covered with the crystal, as with a delicate film of ice, was a wreath
+of blood red roses, that looked as though they had just been plucked
+from the stems and placed there for a temporary ornament. I afterward
+learned that it was the work of an artist, and durable as granite.
+
+I supposed I had arrived at a female seminary, as not a man, or the
+suggestion of one, was to be seen. If it were a seminary, it was for the
+wealth of the land, as house, grounds, adornments, and the ladies'
+attire were rich and elegant.
+
+I stood apart from the groups of beautiful creatures like the genus of
+another race, enveloped in garments of fur that had seen much service. I
+presented a marked contrast. The evident culture, refinement, and
+gentleness of the ladies, banished any fear I might have entertained as
+to the treatment I should receive. But a singular silence that pervaded
+everything impressed me painfully. I stood upon the uplifted verge of an
+immense city, but from its broad streets came no sound of traffic, no
+rattle of wheels, no hum of life. Its marble homes of opulence shone
+white and grand through mossy foliage; from innumerable parks the
+fountains sparkled and statues gleamed like rare gems upon a costly
+robe; but over all a silence, as of death, reigned unbroken. The awe and
+the mystery of it pressed heavily upon my spirit, but I could not refuse
+to obey when a lady stepped out of the group, that had doubtless been
+discussing me, and motioned me to follow her.
+
+She led me through the main entrance into a lofty hall that extended
+through the entire building, and consisted of a number of grand arches
+representing scenes in high relief of the finest sculpture. We entered a
+magnificent salon, where a large assembly of ladies regarded me with
+unmistakable astonishment. Every one of them was a blonde. I was
+presented to one, whom I instantly took to be the Lady Superior of the
+College, for I had now settled it in my mind that I was in a female
+seminary, albeit one of unheard of luxury in its appointments.
+
+The lady had a remarkable majesty of demeanor, and a noble countenance.
+Her hair was white with age, but over her features, the rosy bloom of
+youth still lingered, as if loth to depart. She looked at me kindly and
+critically, but not with as much surprise as the others had evinced. I
+may here remark that I am a brunette. My guide, having apparently
+received some instruction in regard to me, led me upstairs into a
+private apartment. She placed before me a complete outfit of female
+wearing apparel, and informed me by signs that I was to put it on. She
+then retired. The apartment was sumptuously furnished in two
+colors--amber and lazulite. A bath-room adjoining had a beautiful
+porcelain tank with scented water, that produced a delightful feeling of
+exhilaration.
+
+Having donned my new attire, I descended the stairs and met my guide,
+who conducted me into a spacious dining-room. The walls were adorned
+with paintings, principally of fruit and flowers. A large and superb
+picture of a sylvan dell in the side of a rock, was one exception. Its
+deep, cool shadows, and the pellucid water, which a wandering sunbeam
+accidentally revealed, were strikingly realistic. Nearly all of the
+pictures were upon panels of crystal that were set in the wall. The
+light shining through them gave them an exceedingly natural effect. One
+picture that I especially admired, was of a grape vine twining around
+the body and trunk of an old tree. It was inside of the crystal panel,
+and looked so natural that I imagined I could see its leaves and
+tendrils sway in the wind. The occupants of the dining-room were all
+ladies, and again I noted the fact that they were all blondes:
+beautiful, graceful, courteous, and with voices softer and sweeter than
+the strains of an eolian harp.
+
+The table, in its arrangement and decoration, was the most beautiful
+one I had ever seen. The white linen cloth resembled brocaded satin. The
+knives and forks were gold, with handles of solid amber. The dishes were
+of the finest porcelain. Some of them, particularly the fruit stands,
+looked as though composed of hoar frost. Many of the fruit stands were
+of gold filigree work. They attracted my notice at once, not so much on
+account of the exquisite workmanship and unique design of the dishes, as
+the wonderful fruit they contained. One stand, that resembled a huge
+African lily in design, contained several varieties of plums, as large
+as hen's eggs, and transparent. They were yellow, blue and red. The
+centre of the table was occupied by a fruit stand of larger size than
+the others. It looked like a boat of sea foam fringed with gold moss.
+Over its outer edge hung clusters of grapes of a rich wine color, and
+clear as amethysts. The second row looked like globes of honey, the next
+were of a pale, rose color, and the top of the pyramid was composed of
+white ones, the color and transparency of dew.
+
+The fruit looked so beautiful. I thought it would be a sacrilege to
+destroy the charm it had for the eye; but when I saw it removed by pink
+tipped fingers, whose beauty no art could represent, and saw it
+disappear within such tempting lips. I thought the feaster worthy of the
+feast. Fruit appeared to be the principal part of their diet, and was
+served in its natural state. I was, however, supplied with something
+that resembled beefsteak of a very fine quality. I afterward learned
+that it was chemically prepared meat. At the close of the meal, a cup
+was handed me that looked like the half of a soap bubble with all its
+iridescent beauty sparkling and glancing in the light. It contained a
+beverage that resembled chocolate, but whose flavor could not have been
+surpassed by the fabled nectar of the gods.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+I have been thus explicit in detailing the circumstances of my entrance
+into the land of Mizora, or, in other words, the interior of the earth,
+lest some incredulous person might doubt the veracity of this narrative.
+
+It does seem a little astonishing that a woman should have fallen by
+accident, and without intention or desire, upon a discovery that
+explorers and scientists had for years searched for in vain. But such
+was the fact, and, in generosity, I have endeavored to make my accident
+as serviceable to the world in general, and Science in particular, as I
+could, by taking observations of the country, its climate and products,
+and especially its people.
+
+I met with the greatest difficulty in acquiring their language.
+Accustomed to the harsh dialect of the North, my voice was almost
+intractable in obtaining their melodious accentuation. It was,
+therefore, many months before I mastered the difficulty sufficiently to
+converse without embarrassment, or to make myself clearly understood.
+The construction of their language was simple and easily understood, and
+in a short time I was able to read it with ease, and to listen to it
+with enjoyment. Yet, before this was accomplished, I had mingled among
+them for months, listening to a musical jargon of conversation, that I
+could neither participate in, nor understand. All that I could therefore
+discover about them during this time, was by observation. This soon
+taught me that I was not in a seminary--in our acceptance of the
+term--but in a College of Experimental Science. The ladies--girls I had
+supposed them to be--were, in fact, women and mothers, and had reached
+an age that with us would be associated with decrepitude, wrinkles and
+imbecility. They were all practical chemists, and their work was the
+preparation of food from the elements. No wonder that they possessed the
+suppleness and bloom of eternal youth, when the earthy matter and
+impurities that are ever present in our food, were unknown to theirs.
+
+I also discovered that they obtained rain artificially when needed, by
+discharging vast quantities of electricity in the air. I discovered that
+they kept no cattle, nor animals of any kind for food or labor. I
+observed a universal practice of outdoor exercising; the aim seeming to
+be to develop the greatest capacity of lung or muscle. It was
+astonishing the amount of air a Mizora lady could draw into her lungs.
+They called it their brain stimulant, and said that their faculties were
+more active after such exercise. In my country, a cup of strong coffee,
+or some other agreeable beverage, is usually taken into the stomach to
+invigorate or excite the mind.
+
+One thing I remarked as unusual among a people of such cultured taste,
+and that was the size of the ladies' waists. Of all that I measured not
+one was less than thirty inches in circumference, and it was rare to
+meet with one that small. At first I thought a waist that tapered from
+the arm pits would be an added beauty, if only these ladies would be
+taught how to acquire it. But I lived long enough among them to look
+upon a tapering waist as a disgusting deformity. They considered a large
+waist a mark of beauty, as it gave a greater capacity of lung power; and
+they laid the greatest stress upon the size and health of the lungs. One
+little lady, not above five feet in height, I saw draw into her lungs
+two hundred and twenty-five cubic inches of air, and smile proudly when
+she accomplished it. I measured five feet and five inches in height, and
+with the greatest effort I could not make my lungs receive more than two
+hundred cubic inches of air. In my own country I had been called an
+unusually robust girl, and knew, by comparison, that I had a much larger
+and fuller chest than the average among women.
+
+I noticed with greater surprise than anything else had excited in me,
+the marked absence of men. I wandered about the magnificent building
+without hindrance or surveillance. There was not a lock or bolt on any
+door in it. I frequented a vast gallery filled with paintings and
+statues of women, noble looking, beautiful women, but still--nothing but
+women. The fact that they were all blondes, singular as it might appear,
+did not so much impress me. Strangers came and went, but among the
+multitude of faces I met, I never saw a man's.
+
+In my own country I had been accustomed to regard man as a vital
+necessity. He occupied all governmental offices, and was the arbitrator
+of domestic life. It seemed, therefore, impossible to me for a country
+or government to survive without his assistance and advice. Besides, it
+was a country over which the heart of any man must yearn, however
+insensible he might be to beauty or female loveliness. Wealth was
+everywhere and abundant. The climate as delightful as the most
+fastidious could desire. The products of the orchards and gardens
+surpassed description. Bread came from the laboratory, and not from the
+soil by the sweat of the brow. Toil was unknown; the toil that we know,
+menial, degrading and harassing. Science had been the magician that had
+done away all that. Science, so formidable and austere to our untutored
+minds, had been gracious to these fair beings and opened the door to
+nature's most occult secrets. The beauty of those women it is not in my
+power to describe. The Greeks, in their highest art, never rivalled it,
+for here was a beauty of mind that no art can represent. They enhanced
+their physical charms with attractive costumes, often of extreme
+elegance. They wore gems that flashed a fortune as they passed. The
+rarest was of a pale rose color, translucent as the clearest water, and
+of a brilliancy exceeding the finest diamond. Their voices, in song,
+could only be equaled by a celestial choir. No dryad queen ever floated
+through the leafy aisles of her forest with more grace than they
+displayed in every movement. And all this was for feminine eyes
+alone--and they of the most enchanting loveliness.
+
+Among all the women that I met during my stay in Mizora--comprising a
+period of fifteen years--I saw not one homely face or ungraceful form.
+In my own land the voice of flattery had whispered in my ear praises of
+face and figure, but I felt ill-formed and uncouth beside the perfect
+symmetry and grace of these lovely beings. Their chief beauty appeared
+in a mobility of expression. It was the divine fire of Thought that
+illumined every feature, which, while gazing upon the Aphrodite of
+Praxitiles, we must think was all that the matchless marble lacked.
+Emotion passed over their features like ripples over a stream. Their
+eyes were limpid wells of loveliness, where every impulse of their
+natures were betrayed without reserve.
+
+"It would be a paradise for man."
+
+I made this observation to myself, and as secretly would I propound the
+question:
+
+"Why is he not here in lordly possession?"
+
+In _my_ world man was regarded, or he had made himself regarded, as a
+superior being. He had constituted himself the Government, the Law,
+Judge, Jury and Executioner. He doled out reward or punishment as his
+conscience or judgment dictated. He was active and belligerent always in
+obtaining and keeping every good thing for himself. He was
+indispensable. Yet here was a nation of fair, exceedingly fair women
+doing without him, and practising the arts and sciences far beyond the
+imagined pale of human knowledge and skill.
+
+Of their progress in science I will give some accounts hereafter.
+
+It is impossible to describe the feeling that took possession of me as
+months rolled by, and I saw the active employments of a prosperous
+people move smoothly and quietly along in the absence of masculine
+intelligence and wisdom. Cut off from all inquiry by my ignorance of
+their language, the singular absence of the male sex began to prey upon
+my imagination as a mystery. The more so after visiting a town at some
+distance, composed exclusively of schools and colleges for the youth of
+the country. Here I saw hundreds of children--_and all of them were
+girls_. Is it to be wondered at that the first inquiry I made, was:
+
+"Where are the men?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+To facilitate my progress in the language of Mizora I was sent to their
+National College. It was the greatest favor they could have conferred
+upon me, as it opened to me a wide field of knowledge. Their educational
+system was a peculiar one, and, as it was the chief interest of the
+country. I shall describe it before proceeding farther with this
+narrative.
+
+All institutions for instruction were public, as were, also, the books
+and other accessories. The State was the beneficent mother who furnished
+everything, and required of her children only their time and
+application. Each pupil was compelled to attain a certain degree of
+excellence that I thought unreasonably high, after which she selected
+the science or vocation she felt most competent to master, and to that
+she then devoted herself.
+
+The salaries of teachers were larger than those of any other public
+position. The Principal of the National College had an income that
+exceeded any royal one I had ever heard of; but, as education was the
+paramount interest of Mizora, I was not surprised at it. Their desire
+was to secure the finest talent for educational purposes, and as the
+highest honors and emoluments belonged to such a position, it could not
+be otherwise. To be a teacher in Mizora was to be a person of
+consequence. They were its aristocracy.
+
+Every State had a free college provided for out of the State funds. In
+these colleges every department of Science, Art, or Mechanics was
+furnished with all the facilities for thorough instruction. All the
+expenses of a pupil, including board, clothing, and the necessary
+traveling fares, were defrayed by the State. I may here remark that all
+railroads are owned and controlled by the General Government. The rates
+of transportation were fixed by law, and were uniform throughout the
+country.
+
+The National College which I entered belonged to the General
+Government. Here was taught the highest attainments in the arts and
+sciences, and all industries practised in Mizora. It contained the very
+cream of learning. There the scientist, the philosopher and inventor
+found the means and appliances for study and investigation. There the
+artist and sculptor had their finest work, and often their studios. The
+principals and subordinate teachers and assistants were elected by
+popular vote. The State Colleges were free to those of another State who
+might desire to enter them, for Mizora was like one vast family. It was
+regarded as the duty of every citizen to lend all the aid and
+encouragement in her power to further the enlightenment of others,
+wisely knowing the benefits of such would accrue to her own and the
+general good. The National College was open to all applicants,
+irrespective of age, the only requirements being a previous training to
+enter upon so high a plane of mental culture. Every allurement was held
+out to the people to come and drink at the public fountain where the cup
+was inviting and the waters sweet. "For," said one of the leading
+instructors to me, "education is the foundation of our moral elevation,
+our government, our happiness. Let us relax our efforts, or curtail the
+means and inducements to become educated, and we relax into ignorance,
+and end in demoralization. We know the value of free education. It is
+frequently the case that the greatest minds are of slow development, and
+manifest in the primary schools no marked ability. They often leave the
+schools unnoticed; and when time has awakened them to their mental
+needs, all they have to do is to apply to the college, pass an
+examination, and be admitted. If not prepared to enter the college, they
+could again attend the common schools. We realize in its broadest sense
+the ennobling influence of universal education. The higher the culture
+of a people, the more secure is their government and happiness. A
+prosperous people is always an educated one; and the freer the
+education, the wealthier they become."
+
+The Preceptress of the National College was the leading scientist of the
+country. Her position was more exalted than any that wealth could have
+given her. In fact, while wealth had acknowledged advantages, it held a
+subordinate place in the estimation of the people. I never heard the
+expression "very wealthy," used as a recommendation of a person. It was
+always: "_She_ is a fine scholar, or mechanic, or artist, or musician.
+_She_ excels in landscape gardening, or domestic work. _She_ is a
+first-class chemist." But never "_She_ is rich."
+
+The idea of a Government assuming the responsibility of education, like
+a parent securing the interest of its children, was all so new to me;
+and yet, I confessed to myself, the system might prove beneficial to
+other countries than Mizora. In that world, from whence I had so
+mysteriously emigrated, education was the privilege only of the rich.
+And in no country, however enlightened, was there a system of education
+that would reach all. Charitable institutions were restricted, and
+benefited only a few. My heart beat with enthusiasm when I thought of
+the mission before me. And then I reflected that the philosophers of my
+world were but as children in progress compared to these. Still
+traveling in grooves that had been worn and fixed for posterity by
+bygone ages of ignorance and narrow-mindedness, it would require courage
+and resolution, and more eloquence than I possessed, to persuade them
+out of these trodden paths. To be considered the privileged class was an
+active characteristic of human nature. Wealth, and the powerful grip
+upon the people which the organizations of society and governments gave,
+made it hereditary. Yet in this country, nothing was hereditary but the
+prosperity and happiness of the whole people.
+
+It was not a surprise to me that astronomy was an unknown science in
+Mizora, as neither sun, moon, nor stars were visible there. "The moon's
+pale beams" never afford material for a blank line in poetry; neither do
+scientific discussions rage on the formation of Saturn's rings, or the
+spots on the sun. They knew they occupied a hollow sphere, bounded North
+and South by impassible oceans. Light was a property of the atmosphere.
+A circle of burning mist shot forth long streamers of light from the
+North, and a similar phenomena occurred in the South.
+
+The recitation of my geography lesson would have astonished a pupil from
+the outer world. They taught that a powerful current of electricity
+existed in the upper regions of the atmosphere. It was the origin of
+their atmospheric heat and light, and their change of seasons. The
+latter appeared to me to coincide with those of the Arctic zone, in one
+particular. The light of the sun during the Arctic summer is reflected
+by the atmosphere, and produces that mellow, golden, rapturous light
+that hangs like a veil of enchantment over the land of Mizora for six
+months in the year. It was followed by six months of the shifting
+iridescence of the Aurora Borealis.
+
+As the display of the Aurora Borealis originated, and was most brilliant
+at what appeared to me to be the terminus of the pole, I believed it was
+caused by the meeting at that point of the two great electric currents
+of the earth, the one on its surface, and the one known to the
+inhabitants of Mizora. The heat produced by the meeting of two such
+powerful currents of electricity is, undoubtedly, the cause of the open
+Polar Sea. As the point of meeting is below the vision of the
+inhabitants of the Arctic regions, they see only the reflection of the
+Aurora. Its gorgeous, brilliant, indescribable splendor is known only to
+the inhabitants of Mizora.
+
+At the National College, where it is taught as a regular science, I
+witnessed the chemical production of bread and a preparation resembling
+meat. Agriculture in this wonderful land, was a lost art. No one that I
+questioned had any knowledge of it. It had vanished in the dim past of
+their barbarism. With the exception of vegetables and fruit, which were
+raised in luscious perfection, their food came from the elements. A
+famine among such enlightened people was impossible, and scarcity was
+unknown. Food for the body and food for the mind were without price. It
+was owing to this that poverty was unknown to them, as well as disease.
+The absolute purity of all that they ate preserved an activity of vital
+power long exceeding our span of life. The length of their year,
+measured by the two seasons, was the same as ours, but the women who had
+marked a hundred of them in their lifetime, looked younger and fresher,
+and were more supple of limb than myself, yet I had barely passed my
+twenty-second year.
+
+I wrote out a careful description of the processes by which they
+converted food out of the valueless elements--valueless because of their
+abundance--and put it carefully away for use in my own country. There
+drouth, or excessive rainfalls, produced scarcity, and sometimes famine.
+The struggle of the poor was for food, to the exclusion of all other
+interests. Many of them knew not what proper and health-giving
+nourishment was. But here in Mizora, the daintiest morsels came from the
+chemists laboratory, cheap as the earth under her feet.
+
+I now began to enjoy the advantages of conversation, which added greatly
+to my happiness and acquirements. I formed an intimate companionship
+with the daughter of the Preceptress of the National College, and to her
+was addressed the questions I asked about things that impressed me. She
+was one of the most beautiful beings that it had been my lot to behold.
+Her eyes were dark, almost the purplish blue of a pansy, and her hair
+had a darker tinge than is common in Mizora, as if it had stolen the
+golden edge of a ripe chestnut. Her beauty was a constant charm to me.
+
+The National College contained a large and well filled gallery. Its
+pictures and statuary were varied, not confined to historical portraits
+and busts as was the one at the College of Experimental Science. Yet it
+possessed a number of portraits of women exclusively of the blonde type.
+Many of them were ideal in loveliness. This gallery also contained the
+masterpieces of their most celebrated sculptors. They were all studies
+of the female form. I am a connoisseur in art, and nothing that I had
+ever seen before could compare with these matchless marbles, bewitching
+in every delicate contour, alluring in softness, but grand and majestic
+in pose and expression.
+
+But I haunted this gallery for other reasons than its artistic
+attractions. I was searching for the portrait of a man, or something
+suggesting his presence. I searched in vain. Many of the paintings were
+on a peculiar transparent substance that gave to the subject a
+startlingly vivid effect. I afterward learned that they were
+imperishable, the material being a translucent adamant of their own
+manufacture. After a picture was painted upon it, another piece of
+adamant was cemented over it.
+
+Each day, as my acquaintance with the peculiar institutions and
+character of the inhabitants of Mizora increased, my perplexity and a
+certain air of mystery about them increased with it. It was impossible
+for me not to feel for them a high degree of respect, admiration, and
+affection. They were ever gentle, tender, and kind to solicitude. To
+accuse them of mystery were a paradox; and yet they _were_ a mystery. In
+conversation, manners and habits, they were frank to singularity. It was
+just as common an occurrence for a poem to be read and commented on by
+its author, as to hear it done by another. I have heard a poetess call
+attention to the beauties of her own production, and receive praise or
+adverse criticism with the same charming urbanity.
+
+Ambition of the most intense earnestness was a natural characteristic,
+but was guided by a stern and inflexible justice. Envy and malice were
+unknown to them. It was, doubtless, owing to their elevated moral
+character that courts and legal proceedings had become unnecessary. If a
+discussion arose between parties involving a question of law, they
+repaired to the Public Library, where the statute books were kept, and
+looked up the matter themselves, and settled it as the law directed.
+Should they fail to interpret the law alike, a third party was selected
+as referee, but accepted no pay.
+
+Indolence was as much a disgrace to them as is the lack of virtue to the
+women of my country, hence every citizen, no matter how wealthy, had
+some regular trade, business or profession. I found those occupations we
+are accustomed to see accepted by the people of inferior birth and
+breeding, were there filled by women of the highest social rank, refined
+in manner and frequently of notable intellectual acquirements. It grew,
+or was the result of the custom of selecting whatever vocation they felt
+themselves competent to most worthily fill, and as no social favor or
+ignominy rested on any kind of labor, the whole community of Mizora was
+one immense family of sisters who knew no distinction of birth or
+position among themselves.
+
+There were no paupers and no charities, either public or private, to be
+found in the country. The absence of poverty such as I knew existed in
+all civilized nations upon the face of the earth, was largely owing to
+the cheapness of food. But there was one other consideration that bore
+vitally upon it. The dignity and necessity of labor was early and
+diligently impressed upon the mind. The Preceptress said to me:
+
+"Mizora is a land of industry. Nature has taught us the duty of work.
+Had some of us been born with minds fully matured, or did knowledge come
+to some as old age comes to all, we might think that a portion was
+intended to live without effort. But we are all born equal, and labor is
+assigned to all; and the one who seeks labor is wiser than the one who
+lets labor seek her."
+
+Citizens, I learned, were not restrained from accumulating vast wealth
+had they the desire and ability to do so, but custom imposed upon them
+the most honorable processes. If a citizen should be found guilty of
+questionable business transactions, she suffered banishment to a lonely
+island and the confiscation of her entire estate, both hereditary and
+acquired. The property confiscated went to the public schools in the
+town or city where she resided; but never was permitted to augment
+salaries. I discovered this in the statute books, but not in the memory
+of any one living had it been found necessary to inflict such a
+punishment.
+
+"Our laws," said Wauna, "are simply established legal advice. No law can
+be so constructed as to fit every case so exactly that a criminal mind
+could not warp it into a dishonest use. But in a country like ours,
+where civilization has reached that state of enlightenment that needs no
+laws, we are simply guided by custom."
+
+The love of splendor and ornament was a pronounced characteristic of
+these strange people. But where gorgeous colors were used, they were
+always of rich quality. The humblest homes were exquisitely ornamented,
+and often displayed a luxury that, with us, would have been considered
+an evidence of wealth.
+
+They took the greatest delight in their beauty, and were exceedingly
+careful of it. A lovely face and delicate complexion, they averred,
+added to one's refinement. The art of applying an artificial bloom and
+fairness to the skin, which I had often seen practiced in my own
+country, appeared to be unknown to them. But everything savoring of
+deception was universally condemned. They made no concealment of the
+practice they resorted to for preserving their complexions, and so
+universal and effectual were they, that women who, I was informed, had
+passed the age allotted to the grandmothers in my country, had the
+smooth brow and pink bloom of cheek that belongs to a more youthful
+period of life. There was, however, a distinction between youth and old
+age. The hair was permitted to whiten, but the delicate complexion of
+old age, with its exquisite coloring, excited in my mind as much
+admiration as astonishment.
+
+I cannot explain why I hesitated to press my first inquiry as to where
+the men were. I had put the question to Wauna one day, but she professed
+never to have heard of such beings. It silenced me--for a time.
+
+"Perhaps it is some extinct animal," she added, naively. "We have so
+many new things to study and investigate, that we pay but little
+attention to ancient history."
+
+I bided my time and put the query in another form.
+
+"Where is your other parent?"
+
+She regarded me with innocent surprise. "You talk strangely. I have but
+one parent. How could I have any more?"
+
+"You ought to have two."
+
+She laughed merrily. "You have a queer way of jesting. I have but one
+mother, one adorable mother. How could I have two?" and she laughed
+again.
+
+I saw that there was some mystery I could not unravel at present, and
+fearing to involve myself in some trouble, refrained from further
+questioning on the subject. I nevertheless kept a close observance of
+all that passed, and seized every opportunity to investigate a mystery
+that began to harass me with its strangeness.
+
+Soon after my conversation with Wauna, I attended an entertainment at
+which a great number of guests were present. It was a literary festival
+and, after the intellectual delicacies were disposed of, a banquet
+followed of more than royal munificence. Toasts were drank, succeeded by
+music and dancing and all the gayeties of a festive occasion, yet none
+but the fairest of fair women graced the scene. Is it strange,
+therefore, that I should have regarded with increasing astonishment and
+uneasiness a country in all respects alluring to the desires of man--yet
+found him not there in lordly possession?
+
+Beauty and intellect, wealth and industry, splendor and careful economy,
+natures lofty and generous, gentle and loving--why has not Man claimed
+this for himself?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+The Preceptress of the National College appointed her daughter Wanna as
+a guide and instructor to me. I formed a deep and strong attachment for
+her, which, it pains me to remember, was the cause of her unhappy fate.
+In stature she was above the medium height, with a form of the fairest
+earthly loveliness and exquisite grace. Her eyes were so deep a blue,
+that at first I mistook them for brown. Her hair was the color of a ripe
+chestnut frosted with gold, and in length and abundance would cover her
+like a garment. She was vivacious and fond of athletic sports. Her
+strength amazed me. Those beautiful hands, with their tapering fingers,
+had a grip like a vise. They had discovered, in this wonderful land,
+that a body possessing perfectly developed muscles must, by the laws of
+nature, be symmetrical and graceful. They rode a great deal on small,
+two-wheeled vehicles, which they propelled themselves. They gave me one
+on which I accompanied Wauna to all of the places of interest in the
+Capital city and vicinity.
+
+I must mention that Wauna's voice was exceedingly musical, even in that
+land of sweet voices, but she did not excel as a singer.
+
+The infant schools interested me more than all the magnificence and
+grandeur of the college buildings. The quaint courtesy, gentle manners
+and affectionate demeanor of the little ones toward one another, was a
+surprise to me. I had visited infant schools of my own and other
+countries, where I had witnessed the display of human nature,
+unrestrained by mature discretion and policy. Fights, quarrels, kicks,
+screams, the unlawful seizure of toys and trinkets, and other
+misdemeanors, were generally the principal exhibits. But here it was all
+different. I thought, as I looked at them, that should a philanthropist
+from the outside world have chanced unknowingly upon the playground of a
+Mizora infant school, he would have believed himself in a company of
+little angels.
+
+At first, a kindness so universal impressed me as studied; a species of
+refined courtesy in which the children were drilled. But time and
+observation proved to me that it was the natural impulse of the heart,
+an inherited trait of moral culture. In _my_ world, kindness and
+affection were family possessions, extended occasionally to
+acquaintances. Beyond this was courtesy only for the great busy bustling
+mass of humanity called--"the world."
+
+It must not be understood that there was no variety of character in
+Mizora. Just as marked a difference was to be found there as elsewhere;
+but it was elevated and ennobled. Its evil tendencies had been
+eliminated. There were many causes that had made this possible. The
+first, and probably the most influential, was the extreme cheapness of
+living. Food and fuel were items of so small consequence, that poverty
+had become unknown. Added to this, and to me by far the most vital
+reason, was their system of free education. In contemplating the state
+of enlightenment to which Mizora had attained, I became an enthusiast
+upon the subject of education, and resolved, should I ever again reach
+the upper world, to devote all my energies and ability to convincing the
+governments of its importance. I believe it is the duty of every
+government to make its schools and colleges, and everything appertaining
+to education--FREE. To be always starved for knowledge is a more pitiful
+craving than to hunger for bread. One dwarfs the body; the other the
+mind.
+
+The utmost care was bestowed upon the training and education of the
+children. There was nothing that I met with in that beautiful and happy
+country I longed more to bring with me to the inhabitants of my world,
+than their manner of rearing children. The most scrupulous attention was
+paid to their diet and exercise, both mental and physical. The result
+was plump limbs, healthy, happy faces and joyous spirits. In all the
+fifteen years that I spent in Mizora, I never saw a tear of sorrow fall
+from children's eyes. Admirable sanitary regulations exist in all the
+cities and villages of the land, which insures them pure air. I may
+state here that every private-house looks as carefully to the condition
+of its atmosphere, as we do to the material neatness of ours.
+
+The only intense feeling that I could discover among these people was
+the love between parent and child. I visited the theater where the
+tragedy of the play was the destruction of a daughter by shipwreck in
+view of the distracted mother. The scenery was managed with wonderful
+realism. The thunder of the surf as it beat upon the shore, the
+frightful carnival of wind and waves that no human power could still,
+and the agony of the mother watching the vessel break to pieces upon the
+rock and her child sink into the boiling water to rise no more, was
+thrilling beyond my power to describe. I lost control of my feelings.
+The audience wept and applauded; and when the curtain fell, I could
+scarcely believe it had only been a play. The love of Mizora women for
+their children is strong and deep. They consider the care of them a
+sacred duty, fraught with the noblest results of life. A daughter of
+scholarly attainments and noble character is a credit to her mother.
+That selfish mother who looks upon her children as so many afflictions
+is unknown to Mizora. If a mother should ever feel her children as
+burdens upon her, she would never give it expression, as any dereliction
+of duty would be severely rebuked by the whole community, if not
+punished by banishment. Corporal punishment was unknown.
+
+I received an invitation from a lady prominent in literature and science
+to make her a visit. I accepted with gratification, as it would afford
+me the opportunity I coveted to become acquainted with the domestic life
+of Mizora, and perhaps penetrate its greatest mystery, for I must
+confess that the singular dearth of anything and everything resembling
+Man, never ceased to prey upon my curiosity.
+
+The lady was the editor and proprietor of the largest and most widely
+known scientific and literary magazine in the country. She was the
+mother of eight children, and possessed one of the largest fortunes and
+most magnificent residences in the country.
+
+The house stood on an elevation, and was a magnificent structure of grey
+granite, with polished cornices. The porch floors were of clouded
+marble. The pillars supporting its roof were round shafts of the same
+material, with vines of ivy, grape and rose winding about them, carved
+and colored into perfect representations of the natural shrubs.
+
+The drawing-room, which was vast and imposing in size and appearance,
+had a floor of pure white marble. The mantels and window-sills were of
+white onyx, with delicate vinings of pink and green. The floor was
+strewn with richly colored mats and rugs. Luxurious sofas and chairs
+comprised the only furniture. Each corner contained a piece of fine
+statuary. From the centre of the ceiling depended a large gold basin of
+beautiful design and workmanship, in which played a miniature fountain
+of perfumed water that filled the air with a delicate fragrance. The
+walls were divided into panels of polished and unpolished granite. On
+the unpolished panels hung paintings of scenery. The dull, gray color of
+the walls brought out in sharp and tasteful relief the few costly and
+elegant adornments of the room: a placid landscape with mountains dimly
+outlining the distance. A water scene with a boat idly drifting,
+occupied by a solitary figure watching the play of variegated lights
+upon the tranquil waters. Then came a wild and rugged mountain scene
+with precipices and a foaming torrent. Then a concert of birds amusingly
+treated.
+
+The onyx marble mantel-piece contained but a single ornament--an
+orchestra. A coral vase contained a large and perfect tiger lily, made
+of gold. Each stamen supported a tiny figure carved out of ivory,
+holding a musical instrument. When they played, each figure appeared
+instinct with life, like the mythical fairies of my childhood; and the
+music was so sweet, yet faint, that I readily imagined the charmed ring
+and tiny dancers keeping time to its rhythm.
+
+The drawing-room presented a vista of arches draped in curtains of a
+rare texture, though I afterward learned they were spun glass. The one
+that draped the entrance to the conservatory looked like sea foam with
+the faint blush of day shining through it. The conservatory was in the
+shape of a half sphere, and entirely of glass. From its dome, more than
+a hundred feet above our heads, hung a globe of white fire that gave
+forth a soft clear light. Terminating, as it did, the long vista of
+arches with their transparent hangings of cobweb texture, it presented a
+picture of magnificence and beauty indescribably.
+
+The other apartments displayed the same taste and luxury. The
+sitting-room contained an instrument resembling a grand piano.
+
+The grounds surrounding this elegant home were adorned with natural and
+artificial beauties, Grottoes, fountains, lakes, cascades, terraces of
+flowers, statuary, arbors and foliage in endless variety, that rendered
+it a miniature paradise. In these grounds, darting in and out among the
+avenues, playing hide-and-seek behind the statuary, or otherwise amusing
+themselves, I met eight lovely children, ranging from infancy to young
+maidenhood. The glowing cheeks and eyes, and supple limbs spoke of
+perfect health and happiness. When they saw their mother coming, they
+ran to meet her, the oldest carrying the two-year old baby. The stately
+woman greeted each with a loving kiss. She showed in loving glance and
+action how dear they all were to her. For the time being she unbent,
+and became a child herself in the interest she took in their prattle and
+mirth. A true mother and happy children.
+
+I discovered that each department of this handsome home was under the
+care of a professional artist. I remarked to my hostess that I had
+supposed her home was the expression of her own taste.
+
+"So it is," she replied; "but it requires an equally well educated taste
+to carry out my designs. The arrangement and ornamentation of my grounds
+were suggested by me, and planned and executed by my landscape artist."
+
+After supper we repaired to the general sitting-room. The eldest
+daughter had been deeply absorbed in a book before we came in. She
+closed and left it upon a table. I watched for an opportunity to
+carelessly pick it up and examine it. It was a novel I felt sure, for
+she appeared to resign it reluctantly out of courtesy to her guest. I
+might, from it, gather some clue to the mystery of the male sex. I took
+up the book and opened it. It was The Conservation of Force and The
+Phenomena of Nature. I laid it down with a sigh of discomfiture.
+
+The next evening, my hostess gave a small entertainment, and what was my
+amazement, not to say offense, to perceive the cook, the chamber-maid,
+and in fact all the servants in the establishment, enter and join in the
+conversation and amusement. The cook was asked to sing, for, with the
+exception of myself--and I tried to conceal it--no one appeared to take
+umbrage at her presence. She sat down to the piano and sang a pretty
+ballad in a charming manner. Her voice was cultivated and musical, as
+are all the voices in Mizora, but it was lacking in the qualities that
+make a great singer, yet it had a plaintive sweetness that was very
+attractive.
+
+I was dumbfounded at her presumption. In my country such a thing is
+unknown as a servant entertaining guests in such a capacity, and
+especially among people of my rank and position in the world.
+
+I repelled some advances she made me with a hauteur and coldness that it
+mortified me afterward to remember. Instead of being _my_ inferior, I
+was her's, and she knew it; but neither by look, tone nor action did she
+betray her consciousness of it. I had to acknowledge that her hands were
+more delicately modeled than mine, and her bearing had a dignity and
+elegance that might have been envied by the most aristocratic dame of my
+own land. Knowing that the Mizora people were peculiar in their social
+ideas, I essayed to repress my indignation at the time, but later I
+unburdened myself to Wauna who, with her usual sweetness and
+gentleness, explained to me that her occupation was a mere matter of
+choice with her.
+
+"She is one of the most distinguished chemists of this nation. She
+solved the problem of making bread out of limestone of a much finer
+quality than had been in use before."
+
+"Don't tell me that you gave me a stone when I asked for bread!" I
+exclaimed.
+
+"We have not done that," replied Wauna; "but we have given you what you
+took for bread, but which is manufactured out of limestone and the
+refuse of the marble quarries."
+
+I looked at her in such inane astonishment that she hastened to add:
+
+"I will take you to one of the large factories some day. They are always
+in the mountains where the stone is abundant. You can there see loaves
+by the thousands packed in great glass tanks for shipment to the
+different markets. And they do not cost the manufacturer above one
+centime per hundred."
+
+"And what royalty does the discoverer get for this wonder of chemistry?"
+
+"None. Whenever anything of that kind is discovered in our country, it
+is purchased outright by the government, and then made public for the
+benefit of all. The competition among manufacturers consists in the care
+and exactness with which they combine the necessary elements. There is
+quite a difference in the taste and quality of our bread as it comes
+from different factories."
+
+"Why doesn't such a talented person quit working in another woman's
+kitchen and keep herself like a lady?" I inquired, all the prejudice of
+indolent wealth against labor coming up in my thoughts.
+
+"She has a taste for that kind of work," replied Wauna, "instead of for
+making dresses, or carving gems, or painting. She often says she could
+not make a straight line if she tried, yet she can put together with
+such nicety and chemical skill the elements that form an omelette or a
+custard, that she has become famous. She teaches all who desire to
+learn, but none seem to equal her. She was born with a genius for
+cooking and nothing else. Haven't you seen her with a long glass tube
+testing the vessels of vegetables and fruit that were cooking?"
+
+"Yes," I answered. "It was from that that I supposed her occupation
+menial."
+
+"Visitors from other cities," continued Wauna, "nearly always inquire
+for her first."
+
+Perceiving the mistake that I had made, I ventured an apology for my
+behavior toward her, and Wauna replied, with a frankness that nearly
+crushed me:
+
+"We all noticed it, but do not fear a retaliation," she added sweetly.
+"We know that you are from a civilization that we look back upon as one
+of barbarism."
+
+I acknowledged that if any superciliousness existed in Mizora while I
+was there, I must have had it.
+
+The guests departed without refreshments having been served. I explained
+the custom of entertainment in my country, which elicited expressions of
+astonishment. It would be insulting to offer refreshments of any kind to
+a guest between the regular hours for dining, as it would imply a desire
+on your part to impair their health. Such was the explanation of what in
+my country would be deemed a gross neglect of duty. Their custom was
+probably the result of two causes: an enlightened knowledge of the laws
+of health, and the extreme cheapness of all luxuries of the table which
+the skill of the chemist had made available to every class of people in
+the land.
+
+The word "servant" did not exist in the language of Mizora; neither had
+they an equivalent for it in the sense in which we understand and use
+the word. I could not tell a servant--for I must use the word to be
+understood--from a professor in the National College. They were all
+highly-educated, refined, lady-like and lovely. Their occupations were
+always matters of choice, for, as there was nothing in them to detract
+from their social position, they selected the one they knew they had the
+ability to fill. Hence those positions _we_ are accustomed to regard as
+menial, were there filled by ladies of the highest culture and
+refinement; consequently the domestic duties of a Mizora household moved
+to their accomplishment with the ease and regularity of fine machinery.
+
+It was long before I could comprehend the dignity they attached to the
+humblest vocations. They had one proverb that embraced it all: "Labor is
+the necessity of life." I studied this peculiar phase of Mizora life,
+and at last comprehended that in this very law of social equality lay
+the foundation of their superiority. Their admirable system of adapting
+the mind to the vocation in which it was most capable of excelling, and
+endowing that with dignity and respect, and, at the same time,
+compelling the highest mental culture possible, had produced a nation
+in the enjoyment of universal refinement, and a higher order of
+intelligence than any yet known to the outside world.
+
+The standard of an ordinary education was to me astonishingly high. The
+reason for it was easily understood when informed that the only
+aristocracy of the country was that of intellect. Scholars, artists,
+scientists, literateurs, all those excelling in intellectual gifts or
+attainments, were alone regarded as superiors by the masses.
+
+In all the houses that I had visited I had never seen a portrait hung in
+a room thrown open to visitors. On inquiry, I was informed that it was a
+lack of taste to make a portrait conspicuous.
+
+"You meet faces at all times," said my informant, "but you cannot at all
+times have a variety of scenery before you. How monotonous it would be
+with a drawing-room full of women, and the walls filled with their
+painted representatives. We never do it."
+
+"Then where do you keep your family portraits?"
+
+"Ours is in a gallery upstairs."
+
+I requested to be shown this, and was conducted to a very long apartment
+on the third floor, devoted exclusively to relics and portraits of
+family ancestry. There were over three thousand portraits of blond
+women, which my hostess' daughter informed me represented her
+grandmothers for ages back. Not one word did she say about her
+grandfathers.
+
+I may mention here that no word existed in their dictionaries that was
+equivalent to the word "man." I had made myself acquainted with this
+fact as soon as I had acquired sufficient knowledge of their language.
+My astonishment at it cannot be described. It was a mystery that became
+more and more perplexing. Never in the closest intimacy that I could
+secure could I obtain the slightest clue, the least suggestion relating
+to the presence of man. My friend's infant, scarcely two years old,
+prattled of everything but a father.
+
+I cannot explain a certain impressive dignity about the women of Mizora
+that, in spite of their amiability and winning gentleness, forbade a
+close questioning into private affairs. My hostess never spoke of her
+business. It would have been a breach of etiquette to have questioned
+her about it. I could not bring myself to intrude the question of the
+marked absence of men, when not the slightest allusion was ever made to
+them by any citizen.
+
+So time passed on, confirming my high opinion of them, and yet I knew
+and felt and believed that some strange and incomprehensible mystery
+surrounded them, and when I had abandoned all hope of a solution to it,
+it solved itself in the most unexpected and yet natural manner, and I
+was more astonished at the solution than I was at the mystery.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+Their domestic life was so harmonious and perfect that it was a
+perpetual pleasure to contemplate.
+
+Human nature finds its sweetest pleasure, its happiest content, within
+its own home circle; and in Mizora I found no exception to the rule. The
+arrangement and adornment of every house in Mizora were evidently for
+the comfort and happiness of its inmates. To purchase anything for
+merely outside show, or to excite the envy or jealousy of a neighbor,
+was never thought of by an inhabitant of Mizora.
+
+The houses that were built to rent excited my admiration quite as much
+as did the private residences. They all seemed to have been designed
+with two special objects in view--beauty and comfort. Houses built to
+rent in large cities were always in the form of a hollow square,
+inclosing a commodious and handsomely decorated park. The back was
+adorned with an upper and lower piazza opening upon the park. The suites
+of rooms were so arranged as to exclusively separate their occupants
+from all others. The park was undivided. The center was occupied by a
+fountain large enough to shoot its spray as high as the uppermost
+piazza. The park was furnished with rustic seats and shade trees,
+frequently of immense size, branched above its smooth walks and
+promenades, where baby wagons, velocipedes and hobby horses on wheels
+could have uninterrupted sport.
+
+Suburban residences, designed for rent, were on a similar but more
+amplified plan. The houses were detached, but the grounds were in
+common. Many private residences were also constructed on the same plan.
+Five or six acres would be purchased by a dozen families who were not
+rich enough to own large places separately. A separate residence would
+be built for each family, but the ground would be laid off and
+ornamented like a private park. Each of the dozen families would thus
+have a beautiful view and the privilege of the whole ground. In this
+way, cascades, fountains, rustic arbors, rockeries, aquariums, tiny
+lakes, and every variety of landscape ornamenting, could be supplied at
+a comparatively small cost to each family.
+
+Should any one wish to sell, they disposed of their house and
+one-twelfth of the undivided ground, and a certain per cent. of the
+value of its ornaments. The established custom was never to remove or
+alter property thus purchased without the consent of the other
+shareholders. Where a people had been educated to regard justice and
+conscience as their law, such an arrangement could be beneficial to an
+entire city.
+
+Financial ability does not belong to every one, and this plan of uniting
+small capitals gave opportunity to the less wealthy classes to enjoy all
+the luxuries that belong to the rich. In fact some of the handsomest
+parks I saw in Mizora were owned and kept up in this manner. Sometimes
+as many as twenty families united in the purchase of an estate, and
+constructed artificial lakes large enough to sail upon. Artificial
+cascades and fountains of wonderful size and beauty were common
+ornaments in all the private and public parks of the city. I noticed in
+all the cities that I visited the beauty and charm of the public parks,
+which were found in all sections.
+
+The walks were smoothly paved and shaded by trees of enormous size. They
+were always frequented by children, who could romp and play in these
+sylvan retreats of beauty in perfect security.
+
+The high state of culture arrived at by the Mizora people rendered a
+luxurious style of living a necessity to all. Many things that I had
+been brought up to regard as the exclusive privileges of the rich, were
+here the common pleasure of every one. There was no distinction of
+classes; no genteel-poverty people, who denied themselves necessities
+that they might appear to have luxuries. There was not a home in Mizora
+that I entered--and I had access to many--that did not give the
+impression of wealth in all its appointments.
+
+I asked the Preceptress to explain to me how I might carry back to the
+people of my country this social happiness, this equality of physical
+comfort and luxury; and she answered me with emphasis:
+
+"Educate them. Convince the rich that by educating the poor, they are
+providing for their own safety. They will have fewer prisons to build,
+fewer courts to sustain. Educated Labor will work out its own salvation
+against Capital. Let the children of toil start in life with exactly
+the same educational advantages that are enjoyed by the rich. Give them
+the same physical and moral training, and let the rich pay for it by
+taxes."
+
+I shook my head "They will never submit to it," was my reluctant
+admission.
+
+"Appeal to their selfishness," urged the Preceptress "Get them to open
+their college doors and ask all to come and be taught without money and
+without price. The power of capital is great, but stinted and ignorant
+toil will rise against its oppression, and innocence and guilt will
+alike suffer from its fury. Have you never known such an occurrence?"
+
+"Not in my day or country," I answered "But the city in which I was
+educated has such a history. Its gutters flowed with human blood, the
+blood of its nobles."
+
+She inclined her head significantly. "It will be repeated," she said
+sadly, "unless you educate them. Give their bright and active minds the
+power of knowledge. They will use it wisely, for their own and their
+country's welfare."
+
+I doubted my ability to do this, to contend against rooted and inherited
+prejudice, but I resolved to try. I did not need to be told that the
+rich and powerful had a monopoly of intellect: Nature was not partial to
+them, for the children of the poor, I well knew, were often handsomer
+and more intellectual than the offspring of wealth and aristocratic
+birth.
+
+I have before spoken of the positions occupied by those who performed
+what I had been bred to regard as menial work. At first, the mere fact
+of the person who presided over the kitchen being presented to me as an
+equal, was outraging to all my hereditary dignity and pride of birth. No
+one could be more pronounced in a consciousness of inherited nobility
+than I. I had been taught from infancy to regard myself as a superior
+being, merely because the accident of birth had made me so, and the
+arrogance with which I had treated some of my less favored schoolmates
+reverted to me with mortifying regret, when, having asked Wauna to point
+out to me the nobly born, she looked at me with her sweet expression of
+candor and innocence and said:
+
+"We have no nobility of birth. As I once before told you, intellect is
+our only standard of excellence. It alone occupies an exalted place and
+receives the homage of our people."
+
+In a subsequent conversation with her mother, the Preceptress, she said:
+
+"In remote ages, great honor and deference was paid to all who were
+born of rulers, and the designation 'noble blood,' was applied to them.
+At one time in the history of our country they could commit any outrage
+upon society or morals without fear of punishment, simply because they
+belonged to the aristocracy. Even a heinous murder would be unnoticed if
+perpetrated by one of them. Nature alone did not favor them Imbecile and
+immoral minds fell to the lot of the aristocrat as often as to the lowly
+born. Nature's laws are inflexible and swerve not for any human wish.
+They outraged them by the admixture of kindred blood, and degeneracy was
+often the result. A people should always have for their chief ruler the
+highest and noblest intellect among them, but in those dark ages they
+were too often compelled to submit to the lowest, simply because it had
+been _born_ to the position. But," she added, with a sweet smile,
+"_that_ time lies many centuries behind us, and I sometimes think we had
+better forget it entirely."
+
+My first meeting with the domestics of my friend's house impressed me
+with their high mental culture, refinement and elegance. Certainly no
+"grande dame" of my own country but would have been proud of their
+beauty and graceful dignity.
+
+Prejudice, however deeply ingrained, could not resist the custom of a
+whole country, and especially such a one as Mizora, so I soon found
+myself on a familiar footing with my friend's "artist"--for the name by
+which they were designated as a class had very nearly the same meaning.
+
+Cooking was an art, and one which the people of Mizora had cultivated to
+the highest excellence. It is not strange, when their enlightenment is
+understood, that they should attach as much honor to it as the people of
+my country do to sculpture, painting and literature. The Preceptress
+told me that such would be the case with my people when education became
+universal and the poor could start in life with the same intellectual
+culture as the rich. The chemistry of food and its importance in
+preserving a youthful vigor and preventing disease, would then be
+understood and appreciated by all classes, and would receive the
+deference it deserved.
+
+"You will never realize," said the Preceptress earnestly, "the
+incalculable benefit that will accrue to your people from educating your
+poor. Urge that Government to try it for just twenty years, long enough
+for a generation to be born and mature. The bright and eager intellects
+of poverty will turn to Chemistry to solve the problems of cheap Light,
+cheap Fuel and cheap Food. When you can clothe yourselves from the
+fibre of the trees, and warm and light your dwellings from the water of
+your rivers, and eat of the stones of the earth, Poverty and Disease
+will be as unknown to your people as it is to mine."
+
+"If I should preach that to them, they would call me a maniac."
+
+"None but the ignorant will do so. From your description of the great
+thinkers of your country, I am inclined to believe there are minds among
+you advanced enough to believe in it."
+
+I remembered how steamboats and railroads and telegraphy had been
+opposed and ridiculed until proven practicable, and I took courage and
+resolved to follow the advice of my wise counselor.
+
+I had long felt a curiosity to behold the inner workings of a domestic's
+life, and one day ventured to ask my friend's permission to enter her
+kitchen. Surprise was manifested at such a request, when I began to
+apologize and explain. But my hostess smiled and said:
+
+"My kitchen is at all times as free to my guests as my drawing room."
+
+Every kitchen in Mizora is on the same plan and conducted the same way.
+To describe one, therefore, is to describe all. I undertook to explain
+that in my country, good breeding forbade a guest entering the host's
+kitchen, and frequently its appearance, and that of the cook's, would
+not conduce to gastric enjoyment of the edibles prepared in it.
+
+My first visit happened to be on scrubbing day, and I was greatly amused
+to see a little machine, with brushes and sponges attached, going over
+the floor at a swift rate, scouring and sponging dry as it went. Two
+vessels, one containing soap suds and the other clear water, were
+connected by small feed pipes with the brushes. As soon as the drying
+sponge became saturated, it was lifted by an ingenious yet simple
+contrivance into a vessel and pressed dry, and was again dropped to the
+floor.
+
+I inquired how it was turned to reverse its progress so as to clean the
+whole floor, and was told to watch when it struck the wall. I did so,
+and saw that the jar not only reversed the machine, but caused it to
+spring to the right about two feet, which was its width, and again begin
+work on a new line, to be again reversed in the same manner when it
+struck the opposite wall. Carpeted floors were swept by a similar
+contrivance.
+
+No wonder the "artists" of the kitchen had such a dainty appearance.
+They dipped their pretty hands in perfumed water and dried them on the
+finest and whitest damask, while machinery did the coarse work.
+
+Mizora, I discovered, was a land of brain workers. In every vocation of
+life machinery was called upon to perform the arduous physical labor.
+The whole domestic department was a marvel of ingenious mechanical
+contrivances. Dishwashing, scouring and cleaning of every description
+were done by machinery.
+
+The Preceptress told me that it was the result of enlightenment, and it
+would become the custom in my country to make machinery perform the
+laborious work when they learned the value of universal and advanced
+knowledge.
+
+I observed that the most exact care was given to the preparation of
+food. Every cook was required to be a chemist of the highest excellence;
+another thing that struck me as radically different from the custom in
+vogue in my country.
+
+Everything was cooked by hot air and under cover, so that no odor was
+perceptible in the room. Ventilating pipes conveyed the steam from
+cooking food out of doors. Vegetables and fruits appeared to acquire a
+richer flavor when thus cooked. The seasoning was done by exact weight
+and measure, and there was no stirring or tasting. A glass tube, on the
+principle of a thermometer, determined when each article was done. The
+perfection which they had attained as culinary chemists was a source of
+much gratification to me, both in the taste of food so delicious and
+palatable, and in its wholesome effect on my constitution. As to its
+deliciousness, a meal prepared by a Mizora cook could rival the fabled
+feasts of the gods. Its beneficial effects upon me were manifested in a
+healthier tone of body and an an increase of animal spirits, a
+pleasurable feeling of content and amiability.
+
+The Preceptress told me that the first step toward the eradication of
+disease was in the scientific preparation of food, and the establishment
+of schools where cooking was taught as an art to all who applied, and
+without charge. Placed upon a scientific basis it became respectable.
+
+"To eliminate from our food the deleterious earthy matter is our
+constant aim. To that alone do we owe immunity from old age far in
+advance of that period of life when your people become decrepit and
+senile. The human body is like a lamp-wick, which filters the oil while
+it furnishes light. In time the wick becomes clogged and useless and is
+thrown away. If the oil could be made perfectly pure, the wick would not
+fill up."
+
+She gave this homely explanation with a smile and the air of a grown
+person trying to convey to the immature mind of a child an explanation
+of some of Nature's phenomena.
+
+I reflected upon their social condition and arrived at the conviction
+that there is no occupation in life but what has its usefulness and
+necessity, and, when united to culture and refinement, its dignity. A
+tree has a million leaves, yet each individual leaf, insignificant as it
+may appear, has its special share of work to perform in helping the tree
+to live and perfect its fruit. So should every citizen of a government
+contribute to its vitality and receive a share of its benefits.
+
+"Will the time ever come," I asked myself, "when my own country will see
+this and rise to a social, if not intellectual equality." And the
+admonition of the Preceptress would recur to my mind:
+
+"Educate them. Educate them, and enlightenment will solve for them every
+problem in Sociology."
+
+My observations in Mizora led me to believe that while Nature will
+permit and encourage the outgrowth of equality in refinement, she gives
+birth to a more decided prominence in the leadership of intellect.
+
+The lady who conducted me through the culinary department, and pointed
+out the machinery and explained its use and convenience, had the same
+grace and dignity of manner as the hostess displayed when exhibiting to
+me the rare plants in her conservatory.
+
+The laundry was a separate business. No one unconnected with it as a
+profession had anything to do with its duties. I visited several of the
+large city laundries and was informed that all were conducted alike.
+Steam was employed in the cleaning process, and the drying was done by
+hot air impregnated with ozone. This removed from white fabrics every
+vestige of discoloration or stain. I saw twelve dozen fine damask
+table-cloths cleaned, dried and ironed in thirty minutes. All done by
+machinery. They emerged from the rollers that ironed them looking like
+new pieces of goods, so pure was their color, and so glossy their
+finish.
+
+I inquired the price for doing them up, and was told a cent a piece.
+Twelve cents per dozen was the established price for doing up clothes.
+Table-cloths and similar articles were ironed between rollers
+constructed to admit their full width. Other articles of more
+complicated make, were ironed by machines constructed to suit them. Some
+articles were dressed by having hot air forced rapidly through them.
+Lace curtains, shawls, veils, spreads, tidies and all similar articles,
+were by this process made to look like new, and at a cost that I thought
+ought certainly to reduce the establishment to beggary or insolvency.
+But here chemistry again was the magician that had made such cheap labor
+profitable. And such advanced knowledge of chemistry was the result of
+universal education.
+
+Ladies sent their finest laces to be renewed without fear of having them
+reduced to shreds. In doing up the frailest laces, nothing but hot air
+impregnated with ozone was employed. These were consecutively forced
+through the fabric after it was carefully stretched. Nothing was ever
+lost or torn, so methodical was the management of the work.
+
+I asked why cooking was not established as the laundry was, as a
+distinct public business, and was told that it had been tried a number
+of times, but had always been found impracticable. One kind of work in a
+laundry would suit everyone, but one course of cooking could not. Tastes
+and appetites differed greatly. What was palatable to one would be
+disliked by another, and to prepare food for a large number of
+customers, without knowing or being able to know exactly what the demand
+would be, had always resulted in large waste, and as the people of
+Mizora were the most rigid and exacting economists, it was not to be
+wondered at that they had selected the most economical plan. Every
+private cook could determine accurately the amount of food required for
+the household she prepared it for, and knowing their tastes she could
+cater to all without waste.
+
+"We, as yet," said my distinguished instructor, "derive all our fruit
+and vegetables from the soil. We have orchards and vineyards and gardens
+which we carefully tend, and which our knowledge of chemistry enables us
+to keep in health and productiveness. But there is always more or less
+earthy matter in all food derived from cultivating the soil, and the
+laboratories are now striving to produce artificial fruit and vegetables
+that will satisfy the palate and be free from deleterious matter."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+One of the most curious and pleasing sights in Mizora was the flower
+gardens and conservatories. Roses of all sizes and colors and shades of
+color were there. Some two feet across were placed by the side of others
+not exceeding the fourth of an inch in order to display the disparity in
+size.
+
+To enter into a minute description of all the discoveries made by the
+Mizora people in fruit and floriculture, would be too tedious; suffice
+to say they had laid their hands upon the beautiful and compelled nature
+to reveal to them the secret of its formation. The number of petals,
+their color, shape and size, were produced as desired. The only thing
+they could neither create nor destroy was its perfume. I questioned the
+Preceptress as to the possibility of its ever being discovered? She
+replied:
+
+"It is the one secret of the rose that Nature refuses to reveal. I do
+not believe we shall ever possess the power to increase or diminish the
+odor of a flower. I believe that Nature will always reserve to herself
+the secret of its creation. The success that we enjoy in the wonderful
+cultivation of our fruits and flowers was one of our earliest scientific
+conquests."
+
+I learned that their orchards never failed to yield a bounteous harvest.
+They had many fruits that were new to me, and some that were new and
+greatly improved species of kinds that I had already seen and eaten in
+my own or other countries. Nothing that they cultivated was ever without
+its own peculiar beauty as well as usefulness. Their orchards, when the
+fruit was ripe, presented a picture of unique charm. Their trees were
+always trained into graceful shapes, and when the ripe fruit gleamed
+through the dark green foliage, every tree looked like a huge bouquet. A
+cherry tree that I much admired, and the fruit of which I found
+surpassingly delicious, I must allow myself to describe. The cherries
+were not surprisingly large, but were of the colors and transparency of
+honey. They were seedless, the tree having to be propagated from slips.
+When the fruit was ripe the tree looked like a huge ball of pale amber
+gems hiding in the shadows of dark pointed leaves.
+
+Their grape arbors were delightful pictures in their season of maturity.
+Some vines had clusters of fruit three feet long; but these I was told
+were only to show what they _could_ do in grape culture. The usual and
+marketable size of a bunch was from one to two pounds weight. The fruit
+was always perfect that was offered for sale.
+
+Science had provided the fruit growers of Mizora with permanent
+protections from all kinds of blight or decay.
+
+When I considered the wholesomeness of all kinds of food prepared for
+the inhabitants of this favored land. I began to think they might owe a
+goodly portion of their exceptional health to it, and a large share of
+their national amiability to their physical comfort. I made some such
+observation to the Preceptress, and she admitted its correctness.
+
+"The first step that my people made toward the eradication of disease
+was in the preparation of healthy food; not for the rich, who could
+obtain it themselves, but for the whole nation."
+
+I asked for further information and she added:
+
+"Science discovered that mysterious and complicated diseases often had
+their origin in adulterated food. People suffered and died, ignorant of
+what produced their disease. The law, in the first place, rigidly
+enforced the marketing of clean and perfect fruit, and a wholesome
+quality of all other provisions. This was at first difficult to do, as
+in those ancient days, (I refer to a very remote period of our history)
+in order to make usurious profit, dealers adulterated all kinds of food;
+often with poisonous substances. When every state took charge of its
+markets and provided free schools for cooking, progress took a rapid
+advance. Do you wonder at it? Reflect then. How could I force my mind
+into complete absorption of some new combination of chemicals, while the
+gastric juice in my stomach was battling with sour or adulterated food?
+Nature would compel me to pay some attention to the discomfort of my
+digestive organs, and it might happen at a time when I was on the verge
+of a revelation in science, which might be lost. You may think it an
+insignificant matter to speak of in connection with the grand
+enlightenment that we possess; but Nature herself is a mass of little
+things. Our bodies, strong and supple as they are, are nothing but a
+union of tiny cells. It is by the investigation of little things that we
+have reached the great ones."
+
+I felt a keen desire to know more about their progress toward universal
+health, feeling assured that the history of the extirpation of disease
+must be curious and instructive. I had been previously made acquainted
+with the fact that disease was really unknown to them, save in its
+historical existence. To cull this isolated history from their vast
+libraries of past events, would require a great deal of patient and
+laborious research, and the necessary reading of a great deal of matter
+that I could not be interested in, and that could not beside be of any
+real value to me, so I requested the Preceptress to give me an
+epitomized history of it in her own language, merely relating such facts
+as might be useful to me, and that I could comprehend, for I may as well
+bring forward the fact that, in comparison to theirs, my mind was as a
+savages would be to our civilization.
+
+Their brain was of a finer intellectual fiber. It possessed a wider,
+grander, more majestic receptivity. They absorbed ideas that passed over
+me like a cloud. Their imaginations were etherealized. They reached into
+what appeared to be materialless space, and brought from it substances I
+had never heard of before, and by processes I could not comprehend. They
+divided matter into new elements and utilized them. They disintegrated
+matter, added to it new properties and produced a different material. I
+saw the effects and uses of their chemistry, but that was all.
+
+There are minds belonging to my own age, as there have been to all ages,
+that are intellectually in advance of it. They live in a mental and
+prophetic world of their own, and leave behind them discoveries,
+inventions and teachings that benefit and ennoble the generations to
+come. Could such a mind have chanced upon Mizora, as I chanced upon it,
+it might have consorted with its intellect, and brought from the
+companionship ideas that I could not receive, and sciences that I can
+find no words in my language to represent. The impression that my own
+country might make upon a savage, may describe my relation to Mizora.
+What could an uncivilized mind say of our railroads, or magnificent
+cathedrals, our palaces, our splendor, our wealth, our works of art.
+They would be as difficult of representation as were the lofty aims, the
+unselfishness in living, the perfect love, honor and intellectual
+grandeur, and the universal comfort and luxury found in Mizora, were to
+me. To them the cultivation of the mind was an imperative duty, that
+neither age nor condition retarded. To do good, to be approved by their
+own conscience, was their constant pleasure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+It was during my visit at my friend's house that I first witnessed the
+peculiar manner in which the markets in Mizora are conducted.
+Everything, as usual, was fastidiously neat and clean. The fruit and
+vegetables were fresh and perfect. I examined quantities of them to
+satisfy myself, and not a blemish or imperfection could be found on any.
+None but buyers were attending market. Baskets of fruit, bunches of
+vegetables and, in fact, everything exhibited for sale, had the quality
+and the price labeled upon it. Small wicker baskets were near to receive
+the change. When a buyer had selected what suited her, she dropped the
+label and the change in the basket. I saw one basket filled with gold
+and silver coin, yet not one would be missing when the owner came to
+count up the sales. Sometimes a purchaser was obliged to change a large
+piece of money, but it was always done accurately.
+
+There was one singular trait these people possessed that, in conjunction
+with their other characteristics, may seem unnatural: they would give
+and exact the last centime (a quarter of a cent) in a trade. I noticed
+this peculiarity so frequently that I inquired the reason for it, and
+when I had studied it over I decided that, like all the other rules that
+these admirable people had established, it was wise. Said my friend:
+
+"We set a just value on everything we prepare for sale. Anything above
+or below that, would be unjust to buyer or seller."
+
+The varieties of apples, pears, peaches and other fruits had their names
+attached, with the quality, sweet, sour, or slightly acid. In no
+instance was it found to be incorrectly stated. I came to one stall that
+contained nothing but glass jars of butter and cream. The butter was a
+rich buff color, like very fine qualities I had seen in my own country.
+The cream, an article I am fond of drinking, looked so tempting I longed
+to purchase a glass for that purpose. The lady whom I accompanied (my
+hostess' cook) informed me that it was artificially prepared. The butter
+and cheese were chemical productions. Different laboratories produced
+articles of varying flavor, according to the chemist's skill. Although
+their construction was no secret, yet some laboratories enjoyed special
+reputation for their butter and cheese owing to the accuracy with which
+their elements were combined.
+
+She gave me quite a history about artificial food, also how they kept
+fruits and vegetables in their natural state for years without decaying
+or losing their flavor, so that when eaten they were nearly as fine as
+when freshly gathered. After hearing that the cream was manufactured, I
+resolved to taste it. Dropping my coin into the basket, I took up a
+glass and drank it. A look of disgust crossed the countenance of my
+companion.
+
+"Do you not drink this?" I asked in surprise, as I set down the empty
+vessel. "It is truly delicious."
+
+"At regular meal times we all use it, and sometimes drink it in
+preference to other beverages--but never in public. You will never see a
+citizen of Mizora eating in public. Look all over this market and you
+will not discover one person, either adult or child, eating or drinking,
+unless it be water."
+
+I could not; and I felt keenly mortified at my mistake. Yet in my own
+country and others that, according to our standard, are highly
+civilized, a beverage is made from the juice of the corn that is not
+only drank in public places, but its effects, which are always
+unbecoming, are exhibited also, and frequently without reproof. However,
+I said nothing to my companion about this beverage. It bears no
+comparison in color or taste to that made in Mizora. I could not have
+distinguished the latter from the finest dairy cream.
+
+The next place of interest that I visited were their mercantile bazars
+or stores. Here I found things looking quite familiar. The goods were
+piled upon shelves behind counters, and numerous clerks were in
+attendance. It was the regular day for shopping among the Mizora ladies,
+and the merchants had made a display of their prettiest and richest
+goods. I noticed the ladies were as elegantly dressed as if for a
+reception, and learned that it was the custom. They would meet a great
+many friends and acquaintances, and dressed to honor the occasion.
+
+It was my first shopping experience in Mizora, and I quite mortified
+myself by removing my glove and rubbing and examining closely the goods
+I thought of purchasing. I entirely ignored the sweet voice of the
+clerk that was gently informing me that it was "pure linen" or "pure
+wool," so habituated had I become in my own country to being my own
+judge of the quality of the goods I was purchasing, regardless always of
+the seller's recommendation of it. I found it difficult, especially in
+such circumstances, to always remember their strict adherence to honesty
+and fair dealing. I felt rebuked when I looked around and saw the
+actions of the other ladies in buying.
+
+In manufactured goods, as in all other things, not the slightest
+cheatery is to be found. Woolen and cotton mixtures were never sold for
+pure wool. Nobody seemed to have heard of the art of glossing muslin
+cuffs and collars and selling them for pure linen.
+
+Fearing that I had wounded the feelings of the lady in attendance upon
+me, I hastened to apologize by explaining the peculiar methods of trade
+that were practiced in my own country. They were immediately pronounced
+barbarous.
+
+I noticed that ladies in shopping examined colors and effects of
+trimmings or combinations, but never examined the quality. Whatever the
+attendant said about _that_ was received as a fact.
+
+The reason for the absence of attendants in the markets and the presence
+of them in mercantile houses was apparent at once. The market articles
+were brought fresh every day, while goods were stored.
+
+Their business houses and their manner of shopping were unlike anything
+I had ever met with before. The houses were all built in a hollow
+square, enclosing a garden with a fountain in the center. These were
+invariably roofed over with glass, as was the entire building. In winter
+the garden was as warm as the interior of the store. It was adorned with
+flowers and shrubs. I often saw ladies and children promenading in these
+pretty inclosures, or sitting on their rustic sofas conversing, while
+their friends were shopping in the store. The arrangement gave perfect
+light and comfort to both clerks and customers, and the display of rich
+and handsome fabrics was enhanced by the bit of scenery beyond. In
+summer the water for the fountain was artificially cooled.
+
+Every clerk was provided with a chair suspended by pulleys from strong
+iron rods fastened above. They could be raised or lowered at will; and
+when not occupied, could be drawn up out of the way. After the goods
+were purchased, they were placed in a machine that wrapped and tied them
+ready for delivery.
+
+A dining-room was always a part of every store. I desired to be shown
+this, and found it as tasteful and elegant in its appointments as a
+private one would be. Silver and china and fine damask made it inviting
+to the eye, and I had no doubt the cooking corresponded as well with the
+taste.
+
+The streets of Mizora were all paved, even the roads through the
+villages were furnished an artificial cover, durable, smooth and
+elastic. For this purpose a variety of materials were used. Some had
+artificial stone, in the manufacture of which Mizora could surpass
+nature's production. Artificial wood they also made and used for
+pavements, as well as cement made of fine sand. The latter was the least
+durable, but possessed considerable elasticity and made a very fine
+driving park. They were experimenting when I came away on sanded glass
+for road beds. The difficulty was to overcome its susceptibility to
+attrition. After business hours every street was swept by a machine. The
+streets and sidewalks, in dry weather, were as free from soil as the
+floor of a private-house would be.
+
+Animals and domestic fowls had long been extinct in Mizora. This was one
+cause of the weird silence that so impressed me on my first view of
+their capital city. Invention had superceded the usefulness of animals
+in all departments: in the field and the chemistry of food. Artificial
+power was utilized for all vehicles.
+
+The vehicle most popular with the Mizora ladies for shopping and culling
+purposes, was a very low carriage, sometimes with two seats, sometimes
+with one. They were upholstered with the richest fabrics, were
+exceedingly light and graceful in shape, and not above three feet from
+the ground. They were strong and durable, though frequently not
+exceeding fifty pounds in weight. The wheel was the curious and
+ingenious part of the structure, for in its peculiar construction lay
+the delight of its motion. The spokes were flat bands of steel, curved
+outward to the tire. The carriage had no spring other than these spokes,
+yet it moved like a boat gliding down stream with the current. I was
+fortunate enough to preserve a drawing of this wheel, which I hope some
+day to introduce in my own land. The carriages were propelled by
+compressed air or electricity; and sometimes with a mechanism that was
+simply pressed with the foot. I liked the compressed air best. It was
+most easily managed by me. The Mizora ladies preferred electricity, of
+which I was always afraid. They were experimenting with a new propelling
+power during my stay that was to be acted upon by light, but it had not
+come into general use, although I saw some vehicles that were propelled
+by it. They moved with incredible speed, so rapid indeed, that the
+upper part of the carriage had to be constructed of glass, and securely
+closed while in motion, to protect the occupant. It was destined, I
+heard some of their scientists say, to become universal, as it was the
+most economical power yet discovered. They patiently tried to explain it
+to me, but my faculties were not receptive to such advanced philosophy,
+and I had to abandon the hope of ever introducing it into my own
+country.
+
+There was another article manufactured in Mizora that excited my wonder
+and admiration. It was elastic glass. I have frequently mentioned the
+unique uses that they made of it, and I must now explain why. They had
+discovered a process to render it as pliable as rubber. It was more
+useful than rubber could be, for it was almost indestructible. It had
+superceded iron in many ways. All cooking utensils were made of it. It
+entered largely into the construction and decoration of houses. All
+cisterns and cellars had an inner lining of it. All underground pipes
+were made of it, and many things that are the necessities and luxuries
+of life.
+
+They spun it into threads as fine and delicate as a spider's gossamer,
+and wove it into a network of clear or variegated colors that dazzled
+the eye to behold. Innumerable were the lovely fabrics made of it. The
+frailest lace, in the most intricate and aerial patterns, that had the
+advantage of never soiling, never tearing, and never wearing out.
+Curtains for drawing-room arches were frequently made of it. Some of
+them looked like woven dew drops.
+
+One set of curtains that I greatly admired, and was a long time ignorant
+of what they were made of, were so unique, I must do myself the pleasure
+to describe them. They hung across the arch that led to the glass
+conservatory attached to my friend's handsome dwelling. Three very thin
+sheets of glass were woven separately and then joined at the edges so
+ingeniously as to defy detection. The inside curtain was one solid
+color: crimson. Over this was a curtain of snow flakes, delicate as
+those aerial nothings of the sky, and more durable than any fabric
+known. Hung across the arched entrance to a conservatory, with a great
+globe of white fire shining through it, it was lovely as the blush of
+Aphrodite when she rose from the sea, veiled in its fleecy foam.
+
+They also possessed the art of making glass highly refractive. Their
+table-ware surpassed in beauty all that I had ever previously seen. I
+saw tea cups as frail looking as soap bubbles, possessing the delicate
+iridescence of opals. Many other exquisite designs were the product of
+its flexibility and transparency. The first article that attracted my
+attention was the dress of an actress on the stage. It was lace, made of
+gossamer threads of amber in the design of lilies and leaves, and was
+worn over black velvet.
+
+The wonderful water scene that I beheld at the theatre was produced by
+waves made of glass and edged with foam, a milky glass spun into tiny
+bubbles. They were agitated by machinery that caused them to roll with a
+terribly natural look. The blinding flashes of lightning had been the
+display of genuine electricity.
+
+Nothing in the way of artistic effect could call forth admiration or
+favorable comment unless it was so exact an imitation of nature as to
+not be distinguished from the real without the closest scrutiny. In
+private life no one assumed a part. All the acting I ever saw in Mizora
+was done upon the stage.
+
+I could not appreciate their mental pleasures, any more than a savage
+could delight in a nocturne of Chopin. Yet one was the intellectual
+ecstasy of a sublime intelligence, and the other the harmonious rapture
+of a divinely melodious soul. I must here mention that the processes of
+chemical experiment in Mizora differed materially from those I had
+known. I had once seen and tasted a preparation called artificial cream
+that had been prepared by a friend of my fathers, an eminent English
+chemist. It was simply a combination of the known properties of cream
+united in the presence of gentle heat. But in Mizora they took certain
+chemicals and converted them into milk, and cream, and cheese, and
+butter, and every variety of meat, in a vessel that admitted neither air
+nor light. They claimed that the elements of air and light exercised a
+material influence upon the chemical production of foods, that they
+could not be made successfully by artificial processes when exposed to
+those two agents. Their earliest efforts had been unsuccessful of exact
+imitation, and a perfect result had only been obtained by closely
+counterfeiting the processes of nature.
+
+The cream prepared artificially that I had tasted in London, was the
+same color and consistency as natural cream, but it lacked its relish.
+The cream manufactured in Mizora was a perfect imitation of the finest
+dairy product.
+
+It was the same with meats; they combined the elements, and the article
+produced possessed no detrimental flavor. It was a more economical way
+of obtaining meat than by fattening animals.
+
+They were equally fortunate in the manufacture of clothing. Every
+mountain was a cultivated forest, from which they obtained every variety
+of fabric; silks, satins, velvets, laces, woolen goods, and the richest
+articles of beauty and luxury, in which to array themselves, were put
+upon the market at a trifling cost, compared to what they were
+manufactured at in my own country. Pallid and haggard women and
+children, working incessantly for a pittance that barely sustained
+existence, was the ultimatum that the search after the cause of cheap
+prices arrived at in my world, but here it traveled from one bevy of
+beautiful workwoman to another until it ended at the Laboratory where
+Science sat throned, the grand, majestic, humane Queen of this thrice
+happy land.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+Whenever I inquired:
+
+"From whence comes the heat that is so evenly distributed throughout the
+dwellings and public buildings of Mizora?" they invariably pointed to
+the river. I asked in astonishment:
+
+"From water comes fire?"
+
+And they answered: "Yes."
+
+I had long before this time discovered that Mizora was a nation of very
+wonderful people, individually and collectively; and as every revelation
+of their genius occurred, I would feel as though I could not be
+surprised at any marvelous thing that they should claim to do, but I was
+really not prepared to believe that they could set the river on fire.
+Yet I found that such was, scientifically, the fact. It was one of their
+most curious and, at the same time, useful appliances of a philosophical
+discovery.
+
+They separated water into its two gases, and then, with their ingenious
+chemical skill, converted it into an economical fuel.
+
+Their coal mines had long been exhausted, as had many other of nature's
+resources for producing artificial heat. The dense population made it
+impracticable to cultivate forests for fuel. Its rapid increase demanded
+of Science the discovery of a fuel that could be consumed without loss
+to them, both in the matter consumed and in the expense of procuring it.
+Nothing seemed to answer their purpose so admirably as water. Water,
+when decomposed, becomes gas. Convert the gas into heat and it becomes
+water again. A very great heat produces only a small quantity of water:
+hence the extreme utility of water as a heat producing agent.
+
+The heating factories were all detached buildings, and generally, if at
+all practicable, situated near a river, or other body of water. Every
+precaution against accident was stringently observed.
+
+There were several processes for decomposing the water explained to me,
+but the one preferred, and almost universally used by the people of
+Mizora, was electricity. The gases formed at the opposite poles of the
+electrical current, were received in large glass reservoirs, especially
+constructed for them.
+
+In preparing the heat that gave such a delightful temperature to the
+dwellings and public buildings of their vast cities, glass was always
+the material used in the construction of vessels and pipes. Glass pipes
+conveyed the separate gases of hydrogen and oxygen into an apartment
+especially prepared for the purpose, and united them upon ignited
+carbon. The heat produced was intense beyond description, and in the
+hands of less experienced and capable chemists, would have proved
+destructful to life and property. The hardest rock would melt in its
+embrace; yet, in the hands of these wonderful students of Nature, it was
+under perfect control and had been converted into one of the most
+healthful and agreeable agents of comfort and usefulness known. It was
+regulated with the same ease and convenience with which we increase or
+diminish the flames of a gas jet. It was conducted, by means of glass
+pipes, to every dwelling in the city. One factory supplied sufficient
+heat for over half a million inhabitants.
+
+I thought I was not so far behind Mizora in a knowledge of heating with
+hot air; yet, when I saw the practical application of their method, I
+could see no resemblance to that in use in my own world. In winter,
+every house in Mizora had an atmosphere throughout as balmy as the
+breath of the young summer. Country-houses and farm dwellings were all
+supplied with the same kind of heat.
+
+In point of economy it could not be surpassed. A city residence,
+containing twenty rooms of liberal size and an immense conservatory, was
+heated entire, at a cost of four hundred centimes a year. One dollar per
+annum for fuel.
+
+There was neither smoke, nor soot, nor dust. Instead of entering a room
+through a register, as I had always seen heated air supplied, it came
+through numerous small apertures in the walls of a room quite close to
+the floor, thus rendering its supply imperceptible, and making a draft
+of cold air impossible.
+
+The extreme cheapness of artificial heat made a conservatory a necessary
+luxury of every dwelling. The same pipes that supplied the dwelling
+rooms with warmth, supplied the hot-house also, but it was conveyed to
+the plants by a very different process.
+
+They used electricity in their hot-houses to perfect their fruit, but
+in what way I could not comprehend; neither could I understand their
+method of supplying plants and fruits with carbonic acid gas. They
+manufactured it and turned it into their hot-houses during sleeping
+hours. No one was permitted to enter until the carbon had been absorbed.
+They had an instrument resembling a thermometer which gave the exact
+condition of the atmosphere. They were used in every house, as well as
+in the conservatories. The people of Mizora were constantly
+experimenting with those two chemical agents, electricity and carbonic
+acid gas, in their conservatories. They confidently believed that with
+their service, they could yet produce fruit from their hot-houses, that
+would equal in all respects the season grown article.
+
+They produced very fine hot-house fruit. It was more luscious than any
+artificially ripened fruit that I had ever tasted in my own country, yet
+it by no means compared with their season grown fruit. Their preserved
+fruit I thought much more natural in flavor than their hot-house fruit.
+
+Many of their private greenhouses were on a grand scale and contained
+fruit as well as flowers. A family that could not have a hot-house for
+fresh vegetables, with a few fruit trees in it, would be poor indeed.
+Where a number of families had united in purchasing extensive grounds,
+very fine conservatories were erected, their expense being divided among
+the property holders, and their luxuries enjoyed in common.
+
+So methodical were all the business plans of the Mizora people, and so
+strictly just were they in the observance of all business and social
+duties that no ill-feeling or jealousy could arise from a combination of
+capital in private luxuries. Such combinations were formed and carried
+out upon strictly business principles.
+
+If the admirable economy with which every species of work was carried on
+in Mizora could be thoroughly comprehended, the universality of luxuries
+need not be wondered at. They were drilled in economy from a very early
+period. It was taught them as a virtue.
+
+Machinery, with them, had become the slave of invention. I lived long
+enough in Mizora to comprehend that the absence of pauperism, genteel
+and otherwise, was largely due to the ingenious application of machinery
+to all kinds of physical labor. When the cost of producing luxuries
+decreases, the value of the luxuries produced must decrease with it. The
+result is they are within reach of the narrowest incomes. A life
+surrounded by refinement must absorb some of it.
+
+I had a conversation with the Preceptress upon this subject, and she
+said:
+
+"Some natures are so undecided in character that they become only what
+their surroundings make them. Others only partially absorb tastes and
+sentiments that form the influence about them. They maintain a decided
+individuality; yet they are most always noticeably marked with the
+general character of their surroundings. It is very, very seldom that a
+nature is fixed from infancy in one channel."
+
+I told her that I knew of a people whose minds from infancy to mature
+age, never left the grooves they were born in. They belonged to every
+nationality, and had palaces built for them, and attendants with
+cultivated intelligences employed to wait upon them.
+
+"Are their minds of such vast importance to their nation? You have never
+before alluded to intellect so elevated as to command such royal
+homage." My friend spoke with awakened interest.
+
+"They are of no importance at all," I answered, humiliated at having
+alluded to them. "Some of them have not sufficient intelligence to even
+feed themselves."
+
+"And what are they?" she inquired anxiously.
+
+"They are idiots; human vegetables."
+
+"And you build palaces for them, and hire servants to feed and tend
+them, while the bright, ambitious children of the poor among you,
+struggle and suffer for mental advancement. How deplorably short-sighted
+are the wise ones of your world. Truly it were better in your country to
+be born an idiot than a poor genius." She sighed and looked grave.
+
+"What should we do with them?" I inquired.
+
+"What do you do with the useless weeds in your garden," she asked
+significantly. "Do you carefully tend them, while drouth and frost and
+lack of nourishment cause your choice plants to wither and die?"
+
+"We are far behind you," I answered humbly. "But barbarous as you think
+we are, no epithet could be too scathing, too comprehensive of all that
+was vicious and inhuman, to apply to a person who should dare to assail
+the expense of those institutions, or suggest that they be converted to
+the cultivation of intellect that _could_ be improved."
+
+My friend looked thoughtful for a long time, then she resumed her
+discourse at the point where I had so unfortunately interrupted it.
+
+"No people," she said, "can rise to universal culture as long as they
+depend upon hand labor to produce any of the necessities of life. The
+absence of a demand for hand labor gives rise to an increasing demand
+for brain labor, and the natural and inevitable result is an increased
+mental activity. The discovery of a fuel that is furnished at so small a
+cost and with really no labor but what machinery performs, marks one
+grand era in our mental progress."
+
+In mentioning the numerous uses made of glass in Mizora, I must not
+forget to give some notice to their water supply in large cities. Owing
+to their cleanly advantages, the filtering and storing of rain-water in
+glass-lined cisterns supplied many family uses. But drinking water was
+brought to their large cities in a form that did not greatly differ from
+those I was already familiar with, excepting in cleanliness. Their
+reservoirs were dug in the ground and lined with glass, and a perfectly
+fitting cover placed on the top. They were constructed so that the water
+that passed through the glass feed pipes to the city should have a
+uniform temperature, that of ordinary spring water. The water in the
+covered reservoirs was always filtered and tested before passing into
+the distributing pipes.
+
+No citizen of Mizora ever hied to the country for pure water and fresh
+air. Science supplied both in a densely populated city.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+When a question as to the existence of social distinctions would be
+asked the citizens of Mizora, the invariable answer would be--there were
+none; yet a long and intimate acquaintance with them assured me that
+there were. They had an aristocracy; but of so peculiar and amiable a
+kind that it deserves a special mention. It took a long time for me to
+comprehend the exact condition of their society in this respect. That
+there were really no dividing lines between the person who superintended
+the kitchen and the one who paid her for it, in a social point of view,
+I could plainly see; yet there were distinctions; and rather sharply
+defined ones too.
+
+In order to explain more lucidly the peculiar social life of Mizora, I
+will ask you to remember some Charity Fair you have attended, perhaps
+participated in, and which had been gotten up and managed by women of
+the highest social rank. If in a country where titles and social
+positions were hereditary, it then represented the highest aristocracy
+of blood. Grand dames there departed from the routine of their daily
+lives and assumed the lowlier occupations of others. They stood behind
+counters, in booths, and sold fancy articles, or dispensed ices and
+lemonade, or waited upon customers at the refreshment tables; bringing
+in trays of eatables, gathering up and removing empty dishes; performing
+labor that, under the ordinary circumstances of life, they would not
+perform in their own homes, and for their own kindred. It was all done
+with the same conscious dignity and ease that characterized the
+statelier duties of their every day life. One fact was apparent to all:
+they were gentlewomen still. The refinement of their home education, and
+the charm of nourished beauty were, perhaps, more prominent in contrast
+with their assumed avocation.
+
+The Charity Fair, with its clerks and waiter girls and flower sellers
+called from the highest society, was a miniature picture of the actual
+every-day social life of Mizora. The one who ordered a dinner at their
+finest hotel, had it served to her by one who occupied the same social
+standing. Yet there _was_ a difference; but it was the difference of
+mind.
+
+The student in Sociology discovers that in all grades of society,
+congenial natures gravitate to a center. A differentiation of the
+highest mental quality was the result of this law in Mizora, and its
+co-ordinate part, their aristocracy.
+
+The social organism did not need legislation to increase its benefits;
+it turned to Science, and, through Science, to Nature. The Laboratory of
+the Chemist was the focus that drew the attention of all minds. Mizora
+might be called a great school of Nature, whose pupils studied her every
+phase, and pried into her secrets with persistent activity, and obeyed
+her instructions as an imperative duty. They observed Nature to be an
+economist, and practiced economy with scrupulous exactness.
+
+They had observed that in all grades of animal life, from the lowest
+form to the highest, wherever sociality had produced unity a leader was
+evolved, a superiority that differed in power according to the grade of
+development. In the earlier histories, the leaders were chosen for their
+prowess in arms. Great warriors became rulers, and soldiers were the
+aristocracy of the land. As civilization progressed and learning became
+more widely disseminated, the military retired before the more
+intellectual aristocracy of statemanship. Politics was the grand
+entrance to social eminence.
+
+"But," said my friend, "_we_ have arrived at a higher, nobler, grander
+age. The military and political supremacies lived out their usefulness
+and decayed. A new era arrived. The differentia of mind evolved an
+aristocracy."
+
+Science has long been recognized as the greatest benefactor of our race.
+Its investigators and teachers are our only acknowledged superiors and
+leaders.
+
+Generally the grandest intellects and those which retain their creative
+power the longest, are of exceptionally slow development. Precocity is
+short lived, and brilliant rather than strong. This I knew to be true of
+my own race.
+
+In Mizora, a mind that developed late lost none of the opportunities
+that belong exclusively to the young of my own and other countries of
+the outer world. Their free schools and colleges were always open:
+always free. For this reason, it was no unusual thing for a person in
+Mizora to begin life at the very lowest grade and rise to its supreme
+height. Whenever the desire awakened, there was a helping hand extended
+on every side.
+
+The distinction between the aristocracy and the lower class, or the
+great intellects and the less, was similar to the relative positions of
+teacher and pupil. I recognized in this social condition the great media
+of their marvelous approach to perfection. This aristocracy was never
+arrogant, never supercilious, never aggressive. It was what the
+philosophers of our world are: tolerant, humane, sublime.
+
+In all communities of civilized nations marked musical talent will form
+social relations distinct from, but not superior to, other social
+relations. The leader of a musical club might also be the leader of
+another club devoted to exclusive literary pursuits; and both clubs
+possess equal social respect. Those who possess musical predilections,
+seek musical associations; those who are purely literary, seek their
+congenials. This is true of all other mental endowments or tastes; that
+which predominates will seek its affinity; be it in science, literature,
+politics, music, painting, or sculpture. Social organizations naturally
+grow out of other business pursuits and vocations of all grades and
+kinds. The society of Mizora was divided only by such distinctions. The
+scientific mind had precedence of all others. In the social world, they
+found more congenial pleasure in one another, and they mingled more
+frequently among themselves. Other professions and vocations followed
+their example for the same reason. Yet neither was barred by social
+caste from seeking society where she would. If the artisan sought social
+intercourse with a philosopher, she was expected to have prepared
+herself by mental training to be congenial. When a citizen of Mizora
+became ambitious to rise, she did not have to struggle with every
+species of opposition, and contend against rebuff and repulse. Correct
+language, refined tastes, dignified and graceful manners were the common
+acquirements of all. Mental culture of so high an order--I marveled that
+a lifetime should be long enough to acquire it in--was universal.
+
+Under such conditions social barriers could not be impregnable. In a
+world divided by poverty and opulence into all their intermediate
+grades, wealth must inevitably be pre-eminent. It represents refined and
+luxurious environments, and, if mind be there, intellectual pre-eminence
+also. Where wealth alone governs society it has its prerogatives.
+
+The wealth that affords the most luxurious entertainments must be the
+wealth that rules. Its privilege--its duty rather--is to ignore all
+applicants to fraternization that cannot return what it receives. Where
+mind is the sole aristocracy it makes demands as rigid, though
+different, and mind was the aristocracy of Mizora. With them education
+is never at an end. I spoke of having graduated at a renowned school for
+young ladies, and when I explained that to graduate meant to finish
+one's education, it elicited a peal of silvery mirth.
+
+"_We_ never graduate," said Wauna. "There is my mamma's mother, two
+centuries old, and still studying. I paid her a visit the other day and
+she took me into her laboratory. She is a manufacturer of lenses, and
+has been experimenting on microscopes. She has one now that possesses a
+truly wonderful power. The leaf of a pear tree, that she had allowed to
+become mouldy, was under the lens, and she told me to look.
+
+"A panorama of life and activity spread out before me in such magnitude
+that I can only compare it to the feeling one must possess who could be
+suspended in air and look down upon our world for a cycle of time.
+
+"Immense plains were visible with animals grazing upon them, that fought
+with and devoured one another. They perished and sank away and immense
+forests sprang up like magic. They were inhabited by insects and tiny
+creatures resembling birds. A sigh of air moved the leaf and a tiny drop
+of water, scarcely discernible to the naked eye rolled over the forests
+and plains, and before it passed to the other side of the leaf a great
+lake covered the spot. My great-great-grandmother has an acute conductor
+of sound that she has invented, so exquisite in mechanism as to reveal
+the voice of the tiniest insect. She put it to my ear, and the bellowing
+of the animals in battle, the chirp of the insects and the voices of the
+feathered mites could be clearly heard, but attenuated like the delicate
+note of two threads of spun glass clashed together."
+
+"And what good," I asked, "can all this knowledge do you? Your
+great-great-grandmother has condensed the learning of two centuries to
+evolve this one discovery. Is it not so?"
+
+"Yes," replied Wauna, and her look and tone were both solemn. "You ask
+me what good it can do? Reflect! If the history of a single leaf is so
+vast and yet ephemeral, what may not be the history of a single world?
+What, after all, are we when such an infinitesimal space can contain
+such wonderful transactions in a second of time."
+
+I shuddered at the thought she raised in my mind. But inherited beliefs
+are not easily dissipated, so I only sought to change the subject.
+
+"But what is the use of studying _all_ the time. There should be some
+period in your lives when you should be permitted to rest from your
+labors. It is truly irksome to me to see everybody still eager to learn
+more. The artist of the kitchen was up to the National College yesterday
+attending a lecture on chemistry. The artist who arranges my rooms is up
+there to-day listening to one on air. I can not understand why, having
+learned to make beds and cook to perfection, they should not be content
+with their knowledge and their work."
+
+"If you were one of us you would know," said Wauna. "It is a duty with
+us to constantly seek improvement. The culinary artist at the house
+where you are visiting, is a very fine chemist. She has a predilection
+for analyzing the construction of food. She may some day discover how
+_to_ produce vegetables from the elements.
+
+"The artist who arranges your room is attending a lecture on air because
+her vocation calls for an accurate knowledge of it. She attends to the
+atmosphere in the whole house, and sees that it is in perfect health
+sustaining condition. Your hostess has a particular fondness for flowers
+and decorates all her rooms with them. All plants are not harmless
+occupants of livingrooms. Some give forth exhalations that are really
+noxious. That artist has so accurate a knowledge of air that she can
+keep the atmosphere of your home in a condition of perfect purity; yet
+she knows that her education is not finished. She is constantly studying
+and advancing. The time may come when she, too, will add a grand
+discovery to science.
+
+"Had my ancestors thought as you do, and rested on an inferior
+education, I should not represent the advanced stage of development that
+I do. As it is, when my mind reaches the age of my mother's, it will
+have a larger comprehensiveness than hers. She already discerns it. My
+children will have intellects of a finer grade than mine. This is our
+system of mind culture. The intellect is of slower development than the
+body, and takes longer to decay. The gradations of advancement from one
+intellectual basis to another, in a social body, requires centuries to
+mark a distinct change in the earlier ages of civilization, but we have
+now arrived at a stage when advancement is clearly perceptible between
+one generation and the next."
+
+Wauna's mother added:
+
+"Universal education is the great destroyer of castes. It is the
+conqueror of poverty and the foundation of patriotism. It purifies and
+strengthens national, as well as individual character. In the earlier
+history of our race, there were social conditions that rendered many
+lives wretched, and that the law would not and, in the then state of
+civilization, could not reach. They were termed "domestic miseries," and
+disappeared only under the influence of our higher intellectual
+development. The nation that is wise will educate its children."
+
+"Alas! alas!" was my own silent thought. "When will my country rise to
+so grand an idea. When will wealth open the doors of colleges,
+academies, and schools, and make the Fountain of Knowledge as free as
+the God-given water we drink."
+
+And there rose a vision in my mind--one of those day dreams when fancy
+upon the wing takes some definite course--and I saw in my own land a
+Temple of Learning rise, grand in proportion, complete in detail, with a
+broad gateway, over whose wide-open majestic portal was the significant
+inscription: "ENTER WHO WILL: NO WARDER STANDS WATCH AT THE GATE."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+The Government of Mizora not being of primary importance in the
+estimation of the people, I have not made more than a mere mention of it
+heretofore. In this respect I have conformed to the generally expressed
+taste of the Mizora people. In my own country the government and the
+aristocracy were identical. The government offices and emoluments were
+the highest pinnacles of ambition.
+
+I mentioned the disparity of opinion between Mizora and all other
+countries I had known in regard to this. I could not understand why
+politics in Mizora should be of so small importance. The answer was,
+that among an educated and highly enlightened people, the government
+will take care of itself. Having been perfected by wise experience, the
+people allow it to glide along in the grooves that time has made for it.
+
+In form, the government of Mizora was a Federal Republic. The term of
+office in no department exceeded the limit of five years. The
+Presidential term of office was for five years.
+
+They had one peculiar--exceedingly peculiar--law in regard to politics.
+No candidate could come before the public seeking office before having a
+certificate from the State College to which she belonged, stating her
+examination and qualifications to fill such an office.
+
+Just like examining for school-teachers, I thought. And why not? Making
+laws for a State is of far more importance than making them for a few
+dozen scholars. I remembered to have heard some of my American
+acquaintances say that in their country it was not always qualifications
+that get a candidate into office. Some of the ways were devious and not
+suitable for publicity. Offices were frequently filled by incompetent
+men. There had been congressmen and other offices of higher and more
+responsible duties, filled by persons who could not correctly frame a
+sentence in their native language, who could not spell the simplest
+words as they were spelled in the dictionary, unless it were an
+accident.
+
+To seek the office of President, or any other position under the General
+Government, required an examination and certificate from the National
+College. The examinations were always public, and conducted in such a
+manner that imposture was impossible. Constituents could attend if they
+chose, and decide upon the qualifications of a favorite candidate. In
+all the public schools, politics--to a certain extent--formed part of
+the general education of every child. Beyond that, any one having a
+predilection for politics could find in the State Colleges and National
+Colleges the most liberal advantages for acquiring a knowledge of
+political economy, political arithmetic, and the science of government.
+
+Political campaigns, (if such a term could be applicable to the politics
+of Mizora) were of the mildest possible character. The papers published
+the names of the candidates and their examinations in full. The people
+read and decided upon their choice, and, when the time came, voted. And
+that was the extent of the campaign enthusiasm.
+
+I must mention that the examinations on the science of government were
+not conducted as are ordinary examinations in any given study that
+consists of questions and answers. That was the preliminary part. There
+followed a thorough, practical test of their ability to discharge the
+duties of office with wisdom. No matter which side the sympathies or
+affections might be enlisted upon, the stern decree of justice was what
+the Mizorean abided by. From earliest infancy their minds were trained
+in that doctrine. In the discharge of all public duties especially, it
+seemed to be the paramount consideration. Certainly no government
+machinery ever could move with more ease, or give greater satisfaction
+to the people, than that of Mizora.
+
+They never appeared to be excited or uneasy about the result of the
+elections. I never heard an animated political argument, such as I used
+to read about in America. I asked a politician one day what she thought
+of the probable success of the opposite party. She replied that it would
+not make any difference to the country as both candidates were perfectly
+competent to fill the office.
+
+"Do you never make disparaging statements about the opposing candidate?"
+was my inquiry.
+
+"How could we?" she asked in surprise, "when there are none to make."
+
+"You might assume a few for the time being; just to make her lose
+votes."
+
+"That would be a crime worthy of barbarians."
+
+"Do you never have any party issues?"
+
+"No. There is never anything to make an issue of. We all work for the
+good of the people, and the whole people. There is no greed of glory or
+gain; no personal ambition to gratify. Were I to use any artifice to
+secure office or popularity, I should be instantly deprived of public
+esteem and notice. I do my duty conscientiously; _that_ is the aim of
+public life. I work for the public good and my popularity comes as it is
+earned and deserved. I have no fear of being slighted or underrated.
+Every politician feels and acts the same way."
+
+"Have politicians ever bought votes with money, or offered bribes by
+promising positions that it would be in their official power to grant
+when elected?"
+
+"Never! There is not a citizen of Mizora who would not scorn an office
+obtained in such a way. The profession of politics, while not to be
+compared in importance with the sciences, is yet not devoid of dignity.
+It is not necessary to make new laws. They were perfected long ago, and
+what has been proven good we have no desire to change. We manage the
+government according to a conscientious interpretation of the law. We
+have repealed laws that were in force when our Republic was young, and
+dropped them from the statute books. They were laws unworthy of our
+civilization. We have laws for the protection of property and to
+regulate public morals, and while our civilization is in a state of
+advancement that does not require them, yet we think it wisdom to let
+them remain. The people know that we have such laws and live up to them
+without surveillance. They would abide by the principles of justice set
+forth in them just as scrupulously if we should repeal them.
+
+"You spoke of bribes. In remote ages, when our country was emerging from
+a state of semi-barbarism, such things were in common practice.
+Political chicanery was a name given to various underhand and dishonest
+maneuvers to gain office and public power. It was frequently the case
+that the most responsible positions in the Government would be occupied
+by the basest characters, who used their power only for fraud to enrich
+themselves and their friends by robbing the people. They deceived the
+masses by preaching purity. They were never punished. If they were
+accused and brought to trial, the wealth they had stolen from the
+government purchased their acquittal, and then they posed as martyrs.
+The form of government was then, as now, a Federal Republic, but the
+people had very little to do with it. They were merely the tools of
+unscrupulous politicians. In those days a sensitively honest person
+would not accept office, because the name politician was a synonym for
+flexible principles. It was derogatory to one's character to seek
+office."
+
+"Was dishonesty more prominent in one party than another?" I asked,
+thinking how very Americanish this history sounded.
+
+"We, who look back upon the conditions of those times and view it with
+dispassionate judgment, can perceive corruption in both political
+parties. The real welfare of the country was the last thing considered
+by a professional politician. There was always something that was to
+benefit the people brought forward as a party issue, and used as a means
+of working up the enthusiasm or fears of the people, and usually dropped
+after the election.
+
+"The candidate for election in those days might be guilty of heinous
+crimes, yet the party covered them all, and over that covering the
+partisan newspaper spread every virtue in the calendar. A stranger to
+the country and its customs reading one of their partisan newspapers
+during a political campaign, might conclude that the party _it_
+advocated was composed of only the virtues of the country, and their
+leader an epitome of the supremest excellence.
+
+"Reading in the same paper a description of the opposing party, the
+stranger might think it composed of only the degraded and disreputable
+portion of the nation, and its leader the scum of all its depravity. If
+curiosity should induce a perusal of some partisan paper of the other
+party, the same thing could be read in its columns, with a change of
+names. It would be the opposite party that was getting represented in
+the most despicable character, and _their_ leader was the only one who
+possessed enough honesty and talent to keep the country from going to
+wreck. The other party leader was the one who was guilty of all the
+crimes in the calendar. A vast number of people were ignorant enough to
+cling blindly to one party and to believe every word published by its
+partisan papers. This superstitious party faith was what the
+unscrupulous politicians handled dexterously for their own selfish ends.
+It was not until education became universal, and a higher culture was
+forced upon the majority--the working classes--that politics began to
+purify itself, and put on the dignity of real virtue, and receive the
+respect that belongs to genuine justice.
+
+"The people became disgusted with defamatory political literature, and
+the honorable members of both parties abjured it altogether. In such a
+government as this, two great parties could not exist, where one was
+altogether bad and the other altogether good. It became apparent to the
+people that there was good in both parties, and they began to elect it
+irrespective of party prejudice. Politicians began to work for their
+country instead of themselves and their party, and politics took the
+noble position that the rights of humanity designed it for. I have been
+giving you quite a history of our ancient politics. Our present
+condition is far different. As the people became enlightened to a higher
+degree, the government became more compact. It might now be compared to
+a large family. There are one hundred States in the Union. There was a
+time when every State made its own laws for its own domestic government.
+One code of laws is now enforced in every State. In going from one State
+to another citizens now suffer no inconvenience from a confusion of
+laws. Every State owes allegiance to the General Government. No State or
+number of States could set up an independent government without
+obtaining the consent and legal dissolution from the General Government.
+But such a thing will never be thought of. We have prospered as a great
+united Nation. Our union has been our strength, our prosperity."
+
+I visited with Wauna a number of the States' Capitals. In architecture
+the Mizora people display an excellent taste. Their public buildings
+might all be called works of art. Their government buildings,
+especially, were on a scale of magnificent splendor. The hollow square
+seemed to be a favorite form. One very beautiful capitol building was of
+crystal glass, with facing and cornices of marble onyx. It looked more
+like a gigantic gem than anything I could compare it to, especially when
+lighted up by great globes of white fire suspended from every ceiling.
+
+Upon my entrance into Mizora, I was led into the belief that I had
+arrived at a female seminary, because the dining and sleeping
+accommodations for the stateswoman were all in the Capitol building. I
+observed that the State Capitols were similarly accommodated. In Mizora
+the home is the heart of all joy, and wherever a Mizora woman goes, she
+endeavors to surround herself with its comforts and pleasures. That was
+the reason that the splendid Capitol building had its home-like
+appointments, was a Nation of women exclusively--at least as far as I
+had as yet been able to discover.
+
+Another reason for the homes of all officials of the Government being
+within the public buildings, was because all the personal expenses,
+excepting clothing, were paid by the Government. The salaries of
+Government positions were not large, compared with those of the
+sciences; but as their social and political dues were paid out of the
+public treasury, the salaries might be considered as net profit. This
+custom had originated many centuries in the past. In those early days,
+when a penurious character became an incumbent of public office, the
+social obligations belonging to it were often but niggardly requited.
+Sometimes business embarrassments and real necessity demanded economy;
+so, at last, the Government assumed all the expenses contingent upon
+every office, from the highest to the lowest. By this means the occupant
+of a Government office was freed from every care but those of state.
+
+The number and style of all social entertainments that were obligatory
+of the occupant of a public office, were regulated by law. As the people
+of Mizora believed in enjoyment, the entertainments provided by the
+Government as the necessary social dues of its officers, were not few,
+nor scantily furnished.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+The artificial light in Mizora puzzled me longest to understand. When I
+first noticed it, it appeared to me to have no apparent source. At the
+touch of a delicate hand, it blazed forth like a star in the center of
+the ceiling. It diffused a soft and pleasing brilliancy that lent a
+charm to everything it revealed. It was a dreamy daylight, and was
+produced by electricity.
+
+In large halls, like a theatre or opera house, the light fell in a soft
+and penetrating radiance from the center of the dome. Its source was not
+visible to either audience or actresses, and, in consequence, occasioned
+no discomfort to the eyes. The light that illuminated the stage was
+similarly arranged. The footlights were not visible. They were in the
+rear of the stage. The light came upward like the rays of the setting
+sun, revealing the setting of the stage with vivid distinctness. I can
+best describe the effect of this singular arrangement by calling
+attention to the appearance of the sun when declining behind a small
+elevation. How sharply every object is outlined before it? How soft and
+delicate is the light in which everything is bathed? Every cloud that
+floats has all of its fleecy loveliness limned with a radiant clearness.
+
+I was very desirous to know how this singular effect was produced, and
+at my request was taken to the stage. An opening in the back part of it
+was covered with pink colored glass. Powerful electric lights from below
+the stage were reflected through this glass upon it. The glass was
+highly refractive and so perfectly translucent, I at first thought there
+was none there, and when I stood upon its edge, and looked down into a
+fiery gulf below, I instinctively thought of the "Lost People," who are
+said to wander amid torturing yet unconsumable flames. But, happily, the
+ones I gazed upon were harmless ones.
+
+The street lights of Mizora were at a considerable elevation from the
+ground. They were in, or over, the center of the street, and of such
+diffuse brilliancy as to render the city almost as light as day. They
+were in the form of immense globes of soft, white fire, and during the
+six months that answered to the Mizora night, were kept constantly
+burning. It was during this period that the Aurora Borealis shone with
+such marvelous brilliancy.
+
+Generally, its display was heralded by an arc of delicate green-tinted
+light, that spanned the heavens. The green tint deepened into emerald,
+assuming a delicate rose hue as it faded upward into rays that diverged
+from the top until the whole resembled a gigantic crown. Every ray
+became a panorama of gorgeous colors, resembling tiny sparks, moving
+hither and thither with inconceivable swiftness. Sometimes a veil of
+mist of delicate green hue depended from the base of the crown, and
+swayed gently back and forth. As soon as the swaying motion commenced,
+the most gorgeous colors were revealed. Myriads of sparks, no larger
+than snow-flakes, swarmed across the delicate green curtain in every
+conceivable color and shade, but always of that vapory, vivid softness
+that is indescribable. The dancing colors resembled gems encased in a
+film of mist.
+
+One display that I witnessed I shall attempt to describe. The arc of
+delicate green appeared first, and shot upward diverging rays of all the
+warm, rich hues of red. They formed a vast crown, outlined with a
+delicate halo of fire. A veil of misty green fluttered down from its
+base, and, instantly, tiny crowns, composed of every brilliant color,
+with a tracery of fire defining every separate one, began to chase one
+another back and forth with bewildering rapidity. As the veil swayed to
+and fro, it seemed to shake the crowns into skeins of fire, each thread
+strung with countless minute globes of every conceivable color and hue.
+Those fiery threads, aerial as thistle down, wove themselves in and out
+in a tangled mass of gorgeous beauty. Suddenly the beads of color fell
+in a shower of gems, topaz and emerald, ruby and sapphire, amethyst and
+pearly crystals of dew. I looked upward, where the rays of variegated
+colors were sweeping the zenith, and high above the first crown was a
+second more vivid still. Myriads of rainbows, the colors broad and
+intense, fluttered from its base, the whole outlined by a halo of fire.
+It rolled together in a huge scroll, and, in an instant, fell apart a
+shower of flakes, minute as snow, but of all the gorgeous, dazzling hues
+of earth and sky combined. They disappeared in the mystery of space to
+instantly form into a fluttering, waving banner of delicate green mist
+and--vanish; only to repeat itself.
+
+The display of the Aurora Borealis was always an exhibition of
+astonishing rapidity of motion of intense colors. The most glorious
+sunset--where the vapory billows of the sky have caught the bloom of the
+dying Autumn--cannot rival it. All the precious gems of earth appear to
+have dissolved into mist, to join in a wild and aerial dance. The people
+of Mizora attributed it entirely to electricity.
+
+Although the sun never rose or set in Mizora, yet for six months in a
+year, that country had the heart of a voluptuous summer. It beat with a
+strong, warm pulse of life through all nature. The orchards budded and
+bloomed, and mellowed into perfect fruition their luscious globes. The
+fields laughed in the warm, rich light, and smiled on the harvest. I
+could feel my own blood bound as with a new lease of life at the first
+breath of spring.
+
+The winters of Mizora had clouds and rain and sleet and snow, and
+sometimes, especially near the circular sea, the fury of an Arctic snow
+storm; but so well prepared were they that it became an amusement.
+Looking into the chaos of snow flakes, driven hither and thither by
+fierce winds, the pedestrians in the street presented no painful
+contrast to the luxury of your own room, with its balmy breath and
+cheerful flowers. You saw none but what were thoroughly clad, and you
+knew that they were hurrying to homes that were bright and attractive,
+if not as elegant as yours; where loving welcomes were sure to greet
+them and happiness would sit with them at the feast; for the heart that
+is pure has always a kingly guest for its company.
+
+A wonderful discovery that the people of Mizora had made was the power
+to annihilate space as an impediment to conversation. They claimed that
+the atmosphere had regular currents of electricity that were accurately
+known to them. They talked to them by means of simply constructed
+instruments, and the voice would be as audible and as easily recognized
+at three thousand miles distant as at only three feet. Stations were
+built similar to our telegraph offices, but on high elevations. I
+understood that they could not be used upon the surface. Every private
+and public house, however, had communication with the general office,
+and could converse with friends at a distance whenever desirable. Public
+speakers made constant use of it, but in connection with another
+extraordinary apparatus which I regret my inability to perfectly
+describe.
+
+I saw it first from the dress circle of a theater. It occupied the whole
+rear of the stage, and from where I sat, looked like a solid wall of
+polished metal. But it had a wonderful function, for immediately in
+front of it, moving, speaking and gesturing, was the figure of a popular
+public lecturer, so life-like in appearance that I could scarcely be
+convinced that it was only a reflection. Yet such it was, and the
+original was addressing an audience in person more than a thousand miles
+distant.
+
+It was no common thing for a lecturer to address a dozen or more
+audiences at the same time, scattered over an area of thousands of
+miles, and every one listening to and observing what appeared to be the
+real speaker. In fact, public speakers in Mizora never traveled on pure
+professional business. It was not necessary. They prepared a room in
+their own dwelling with the needful apparatus, and at the time specified
+delivered a lecture in twenty different cities.
+
+I was so interested in this very remarkable invention that I made
+vigorous mental exertions to comprehend it sufficiently to explain its
+mechanism and philosophical principles intelligently; but I can only say
+that it was one of the wonders those people produced with electricity.
+The mechanism was simple, but the science of its construction and
+workings I could not comprehend. The grasp of my mind was not broad
+enough. The instrument that transmitted the voice was entirely separate.
+
+I must not neglect to mention that all kinds of public entertainments,
+such as operas, concerts and dramas, could be and were repeated to
+audiences at a distance from where the real transaction was taking
+place. I attended a number of operas that were only the reflex of others
+that were being presented to audiences far distant.
+
+These repetitions were always marvels of accuracy of vividness.
+
+Small reflecting apparatus were to be found in every dwelling and
+business house. It is hardly necessary to state that letter-writing was
+an unknown accomplishment in Mizora. The person who desired to converse
+with another, no matter how far distant, placed herself in communication
+with her two instruments and signaled. Her friend appeared upon the
+polished metal surface like the figure in a mirror, and spoke to her
+audibly, and looked at her with all the naturalness of reality.
+
+I have frequently witnessed such interviews between Wauna and her
+mother, when we were visiting distant cities. It was certainly a more
+satisfactory way of communicating than by letter. The small apparatus
+used by private families and business houses were not like those used in
+public halls and theaters. In the former, the reflection was exactly
+similar to the image of a mirror; in the latter, the figure was
+projected upon the stage. It required more complicated machinery to
+produce, and was not practicable for small families or business houses.
+I now learned that on my arrival in Mizora I had been taken to one of
+the largest apparatus and put in communication with it. I was informed
+by Wauna that I had been exhibited to every college and school in the
+country by reflex representation. She said that she and her mother had
+seen me distinctly and heard my voice. The latter had been so
+uncongenial in accent and tone that she had hesitated about becoming my
+instructor on that account. It was my evident appreciation of my
+deficiencies as compared to them that had enlisted her sympathy.
+
+Now, in my own country, my voice had attracted attention by its
+smoothness and modulation, and I was greatly surprised to hear Wauna
+speak of its unmusical tone as really annoying. But then in Mizora there
+are no voices but what are sweet enough to charm the birds.
+
+In the journeys that Wauna and I took during the college vacation, we
+were constantly meeting strangers, but they never appeared the least
+surprised at my dark hair and eyes, which were such a contrast to all
+the other hair and eyes to be met with in Mizora, that I greatly
+wondered at it until I learned of the power of the reflector. I
+requested permission to examine one of the large ones used in a theater,
+and it was granted me. Wauna accompanied me and signaled to a friend of
+hers. As if by magic a form appeared and moved across the stage. It
+bowed to me, smiled and motioned with its hand, to all appearances a
+material body. I asked Wauna to approach it, which she did, and passed
+her hand through it. There was nothing that resisted her touch, yet I
+plainly saw the figure, and recognized it as the perfect representation
+of a friend of Wauna's, an actress residing in a distant city. When I
+ascended the stage, the figure vanished, and I understood that it could
+be visible only at a certain distance from the reflector.
+
+In traveling great distances, or even short ones where great speed was
+desired, the Mizoraens used air ships; but only for the transportation
+of passengers and the very lightest of freight. Heavy articles could not
+be as conveniently carried by them as by railroads. Their railroads were
+constructed and conducted on a system so perfect that accidents were
+never known. Every engineer had an electric signal attached to the
+engine, that could signal a train three miles distant.
+
+The motive power for nearly all engines was compressed air. Electricity,
+which was recognized by Mizora scientists as a force of great
+intensity, was rarely used as a propelling power on railroads. Its use
+was attended by possible danger, but compressed air was not. Electricity
+produced the heat that supplied the air ships and railroads with that
+very necessary comfort. In case there should be an accident, as a
+collision, or thrown from the track, heat could not be a source of
+danger when furnished by electricity. But I never heard of a railroad
+accident during the whole fifteen years that I spent in Mizora.
+
+Air-ships, however, were not exempt from danger, although the
+precautions against it were ingenious and carefully observed. The Mizora
+people could tell the approach of a storm, and the exact time it would
+arrive. They had signal stations established for the purpose, all over
+the country.
+
+But, though they were skilled mechanics, and far in advance of my own
+world, and the limits of my comprehension in their scientific
+discoveries and appliances, they had not yet discovered the means of
+subduing the elements, or driving unharmed through their fury. When
+nature became convulsed with passion, they guarded themselves against
+it, but did not endeavor to thwart it.
+
+Their air-ships were covered, and furnished with luxurious seats. The
+whole upper part of the car was composed of very thin glass. They
+traveled with, to me, astonishing rapidity. Towns and cities flew away
+beneath us like birds upon the wing. I grew frightened and apprehensive,
+but Wauna chatted away with her friends with the most charming
+unconcern.
+
+I was looking down, when I perceived, by the increasing size of objects
+below, that we were descending. The conductor entered almost
+immediately, and announced that we were going down to escape an
+approaching storm. A signal had been received and the ship was at once
+lowered.
+
+I felt intensely relieved to step again on solid earth, and hoped I
+might escape another trial of the upper regions. But after waiting until
+the storm was over we again entered the ship. I was ashamed to refuse
+when everyone else showed no fear.
+
+In waiting for the storm to pass we were delayed so long that our
+journey could have been performed almost as speedily by rail. I wondered
+why they had not invented some means by which they could drive through a
+tempest in perfect safety. As usual, I addressed my inquiries to Wauna.
+She answered:
+
+"So frail a thing as an air-ship must necessarily be, when compared with
+the strength of a storm, is like a leaf in the wind. We have not yet
+discovered, and we have but little expectation of discovering, any means
+by which we can defy the storms that rage in the upper deeps.
+
+"The electricity that we use for heat is also a source of danger during
+a storm. Our policy is to evade a peril we cannot control or destroy.
+Hence, when we receive a signal that a storm is approaching we get out
+of its way. Our railroad carriages, having no danger to fear from them,
+ride right through the storm."
+
+The people of Mizora, I perceived, possessed a remarkable acuteness of
+vision. They could see the odor emanating from flowers and fruit. They
+described it to me as resembling attenuated mist. They also named other
+colors in the solar spectrum than those known to me. When I first heard
+them speak of them, I thought it a freak of the imagination; but I
+afterward noticed artists, and persons who had a special taste for
+colors, always detected them with greater readiness. The presence of
+these new colors were apparent to all with whom I spoke upon the
+subject. When I mentioned my own inability to discern them, Wauna said
+that it was owning to my inferior mental development.
+
+"A child," she said, "if you will observe, is first attracted by red,
+the most glaring color known. The untutored mind will invariably select
+the gaudiest colors for personal adornment. It is the gentle, refined
+taste of civilization that chooses the softened hues and colors."
+
+"But you, as a nation, are remarkable for rich warm colors in your
+houses and often in your dress," I said.
+
+"But they are never glaring," she replied. "If you will notice, the most
+intense colors are always so arranged as to present a halo, instead of
+sharply defined brilliancy. If a gorgeous color is worn as a dress, it
+will be covered with filmy lace. You have spoken of the splendor of the
+Aurora Borealis. It is nature's most gorgeous robe, and intense as the
+primal colors are, they are never glaring. They glow in a film of vapor.
+We have made them our study. Art, with us, has never attempted to
+supercede nature."
+
+The sense of smell was also exceedingly sensitive with the Mizora
+people. They detected odors so refined that I was not aware of them. I
+have often seen a chemist take a bottle of perfumery and name its
+ingredients from the sense of smell only. No one appeared surprised at
+the bluntness of my senses. When I spoke of this Wauna tried to explain
+it.
+
+"We are a more delicately organized race of beings than you are. Our
+intellects, and even sense that we possess, is of a higher and finer
+development. We have some senses that you do not possess, and are unable
+to comprehend their exquisite delicacy. One of them I shall endeavor to
+explain to you by describing it as impression. We possess it in a highly
+refined state, both mentally and physically. Our sensitiveness to
+changes of temperature, I have noticed, is more marked than yours. It is
+acute with all of my people. For this reason, although we are free from
+disease, our bodies could not sustain, as readily as yours could, a
+sudden and severe shock to their normal temperature, such as a marked
+change in the atmosphere would occasion. We are, therefore, extremely
+careful to be always appropriately clothed. That is a physical
+impression. It is possessed by you also, but more obtusely.
+
+"Our sensitiveness to mental pleasure and pain you would pronounce
+morbid on account of its intensity. The happiness we enjoy in the
+society of those who are congenial, or near and dear to us through
+family ties, is inconceivable to you. The touch of my mother's hand
+carries a thrill of rapture with it.
+
+"We feel, intuitively, the happiness or disappointment of those we are
+with. Our own hopes impress us with their fulfillment or frustration,
+before we know what will actually occur. This feeling is entirely
+mental, but it is evidence of a highly refined mentality. We could not
+be happy unless surrounded, as we are, by cultivated and elegant
+pleasures. They are real necessities to us.
+
+"Our appreciation of music, I notice, has a more exquisite delicacy than
+yours. You desire music, but it is the simpler operas that delight you
+most. Those fine and delicate harmonies that we so intensely enjoy, you
+appear incapable of appreciating."
+
+I have previously spoken of their elegance in dress, and their fondness
+for luxury and magnificence. On occasions of great ceremony their
+dresses were furnished with very long trains. The only prominent
+difference that I saw in their state dresses, and the rare and costly
+ones I had seen in my own and other countries, was in the waist. As the
+women of Mizora admired a large waist, their dresses were generally
+loose and flowing. Ingenuity, however, had fashioned them into graceful
+and becoming outlines. On occasions of great state and publicity,
+comfortably fitting girdles confined the dress at the waist.
+
+I attended the Inaugural of a Professor of Natural History in the
+National College. The one who had succeeded to this honor was widely
+celebrated for her erudition. It was known that the ceremony would be a
+grand affair, and thousands attended it.
+
+I there witnessed another of these marvelous achievements in science
+that were constantly surprising me in Mizora. The inauguration took
+place in a large hall, the largest I had ever seen. It would accommodate
+two hundred thousand people, and was filled to repletion. I was seated
+far back in the audience, and being a little short-sighted anyway, I
+expected to be disappointed both in seeing and hearing the ceremonies.
+What was my astonishment then, when they began, to discover that I could
+see distinctly every object upon the stage, and hear with perfect
+accuracy every word that was uttered.
+
+Upon expressing myself to Wauna as being greatly pleased that my
+eyesight and hearing had improved so wonderfully and unexpectedly, she
+laughed merrily, and asked me if I had noticed a curious looking band of
+polished steel that curved outward from the proscenium, and encircled
+its entire front? I had noticed it, but supposed it to be connected with
+some different arrangement they might have made concerning the
+footlights. Wauna informed me that I owed my improved hearing to that.
+
+"But my eyesight," I asked, "how do you account for its unusual
+penetrativeness?"
+
+"Have you ever noticed some seasons of the year display a noticeably
+marked transparency of the atmosphere that revealed objects at great
+distances with unusual clearness? Well, we possess a knowledge of air
+that enables us to qualify it with that peculiar magnifying condition.
+On occasions like this we make use of it. This hall was built after the
+discovery, and was specially prepared for its use. It is seldom employed
+in smaller halls."
+
+Just then a little flutter of interest upon the stage attracted my
+attention, and I saw the candidate for the professorship entering,
+accompanied by the Faculty of the National College.
+
+She wore a sea-green velvet robe with a voluminous train. The bottom of
+the dress was adorned with a wreath or band of water lilies, embroidered
+in seed pearls. A white lace overdress of filmiest texture fell over the
+velvet, almost touching the wreath of lilies, and looked as though it
+was made of sea foam. A girdle of large pink pearls confined the robe at
+the waist. Natural flowers were on her bosom and in her hair.
+
+The stage was superbly decorated with flowers and shells. A large chair,
+constructed of beautiful shells and cushioned with green velvet, rested
+upon a dais of coral. It was the chair of honor. Behind it was a curtain
+of sea-moss. I afterward learned that the moss was attached to a film of
+glass too delicate to detect without handling.
+
+In the midst of these charming surroundings stood the applicant for
+honor. Her deep blue eyes glowed with the joy of triumph. On the
+delicate cheek and lip burned the carmine hue of perfect health. The
+golden hair even seemed to have caught a brighter lustre in its coiled
+masses. The uplifted hand and arm no marble goddess could have matched,
+for this had the color and charm of life. As she stood revealed by the
+strong light that fell around her, every feature ennobled with the glory
+of intellect, she appeared to me a creature of unearthly loveliness, as
+something divine.
+
+I spoke to Wauna of the rare beauty and elegance of her dress.
+
+"She looks like a fabled Naiad just risen from the deep," was my
+criticism on her.
+
+"Her dress," answered Wauna, "is intended to be emblematical of Nature.
+The sea-green robe, the water lilies of pearls, the foamy lace are all
+from Nature's Cradle of Life."
+
+"How poetical!" I exclaimed.
+
+But then Mizora is full of that charming skill that blends into perfect
+harmony the beautiful and useful in life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+On my return to college, after the close of vacation, I devoted myself
+exclusively to history. It began with their first President; and from
+the evidence of history itself, I knew that the Nation was enjoying a
+high state of culture when its history began.
+
+No record of a more primitive race was to be found in all the Library,
+assiduously as I searched for it. I read with absorbing interest their
+progress toward perfect enlightenment, their laborious searchings into
+science that had resulted in such marvelous achievements. But earnestly
+as I sought for it, and anxiously as I longed for it, I found and heard
+no mention of a race of men. From the most intimate intercourse with the
+people of Mizora, I could discover no attempt at concealment in
+anything, yet the inquiry _would_ crowd itself upon me. "Where are the
+men?" And as constantly would I be forced to the conclusion that Mizora
+was either a land of mystery beyond the scope of the wildest and
+weirdest fancy, or else they were utterly oblivious of such a race. And
+the last conclusion was most improbable of all.
+
+Man, in my country, was a necessity of government, law, and protection.
+His importance, (as I viewed it from inherited ideas) was incalculable.
+It _could_ not be possible that he had no existence in a country so
+eminently adapted to his desires and ability.
+
+The expression, "domestic misery," that the Preceptress made use of one
+day in conversation with me, haunted my imagination with a persistent
+suspicion of mystery. It had a familiar sound to me. It intimated
+knowledge of a world _I_ knew so well; where ill-nature, malice, spite,
+envy, deceit, falsehood and dishonesty, made life a continual anxiety.
+
+Locks, bolts and bars shut out the thief who coveted your jewels; but no
+bolts nor bars, however ingeniously constructed or strongly made, could
+keep out the thief who coveted your character. One little word from a
+pretended friend might consummate the sorrow of your whole life, and be
+witnessed by the perpetrator without a pang--nay, even with exultation.
+
+There were other miseries I thought of that were common in my country.
+There were those we love. Some who are woven into our lives and
+affections by the kinship of blood; who grow up weak and vacillating,
+and are won away, sometimes through vice, to estrangement. Our hearts
+ache not the less painfully that they have ceased to be worthy of a
+throb; or that they have been weak enough to become estranged, to
+benefit some selfish alien.
+
+There were other sorrows in that world that I had come from, that
+brought anguish alike to the innocent and the guilty. It was the sorrow
+of premature death. Diseases of all kinds made lives wretched; or tore
+them asunder with death. How many hearts have ached with cankering pain
+to see those who are vitally dear, wasting away slowly, but surely, with
+unrelievable suffering; and to know that life but prolongs their misery,
+and death relieves it only with inconsolable grief for the living.
+
+Who has looked into a pair of youthful eyes, so lovely that imagination
+could not invent for them another charm, and saw the misty film of death
+gather over them, while your heart ached with regret as bitter as it was
+unavailing. The soft snows of winter have fallen--a veil of purity--over
+the new made graves of innocence and youth, and its wild winds have been
+the saddest requiem. The dews of summer have wept with your tears, and
+its zephyrs have sighed over the mouldering loveliness of youth.
+
+I had known no skill in my world that could snatch from death its
+unlawful prey of youth. But here, in this land so eminently blessed, no
+one regarded death as a dreaded invader of their household.
+
+"_We cannot die until we get old_," said Wauna, naively.
+
+And looking upon their bounding animal spirits, their strong supple
+frames, and the rich, red blood of perfect health, mantling their cheeks
+with its unsurpassable bloom, one would think that disease must have
+strong grasp indeed that could destroy them.
+
+But these were not all the sorrows that my own country knew. Crimes,
+with which we had no personal connection, shocked us with their horrible
+details. They crept, like noxious vapors, into the moral atmosphere of
+the pure and good; tainting the weak, and annoying the strong.
+
+There were other sorrows in my country that were more deplorable still.
+It was the fate of those who sought to relieve the sufferings of the
+many by an enforced government reform. Misguided, imprudent and
+fanatical they might be, but their aim at least was noble. The wrongs
+and sufferings of the helpless and oppressed had goaded them to action
+for their relief.
+
+But, alas! The pale and haggard faces of thousands of those patriot
+souls faded and wasted in torturing slowness in dungeons of rayless
+gloom. Or their emaciated and rheumatic frames toiled in speechless
+agony amid the horrors of Siberia's mines.
+
+In _this_ land they would have been recognized as aspiring natures,
+spreading their wings for a nobler flight, seeking a higher and grander
+life. The smile of beauty would have urged them on. Hands innumerable
+would have given them a cordial and encouraging grasp. But in the land
+they had sought to benefit and failed, they suffered in silence and
+darkness, and died forgotten or cursed.
+
+My heart and my brain ached with memory, and the thought again occurred:
+"_Could_ the Preceptress ever have known such a race of people?"
+
+I looked at her fair, calm brow, where not a wrinkle marred the serene
+expression of intellect, although I had been told that more than a
+hundred years had touched with increasing wisdom its broad surface. The
+smile that dwelt in her eyes, like the mystic sprite in the fountain,
+had not a suspicion of sadness in them. A nature so lofty as hers, where
+every feeling had a generous and noble existence and aim, could not have
+known without anguish the race of people _I_ knew so well. Their sorrows
+would have tinged her life with a continual sadness.
+
+The words of Wauna had awakened a new thought. I knew that their mental
+life was far above mine, and that in all the relations of life, both
+business and social, they exhibited a refinement never attained by my
+people. I had supposed these qualities to be an endowment of nature, and
+not a development sought and labored for by themselves. But my
+conversation with Wauna had given me a different impression, and the
+thought of a future for my own country took possession of me.
+
+"Could it ever emerge from its horrors, and rise through gradual but
+earnest endeavor to such perfection? Could a higher civilization crowd
+its sufferings out of existence and, in time, memory?"
+
+I had never thought of my country having a claim upon me other than what
+I owed to my relatives and society. But in Mizora, where the very
+atmosphere seemed to feed one's brain with grander and nobler ideas of
+life and humanity, my nature had drank the inspiration of good deeds and
+impulses, and had given the desire to work for something beside myself
+and my own kindred. I resolved that if I should ever again behold my
+native country, I would seek the good of all its people along with that
+of my nearest and dearest of kin. But how to do it was a matter I could
+not arrange. I felt reluctant to ask either Wauna or her mother. The
+guileless frankness of Wauna's nature was an impassable barrier to the
+confidence of crimes and wretchedness. One glance of horror from her
+dark, sweet eyes, would have chilled me into painful silence and
+sorrowful regret.
+
+The mystery that had ever surrounded these lovely and noble blonde women
+had driven me into an unnatural reserve in regard to my own people and
+country. I had always perceived the utter absence of my allusion to the
+masculine gender, and conceiving that it must be occasioned by some more
+than ordinary circumstances, I refrained from intruding my curiosity.
+
+That the singular absence of men was connected with nothing criminal or
+ignoble on their part I felt certain; but that it was associated with
+something weird and mysterious I had now become convinced. My efforts to
+discover their whereabouts had been earnest and untiring. I had visited
+a number of their large cities, and had enjoyed the hospitality of many
+private homes. I had examined every nook and corner of private and
+public buildings, (for in Mizora nothing ever has locks) and in no place
+had I ever discovered a trace or suggestion of man.
+
+Women and girls were everywhere. Their fair faces and golden heads
+greeted me in every town and city. Sometimes a pair of unusually dark
+blue eyes, like the color of a velvet-leaved pansy, looked out from an
+exquisitely tinted face framed in flossy golden hair, startling me with
+its unnatural loveliness, and then I would wonder anew:
+
+"Why is such a paradise for man so entirely devoid of him?"
+
+I even endeavored to discover from the conversation of young girls some
+allusion to the male sex. But listen as attentively and discreetly as I
+could, not one allusion did I hear made to the mysteriously absent
+beings. I was astonished that young girls, with cheeks like the downy
+bloom of a ripe peach, should chatter and laugh merrily over every
+conversational topic but that of the lords of society. The older and the
+wiser among women might acquire a depreciating idea of their worth, but
+innocent and inexperienced girlhood was apt to surround that name with a
+halo of romance and fancied nobility that the reality did not always
+possess. What, then, was my amazement to find _them_ indifferent and
+wholly neglectful of that (to me) very important class of beings.
+
+Conjecture at last exhausted itself, and curiosity became indifferent.
+Mizora, as a nation, or an individual representative, was incapable of
+dishonor. Whatever their secret I should make no farther effort to
+discover it. Their hospitality had been generous and unreserved. Their
+influence upon my character--morally--had been an incalculable benefit.
+I had enjoyed being among them. The rhythm of happiness that swept like
+a strain of sweet music through all their daily life, touched a chord in
+my own nature that responded.
+
+And when I contrasted the prosperity of Mizora--a prosperity that
+reached every citizen in its vast territory--with the varied phases of
+life that are found in my own land, it urged me to inquire if there
+could be hope for such happiness within its borders.
+
+To the Preceptress, whose sympathies I knew were broad as the lap of
+nature, I at last went with my desire and perplexities. A sketch of my
+country's condition was the inevitable prelude. I gave it without once
+alluding to the presence of Man. She listened quietly and attentively.
+Her own land lay like a charming picture before her. I spoke of its
+peaceful happiness, its perfected refinement, its universal wealth, and
+paramount to all its other blessings, its complete ignorance of social
+ills. With them, love did not confine itself to families, but encircled
+the Nation in one embrace. How dismal, in contrast, was the land that
+had given me birth.
+
+"But one eminent distinction exists among us as a people," I added in
+conclusion. "We are not all of one race."
+
+I paused and looked at the Preceptress. She appeared lost in reverie.
+Her expression was one of solicitude and approached nearer to actual
+pain than anything I had ever noticed upon it before. She looked up and
+caught my eye regarding her. Then she quietly asked:
+
+"_Are there men in your country?_"
+
+
+
+
+PART SECOND.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+I answered in the affirmative, and further added that I had a husband
+and a son.
+
+The effect of a confession so simple, and so natural, wounded and amazed
+me.
+
+The Preceptress started back with a look of loathing and abhorrence; but
+it was almost instantly succeeded by one of compassion.
+
+"You have much to learn," she said gently, "and I desire not to judge
+you harshly. _You_ are the product of a people far back in the darkness
+of civilization. _We_ are a people who have passed beyond the boundary
+of what was once called Natural Law. But, more correctly, we have become
+mistresses of Nature's peculiar processes. We influence or control them
+at will. But before giving you any further explanation I will show you
+the gallery containing the portraits of our very ancient ancestors."
+
+She then conducted me into a remote part of the National College, and
+sliding back a panel containing a magnificent painting, she disclosed a
+long gallery, the existence of which I had never suspected, although I
+knew their custom of using ornamented sliding panels instead of doors.
+Into this I followed her with wonder and increasing surprise. Paintings
+on canvas, old and dim with age; paintings on porcelain, and a peculiar
+transparent material, of which I have previously spoken, hung so thick
+upon the wall you could not have placed a hand between them. They were
+all portraits of men. Some were represented in the ancient or mediaeval
+costumes of my own ancestry, and some in garbs resembling our modern
+styles.
+
+Some had noble countenances, and some bore on their painted visages the
+unmistakable stamp of passion and vice. It is not complimentary to
+myself to confess it, but I began to feel an odd kind of companionship
+in this assembly of good and evil looking men, such as I had not felt
+since entering this land of pre-eminently noble and lovely women.
+
+As I gazed upon them, arrayed in the armor of some stern warrior, or the
+velvet doublet of some gay cavalier, the dark eyes of a debonair knight
+looked down upon me with familiar fellowship. There was pride of birth,
+and the passion of conquest in every line of his haughty, sensuous face.
+I seemed to breathe the same moral atmosphere that had surrounded me in
+the outer world.
+
+_They_ had lived among noble and ignoble deeds I felt sure. _They_ had
+been swayed by conflicting desires. _They_ had known temptation and
+resistance, and reluctant compliance. _They_ had experienced the
+treachery and ingratitude of humanity, and had dealt in it themselves.
+_They_ had known joy as I had known it, and their sorrow had been as my
+sorrows. _They_ had loved as I had loved, and sinned as I had sinned,
+and suffered as I had suffered.
+
+I wept for the first time since my entrance into Mizora, the bitter
+tears of actual experience, and endeavored to convey to the Preceptress
+some idea of the painful emotion that possessed me.
+
+"I have noticed," she said, "in your own person and the descriptions you
+have given of your native country, a close resemblance to the people and
+history of our nation in ages far remote. These portraits are very old.
+The majority of them were painted many thousands of years ago. It is
+only by our perfect knowledge of color that we are enabled to preserve
+them. Some have been copied by expert artists upon a material
+manufactured by us for that purpose. It is a transparent adamant that
+possesses no refractive power, consequently the picture has all the
+advantage of a painting on canvas, with the addition of perpetuity. They
+can never fade nor decay."
+
+"I am astonished at the existence of this gallery," I exclaimed. "I have
+observed a preference for sliding panels instead of doors, and that they
+were often decorated with paintings of rare excellence, but I had never
+suspected the existence of this gallery behind one of them."
+
+"Any student," said the Preceptress, "who desires to become conversant
+with our earliest history, can use this gallery. It is not a secret, for
+nothing in Mizora is concealed; but we do not parade its existence, nor
+urge upon students an investigation of its history. They are so far
+removed from the moral imbecility that dwarfed the nature of these
+people, that no lesson can be learned from their lives; and their time
+can be so much more profitably spent in scientific research and study."
+
+"You have not, then, reached the limits of scientific knowledge?" I
+wonderingly inquired, for, to me, they had already overstepped its
+imaginary pale.
+
+"When we do we shall be able to create intellect at will. We govern to a
+certain extent the development of physical life; but the formation of
+the brain--its intellectual force, or capacity I should say--is beyond
+our immediate skill. Genius is yet the product of long cultivation."
+
+I had observed that dark hair and eyes were as indiscriminately mingled
+in these portraits as I had been accustomed to find them in the living
+people of my own and other countries. I drew the Preceptress' attention
+to it.
+
+"We believe that the highest excellence of moral and mental character is
+alone attainable by a fair race. The elements of evil belong to the dark
+race."
+
+"And were the people of this country once of mixed complexions?"
+
+"As you see in the portraits? Yes," was the reply.
+
+"And what became of the dark complexions?"
+
+"We eliminated them."
+
+I was too astonished to speak and stood gazing upon the handsome face of
+a young man in a plumed hat and lace-frilled doublet. The dark eyes had
+a haughty look, like a man proud of his lineage and his sex.
+
+"Let us leave this place," said the Preceptress presently. "It always
+has a depressing effect upon me."
+
+"In what way?" I asked.
+
+"By the degradation of the human race that they force me to recall."
+
+I followed her out to a seat on one of the small porticoes.
+
+In candidly expressing herself about the dark complexions, my companion
+had no intention or thought of wounding my feelings. So rigidly do they
+adhere to the truth in Mizora that it is of all other things
+pre-eminent, and is never supposed to give offense. The Preceptress but
+gave expression to the belief inculcated by centuries of the teachings
+and practices of her ancestors. I was not offended. It was her
+conviction. Besides, I had the consolation of secretly disagreeing with
+her. I am still of the opinion that their admirable system of
+government, social and political, and their encouragement and provision
+for universal culture of so high an order, had more to do with the
+formation of superlative character than the elimination of the dark
+complexion.
+
+The Preceptress remained silent a long time, apparently absorbed in the
+beauty of the landscape that stretched before us. The falling waters of
+a fountain was all the sound we heard. The hour was auspicious. I was so
+eager to develop a revelation of the mystery about these people that I
+became nervous over my companion's protracted silence. I felt a delicacy
+in pressing inquiries concerning information that I thought ought to be
+voluntarily given. Inquisitiveness was regarded as a gross rudeness by
+them, and I could frame no question that I did not fear would sound
+impertinent. But at last patience gave way and, at the risk of
+increasing her commiseration for my barbarous mental condition, I asked:
+
+"Are you conversant with the history of the times occupied by the
+originals of the portraits we have just seen?"
+
+"I am," she replied.
+
+"And would you object to giving me a condensed recital of it?"
+
+"Not if it can do you any good?"
+
+"What has become of their descendants--of those portraits?"
+
+"They became extinct thousands of years ago."
+
+She became silent again, lost in reverie. The agitation of my mind was
+not longer endurable. I was too near the acme of curiosity to longer
+delay. I threw reserve aside and not without fear and trembling faltered
+out:
+
+"Where are the men of this country? Where do they stay?"
+
+_"There are none_," was the startling reply. "_The race became extinct
+three thousand years ago._"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+I trembled at the suggestion of my own thoughts. Was this an enchanted
+country? Where the lovely blonde women fairies--or some weird beings of
+different specie, human only in form? Or was I dreaming?
+
+"I do not believe I understand you," I said. "I never heard of a country
+where there were no men. In my land they are so very, very important."
+
+"Possibly," was the placid answer.
+
+"And you are really a nation of women?"
+
+"Yes," she said. "And have been for the last three thousand years."
+
+"Will you tell me how this wonderful change came about?"
+
+"Certainly. But in order to do it, I must go back to our very remote
+ancestry. The civilization that I shall begin with must have resembled
+the present condition of your own country as you describe it. Prisons
+and punishments were prevalent throughout the land."
+
+I inquired how long prisons and places of punishment had been abolished
+in Mizora.
+
+"For more than two thousand years," she replied. "I have no personal
+knowledge of crime. When I speak of it, it is wholly from an historical
+standpoint. A theft has not been committed in this country for many many
+centuries. And those minor crimes, such as envy, jealousy, malice and
+falsehood, disappeared a long time ago. You will not find a citizen in
+Mizora who possesses the slightest trace of any of them.
+
+"Did they exist in earlier times?"
+
+"Yes. Our oldest histories are but records of a succession of dramas in
+which the actors were continually striving for power and exercising all
+of those ancient qualities of mind to obtain it. Plots, intrigues,
+murders and wars, were the active employments of the very ancient rulers
+of our land. As soon as death laid its inactivity upon one actor,
+another took his place. It might have continued so; and we might still
+be repeating the old tragedy but for one singular event. In the history
+of your own people you have no doubt observed that the very thing
+plotted, intrigued and labored for, has in accomplishment proved the
+ruin of its projectors. You will remark this in the history I am about
+to relate.
+
+"Main ages ago this country was peopled by two races--male and female.
+The male race were rulers in public and domestic life. Their supremacy
+had come down from pre-historic time, when strength of muscle was the
+only master. Woman was a beast of burden. She was regarded as inferior
+to man, mentally as well as physically. This idea prevailed through
+centuries of the earlier civilization, even after enlightenment had
+brought to her a chivalrous regard from men. But this regard was
+bestowed only upon the women of their own household, by the rich and
+powerful. Those women who had not been fortunate enough to have been
+born in such a sphere of life toiled early and late, in sorrow and
+privation, for a mere pittance that was barely sufficient to keep the
+flame of life from going out. Their labor was more arduous than men's,
+and their wages lighter.
+
+"The government consisted of an aristocracy, a fortunate few, who were
+continually at strife with one another to gain supremacy of power, or an
+acquisition of territory. Wars, famine and pestilence were of frequent
+occurrence. Of the subjects, male and female, some had everything to
+render life a pleasure, while others had nothing. Poverty, oppression
+and wretchedness was the lot of the many. Power, wealth and luxury the
+dower of the few.
+
+"Children came into the world undesired even by those who were able to
+rear them, and often after an attempt had been made to prevent their
+coming alive. Consequently numbers of them were deformed, not only
+physically, but mentally. Under these conditions life was a misery to
+the larger part of the human race, and to end it by self-destruction was
+taught by their religion to be a crime punishable with eternal torment
+by quenchless fire.
+
+"But a revolution was at hand. Stinted toil rose up, armed and wrathful,
+against opulent oppression. The struggle was long and tragical, and was
+waged with such rancor and desperate persistence by the
+insurrectionists, that their women and children began to supply the
+places vacated by fallen fathers, husbands and brothers. It ended in
+victory for them. They demanded a form of government that should be the
+property of all. It was granted, limiting its privileges to adult male
+citizens.
+
+"The first representative government lasted a century. In that time
+civilization had taken an advance far excelling the progress made in
+three centuries previous. So surely does the mind crave freedom for its
+perfect development. The consciousness of liberty is an ennobling
+element in human nature. No nation can become universally moral until it
+is absolutely FREE.
+
+"But this first Republic had been diseased from its birth. Slavery had
+existed in certain districts of the nation. It was really the remains of
+a former and more degraded state of society which the new government, in
+the exultation of its own triumphant inauguration, neglected or lacked
+the wisdom to remedy. A portion of the country refused to admit slavery
+within its territory, but pledged itself not to interfere with that
+which had. Enmities, however, arose between the two sections, which,
+after years of repression and useless conciliation, culminated in
+another civil war. Slavery had resolved to absorb more territory, and
+the free territory had resolved that it should not. The war that
+followed in consequence severed forever the fetters of the slave and was
+the primary cause of the extinction of the male race.
+
+"The inevitable effect of slavery is enervating and demoralizing. It is
+a canker that eats into the vitals of any nation that harbors it, no
+matter what form it assumes. The free territory had all the vigor,
+wealth and capacity for long endurance that self-dependence gives. It
+was in every respect prepared for a long and severe struggle. Its forces
+were collected in the name of the united government.
+
+"Considering the marked inequality of the combatants the war would
+necessarily have been of short duration. But political corruption had
+crept into the trust places of the government, and unscrupulous
+politicians and office-seekers saw too many opportunities to harvest
+wealth from a continuation of the war. It was to their interest to
+prolong it, and they did. They placed in the most responsible positions
+of the army, military men whose incapacity was well known to them, and
+sustained them there while the country wept its maimed and dying sons.
+
+"The slave territory brought to the front its most capable talent. It
+would have conquered had not the resources against which it contended
+been almost unlimited. Utterly worn out, every available means of supply
+being exhausted, it collapsed from internal weakness.
+
+"The general government, in order to satisfy the clamors of the
+distressed and impatient people whose sons were being sacrificed, and
+whose taxes were increasing, to prolong the war had kept removing and
+reinstating military commanders, but always of reliable incapacity.
+
+"A man of mediocre intellect and boundless self-conceit happened to be
+the commander-in-chief of the government army when the insurrection
+collapsed. The politicians, whose nefarious scheming had prolonged the
+war, saw their opportunity for furthering their own interests by
+securing his popularity. They assumed him to be the greatest military
+genius that the world had ever produced; as evidenced by his success
+where so many others had failed. It was known that he had never risked a
+battle until he was assured that his own soldiers were better equipped
+and outnumbered the enemy. But the politicians asserted that such a
+precaution alone should mark him as an extraordinary military genius.
+The deluded people accepted him as a hero.
+
+"The politicians exhausted their ingenuity in inventing honors for him.
+A new office of special military eminence, with a large salary attached,
+was created for him. He was burdened with distinctions and emoluments,
+always worked by the politicians, for their benefit. The nation,
+following the lead of the political leaders, joined in their adulation.
+It failed to perceive the dangerous path that leads to anarchy and
+despotism--the worship of one man. It had unfortunately selected one who
+was cautious and undemonstrative, and who had become convinced that he
+really was the greatest prodigy that the world had ever produced.
+
+"He was made President, and then the egotism and narrow selfishness of
+the man began to exhibit itself. He assumed all the prerogatives of
+royalty that his position would permit. He elevated his obscure and
+numerous relatives to responsible offices. Large salaries were paid them
+and intelligent clerks hired by the Government to perform their official
+duties.
+
+"Corruption spread into every department, but the nation was blind to
+its danger. The few who did perceive the weakness and presumption of the
+hero were silenced by popular opinion.
+
+"A second term of office was given him, and then the real character of
+the man began to display itself before the people. The whole nature of
+the man was selfish and stubborn. The strongest mental trait possessed
+by him was cunning.
+
+"His long lease of power and the adulation of his political
+beneficiaries, acting upon a superlative self-conceit, imbued him with
+the belief that he had really rendered his country a service so
+inestimable that it would be impossible for it to entirely liquidate it.
+He exalted to unsuitable public offices his most intimate friends. They
+grew suddenly exclusive and aristocratic, forming marriages with eminent
+families.
+
+"He traveled about the country with his entire family, at the expense of
+the Government, to gradually prepare the people for the ostentation of
+royalty. The cities and towns that he visited furnished fetes,
+illuminations, parades and every variety of entertainment that could be
+thought of or invented for his amusement or glorification. Lest the
+parade might not be sufficiently gorgeous or demonstrative he secretly
+sent agents to prepare the programme and size of his reception, always
+at the expense of the city he intended to honor with his presence.
+
+"He manifested a strong desire to subvert the will of the people to his
+will. When informed that a measure he had proposed was unconstitutional,
+he requested that the constitution be changed. His intimate friends he
+placed in the most important and trustworthy positions under the
+Government, and protected them with the power of his own office.
+
+"Many things that were distasteful and unlawful in a free government
+were flagrantly flaunted in the face of the people, and were followed by
+other slow, but sure, approaches to the usurpation of the liberties of
+the Nation. He urged the Government to double his salary as President,
+and it complied.
+
+"There had long existed a class of politicians who secretly desired to
+convert the Republic into an Empire, that they might secure greater
+power and opulence. They had seen in the deluded enthusiasm of the
+people for one man, the opportunity for which they had long waited and
+schemed. He was unscrupulous and ambitious, and power had become a
+necessity to feed the cravings of his vanity.
+
+"The Constitution of the country forbade the office of President to be
+occupied by one man for more than two terms. The Empire party proposed
+to amend it, permitting the people to elect a President for any number
+of terms, or for life if they choose. They tried to persuade the people
+that the country owed the greatest General of all time so distinctive an
+honor. They even claimed that it was necessary to the preservation of
+the Government; that his popularity could command an army to sustain him
+if he called for it.
+
+"But the people had begun to penetrate the designs of the hero, and
+bitterly denounced his resolution to seek a third term of power. The
+terrible corruptions that had been openly protected by him, had
+advertised him as criminally unfit for so responsible an office. But,
+alas! the people had delayed too long. They had taken a young elephant
+into the palace. They had petted and fed him and admired his bulky
+growth, and now they could not remove him without destroying the
+building.
+
+"The politicians who had managed the Government so long, proved that
+they had more power than the people They succeeded, by practices that
+were common with politicians in those days, in getting him nominated for
+a third term. The people, now thoroughly alarmed, began to see their
+past folly and delusion. They made energetic efforts to defeat his
+election. But they were unavailing. The politicians had arranged the
+ballot, and when the counts were published, the hero was declared
+President for life. When too late the deluded people discovered that
+they had helped dig the grave for the corpse of their civil liberty, and
+those who were loyal and had been misled saw it buried with unavailing
+regret. The undeserved popularity bestowed upon a narrow and selfish
+nature had been its ruin. In his inaugural address he declared that
+nothing but the will of the people governed him. He had not desired the
+office; public life was distasteful to him, yet he was willing to
+sacrifice himself for the good of his country.
+
+"Had the people been less enlightened, they might have yielded without a
+murmur; but they had enjoyed too long the privileges of a free
+Government to see it usurped without a struggle. Tumult and disorder
+prevailed over the country. Soldiers were called out to protect the new
+Government, but numbers of them refused to obey. The consequence was
+they fought among themselves. A dissolution of the Government was the
+result. The General they had lauded so greatly failed to bring order out
+of chaos; and the schemers who had foisted him into power, now turned
+upon him with the fury of treacherous natures when foiled of their prey.
+Innumerable factions sprung up all over the land, each with a leader
+ambitious and hopeful of subduing the whole to his rule. They fought
+until the extermination of the race became imminent, when a new and
+unsuspected power arose and mastered.
+
+"The female portion of the nation had never had a share in the
+Government. Their privileges were only what the chivalry or kindness of
+the men permitted. In law, their rights were greatly inferior. The evils
+of anarchy fell with direct effect upon them. At first, they organized
+for mutual protection from the lawlessness that prevailed. The
+organizations grew, united and developed into military power. They used
+their power wisely, discreetly, and effectively. With consummate skill
+and energy they gathered the reins of Government in their own hands.
+
+"Their first aim had been only to force the country into peace. The
+anarchy that reigned had demoralized society, and they had suffered
+most. They had long pleaded for an equality of citizenship with men, but
+had pleaded in vain. They now remembered it, and resolved to keep the
+Government that their wisdom and power had restored. They had been
+hampered in educational progress. Colleges and all avenues to higher
+intellectual development had been rigorously closed against them. The
+professional pursuits of life were denied them. But a few, with sublime
+courage and energy, had forced their way into them amid the revilings of
+some of their own sex and opposition of the men. It was these brave
+spirits who had earned their liberal cultivation with so much
+difficulty, that had organized and directed the new power. They
+generously offered to form a Government that should be the property of
+all intelligent adult citizens, not criminal.
+
+"But these wise women were a small minority. The majority were ruled by
+the remembrance of past injustice. _They_ were now the power, and
+declared their intention to hold the Government for a century.
+
+"They formed a Republic, in which they remedied many of the defects that
+had marred the Republic of men. They constituted the Nation an integer
+which could never be disintegrated by States' Rights ideas or the
+assumption of State sovereignty.
+
+"They proposed a code of laws for the home government of the States,
+which every State in the Union ratified as their State Constitution,
+thus making a uniformity and strength that the Republic of men had never
+known or suspected attainable.
+
+"They made it a law of every State that criminals could be arrested in
+any State they might flee to, without legal authority, other than that
+obtained in the vicinity of the crime. They made a law that criminals,
+tried and convicted of crime, could not be pardoned without the sanction
+of seventy-five out of one hundred educated and disinterested people,
+who should weigh the testimony and render their decision under oath. It
+is scarcely necessary to add that few criminals ever were pardoned. It
+removed from the office of Governor the responsibility of pardoning, or
+rejecting pardons as a purely personal privilege. It abolished the
+power of rich criminals to bribe their escape from justice; a practice
+that had secretly existed in the former Republic.
+
+"In forming their Government, the women, who were its founders, profited
+largely by the mistakes or wisdom displayed in the Government of men.
+Neither the General Government, nor the State Government, could be
+independent of the other. A law of the Union could not become such until
+ratified by every State Legislature. A State law could not become
+constitutional until ratified by Congress.
+
+"In forming the State Constitutions, laws were selected from the
+different State Constitutions that had proven wise for State Government
+during the former Republic. In the Republic of men, each State had made
+and ratified its own laws, independent of the General Government. The
+consequence was, no two States possessed similar laws.
+
+"To secure strength and avoid confusion was the aim of the founders of
+the new Government. The Constitution of the National Government provided
+for the exclusion of the male sex from all affairs and privileges for a
+period of one hundred years.
+
+"_At the end of that time not a representative of the sex was in
+existence._"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+I expressed my astonishment at her revelation. Their social life existed
+under conditions that were incredible to me. Would it be an impertinence
+to ask for an explanation that I might comprehend? Or was it really the
+one secret they possessed and guarded from discovery, a mystery that
+must forever surround them with a halo of doubt, the suggestion of
+uncanny power? I spoke as deprecatingly as I could. The Preceptress
+turned upon me a calm but penetrating gaze.
+
+"Have we impressed you as a mysterious people?" she asked.
+
+"Very, very much!" I exclaimed. "I have at times been oppressed by it."
+
+"You never mentioned it," she said, kindly.
+
+"I could not find an opportunity to," I said.
+
+"It is the custom in Mizora, as you have no doubt observed, never to
+make domestic affairs a topic of conversation outside of the family, the
+only ones who would be interested in them; and this refinement has kept
+you from the solution of our social system. I have no hesitancy in
+gratifying your wish to comprehend it. The best way to do it is to let
+history lead up to it, if you have the patience to listen."
+
+I assured her that I was anxious to hear all she chose to tell. She then
+resumed:
+
+"The prosperity of the country rapidly increased under the rule of the
+female Presidents. The majority of them were in favor of a high state of
+morality, and they enforced it by law and practice. The arts and
+sciences were liberally encouraged and made rapid advancement. Colleges
+and schools flourished vigorously, and every branch of education was now
+open to women.
+
+"During the Republic of men, the government had founded and sustained a
+military and naval academy, where a limited number of the youth of the
+country were educated at government expense. The female government
+re-organized the institutions, substituting the youth of their own sex.
+They also founded an academy of science, which was supplied with every
+facility for investigation and progress. None but those having a marked
+predilection for scientific research could obtain admission, and then it
+was accorded to demonstrated ability only. This drew to the college the
+best female talent in the country. The number of applicants was not
+limited.
+
+"Science had hitherto been, save by a _very_ few, an untrodden field to
+women, but the encouragement and rare facilities offered soon revealed
+latent talent that developed rapidly. Scarcely half a century had
+elapsed before the pupils of the college had effected by their
+discoveries some remarkable changes in living, especially in the
+prevention and cure of diseases.
+
+"However prosperous they might become, they could not dwell in political
+security with a portion of the citizens disfranchised. The men were
+resolved to secure their former power. Intrigues and plots against the
+government were constantly in force among them. In order to avert
+another civil war, it was finally decided to amend the constitution, and
+give them an equal share in the ballot. They had no sooner obtained that
+than the old practices of the former Republic were resorted to to secure
+their supremacy in government affairs. The women looked forward to their
+former subjugation as only a matter of time, and bitterly regretted
+their inability to prevent it. But at the crisis, a prominent scientist
+proposed to let the race die out. Science had revealed the Secret of
+Life."
+
+She ceased speaking, as though I fully understood her.
+
+"I am more bewildered than ever," I exclaimed. "I cannot comprehend
+you."
+
+"Come with me," she said.
+
+I followed her into the Chemist's Laboratory. She bade me look into a
+microscope that she designated, and tell her what I saw.
+
+"An exquisitely minute cell in violent motion," I answered.
+
+"Daughter," she said, solemnly, "you are now looking upon the germ of
+_all_ Life, be it animal or vegetable, a flower or a human being, it has
+that one common beginning. We have advanced far enough in Science to
+control its development. Know that the MOTHER is the only important part
+of all life. In the lowest organisms no other sex is apparent."
+
+I sat down and looked at my companion in a frame of mind not easily
+described. There was an intellectual grandeur in her look and mien that
+was impressive. Truth sat, like a coronet, upon her brow. The revelation
+I had so longed for, I now almost regretted. It separated me so far from
+these beautiful, companionable beings.
+
+"Science has instructed you how to supercede Nature," I said, finally.
+
+"By no means. It has only taught us how to make her obey us. We cannot
+_create_ Life. We cannot develop it. But we can control Nature's
+processes of development as we will. Can you deprecate such a power?
+Would not your own land be happier without idiots, without lunatics,
+without deformity and disease?"
+
+"You will give me little hope of any radical change in my own lifetime
+when I inform you that deformity, if extraordinary, becomes a source of
+revenue to its possessor."
+
+"All reforms are of slow growth," she said. "The moral life is the
+highest development of Nature. It is evolved by the same slow processes,
+and like the lower life, its succeeding forms are always higher ones.
+Its ultimate perfection will be mind, where all happiness shall dwell,
+where pleasure shall find fruition, and desire its ecstasy.
+
+"It is the duty of every generation to prepare the way for a higher
+development of the next, as we see demonstrated by Nature in the
+fossilized remains of long extinct animal life, a preparatory condition
+for a higher form in the next evolution. If you do not enjoy the fruit
+of your labor in your own lifetime, the generation that follows you will
+be the happier for it. Be not so selfish as to think only of your own
+narrow span of life."
+
+"By what means have you reached so grand a development?" I asked.
+
+"By the careful study of, and adherence to, Nature's laws. It was long
+years--I should say centuries--before the influence of the coarser
+nature of men was eliminated from the present race.
+
+"We devote the most careful attention to the Mothers of our race. No
+retarding mental or moral influences are ever permitted to reach her. On
+the contrary, the most agreeable contacts with nature, all that can
+cheer and ennoble in art or music surround her. She is an object of
+interest and tenderness to all who meet her. Guarded from unwholesome
+agitation, furnished with nourishing and proper diet--both mental and
+physical--the child of a Mizora mother is always an improvement upon
+herself. With us, childhood has no sorrows. We believe, and the present
+condition of our race proves, that a being environed from its birth with
+none but elevating influences, will grow up amiable and intelligent
+though inheriting unfavorable tendencies.
+
+"On this principle we have ennobled our race and discovered the means of
+prolonging life and youthful loveliness far beyond the limits known by
+our ancestors.
+
+"Temptation and necessity will often degrade a nature naturally inclined
+and desirous to be noble. We early recognized this fact, and that a
+nature once debased by crime would transmit it to posterity. For this
+reason we never permitted a convict to have posterity."
+
+"But how have you become so beautiful?" I asked. "For, in all my
+journeys, I have not met an uncomely face or form. On the contrary, all
+the Mizora women have perfect bodies and lovely features."
+
+"We follow the gentle guidance of our mother, Nature. Good air and
+judicious exercise for generations and generations before us have
+helped. Our ancestors knew the influence of art, sculpture, painting and
+music, which they were trained to appreciate."
+
+"But has not nature been a little generous to you?" I inquired.
+
+"Not more so than she will be to any people who follow her laws. When
+you first came here you had an idea that you could improve nature by
+crowding your lungs and digestive organs into a smaller space than she,
+the maker of them, intended them to occupy.
+
+"If you construct an engine, and then cram it into a box so narrow and
+tight that it cannot move, and then crowd on the motive power, what
+would you expect?
+
+"Beautiful as you think my people, and as they really are, yet, by
+disregarding nature's laws, or trying to thwart her intentions, in a few
+generations to come, perhaps even in the next, we could have coarse
+features and complexions, stoop shoulders and deformity.
+
+"It has required patience, observation and care on the part of our
+ancestors to secure to us the priceless heritage of health and perfect
+bodies. Your people can acquire them by the same means."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+     As to Physical causes, I am inclined to doubt altogether of their
+     operation in this particular; nor do I think that men owe anything
+     of their temper or genius to the air, food, or climate.--_Bacon._
+
+
+I listened with the keenest interest to this curious and instructive
+history; and when the Preceptress had ceased speaking. I expressed my
+gratitude for her kindness. There were many things about which I desired
+information, but particularly their method of eradicating disease and
+crime. These two evils were the prominent afflictions of all the
+civilized nations I knew. I believed that I could comprehend enough of
+their method of extirpation to benefit my own country. Would she kindly
+give it?
+
+"I shall take Disease first," she said, "as it is a near relative of
+Crime. You look surprised. You have known life-long and incurable
+invalids who were not criminals. But go to the squalid portion of any of
+your large cities, where Poverty and Disease go hand in hand, where the
+child receives its life and its first nourishment from a haggard and
+discontented mother. Starvation is her daily dread. The little
+tendernesses that make home the haven of the heart, are never known to
+her. Ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-cherished, all that _might_ be refined
+and elevated in her nature, if properly cultivated, is choked into
+starveling shapes by her enemy--Want.
+
+"If you have any knowledge of nature, ask yourself if such a condition
+of birth and infancy is likely to produce a noble, healthy human being?
+Do your agriculturists expect a stunted, neglected tree to produce rare
+and luscious fruit?"
+
+I was surprised at the Preceptress' graphic description of wretchedness,
+so familiar to all the civilized nations that I knew, and asked:
+
+"Did such a state of society ever exist in this country?"
+
+"Ages ago it was as marked a social condition of this land as it is of
+your own to-day. The first great move toward eradicating disease was in
+providing clean and wholesome food for the masses. It required the
+utmost rigor of the law to destroy the pernicious practice of
+adulteration. The next endeavor was to crowd poverty out of the land. In
+order to do this the Labor question came first under discussion, and
+resulted in the establishment in every state of a Board of Arbitration
+that fixed the price of labor on a per cent, of the profits of the
+business. Public and private charities were forbidden by law as having
+an immoral influence upon society. Charitable institutions had long been
+numerous and fashionable, and many persons engaged in them as much for
+their own benefit as that of the poor. It was not always the honest and
+benevolent ones who became treasurers, nor were the funds always
+distributed among the needy and destitute, or those whom they were
+collected for. The law put a stop to the possibility of such frauds, and
+of professional impostors seeking alms. Those who needed assistance were
+supplied with work--respectable, independent work--furnished by the city
+or town in which they resided. A love of industry, its dignity and
+independence, was carefully instilled into every young mind. There is no
+country but what ought to provide for everyone of its citizens a
+comfortable, if not luxurious, home by humane legislation on the labor
+question.
+
+"The penitentiaries were reconstructed by the female government. One
+half the time formerly allotted to labor was employed in compulsory
+education. Industrial schools were established in every State, where all
+the mechanical employments were taught free. Objects of charity were
+sent there and compelled to become self supporting. These industrial
+schools finally became State Colleges, where are taught, free, all the
+known branches of knowledge, intellectual and mechanical.
+
+"Pauperism disappeared before the wide reaching influence of these
+industrial schools, but universal affluence had not come. It could not
+exist until education had become universal.
+
+"With this object in view, the Government forbade the employment of any
+citizen under the age of twenty-one, and compelled their attendance at
+school up to that time. At the same time a law was passed that
+authorized the furnishing of all school-room necessaries out of the
+public funds. If a higher education were desired the State Colleges
+furnished it free of all expenses contingent.
+
+"All of these measures had a marked influence in improving the
+condition of society, but not all that was required. The necessity for
+strict sanitary laws became obvious. Cities and towns and even farms
+were visited, and everything that could breed malaria, or produce impure
+air, was compelled to be removed. Personal and household cleanliness at
+last became an object of public interest, and inspectors were appointed
+who visited families and reported the condition of their homes. All
+kinds of out-door sports and athletic exercises were encouraged and
+became fashionable.
+
+"All of these things combined, made a great improvement in the health
+and vigor of our race, but still hereditary diseases lingered.
+
+"There were many so enfeebled by hereditary disease they had not enough
+energy to seek recuperation, and died, leaving offspring as wretched,
+who in turn followed their parents' example.
+
+"Statistics were compiled, and physician's reports circulated, until a
+law was passed prohibiting the perpetuity of diseased offspring. But,
+although disease became less prevalent, it did not entirely disappear.
+The law could only reach the most deplorable afflictions, and was
+eventually repealed.
+
+"As the science of therapeutics advanced, all diseases--whether
+hereditary or acquired--were found to be associated with abnormal
+conditions of the blood. A microscopic examination of a drop of blood
+enabled the scientist to determine the character and intensity of any
+disease, and at last to effect its elimination from the system.
+
+"The blood is the primal element of the body. It feeds the flesh, the
+nerves, the muscles, the brain. Disease cannot exist when it is in a
+natural condition. Countless experiments have determined the exact
+properties of healthy blood and how to produce it. By the use of this
+knowledge we have eliminated hereditary diseases, and developed into a
+healthy and moral people. For people universally healthy is sure of
+being moral. Necessity begets crime. It is the _wants_ of the ignorant
+and debased that suggests theft. It is a diseased fancy, or a mind
+ignorant of the laws that govern the development of human nature, that
+could attribute to offspring hated before birth: infancy and childhood
+neglected; starved, ill-used in every way, a disposition and character,
+amiable and humane and likely to become worthy members of society. The
+reverse is almost inevitable. Human nature relapses into the lower and
+baser instincts of its earlier existence, when neglected, ill-used and
+_ignorant_. All of those lovely traits of character which excite the
+enthusiast, such as gratitude, honor, charity are the results of
+education only. They are not the natural instincts of the human mind,
+but the cultivated ones.
+
+"The most rigid laws were passed in regard to the practice of medicine.
+No physician could become a practitioner until examined and authorized
+to do so by the State Medical College. In order to prevent favoritism,
+or the furnishing of diplomas to incompetent applicants, enormous
+penalties were incurred by any who would sign such. The profession long
+ago became extinct. Every mother is a family physician. That is, she
+obeys the laws of nature in regard to herself and her children, and they
+never need a doctor.
+
+"Having become healthy and independent of charity, crime began to
+decrease naturally. The conditions that had bred and fostered petty
+crimes having ceased to exist, the natures that had inherited them rose
+above their influence in a few generations, and left honorable
+posterity.
+
+"But crime in its grossest form is an ineradicable hereditary taint.
+Generation after generation may rise and disappear in a family once
+tainted with it, without displaying it, and then in a most unexpected
+manner it will spring up in some descendant, violent and unconquerable.
+
+"We tried to eliminate it as we had disease, but failed. It was an
+inherited molecular structure of the brain. Science could not
+reconstruct it. The only remedy was annihilation. Criminals had no
+posterity."
+
+"I am surprised," I interrupted, "that possessing the power to control
+the development of the body, you should not do so with the mind."
+
+"If we could we would produce genius that could discover the source of
+all life. We can control Cause and Effect, but we cannot create Cause.
+We do not even know its origin. What the perfume is to the flower, the
+intellect is to the body; a secret that Nature keeps to herself. For a
+thousand years our greatest minds have sought to discover its source,
+and we are as far from it to-day as we were a thousand years ago."
+
+"How then have you obtained your mental superiority?" I inquired.
+
+"By securing to our offspring perfect, physical and mental health.
+Science has taught us how to evolve intellect by following demonstrated
+laws. I put a seed into the ground and it comes up a little green slip,
+that eventually becomes a tree. When I planted the seed in congenial
+soil, and watered and tended the slip, I assisted Nature. But I did not
+create the seed nor supply the force that made it develop into a tree,
+nor can I define that force."
+
+"What has produced the exquisite refinement of your people?"
+
+"Like everything else, it is the result of gradual development aiming
+at higher improvement. By following strictly the laws that govern the
+evolution of life, we control the formation of the body and brain.
+Strong mental traits become intensified by cultivation from generation
+to generation and finally culminate in one glorious outburst of power,
+called Genius. But there is one peculiarity about mind. It resembles
+that wonderful century plant which, after decades of developing, flowers
+and dies. Genius is the long unfolding bloom of mind, and leaves no
+posterity. We carefully prepare for the future development of Genius. We
+know that our children will be neither deformed nor imbecile, but we
+watch the unfolding of their intellects with the interest of a new
+revelation. We guide them with the greatest care.
+
+"I could take a child of your people with inherited weakness of body and
+mind. I should rear it on proper food and exercise--both mental and
+physical--and it would have, when matured, a marked superiority to its
+parents. It is not what Nature has done for us, it is what we have done
+for her, that makes us a race of superior people."
+
+"The qualities of mind that are the general feature of your people," I
+remarked, "are so very high, higher than our estimate of Genius. How was
+it arrived at?"
+
+"By the processes I have just explained. Genius is always a leader. A
+genius with us has a subtlety of thought and perception beyond your
+power of appreciation. All organized social bodies move intellectually
+in a mass, with their leader just ahead of them."
+
+"I have visited, as a guest, a number of your families, and found their
+homes adorned with paintings and sculpture that would excite wondering
+admiration in my own land as rare works of art, but here they are only
+the expression of family taste and culture. Is that a quality of
+intellect that has been evolved, or is it a natural endowment of your
+race?"
+
+"It is not an endowment, but has been arrived at by the same process of
+careful cultivation. Do you see in those ancient portraits a variety of
+striking colors? There is not a suggestion of harmony in any of them. On
+the contrary, they all display violent contrasts of color. The originals
+of them trod this land thousands of years ago. Many of the colors, we
+know, were unknown to them. Color is a faculty of the mind that is
+wholly the result of culture. In the early ages of society, it was known
+only in the coarsest and most brilliant hues. A conception and
+appreciation of delicate harmonies in color is evidence of a superior
+and refined mentality. If you will notice it, the illiterate of your
+own land have no taste for or idea of the harmony of color. It is the
+same with sound. The higher we rise in culture, the more difficult we
+are to please in music. Our taste becomes critical."
+
+I had been revolving some things in my mind while the Preceptress was
+speaking, and I now ventured to express them. I said:
+
+"You tell me that generations will come and go before a marked change
+can occur in a people. What good then would it do me or mine to study
+and labor and investigate in or to teach my people how to improve? They
+can not comprehend progress. They have not learned by contact, as I have
+in Mizora, how to appreciate it. I should only waste life and happiness
+in trying to persuade them to get out of the ruts they have traveled so
+long; they think there are no other roads. I should be reviled, and
+perhaps persecuted. My doctrines would be called visionary and
+impracticable. I think I had better use my knowledge for my own kindred,
+and let the rest of the world find out the best way it can."
+
+The Preceptress looked at me with mild severity. I never before had seen
+so near an approach to rebuke in her grand eyes.
+
+"What a barbarous, barbarous idea!" she exclaimed. "Your country will
+never rise above its ignorance and degradation, until out of its mental
+agony shall be evolved a nature kindled with an ambition that burns for
+Humanity instead of self. It will be the nucleus round which will gather
+the timid but anxious, and _then_ will be lighted that fire which no
+waters can quench. It burns for the liberty of thought. Let human nature
+once feel the warmth of its beacon fires, and it will march onward,
+defying all obstacles, braving all perils till it be won. Human nature
+is ever reaching for the unattained. It is that little spark within us
+that has an undying life. When we can no longer use it, it flies
+elsewhere."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+I had long contemplated a trip to the extreme southern boundary of
+Mizora. I had often inquired about it, and had always been answered that
+it was defined by an impassable ocean. I had asked them to describe it
+to me, for the Mizora people have a happy faculty of employing tersely
+expressive language when necessary; but I was always met with the
+surprising answer that no tongue in Mizora was eloquent enough to
+portray the wonders that bounded Mizora on the south. So I requested the
+Preceptress to permit Wauna to accompany me as a guide and companion; a
+request she readily complied with.
+
+"Will you be afraid or uneasy about trusting her on so long a journey
+with no companion or protector but me?" I asked.
+
+The Preceptress smiled at my question.
+
+"Why should I be afraid, when in all the length and breadth of our land
+there is no evil to befall her, or you either. Strangers are friends in
+Mizora, in one sense of the word, when they meet. You will both travel
+as though among time endeared associates. You will receive every
+attention, courtesy and kindness that would be bestowed upon near and
+intimate acquaintances. No, in this land, mothers do not fear to send
+their daughters alone and unrecommended among strangers."
+
+When speed was required, the people of Mizora traveled altogether by air
+ships. But when the pleasure of landscape viewing, and the delight and
+exhilaration of easy progress is desired, they use either railroad cars
+or carriages.
+
+Wauna and I selected an easy and commodious carriage. It was propelled
+by compressed air, which Wauna said could be obtained whenever we needed
+a new supply at any village or country seat.
+
+Throughout the length and breadth of Mizora the roads were artificially
+made. Cities, towns, and villages were provided with paved streets,
+which the public authorities kept in a condition of perfect cleanliness.
+The absence of all kinds of animals rendered this comparatively easy. In
+alluding to this once in the presence of the Preceptress, she startled
+me by the request that I should suggest to my people the advantage to be
+derived from substituting machinery for animal labor.
+
+"The association of animals is degrading," she asserted. "And you, who
+still live by tilling the soil, will find a marked change economically
+in dispensing with your beasts of burden. Fully four-fifths that you
+raise on your farms is required to feed your domestic animals. If your
+agriculture was devoted entirely to human food, it would make it more
+plentiful for the poor."
+
+I did not like to tell her that I knew many wealthy people who housed
+and fed their domestic animals better than they did their tenants. She
+would have been disgusted with such a state of barbarism.
+
+Country roads in Mizora were usually covered with a cement that was
+prepared from pulverized granite. They were very durable and very hard.
+Owing to their solidity, they were not as agreeable for driving as
+another kind of cement they manufactured. I have previously spoken of
+the peculiar style of wheel that was used on all kinds of light
+conveyances in Mizora, and rendered their progress over any road the
+very luxury of motion.
+
+In our journey, Wauna took me to a number of factories, where the
+wonderful progress they had made in science continually surprised and
+delighted me. The spider and the silkworm had yielded their secret to
+these indefatigable searchers into nature's mysteries. They could spin a
+thread of gossamer, or of silk from their chemicals, of any width and
+length, and with a rapidity that was magical. Like everything else of
+that nature in Mizora, these discoveries had been purchased by the
+Government, and then made known to all.
+
+They also manufactured ivory that I could not tell from the real
+article. I have previously spoken of their success in producing various
+kinds of marble and stone. A beautiful table that I saw made out of
+artificial ivory, had a painting upon the top of it. A deep border,
+composed of delicate, convoluted shells, extended round the top of the
+table and formed the shores of a mimic ocean, with coral reefs and tiny
+islands, and tangled sea-weeds and shining fishes sporting about in the
+pellucid water. The surface was of highly polished smoothness, and I was
+informed that the picture was _not_ a painting but was formed of
+colored particles of ivory that had been worked in before the drying or
+solidifying process had been applied. In the same way they formed main
+beautiful combinations of marbles. The magnificent marble columns that
+supported the portico of my friend's house were all of artificial make.
+The delicate green leaves and creeping vines of ivy, rose, and
+eglantine, with their spray-like blossoms, were colored in the
+manufacturing process and chiseled out of the solid marble by the
+skillful hand of the artist.
+
+It would be difficult for me to even enumerate all the beautiful arts
+and productions of arts that I saw in Mizora. Our journey was full of
+incidents of this kind.
+
+Every city and town that we visited was like the introduction of a new
+picture. There was no sameness between any of them. Each had aimed at
+picturesqueness or stately magnificence, and neither had failed to
+obtain it. Looking back as I now do upon Mizora, it presents itself to
+me as a vast and almost limitless landscape, variegated with grand
+cities, lovely towns and villages, majestic hills and mountains crowned
+with glittering snows, or deep, delightful valleys veiled in scented
+vines.
+
+Kindness, cordiality and courtesy met us on every side. It was at first
+quite novel for me to mingle among previously unheard-of people with
+such sociability, but I did as Wauna did, and I found it not only
+convenient but quite agreeable.
+
+"I am the daughter of the Preceptress of the National College," said
+Wauna; and that was the way she introduced herself.
+
+I noticed with what honor and high esteem the name of the Preceptress
+was regarded. As soon as it was known that the daughter of the
+Preceptress had arrived, the citizens of whatever city we had stopped in
+hastened to extend to her every courtesy and favor possible for them to
+bestow. She was the daughter of the woman who held the highest and most
+enviable position in the Nation. A position that only great intellect
+could secure in that country.
+
+As we neared the goal of our journey, I noticed an increasing warmth of
+the atmosphere, and my ears were soon greeted with a deep, reverberating
+roar like continuous thunder. I have seen and heard Niagara, but a
+thousand Niagaras could not equal that deafening sound. The heat became
+oppressive. The light also from a cause of which I shall soon speak.
+
+We ascended a promontory that jutted out from the main land a quarter of
+a mile, perhaps more. Wauna conducted me to the edge of the cliff and
+told me to look down. An ocean of whirlpools was before us. The
+maddened dashing and thundering of the mighty waters, and the awe they
+inspired no words can paint. Across such an abyss of terrors it was
+certain no vessel could sail. We took our glasses and scanned the
+opposite shore, which appeared to be a vast cataract as though the ocean
+was pouring over a precipice of rock. Wauna informed me that where the
+shore was visible it was a perpendicular wall of smooth rock.
+
+Over head an arc of fire spanned the zenith from which depended curtains
+of rainbows waving and fluttering, folding and floating out again with a
+rapid and incessant motion. I asked Wauna why they had not crossed in
+air-ships, and she said they had tried it often but had always failed.
+
+"In former times," she said, "when air-ships first came into use it was
+frequently attempted, but no voyager ever returned. We have long since
+abandoned the attempt, for now we know it to be impossible."
+
+I looked again at that display of uncontrollable power. As I gazed it
+seemed to me I would be drawn down by the resistless fascination of
+terror. I grasped Wauna and she gently turned my face to the smiling
+landscape behind us. Hills and valleys, and sparkling cities veiled in
+foliage, with their numberless parks and fountains and statues sleeping
+in the soft light, gleaming lakes and wandering rivers that glittered
+and danced in the glorious atmosphere like prisoned sunbeams, greeted us
+like the alluring smile of love, and yet, for the first time since
+entering this lovely land, I felt myself a prisoner. Behind me was an
+impassable barrier. Before me, far beyond this gleaming vision of
+enchantment, lay another road whose privations and dangers I dreaded to
+attempt.
+
+I felt as a bird might feel who has been brought from the free expanse
+of its wild forest-home, and placed in a golden cage where it drinks
+from a jeweled cup and eats daintier food than it could obtain in its
+own rude haunts. It pines for that precarious life; its very dangers and
+privations fill its breast with desire. I began to long with unutterable
+impatience to see once more the wild, rough scenes of my own nativity.
+Memory began to recall them with softening touches. My heart yearned for
+my own; debased as compared with Mizora though they be, there was the
+congeniality of blood between us. I longed to see my own little one
+whose dimpled hands I had unclasped from my neck in that agonized
+parting. Whenever I saw a Mizora mother fondling her babe, my heart
+leapt with quick desire to once more hold my own in such loving embrace.
+The mothers of Mizora have a devotional love for their children. Their
+smiles and prattle and baby wishes are listened to with loving
+tenderness, and treated as matters of importance.
+
+I was sitting beside a Mizora mother one evening, listening to some
+singing that I truly thought no earthly melody could surpass. I asked
+the lady if ever she had heard anything sweeter, and she answered,
+earnestly:
+
+"Yes, the voices of my own children."
+
+On our homeward journey, Wauna took me to a lake from the center of
+which we could see, with our glasses, a green island rising high above
+the water like an emerald in a silver setting.
+
+"That," said Wauna, directing my attention to it, "is the last vestige
+of a prison left in Mizora. Would you like to visit it?"
+
+I expressed an eager willingness to behold so curious a sight, and
+getting into a small pleasure boat, we started toward it. Boats are
+propelled in Mizora either by electricity or compressed air, and glide
+through the water with soundless swiftness.
+
+As we neared the island I could perceive the mingling of natural and
+artificial attractions. We moored our boat at the foot of a flight of
+steps, hewn from the solid rock. On reaching the top, the scene spread
+out like a beautiful painting. Grottos, fountains, and cascades, winding
+walks and vine-covered bowers charmed us as we wandered about. In the
+center stood a medium-sized residence of white marble. We entered
+through a door opening on a wide piazza. Art and wealth and taste had
+adorned the interior with a generous hand. A library studded with books
+closely shut behind glass doors had a wide window that commanded an
+enchanting view of the lake, with its rippling waters sparkling and
+dimpling in the light. On one side of the mantelpiece hung a full length
+portrait of a lady, painted with startling naturalness.
+
+"That," said Wauna, solemnly, "was the last prisoner in Mizora."
+
+I looked with interested curiosity at a relic so curious in this land.
+It was a blonde woman with lighter colored eyes than is at all common in
+Mizora. Her long, blonde hair hung straight and unconfined over a dress
+of thick, white material. Her attitude and expression were dejected and
+sorrowful. I had visited prisons in my own land where red-handed murder
+sat smiling with indifference. I had read in newspapers, labored
+eloquence that described the stoicism of some hardened criminal as a
+trait of character to be admired. I had read descriptions where mistaken
+eloquence exerted itself to waken sympathy for a criminal who had never
+felt sympathy for his helpless and innocent victims, and I had felt
+nothing but creeping horror for it all. But gazing at this picture of
+undeniable repentance, tears of sympathy started to my eyes. Had she
+been guilty of taking a fellow-creature's life?
+
+"Is she still living?" I asked by way of a preface.
+
+"Oh, no, she has been dead for more than a century," answered Wauna.
+
+"Was she confined here very long?"
+
+"For life," was the reply.
+
+"I should not believe," I said, "that a nature capable of so deep a
+repentance could be capable of so dark a crime as murder."
+
+"Murder!" exclaimed Wauna in horror. "There has not been a murder
+committed in this land for three thousand years."
+
+It was my turn to be astonished.
+
+"Then tell me what dreadful crime she committed."
+
+"She struck her child," said Wauna, sadly; "her little innocent,
+helpless child that Nature gave her to love and cherish, and make noble
+and useful and happy."
+
+"Did she inflict a permanent injury?" I asked, with increased
+astonishment at this new phase of refinement in the Mizora character.
+
+"No one can tell the amount of injury a blow does to a child. It may
+immediately show an obvious physical one; it may later develop a mental
+one. It may never seem to have injured it at all, and yet it may have
+shocked a sensitive nature and injured it permanently. Crime is evolved
+from perverted natures, and natures become perverted from ill-usage. It
+merges into a peculiar structure of the brain that becomes hereditary."
+
+"What became of the prisoner's child?"
+
+"It was adopted by a young lady who had just graduated at the State
+College of the State in which the mother resided. It was only five years
+old, and its mother's name was never mentioned to it or to anyone else.
+Long before that, the press had abolished the practice of giving any
+prominence to crime. That pernicious eloquence that in uncivilized ages
+had helped to nourish crime by a maudlin sympathy for the criminal, had
+ceased to exist. The young lady called the child daughter, and it called
+her mother."
+
+"Did the real mother never want to see her child?"
+
+"That is said to be a true picture of her," said Wauna; "and who can
+look at it and not see sorrow and remorse."
+
+"How could you be so stern?" I asked, in wondering astonishment.
+
+"Pity has nothing to do with crime," said Wauna, firmly. "You must look
+to humanity, and not to the sympathy one person excites when you are
+aiding enlightenment. That woman wandered about these beautiful grounds,
+or sat in this elegant home a lonely and unsympathized-with prisoner.
+She was furnished with books, magazines and papers, and every physical
+comfort. Sympathy for her lot was never offered her. Childhood is
+regarded by my people as the only period of life that is capable of
+knowing perfect happiness, and among us it is a crime greater than the
+heinousness of murder in your country, to deprive a human being of its
+childhood--in which cluster the only unalloyed sweets of life.
+
+"A human being who remembers only pain, rebukes treatment in childhood,
+has lost the very flavor of existence, and the person who destroyed it
+is a criminal indeed."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+There was one peculiarity about Mizora that I noticed soon after my
+arrival, but for various reasons have refrained from speaking of before
+now. It was the absence of houses devoted to religious worship.
+
+In architecture Mizora displayed the highest perfection. Their colleges,
+art galleries, public libraries, opera houses, and all their public
+buildings were grand and beautiful. Never in any country, had I beheld
+such splendor in design and execution. Their superior skill in this
+respect, led me to believe that their temples of worship must be on a
+scale of magnificence beyond all my conceiving. I was eager to behold
+them. I looked often upon my first journeyings about their cities to
+discover them, but whenever I noticed an unusually imposing building,
+and asked what it was, it was always something else. I was frequently on
+the point of asking them to conduct me to some church that resembled my
+own in worship, (for I was brought up in strict compliance with the
+creeds, dogmas, and regulations of the Russo Greek Church) but I
+refrained, hoping that in time, I should be introduced to their
+religious ceremonies.
+
+When time passed on, and no invitation was extended me, and I saw no
+house nor preparation for religious worship, nor even heard mention of
+any, I asked Wauna for an explanation. She appeared not to comprehend
+me, and I asked the question:
+
+"Where do you perform your religious rites and ceremonies?"
+
+She looked at me with surprise.
+
+"You ask me such strange questions that sometimes I am tempted to
+believe you a relic of ancient mythology that has drifted down the
+centuries and landed on our civilized shores, or else have been gifted
+with a marvelous prolongation of life, and have emerged upon us from
+some cavern where you have lived, or slept for ages in unchanged
+possession of your ancient superstition."
+
+"Have you, then," I asked in astonishment, "no religious temples
+devoted to worship?"
+
+"Oh, yes, we have temples where we worship daily. Do you see that
+building?" nodding toward the majestic granite walls of the National
+College. "That is one of our most renowned temples, where the highest
+and the noblest in the land meet and mingle familiarly with the humblest
+in daily worship."
+
+"I understand all that you wish to imply by that," I replied. "But have
+you no building devoted to divine worship; no temple that belongs
+specially to your Deity; to the Being that created you, and to whom you
+owe eternal gratitude and homage?"
+
+"We have;" she answered grandly, with a majestic wave of her hand, and
+in that mellow, musical voice that was sweeter than the chanting of
+birds, she exclaimed:
+
+
+     "This vast cathedral, boundless as our wonder;
+       Whose shining lamps yon brilliant mists[A] supply;
+     Its choir the winds, and waves; its organ thunder;
+       Its dome the sky."
+
+[Footnote A: Aurora Borealis]
+
+"Do you worship Nature?" I asked.
+
+"If we did, we should worship ourselves, for we are a part of Nature."
+
+"But do you not recognize an invisible and incomprehensible Being that
+created you, and who will give your spirit an abode of eternal bliss, or
+consign it to eternal torments according as you have glorified and
+served him?"
+
+"I am an atom of Nature;" said Wauna, gravely. "If you want me to answer
+your superstitious notions of religion, I will, in one sentence,
+explain, that the only religious idea in Mizora is: Nature is God, and
+God is Nature. She is the Great Mother who gathers the centuries in her
+arms, and rocks their children into eternal sleep upon her bosom."
+
+"But how," I asked in bewildered astonishment, "how can you think of
+living without creeds, and confessionals? How can you prosper without
+prayer? How can you be upright, and honest, and true to yourselves and
+your friends without praying for divine grace and strength to sustain
+you? How can you be noble, and keep from envying your neighbors,
+without a prayer for divine grace to assist you to resist such
+temptation?"
+
+"Oh, daughter of the dark ages," said Wauna, sadly, "turn to the
+benevolent and ever-willing Science. She is the goddess who has led us
+out of ignorance and superstition; out of degradation and disease, and
+every other wretchedness that superstitious, degraded humanity has
+known. She has lifted us above the low and the little, the narrow and
+mean in human thought and action, and has placed us in a broad, free,
+independent, noble, useful and grandly happy life."
+
+"You have been favored by divine grace," I reiterated, "although you
+refuse to acknowledge it."
+
+She smiled compassionately as she answered:
+
+"She is the divinity who never turned a deaf ear to earnest and
+persistent effort in a sensible direction. But prayers to her must be
+_work_, resolute and conscientious _work_. She teaches that success in
+this world can only come to those who work for it. In your superstitious
+belief you pray for benefits you have never earned, possibly do not
+deserve, but expect to get simply because you pray for them. Science
+never betrays such partiality. The favors she bestows are conferred only
+upon the industrious."
+
+"And you deny absolutely the efficacy of prayer?" I asked.
+
+"If I could obtain anything by prayer alone, I would pray that my
+inventive faculty should be enlarged so that I might conceive and
+construct an air-ship that could cleave its way through that chaos of
+winds that is formed when two storms meet from opposite directions. It
+would rend to atoms one of our present make. But prayer will never
+produce an improved air-ship. We must dig into science for it. Our
+ancestors did not pray for us to become a race of symmetrically-shaped
+and universally healthy people, and expect that to effect a result. They
+went to work on scientific principles to root out disease and crime and
+want and wretchedness, and every degrading and retarding influence."
+
+"Prayer never saved one of my ancestors from premature death," she
+continued, with a resolution that seemed determined to tear from my mind
+every fabric of faith in the consolations of divine interposition that
+had been a special part of my education, and had become rooted into my
+nature. "Disease, when it fastened upon the vitals of the young and
+beautiful and dearly-loved was stronger and more powerful than all the
+agonized prayers that could be poured from breaking hearts. But science,
+when solicited by careful study and experiment and investigation,
+offered the remedy. And _now_, we defy disease and have no fear of death
+until our natural time comes, and _then_ it will be the welcome rest
+that the worn-out body meets with gratitude."
+
+"But when you die," I exclaimed, "do you not believe you have an after
+life?"
+
+"When I die," replied Wauna, "my body will return to the elements from
+whence it came. Thought will return to the force which gave it. The
+power of the brain is the one mystery that surrounds life. We know that
+the brain is a mechanical structure and acted upon by force; but how to
+analyze that force is still beyond our reach. You see that huge engine?
+We made it. It is a fine piece of mechanism. We know what it was made to
+do. We turn on the motive power, and it moves at the rate of a mile a
+minute if we desire it. Why should it move? Why might it not stand
+still? You say because of a law of nature that under the circumstances
+compels it to move. Our brain is like that engine--a wonderful piece of
+mechanism, and when the blood drives it, it displays the effects of
+force which we call Thought. We can see the engine move and we know what
+law of nature it obeys in moving. But the brain is a more mysterious
+structure, for the force which compels it to action we cannot analyze.
+The superstitious ancients called this mystery the soul."
+
+"And do you discard that belief?" I asked, trembling and excited to hear
+such sacrilegious talk from youth so beautiful and pure.
+
+"What our future is to be after dissolution no one knows," replied
+Wauna, with the greatest calmness and unconcern. "A thousand theories
+and systems of religion have risen and fallen in the history of the
+human family, and become the superstitions of the past. The elements
+that compose this body may construct the delicate beauty of a flower, or
+the green robe that covers the bosom of Mother Earth, but we cannot
+know."
+
+"But that beautiful belief in a soul," I cried, in real anguish, "How
+can you discard it? How sever the hope that after death, we are again
+united to part no more? Those who have left us in the spring time of
+life, the bloom on their young cheeks suddenly paled by the cold touch
+of death, stand waiting to welcome us to an endless reunion."
+
+"Alas, for your anguish, my friend," said Wauna, with pityng tenderness.
+"Centuries ago _my_ people passed through that season of mental pain.
+That beautiful visionary idea of a soul must fade, as youth and beauty
+fade, never to return; for Nature nowhere teaches the existence of such
+a thing. It was a belief born of that agony of longing for happiness
+without alloy, which the children of earth in the long-ago ages hoped
+for, but never knew. Their lot was so barren of beauty and happiness,
+and the desire for it is, now and always has been, a strong trait of
+human character. The conditions of society in those earlier ages
+rendered it impossible to enjoy this life perfectly, and hope and
+longing pictured an imaginary one for an imaginary part of the body
+called the Soul. Progress and civilization have brought to us the ideal
+heaven of the ancients, and we receive from Nature no evidence of any
+other."
+
+"But I do believe there is another," I declared. "And we ought to be
+prepared for it."
+
+Wauna smiled. "What better preparation could you desire, then, than good
+works in this?" she asked.
+
+"You should pray, and do penance for your sins," was my reply.
+
+"Then," said Wauna, "we are doing the wisest penance every day. We are
+studying, investigating, experimenting in order that those who come
+after us may be happier than we. Every day Science is yielding us some
+new knowledge that will make living in the future still easier than
+now."
+
+"I cannot conceive," I said, "how you are to be improved upon."
+
+"When we manufacture fruit and vegetables from the elements, can you not
+perceive how much is to be gained? Old age and death will come later,
+and the labor of cultivation will be done away. Such an advantage will
+not be enjoyed during my lifetime. But we will labor to effect it for
+future generations."
+
+"Your whole aim in life, then, is to work for the future of your race,
+instead of the eternal welfare of your own soul?" I questioned, in
+surprise.
+
+"If Nature," said Wauna, "has provided us a future life, if that
+mysterious something that we call Thought is to be clothed in an
+etherealized body, and live in a world where decay is unknown, I have no
+fear of my reception there. Live _this_ life usefully and nobly, and no
+matter if a prayer has never crossed your lips your happiness will be
+assured. A just and kind action will help you farther on the road to
+heaven than all the prayers that you can utter, and all the pains and
+sufferings that you can inflict upon the flesh, for it will be that much
+added to the happiness of this world. The grandest epitaph that could be
+written is engraved upon a tombstone in yonder cemetery. The subject was
+one of the pioneers of progress in a long-ago century, when progress
+fought its way with difficulty through ignorance and superstition. She
+suffered through life for the boldness of her opinions, and two
+centuries after, when they had become popular, a monument was erected to
+her memory, and has been preserved through thousands of years as a motto
+for humanity. The epitaph is simply this: 'The world is better for her
+having lived in it.'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+Not long after my conversation with Wauna, mentioned in the previous
+chapter, an event happened in Mizora of so singular and unexpected a
+character for that country that it requires a particular description. I
+refer to the death of a young girl, the daughter of the Professor of
+Natural History in the National College, whose impressive inaugural
+ceremonies I had witnessed with so much gratification. The girl was of a
+venturesome disposition, and, with a number of others, had gone out
+rowing. The boats they used in Mizora for that purpose were mere cockle
+shells. A sudden squall arose from which all could have escaped, but the
+reckless daring of this young girl cost her her life. Her boat was
+capsized, and despite the exertions made by her companions, she was
+drowned.
+
+Her body was recovered before the news was conveyed to the mother. As
+the young companions surrounded it in the abandon of grief that tender
+and artless youth alone feels, had I not known that not a tie of
+consanguinity existed between them, I might have thought them a band of
+sisters mourning their broken number. It was a scene I never expect and
+sincerely hope never to witness again. It made the deeper impression
+upon me because I knew the expressions of grief were all genuine.
+
+I asked Wauna if any of the dead girl's companions feared that her
+mother might censure them for not making sufficient effort to save her
+when her boat capsized. She looked at me with astonishment.
+
+"Such a thought," she said, "will never occur to her nor to any one else
+in Mizora. I have not asked the particulars, but I know that everything
+was done that could have been done to save her. There must have been
+something extraordinarily unusual about the affair for all Mizora girls
+are expert swimmers, and there is not one but would put forth any
+exertion to save a companion."
+
+I afterward learned that such had really been the case.
+
+It developed upon the Preceptress to break the news to the afflicted
+mother. It was done in the seclusion of her own home. There was no
+manifestation of morbid curiosity among acquaintances, neighbors and
+friends. The Preceptress and one or two others of her nearest and most
+intimate friends called at the house during the first shock of her
+bereavement.
+
+After permission had been given to view the remains, Wauna and I called
+at the house, but only entered the drawing-room. On a low cot, in an
+attitude of peaceful repose, lay the breathless sleeper. Her mother and
+sisters had performed for her the last sad offices of loving duty, and
+lovely indeed had they made the last view we should have of their dear
+one.
+
+There was to be no ceremony at the house, and Wauna and I were in the
+cemetery when the procession entered. As we passed through the city, I
+noticed that every business house was closed. The whole city was
+sympathizing with sorrow. I never before saw so vast a concourse of
+people. The procession was very long and headed by the mother, dressed
+and veiled in black. Behind her were the sisters carrying the body. It
+rested upon a litter composed entirely of white rosebuds. The sisters
+wore white, their faces concealed by white veils. Each wore a white
+rosebud pinned upon her bosom. They were followed by a long procession
+of young girls, schoolmates and friends of the dead. They were all
+dressed in white, but were not veiled. Each one carried a white rosebud.
+
+The sisters placed the litter upon rests at the side of the grave, and
+clasping hands with their mother, formed a semicircle about it. They
+were all so closely veiled that their features could not be seen, and no
+emotion was visible. The procession of young girls formed a circle
+inclosing the grave and the mourners, and began chanting a slow and
+sorrowful dirge. No words can paint the pathos and beauty of such a
+scene. My eye took in every detail that displayed that taste for the
+beautiful that compels the Mizora mind to mingle it with every incident
+of life. The melody sounded like a chorus of birds chanting, in perfect
+unison, a weird requiem over some dead companion.
+
+
+                           DIRGE
+
+     She came like the Spring in its gladness
+     We received her with joy--we rejoiced in her promise
+     Sweet was her song as the bird's,
+     Her smile was as dew to the thirsty rose.
+     But the end came ere morning awakened,
+     While Dawn yet blushed in its bridal veil,
+     The leafy music of the woods was hushed in snowy shrouds.
+     Spring withered with the perfume in her hands;
+     A winter sleet has fallen upon the buds of June;
+     The ice-winds blow where yesterday zephyrs disported:
+     Life is not consummated
+     The rose has not blossomed, the fruit has perished in the flower,
+     The bird lies frozen under its mother's breast
+     Youth sleeps in round loveliness when age should lie withered and
+       weary, and full of honor.
+     Then the grave would be welcome, and our tears would fall not.
+     The grave is not for the roses of youth;
+     We mourn the early departed.
+     Youth sleeps without dreams--
+     Without an awakening.
+
+
+At the close of the chant, the mother first and then each sister took
+from her bosom the white rosebud and dropped it into the grave. Then
+followed her schoolmates and companions who each dropped in the bud she
+carried. A carpet of white rosebuds was thus formed, on which the body,
+still reclining upon its pillow of flowers, was gently lowered.
+
+The body was dressed in white, and over all fell a veil of fine white
+tulle. A more beautiful sight I can never see than that young, lovely
+girl in her last sleep with the emblems of youth, purity and swift decay
+forming her pillow, and winding-sheet. Over this was placed a film of
+glass that rested upon the bottom and sides of the thin lining that
+covered the bottom and lower sides of the grave. The remainder of the
+procession of young girls then came forward and dropped their rosebuds
+upon it, completely hiding from view the young and beautiful dead.
+
+The eldest sister then took a handful of dust and casting it into the
+grave, said in a voice broken, yet audible: "Mingle ashes with ashes,
+and dust with its original dust. To the earth whence it was taken,
+consign we the body of our sister." Each sister then threw in a handful
+of dust, and then with their mother entered their carriage, which
+immediately drove them home.
+
+A beautiful silver spade was sticking in the soft earth that had been
+taken from the grave. The most intimate of the dead girls friends took a
+spadeful of earth and threw it into the open grave. Her example was
+followed by each one of the remaining companions until the grave was
+filled. Then clasping hands, they chanted a farewell to their departed
+companion and playmate. After which they strewed the grave with flowers
+until it looked like a bed of beauty, and departed.
+
+I was profoundly impressed by the scene. Its solemnity, its beauty, and
+the universal expression of sorrow it had called forth. A whole city
+mourned the premature death of gifted and lovely youth. Alas! In my own
+unhappy country such an event would have elicited but a passing phrase
+of regret from all except the immediate family of the victim; for
+_there_ sorrow is a guest at every heart, and leaves little room for
+sympathy with strangers.
+
+The next day the mother was at her post in the National College; the
+daughters were at their studies, all seemingly calm and thoughtful, but
+showing no outward signs of grief excepting to the close observer. The
+mother was performing her accustomed duties with seeming cheerfulness,
+but now and then her mind would drop for a moment in sorrowful
+abstraction to be recalled with resolute effort and be fastened once
+more upon the necessary duty of life.
+
+The sisters I often saw in those abstracted moods, and frequently saw
+them wiping away silent but unobtrusive tears. I asked Wauna for the
+meaning of such stoical reserve, and the explanation was as curious as
+were all the other things that I met with in Mizora.
+
+"If you notice the custom of different grades of civilization in your
+own country," said Wauna, "you will observe that the lower the
+civilization the louder and more ostentatious is the mourning. True
+refinement is unobtrusive in everything, and while we do not desire to
+repress a natural and inevitable feeling of sorrow, we do desire to
+conceal and conquer it, for the reason that death is a law of nature
+that we cannot evade. And, although the death of a young person has not
+occurred in Mizora in the memory of any living before this, yet it is
+not without precedent. We are very prudent, but we cannot guard entirely
+against accident. It has cast a gloom over the whole city, yet we
+refrain from speaking of it, and strive to forget it because it cannot
+be helped."
+
+"And can you see so young, so fair a creature perish without wanting to
+meet her again?"
+
+"Whatever sorrow we feel," replied Wauna, solemnly, "we deeply realize
+how useless it is to repine. We place implicit faith in the revelations
+of Nature, and in no circumstances does she bid us expect a life beyond
+that of the body. That is a life of individual consciousness."
+
+"How much more consoling is the belief of my people," I replied,
+triumphantly. "Their belief in a future reunion would sustain them
+through the sorrow of parting in this. It has been claimed that some
+have lived pure lives solely in the hope of meeting some one whom they
+loved, and who had died in youth and innocence."
+
+Wauna smiled.
+
+"You do not all have then the same fate in anticipation for your future
+life?" she asked.
+
+"Oh, no!" I answered. "The good and the wicked are divided."
+
+"Tell me some incident in your own land that you have witnessed, and
+which illustrates the religious belief of your country."
+
+"The belief that we have in a future life has often furnished a theme
+for the poets of my own and other countries. And sometimes a quaint and
+pretty sentiment is introduced into poetry to express it."
+
+"I should like to hear some such poetry. Can you recite any?"
+
+"I remember an incident that gave birth to a poem that was much admired
+at the time, although I can recall but the two last stanzas of it. A
+rowing party, of which I was a member, once went out upon a lake to view
+the sunset. After we had returned to shore, and night had fallen upon
+the water in impenetrable darkness, it was discovered that one of the
+young men who had rowed out in a boat by himself was not with us. A
+storm was approaching, and we all knew that his safety lay in getting
+ashore before it broke. We lighted a fire, but the blaze could not be
+seen far in such inky darkness. We hallooed, but received no answer, and
+finally ceased our efforts. Then one of the young ladies who possessed a
+very high and clear soprano voice, began singing at the very top of her
+power. It reached the wanderer in the darkness, and he rowed straight
+toward it. From that time on he became infatuated with the singer,
+declaring that her voice had come to him in his despair like an angel's
+straight from heaven.
+
+"She died in less than a year, and her last words to him were: 'Meet me
+in heaven.' He had always been recklessly inclined, but after that he
+became a model of rectitude and goodness. He wrote a poem that was
+dedicated to her memory. In it he described himself as a lone wanderer
+on a strange sea in the darkness of a gathering storm and no beacon to
+guide him, when suddenly he hears a voice singing which guides him safe
+to shore. He speaks of the beauty of the singer and how dear she became
+to him, but he still hears the song calling him across the ocean of
+death."
+
+"Repeat what you remember of it," urged Wauna.
+
+
+     "That face and form, have long since gone
+       Beyond where the day was lifted:
+     But the beckoning song still lingers on,
+       An angels earthward drifted.
+
+     And when death's waters, around me roar
+       And cares, like the birds, are winging:
+     If I steer my bark to Heaven's shore
+       'Twill be by an angel's singing."
+
+
+"Poor child of superstition," said Wauna, sadly. "Your belief has
+something pretty in it, but for your own welfare, and that of your
+people, you must get rid of it as we have got rid of the offspring of
+Lust. Our children come to us as welcome guests through portals of the
+holiest and purest affection. That love which you speak of, I know
+nothing about. I would not know. It is a degradation which mars your
+young life and embitters the memories of age. We have advanced beyond
+it. There is a cruelty in life," she added, compassionately, "which we
+must accept with stoicism as the inevitable. Justice to your posterity
+demands of you the highest and noblest effort of which your intellect is
+capable."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+The conversation that I had with Wauna gave me so much uneasiness that I
+sought her mother. I cannot express the shock I felt at hearing such
+youthful and innocent lips speak of the absurdity of religious forms,
+ceremonies, and creeds. She regarded my belief in them as a species of
+barbarism. But she had not convinced me. _I was resolved not to be
+convinced._ I believed she was in error.
+
+Surely, I thought, a country so far advanced in civilization, and
+practicing such unexampled rectitude, must, according to my religious
+teaching, have been primarily actuated by religious principles which
+they had since abandoned. My only surprise was that they had not
+relapsed into immorality, after destroying church and creed, and I began
+to feel anxious to convince them of the danger I felt they were
+incurring in neglecting prayer and supplication at the throne to
+continue them in their progress toward perfection of mental and moral
+culture.
+
+I explained my feelings to the Preceptress with great earnestness and
+anxiety for their future, intimating that I believed their immunity from
+disaster had been owing to Divine sufferance. "For no nation," I added,
+quoting from my memory of religious precepts, "can prosper without
+acknowledging the Christian religion."
+
+She listened to me with great attention, and when I had finished, asked:
+
+"How do you account for our long continuance in prosperity and progress,
+for it is more than a thousand years since we rooted out the last
+vestige of what you term religion, from the mind. We have had a long
+immunity from punishment. To what do you attribute it?"
+
+I hesitated to explain what had been in my mind, but finally faltered
+out something about the absence of the male sex. I then had to explain
+that the prisons and penitentiaries of my own land, and of all other
+civilized lands that I knew of, were almost exclusively occupied by the
+male sex. Out of eight hundred penitentiary prisoners, not more than
+twenty or thirty would be women; and the majority of them could trace
+_their_ crimes to man's infidelity.
+
+"And what do you do to reform them?" inquired the Preceptress.
+
+"We offer them the teachings of Christianity. All countries, however,
+differ widely in this respect. The government of my country is not as
+generous to prisoners as that of some others. In the United States every
+penitentiary is supplied with a minister who expounds the Gospel to the
+prisoners every Sunday; that is once every seven days."
+
+"And what do they do the rest of the time?"
+
+"They work."
+
+"Are they ignorant?"
+
+"Oh, yes, indeed;" I replied, earnestly. "You could not find one scholar
+in ten thousand of them. Their education is either very limited, or
+altogether deficient."
+
+"Do the buildings they are confined in cost a great deal?"
+
+"Vast sums of money are represented by them; and it often costs a
+community a great deal of money to send a criminal to the penitentiary.
+In some States the power to pardon rests entirely with the governor, and
+it frequently occurs that a desperate criminal, who has cost a county a
+great deal of money to get rid of him, will be pardoned by the governor,
+to please a relative, or, as it is sometimes believed, for a bribe."
+
+"And do the people never think of educating their criminals instead of
+working them?
+
+"That would be an expense to the government," I replied.
+
+"If they would divide the time, and compel them to study half a day as
+rigorously as they make them work, it would soon make a vast change in
+their morals. Nothing so ennobles the mind as a broad and thorough
+education."
+
+"They are all compelled to listen to religious instruction once a week,"
+I answered. "That surely ought to make some improvement in them. I
+remember hearing an American lady relate her attendance at chapel
+service in a State penitentiary one Sunday. The minister's education was
+quite limited, as she could perceive from the ungrammatical language he
+used, but he preached sound orthodox doctrine. The text selected had a
+special application to his audience: 'Depart from me ye accursed, into
+everlasting torment prepared for the Devil and his angels.' There were
+eight hundred prisoners, and the minister assured them, in plain
+language, that such would surely be their sentence unless they
+repented."
+
+"And that is what you call the consolations of religion, is it?" asked
+the Preceptress with an expression that rather disconcerted me; as
+though my zeal and earnestness entirely lacked the light of knowledge
+with which she viewed it.
+
+"That is religious instruction;" I answered. "The minister exhorted the
+prisoners to pray and be purged of their sins. And it was good advice."
+
+"But they might aver," persisted the Preceptress, "that they had prayed
+to be restrained from crime, and their prayers had not been answered."
+
+"They didn't pray with enough faith, then;" I assured her in the
+confidence of my own belief. "That is wherein I think my own church is
+so superior to the other religions of the world," I added, proudly. "We
+can get the priest to absolve us from sin, and then we know we are rid
+of it, when he tells us so."
+
+"But what assurance have you that the priest can do so?" asked the
+Preceptress.
+
+"Because it is his duty to do so."
+
+"Education will root out more sin than all your creeds can," gravely
+answered the Preceptress. "Educate your convicts and train them into
+controlling and subduing their criminal tendencies by _their own will_,
+and it will have more effect on their morals than all the prayers ever
+uttered. Educate them up to that point where they can perceive for
+themselves the happiness of moral lives, and then you may trust them to
+temptation without fear. The ideas you have expressed about dogmas,
+creeds and ceremonies are not new to us, though, as a nation, we do not
+make a study of them. They are very, very ancient. They go back to the
+first records of the traditionary history of man. And the farther you go
+back the deeper you plunge into ignorance and superstition.
+
+"The more ignorant the human mind, the more abject was its slavery to
+religion. As history progresses toward a more diffuse education of the
+masses, the forms, ceremonies and beliefs in religion are continually
+changing to suit the advancement of intelligence; and when intelligence
+becomes universal, they will be renounced altogether. What is true of
+the history of one people will be true of the history of another.
+Religions are not necessary to human progress. They are really clogs. My
+ancestors had more trouble to extirpate these superstitious ideas from
+the mind than they had in getting rid of disease and crime. There were
+several reasons for this difficulty. Disease and crime were self-evident
+evils, that the narrowest intelligence could perceive; but beliefs in
+creeds and superstitions were perversions of judgment, resulting from a
+lack of thorough mental training. As soon, however, as education of a
+high order became universal, it began to disappear. No mind of
+philosophical culture can adhere to such superstitions.
+
+"Many ages the people made idols, and, decking them with rich ornaments,
+placed them in magnificent temples specially built for them and the
+rites by which they worshipped them. There have existed many variations
+of this kind of idolatry that are marked by the progressive stages of
+civilization. Some nations of remote antiquity were highly cultured in
+art and literature, yet worshipped gods of their own manufacture, or
+imaginary gods, for everything. Light and darkness, the seasons, earth,
+air, water, all had a separate deity to preside over and control their
+special services. They offered sacrifices to these deities as they
+desired their co-operation or favor in some enterprise to be undertaken.
+
+"In remote antiquity, we read of a great General about to set out upon
+the sea to attack the army of another nation. In order to propitiate the
+god of the ocean, he had a fine chariot built to which were harnessed
+two beautiful white horses. In the presence of a vast concourse of
+people collected to witness the ceremony, he drove them into the sea.
+When they sank out of sight it was supposed that the god had accepted
+the present, and would show his gratitude for it by favoring winds and
+peaceful weather.
+
+"A thousand years afterward history speaks of the occurrence derisively,
+as an absurd superstition, and at the same time they believed in and
+lauded a more absurd and cruel religion. They worshipped an imaginary
+being who had created and possessed absolute control of everything. Some
+of the human family it had pleased him to make eminently good, while
+others he made eminently bad. For those whom he had created with evil
+desires, he prepared a lake of molten fire into which they were to be
+cast after death to suffer endless torture for doing what they had been
+expressly created to do. Those who had been created good were to be
+rewarded for following out their natural inclinations, by occupying a
+place near the Deity, where they were to spend eternity in singing
+praises to him.
+
+"He could, however, be persuaded by prayer from following his original
+intentions. Very earnest prayer had caused him to change his mind, and
+send rain when he had previously concluded to visit the country with
+drouth.
+
+"Two nations at war with each other, and believing in the same Deity,
+would pray for a pestilence to visit their enemy. Death was universally
+regarded as a visitation of Providence for some offense committed
+against him instead of against the laws of nature.
+
+"Some believed that prayer and donations to the church or priest, could
+induce the Deity to take their relatives from the lake of torment and
+place them in his own presence. The Deity was prayed to on every
+occasion, and for every trivial object. The poor and indolent prayed for
+him to send them food and clothes. The sick prayed for health, the
+foolish for wisdom, and the revengeful besought the Deity to consign all
+their enemies to the burning lake.
+
+"The intelligent and humane began to doubt the necessity of such
+dreadful and needless torment for every conceivable misdemeanor, and it
+was modified, and eventually dropped altogether. Education finally
+rooted out every phase of superstition from the minds of the people, and
+now we look back and smile at the massive and magnificent structures
+erected to the worship of a Deity who could be coaxed to change his mind
+by prayer."
+
+I did not tell the Preceptress that she had been giving me a history of
+my own ancestry; but I remarked the resemblance with the joyous hope
+that in the future of my own unhappy country lay the possibility of a
+civilization so glorious, the ideal heaven of which every sorrowing
+heart had dreamed. But always with the desire to believe it had a
+spiritual eternity.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+I have described the peculiar ceremony attending the burial of youth in
+Mizora. Old age, in some respects, had a similar ceremony, but the
+funeral of an aged person differed greatly from what I had witnessed at
+the grave of youth. Wauna and I attended the funeral of a very aged
+lady. Death in Mizora was the gradual failing of mental and physical
+vigor. It came slowly, and unaccompanied with pain. It was received
+without regret, and witnessed without tears.
+
+The daughters performed the last labor that the mother required. They
+arrayed her body for burial and bore it to the grave. If in that season
+of the year, autumn leaves hid the bier, and formed the covering and
+pillow of her narrow bed. If not in the fall, full-blown roses and
+matured flowers were substituted.
+
+The ceremony was conducted by the eldest daughter, assisted by the
+others. No tears were shed; no mourning worn; no sorrowful chanting. A
+solemn dirge was sung indicative of decay. A dignified solemnity
+befitting the farewell to a useful life was manifest in all the
+proceedings; but no demonstrations of sorrow were visible. The mourners
+were unveiled, and performed the last services for their mother with
+calmness. I was so astonished at the absence of mourning that I asked an
+explanation of Wauna.
+
+"Why should we mourn," was the surprising answer, "for what is
+inevitable? Death must come, and, in this instance, it came in its
+natural way. There is nothing to be regretted or mourned over, as there
+was in the drowning of my young friend. Her life was suddenly arrested
+while yet in the promise of its fruitfulness. There was cause for grief,
+and the expressions and emblems of mourning were proper and appropriate.
+But here, mourning would be out of place, for life has fulfilled its
+promises. Its work is done, and nature has given the worn-out body rest.
+That is all."
+
+That sympathy and regret which the city had expressed for the young
+dead was manifested only in decorum and respectful attendance at the
+funeral. No one appeared to feel that it was an occasion for mourning.
+How strange it all seemed to me, and yet there was a philosophy about it
+that I could not help but admire. Only I wished that they believed as I
+did, that all of those tender associations would be resumed beyond the
+grave. If only they could be convinced. I again broached the subject to
+Wauna. I could not relinquish the hope of converting her to my belief.
+She was so beautiful, so pure, and I loved her so dearly. I could not
+give up my hope of an eternal reunion. I appealed to her sympathy.
+
+"What hope," I asked, "can you offer those whose lives have been only
+successive phases of unhappiness? Why should beings be created only to
+live a life of suffering, and then die, as many, very many, of my people
+do? If they had no hope of a spiritual life, where pain and sorrow are
+to be unknown, the burdens of this life could not be borne."
+
+"You have the same consolation," replied Wauna, "as the Preceptress had
+in losing her daughter. That daring spirit that cost her her life, was
+the pride of her mother. She possessed a promising intellect, yet her
+mother accepts her death as one of the sorrowful phases of life, and
+bravely tries to subdue its pain. Long ages behind us, as my mother has
+told you, the history of all human life was but a succession of woes.
+Our own happy state has been evolved by slow degrees out of that
+sorrowful past. Human progress is marked by blood and tears, and the
+heart's bitterest anguish. We, as a people, have progressed almost
+beyond the reach of sorrow, but you are in the midst of it. You must
+work for the future, though you cannot be of it."
+
+"I cannot," I declared, "reconcile myself to your belief. I am separated
+from my child. To think I am never to see it in this world, nor through
+endless ages, would drive me insane with despair. What consolation can
+your belief offer _me_?"
+
+"In this life, you may yearn for your child, but after this life you
+sleep," answered Wauna, sententiously. "And how sweet that sleep! No
+dreams; no waking to work and trial; no striving after perfection; no
+planning for the morrow. It is oblivion than which there can be no
+happier heaven."
+
+"Would not meeting with those you have loved be happier?" I asked, in
+amazement.
+
+"There would be happiness; and there would be work, too."
+
+"But my religion does not believe in work in heaven," I answered.
+
+"Then it has not taken the immutable laws of Nature into consideration,"
+said Wauna. "If Nature has prepared a conscious existence for us after
+this body decays, she has prepared work for us, you may rest assured. It
+might be a grander, nobler work; but it would be work, nevertheless.
+Then, how restful, in contrast, is our religion. It is eternal,
+undisturbable rest for both body and brain. Besides, as you say
+yourself, you cannot be sure of meeting those whom you desire to meet in
+that other country. They may be the ones condemned to eternal suffering
+for their sins. Think you I could enjoy myself in any surroundings, when
+I knew that those who were dear to me in this life, were enduring
+torment that could have no end. Give me oblivion rather than such a
+heaven.
+
+"Our punishment comes in this world; but it is not so much through sin
+as ignorance. The savages lived lives of misery, occasioned by their
+lack of intelligence. Humanity must always suffer for the mistakes it
+makes. Misery belongs to the ignorant; happiness to the wise. That is
+our doctrine of reward and punishment."
+
+"And you believe that my people will one day reject all religions?"
+
+"When they are advanced enough," she answered. "You say you have
+scholars among you already, who preach their inconsistencies. What do
+you call them?"
+
+"Philosophers," was my reply.
+
+"They are your prophets," said Wauna. "When they break the shackles that
+bind you to creeds and dogmas, they will have done much to advance you.
+To rely on one's own _will_ power to do right is the only safe road to
+morality, and your only heaven."
+
+I left Wauna and sought a secluded spot by the river. I was shocked
+beyond measure at her confession. It had the earnestness, and, to me,
+the cruelty of conviction. To live without a spiritual future in
+anticipation was akin to depravity, to crime and its penalty of prison
+life forever. Yet here was a people, noble, exalted beyond my
+conceiving, living in the present, and obeying only a duty to posterity.
+I recalled a painting I had once seen that always possessed for me a
+horrible fascination. In a cave, with his foot upon the corpse of a
+youth, sat the crowned and sceptered majesty of Death. The waters of
+oblivion encompassed the throne and corpse, which lay with its head and
+feet bathed in its waters--for out of the Unknown had life come, and to
+the Unknown had it departed. Before me, in vision, swept the mighty
+stream of human life from which I had been swept to these strange
+shores. All its sufferings, its delusions; its baffled struggles; its
+wrongs, came upon me with a sense of spiritual agony in them that
+religion--my religion, which was their only consolation--must vanish in
+the crucible of Science. And that Science was the magician that was to
+purify and exalt the world. To live in the Present; to die in it and
+become as the dust; a mere speck, a flash of activity in the far,
+limitless expanse of Nature, of Force, of Matter in which a spiritual
+ideal had no part. It was horrible to think of. The prejudices of
+inherited religious faith, the contracted forces of thought in which I
+had been born and reared could not be uprooted or expanded without pain.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+I had begun to feel an intense longing to return to my own country, but
+it was accompanied by a desire, equally as strong, to carry back to that
+woe-burdened land some of the noble lessons and doctrines I had learned
+in this. I saw no means of doing it that seemed so available as a
+companion,--a being, born and bred in an atmosphere of honor and grandly
+humane ideas and actions.
+
+My heart and my judgment turned to Wauna. She was endeared to me by long
+and gentle association. She was self-reliant and courageous, and
+possessed a strong will. Who, of all my Mizora acquaintances, was so
+well adapted to the service I required.
+
+When I broached the subject to her, Wauna expressed herself as really
+pleased with the idea; but when we went to the Preceptress, she
+acknowledged a strong reluctance to the proposition. She said:
+
+"Wauna can form no conception of the conditions of society in your
+country. They are far, very far, behind our own. They will, I fear,
+chafe her own nature more than she can improve theirs. Still, if I
+thought she could lead your people into a broader intelligence, and
+start them on the way upward to enlightenment and real happiness, I
+would let her go. The moment, however, that she desires to return she
+must be aided to do so."
+
+I pledged myself to abide by any request the Preceptress might make of
+me. Wauna's own inclinations greatly influenced her mother, and finally
+we obtained her consent. Our preparations were carefully made. The
+advanced knowledge of chemistry in Mizora placed many advantages in our
+way. Our boat was an ingenious contrivance with a thin glass top that
+could be removed and folded away until needed to protect us from the
+rigors of the Arctic climate.
+
+I had given an accurate description of the rapids that would oppose us,
+and our boat was furnished with a motive power sufficient to drive us
+through them at a higher rate of speed than what they moved at. It was
+built so as to be easily converted into a sled, and runners were made
+that could be readily adjusted. We were provided with food and clothing
+prepared expressly for the severe change to and rigors of the Arctic
+climate through which we must pass.
+
+I was constantly dreading the terrors of that long ice-bound journey,
+but the Preceptress appeared to be little concerned about it. When I
+spoke of its severities, she said for us to observe her directions, and
+we should not suffer. She asked me if I had ever felt uncomfortable in
+any of the air-ship voyages I had taken, and said that the cold of the
+upper regions through which I had passed in their country was quite as
+intense as any I could meet within a lower atmosphere of my own.
+
+The newspapers had a great deal to say about the departure of the
+Preceptress' daughter on so uncertain a mission, and to that strange
+land of barbarians which I represented. When the day arrived for our
+departure, immense throngs of people from all parts of the country lined
+the shore, or looked down upon us from their anchored air-ships.
+
+The last words of farewell had been spoken to my many friends and
+benefactors. Wauna had bidden a multitude of associates good-bye, and
+clasped her mother's hand, which she held until the boat parted from the
+shore. Years have passed since that memorable parting, but the look of
+yearning love in that Mizora mother's eyes haunts me still. Long and
+vainly has she watched for a boat's prow to cleave that amber mist and
+bear to her arms that vision of beauty and tender love I took away from
+her. My heart saddens at the thought of her grief and long, long waiting
+that only death will end.
+
+We pointed the boat's prow toward the wide mysterious circle of amber
+mists, and then turned our eyes for a last look at Mizora. Wauna stood
+silent and calm, earnestly gazing into the eyes of her mother, until the
+shore and the multitude of fair faces faded like a vision of heaven from
+our views.
+
+"O beautiful Mizora!" cried the voice of my heart. "Shall I ever again
+see a land so fair, where natures so noble and aims so lofty have their
+abiding place? Memory will return to you though my feet may never again
+tread your delightful shores. Farewell, sweet ideal land of my Soul, of
+Humanity, farewell!"
+
+My thoughts turned to that other world from which I had journeyed so
+long. Would the time ever come when it, too, would be a land of
+universal intelligence and happiness? When the difference of nations
+would be settled by argument instead of battle? When disease, deformity
+and premature death would be unknown? When locks, and bolts and bars
+would be useless?
+
+I hoped so much from the personal influence of Wauna. So noble, so
+utterly unconscious of wrong, she must surely revolutionize human nature
+whenever it came in contact with her own.
+
+I pictured to myself my own dear land--dear, despite its many phases of
+wretchedness--smiling in universal comfort and health. I imagined its
+political prisons yawning with emptiness, while their haggard and
+decrepit and sorrowful occupants hobbled out into the sunshine of
+liberty, and the new life we were bringing to them. Fancy flew abroad on
+the wings of hope, dropping the seeds of progress wherever it passed.
+
+The poor should be given work, and justly paid for it, instead of being
+supported by charity. The charity that had fostered indolence in its
+mistaken efforts to do good, should be employed to train poverty to
+skillful labor and economy in living. And what a world of good that one
+measure would produce! The poor should possess exactly the same
+educational advantages that were supplied to the rich. In this _one_
+measure, if I could only make it popular, I would see the golden promise
+of the future of my country. "Educate your poor and they will work out
+their own salvation. Educated Labor can dictate its rights to Capital."
+
+How easy of accomplishment it all seemed to me, who had seen the
+practical benefits arising to a commonwealth that had adopted these
+mottoes. I doubted not that the wiser and better of my own people would
+aid and encourage me. Free education would lead to other results.
+
+Riches should be accumulated only by vast and generous industries that
+reached a helping hand to thousands of industrious poor, instead of
+grinding them out of a few hundred of poorly-paid and over-worked
+artisans. Education in the hands of the poor would be a powerful agent
+with which they would alleviate their own condition, and defend
+themselves against oppression and knavery.
+
+The prisons should be supplied with schools as well as work-rooms, where
+the intellect should be trained and cultivated, and where moral idiocy,
+by the stern and rigorous law of Justice to Innocence, should be forced
+to deny itself posterity.
+
+No philanthropical mind ever spread the wings of its fancy for a broader
+flight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+Our journey was a perilous one with all our precautions. The passage
+through the swiftest part of the current almost swamped our boat. The
+current that opposed us was so strong, that when we increased our speed
+our boat appeared to be cleaving its way through a wall of waters. Wauna
+was perfectly calm, and managed the motor with the steadiest nerves. Her
+courage inspired me, though many a time I despaired of ever getting out
+of the rapids. When we did, and looked up at the star-gemmed canopy that
+stretches above my own world, and abroad over the dark and desolate
+waste of waters around us, it gave me an impression of solemn and weird
+magnificence. It was such a contrast to the vivid nights of Mizora, to
+which my eyes had so long been accustomed, that it came upon me like a
+new scene.
+
+The stars were a source of wonder and ceaseless delight to Wauna. "It
+looks," she said, "as though a prodigal hand had strewn the top of the
+atmosphere with diamonds."
+
+The journey over fields of ice and snow was monotonous, but, owing to
+the skill and knowledge of Mizora displayed in our accoutrements, it was
+deprived of its severities. The wind whistled past us without any other
+greeting than its melancholy sound. We looked out from our snug quarters
+on the dismal hills of snow and ice without a sensation of distress. The
+Aurora Borealis hung out its streamers of beauty, but they were pale
+compared to what Wauna had seen in her own country. The Esquimaux she
+presumed were animals.
+
+We traveled far enough south to secure passage upon a trading-vessel
+bound for civilized shores. The sun came up with his glance of fire and
+his banners of light, laying his glorious touch on cloud and water, and
+kissing the cheek with his warmth. He beamed upon us from the zenith,
+and sank behind the western clouds with a lingering glance of beauty.
+The moon came up like the ghost of the sun, casting a weird yet tender
+beauty on every object. To Wauna it was a revelation of magnificence in
+nature beyond her contriving.
+
+"How grand," she exclaimed, "are the revelations of nature in your
+world! To look upon them, it seems to me, would broaden and deepen the
+mind with the very vastness of their splendor. Nature has been more
+bountiful to you than to Mizora. The day with its heart of fire, and the
+night with its pale beauty are grander than ours. They speak of vast and
+incomprehensible power."
+
+When I took Wauna to the observatory, and she looked upon the countless
+multitudes of worlds and suns revolving in space so far away that a sun
+and its satellites looked like a ball of mist, she said that words could
+not describe her sensations.
+
+"To us," she said, "the leaves of Nature's book are the winds and waves,
+the bud and bloom and decay of seasons. But here every leaf is a world.
+A mighty hand has sprinkled the suns like fruitful seeds across the
+limitless fields of space. Can human nature contemplate a scene so grand
+that reaches so far beyond the grasp of mind, and not feel its own
+insignificance, and the littleness of selfish actions? And yet you can
+behold these myriads of worlds and systems of worlds wheeling in the dim
+infinity of space--a spectacle awful in its vastness--and turn to the
+practice of narrow superstitions?"
+
+At last the shores of my native land greeted my longing eyes, and the
+familiar scenes of my childhood drew near. But when, after nearly twenty
+years absence, I stood on the once familiar spot, the graves of my
+heart's dear ones were all that was mine. My little one had died soon
+after my exile. My father had soon followed. Suspected, and finally
+persecuted by the government, my husband had fled the country, and,
+nearly as I could discover, had sought that universal asylum for the
+oppressed of all nations--the United States. And thither I turned my
+steps.
+
+In my own country and in France, the friends who had known me in
+girlhood were surprised at my youthful appearance. I did not explain the
+cause of it to them, nor did I mention the people or country from whence
+I had come. Wauna was my friend and a foreigner--that was all.
+
+The impression she made was all that I had anticipated. Her unusual
+beauty and her evident purity attracted attention wherever she went. The
+wonderful melody of her singing was much commented upon, but in Mizora
+she had been considered but an indifferent singer. But I had made a
+mistake in my anticipation of her personal influence. The gentleness
+and delicacy of her character received the tenderest respect. None who
+looked upon that face or met the glance of the dark soft eyes ever
+doubted that the nature that animated them was pure and beautiful. Yet
+it was the respect felt for a character so exceptionably superior that
+imitation and emulation would be impossible.
+
+"She is too far above the common run of human nature," said one
+observer. "I should not be surprised if her spirit were already pluming
+its wings for a heavenly flight. Such natures never stay long among us."
+
+The remark struck my heart with a chill of depression. I looked at Wauna
+and wondered why I had noticed sooner the shrinking outlines of the once
+round cheek. Too gentle to show disgust, too noble to ill-treat, the
+spirit of Wauna was chafing under the trying associations. Men and women
+alike regarded her as an impossible character, and I began to realize
+with a sickening regret that I had made a mistake. In my own country, in
+France and England, her beauty was her sole attraction to men. The lofty
+ideal of humanity that she represented was smiled at or gently ignored.
+
+"The world would be a paradise," said one philosopher, "if such
+characters were common. But one is like a seed in the ocean; it cannot
+do much good."
+
+When we arrived in the United States, its activity and evident progress
+impressed Wauna with a feeling more nearly akin to companionship. Her
+own character received a juster appreciation.
+
+"The time is near," she said, "when the New World will be the teacher of
+the Old in the great lesson of Humanity. You will live to see it
+demonstrate to the world the justice and policy of giving to every child
+born under its flag the highest mental, moral and physical training
+known to the present age. You can hardly realize what twenty-five years
+of free education will bring to it. They are already on the right path,
+but they are still many centuries behind my own country in civilization,
+in their government and modes of dispensing justice. Yet their free
+schools, as yet imperfect, are, nevertheless, fruitful seeds of
+progress."
+
+Yet here the nature of Wauna grew restless and homesick, and she at last
+gave expression to her longing for home.
+
+"I am not suited to your world," she said, with a look of deep sorrow in
+her lovely eyes. "None of my people are. We are too finely organized. I
+cannot look with any degree of calmness upon the practices of your
+civilization. It is a common thing to see mothers ill-treat their own
+helpless little ones. The pitiful cries of the children keep ringing in
+my ears. Cannot mothers realize that they are whipping a mean spirit
+into their offspring instead of out. I have heard the most enlightened
+deny their own statements when selfishness demanded it. I cannot mention
+the half of the things I witness daily that grates upon my feelings. I
+cannot reform them. It is not for such as I to be a reformer. Those who
+need reform are the ones to work for it."
+
+Sorrowfully I bade adieu to my hopes and my search for Alexis, and
+prepared to accompany Wauna's return. We embarked on a whaling vessel,
+and having reached its farthest limit, we started on our perilous
+journey north; perilous for the lack of our boat, of which we could hear
+nothing. It had been left in charge of a party of Esquimaux, and had
+either been destroyed, or was hidden. Our progress, therefore, depended
+entirely upon the Esquimaux. The tribe I had journeyed so far north with
+had departed, and those whom I solicited to accompany us professed to be
+ignorant of the sea I mentioned. Like all low natures, the Esquimaux are
+intensely selfish. Nothing could induce them to assist us but the most
+apparent benefit to themselves; and this I could not assure them. The
+homesickness, and coarse diet and savage surroundings told rapidly on
+the sensitive nature of Wauna. In a miserable Esquimaux hut, on a pile
+of furs, I saw the flame of a beautiful and grandly noble life die out.
+My efforts were hopeless; my anguish keen. O Humanity, what have I
+sacrificed for you!
+
+"Oh, Wauna," I pleaded, as I saw the signs of dissolution approaching,
+"shall I not pray for you?"
+
+"Prayers cannot avail me," she replied, as her thin hands reached and
+closed over one of mine. "I had hoped once more to see the majestic
+hills and smiling valleys of my own sweet land, but I shall not. If I
+could only go to sleep in the arms of my mother. But the Great Mother of
+us all will soon receive me in her bosom. And oh! my friend, promise me
+that her dust shall cover me from the sight of men. When my mother
+rocked me to slumber on her bosom, and soothed me with her gentle
+lullaby, she little dreamed that I should suffer and die first. If you
+ever reach Mizora, tell her only that I sleep the sleep of oblivion. She
+will know. Let the memory of my suffering die with me."
+
+"Oh, Wauna," I exclaimed, in anguish, "you surely have a soul. How can
+anything so young, so pure, so beautiful, be doomed to annihilation?"
+
+"We are not annihilated," was the calm reply. "And as to beauty, are
+the roses not beautiful? Yet they die and you say it is the end of the
+year's roses. The birds are harmless, and their songs make the woods
+melodious with the joy of life, yet they die, and you say they have no
+after life. We are like the roses, but our lives are for a century and
+more. And when our lives are ended, the Great Mother gathers us in. We
+are the harvest of the centuries."
+
+When the dull, gray light of the Arctic morning broke, it fell gently
+upon the presence of Death.
+
+With the assistance of the Esquimaux, a grave was dug, and a rude wooden
+cross erected on which I wrote the one word "Wauna," which, in the
+language of Mizora, means "Happiness."
+
+
+The world to which I have returned is many ages behind the civilization
+of Mizora.
+
+Though we cannot hope to attain their perfection in our generation, yet
+many, very many, evils could be obliterated were we to follow their
+laws. Crime is as hereditary as disease.
+
+No savant now denies the transmittable taint of insanity and
+consumption. There are some people in the world now, who, knowing the
+possibility of afflicting offspring with hereditary disease, have lived
+in ascetic celibacy. But where do we find a criminal who denies himself
+offspring, lest he endow posterity with the horrible capacity for murder
+that lies in his blood?
+
+The good, the just, the noble, close heart and eyes to the sweet
+allurements of domestic life, lest posterity suffer physically or
+mentally by them. But the criminal has no restraints but what the law
+enforces. Ignorance, poverty and disease, huddled in dens of
+wretchedness, where they multiply with reckless improvidence, sometimes
+fostered by mistaken charity.
+
+The future of the world, if it be grand and noble, will be the result of
+UNIVERSAL EDUCATION, FREE AS THE GOD-GIVEN WATER WE DRINK.
+
+In the United States I await the issue of universal liberty. In this
+refuge for oppression, my husband found a grave. Childless, homeless and
+friendless, in poverty and obscurity, I have written the story of my
+wanderings. The world's fame can never warm a heart already dead to
+happiness; but out of the agony of one human life, may come a lesson for
+many. Life is a tragedy even under the most favorable conditions.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mizora: A Prophecy, by Mary E. Bradley
+
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