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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..923642a --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #53193 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/53193) diff --git a/old/53193-h.zip b/old/53193-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c6eb6bf..0000000 --- a/old/53193-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/53193-h/53193-h.htm b/old/53193-h/53193-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index acbd804..0000000 --- a/old/53193-h/53193-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,4009 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=us-ascii" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Intermere, by William Alexander Taylor. - </title> - - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - -h1,h2 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -.copyright { - text-align: center; - font-size: 70%; - font-weight: bold; - text-indent: 0; - margin-top: 5em; -} - -.pub1 { - font-size: 150%; - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0; - margin-bottom: 1em; -} - -.pub2 { - font-size: 100%; - text-align: center; - font-variant: small-caps; - font-weight: bold; - text-indent: 0; - margin-top: 2em; -} - -.small {font-size: 70%;} - -.chap { - font-size: 100%; - text-align: center; - margin-bottom: 1em; -} - -.chapnum { - font-size: 200%; - font-weight: bold; - text-align: center; - margin-bottom: 1em; -} - -.author { - font-size: 170%; - font-style: italic; - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0; - margin-bottom: 1em; -} - -hr { - width: 34%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33%; - margin-right: 33%; - clear: both; -} - -hr.tb { - width: 46%; - margin-left: 27%; - margin-right: 27%; -} - -hr.chap { - width: 66%; - margin-left: 17%; - margin-right: 17%; -} - -hr.r10 { - width: 10%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 45%; - margin-right: 45%; -} - -table { - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; -} - -.tdr {text-align: right;} - -.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ - /* visibility: hidden; */ - position: absolute; - left: 92%; - font-size: smaller; - text-align: right; -} /* page numbers */ - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin-left: auto; - margin-bottom: 5em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -/* Transcriber's notes */ -.tnote { - background-color: #E6E6FA; - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; - padding-bottom: .5em; - padding-top: .5em; - padding-left: .5em; - padding-right: .5em; -} - -.tntitle { - font-size: 1.25em; - font-weight: bold; - text-align: center; - clear: both; -} - -div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} - -h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} - -</style> - - - - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Intermere, by William Alexander Taylor - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Intermere - -Author: William Alexander Taylor - -Release Date: October 2, 2016 [EBook #53193] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INTERMERE *** - - - - -Produced by Ralph and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class="tnote"> -<p class="tntitle">Transcriber's Note:</p> - -<p>Punctuation and possible typographical errors have been changed.</p> - -<p>Archaic and variable spelling have been preserved.</p> - -<p>The cover image and Table of Contents were created by the transcriber and -placed in the public domain.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span></p> - - -<div class="chapter"> -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 420px;"> -<img src="images/taylor.jpg" width="420" height="600" alt="William Alexander Taylor" /> -</div> -</div> - - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span></p> - - - -<div class="chapter"> -<h1>INTERMERE.</h1> -</div> -<hr class="r10" /> - - -<p class="author"><small>BY</small><br /> -WILLIAM<br /> -ALEXANDER<br /> -TAYLOR,<br /></p> - - -<hr class="r10" /> - -<p class="pub1">COLUMBUS, OHIO.<br /></p> - -<p class="pub1">1901 - - - 1902<br /></p> - -<p class="pub2">The XX. Century Pub. Co.</p> - - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span></p> - - - - -<div class="copyright"> -COPYRIGHT BY<br /> -WM. A. TAYLOR,<br /> -1901.<br /><br /><br /> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span></p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<blockquote> -<p>THIS IS THE STRANGE AND -REMARKABLE STORY, IN SUBSTANCE, -AND LARGELY IN DETAIL, -AS NARRATED BY GILES -HENRY ANDERTON, JOURNALIST -AND AMERICAN TOURIST.</p></blockquote> -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CONTENTS">CONTENTS</h2> - -<table summary="Table of Contents"> - <tr class="small"> - <th colspan="2" class="tdr">Page</th> - </tr> - <tr> - <th colspan="2"><a href="#I">CHAPTER I</a></th> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>The tourist lost in mid-ocean is mysteriously introduced into Intermere, and meets the first citizen and other chief officials.</td> - <td class="tdr">10</td> - </tr> - <tr> - <th colspan="2"><a href="#II">CHAPTER II</a></th> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Xamas, the first citizen, explains the polity and principles governing the Commonwealth and promoting the interests of all the people of Intermere.</td> - <td class="tdr">30</td> - </tr> - <tr> - <th colspan="2"><a href="#III">CHAPTER III</a></th> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Maros places Anderton in communication with his mother, and dissipates his superstitious ideas and otherwise enlightens him as to the possibilities of science.</td> - <td class="tdr">54</td> - </tr> - <tr> - <th colspan="2"><a href="#IV">CHAPTER IV</a></th> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>A trip by air and land and water through the provinces, cities, hamlets and gardens, with matchless beauty and enjoyment on every hand.</td> - <td class="tdr">73</td> - </tr> - <tr> - <th colspan="2"><a href="#V">CHAPTER V</a></th> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>The philosophy of life, and the faculty of its enjoyment as personified in the persons and vocations of the entertainers.</td> - <td class="tdr">95</td> - </tr> - <tr> - <th colspan="2"><a href="#VI">CHAPTER VI</a></th> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>The secret of Intermere partially revealed to Anderton, and when he least expects it he is restored to his home and kindred, much to his regret.</td> - <td class="tdr">119</td> - </tr> - <tr> - <th colspan="2"><a href="#VII">CHAPTER VII</a></th> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Le envoi.</td> - <td class="tdr">148</td> - </tr> - -</table> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="I" class="nobreak">I.</h2> -</div> - -<blockquote> - -<p>THE TOURIST LOST IN MID-OCEAN -IS MYSTERIOUSLY INTRODUCED -INTO INTERMERE, -AND MEETS THE FIRST CITIZEN -AND OTHER CHIEF OFFICIALS.</p></blockquote> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span></p> - - - - -<p class="chapnum">I.</p> - -<p class="chap">THE MISTLETOE.</p> -<hr class="r10" /> - -<p>The Mistletoe, staunch, trim and buoyant, -steamed across the equator under the -glare of a midday sun from a fleckless sky, and -began to ascend toward the antarctic circle.</p> - -<p>Three days later we came in sight of a great -bank of fog or mist, which stood like a gray -wall of stone across the entire horizon, plunged -into it and the sun disappeared—disappeared -forever to all except one of the gay and careless -crew and passengers.</p> - -<p>For days, as was shown by the ship's chronometers, -we steamed slowly on our course, surrounded -by an inky midnight, instinct with an -oppressive and fearsome calm. As we approached -the fortieth parallel of south latitude<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span> -a remarkable change set in. The deathly calm -was suddenly broken by the rush of mighty -and boisterous winds, sweeping now from one -point of the compass, and then suddenly veering -to another, churning up the waters and -spinning the Mistletoe round and round like -a top.</p> - -<p>In the midst of the terror and confusion, -heightened by the unheeded commands of the -officers, a glittering sheeny bolt, like a coruscating -column of steel, dropped straight from -the zenith, striking the gyrating Mistletoe -amidships.</p> - -<p>There was a deafening report, the air was -filled with serpentine lines of flame, followed -simultaneously by the dull explosion of the -boilers, the hissing of escaping steam, the -groaning of cordage and machinery, the lurching -of the vessel as the water poured in apparently -from a score of openings, a shuddering -vibration of all its parts, and then, amid<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span> -cries and prayers and imprecations, the -wrecked vessel shot like a plummet to the -bottom.</p> - -<p>I felt myself being dragged down to the immeasurable -watery depths, confused with roaring -sounds and oppressed with terrors indescribable -and horrible. The descent seemed -miles and miles. Then I felt myself slowly -rising toward the surface, followed by legions -of submarine monsters of grotesque shapes -and terrifying aspects.</p> - -<p>With accelerated motion I approached the -surface and, shooting like a cork above the -now calm sea, fortunately fell upon a piece of -floating wreckage. Looking upward as I lay -upon it, I saw the blue sky and the brilliant -stars far overhead. The fierce winds and inky -darkness and blackness of the night were disappearing -beyond the northeastern horizon.</p> - -<p>I tried to concentrate my scattered thoughts -and piece out the awful catastrophe that had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span> -befallen the ship and my companions, but the -effort was too great a strain and I ceased to -think—perhaps I ceased to exist.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>I seemed to be passing through a vague -twilight of sentient existence. Thought was -rudimentary with me, if, indeed, there were -any thoughts. They were mere sensations, -perhaps, or impressions imperfectly shaped, -but I remember them now as being so delightful, -that I prayed, in a feeble way, that I might -never be awakened from them. And then -gradually the senses of sight, hearing, and full -physical and mental existence returned to me.</p> - -<p>At length I was able to determine that I lay -on something like a hammock on the deck of -a smoothly gliding vessel. Turning my head -first to the right and then to the left, I imagined -that I was indeed in Paradise, only the -reality before me was so infinitely more beautiful -than the most vivid poetic descriptions I -had ever read of the longed for heaven of endless<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span> -peace and happiness. But this could not -be the Paradise of the disembodied souls, for -I realized I was there in all my physical -personal being.</p> - -<p>I was sailing through a smooth, shimmering -sea, thickly studded with matchlessly beautiful -islands. They lay in charming profusion and -picturesque irregularity of contour on the right -and the left, each a distinct type of beauty and -perfection. I could make out houses and gardens -and farms and people on each of them.</p> - -<p>Looking to the right I saw what appeared to -be a mainland with majestic and softly modulated -mountains and broad valleys, running -from the distance down to the sands of the -seashore. Above the mountains shone the unobscured -sun, but not the burning orb I had -known of old in the lower latitudes. It kissed -me with a tenderness that was entrancing, -filling my weakened frame with new life.</p> - -<p>The breezes toyed with my tangled and unkempt<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span> -locks, fanned my brow and whispered -such things to me as did the zephyrs when I -stood upon the threshold of guileless boyhood.</p> - -<p>Finally I was able to frame a consecutive -thought, in the interrogative form, and it was -this:</p> - -<p>"Where am I? Is this the Heaven my -mother taught me to seek?"</p> - -<p>I had as yet seen no one aboard the ship, or -whatever it was, although I had heard the hum -of what seemed to be conversation from some -point beyond the line of vision. Again I silently -repeated my mental question.</p> - -<p>As if in response to my unuttered query, a -being, or a man, of striking and pleasing appearance -came to my side and laying his hand -softly on my forehead, addressed me in a -tongue at once familiar but wholly unknown, -as paradoxical as that may sound.</p> - -<p>I remained silent and he again addressed me.</p> - -<p>I did not feel disconcerted or awed by his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span> -appearance and said: "I speak French and -German imperfectly; English with some -fluency."</p> - -<p>His rejoinder was in English: "You speak -English, but are not an Englishman except by -partial descent. You are an American. Not -a native of the eastern portion of the continent, -but from west of the range of mountains -which separate the Atlantic seaboard -from the great central valley of the continent. -You are from the tributary Ohio valley, and -are, therefore, better fitted to comprehend what -you will be permitted to see and hear, than the -average habitant of the eastern seashore, -especially of its great cities."</p> - -<p>You can possibly imagine, in a faint way, my -unbounded surprise to be thus addressed by -one who was more than a stranger to me.</p> - -<p>"You asked yourself two questions. I will -answer the first: You are in Intermere."</p> - -<p>"And where is Intermere?"</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span></p> - -<p>"It lies at your feet and expands on every -hand about you. Let that suffice.</p> - -<p>"No, this is not the Heaven to which your -mother taught you to aspire. It is a part of -your own planet, inhabited by beings sprung -from the same parent stock as yourself, but -differing from all other nations and peoples; a -people who are many steps nearer to the -higher and better life, and is, by comparison, -the Paradise or Eden that masks the gateway -of the true Heaven, in a sphere beyond in the -great Universe."</p> - -<p>He motioned to some one, and two persons -appeared with refreshments.</p> - -<p>"Partake," he said, "and renew your exhausted -physical and mental powers."</p> - -<p>The proffered refreshments and cordials -seemed to be the acme of the gustatorial -dreams of my former life: the suggestion of -other things, yet unlike them. After I had -partaken, a new life thrilled every nerve and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span> -fibre of my physical being and pulsated -through every mental faculty.</p> - -<p>I arose from my recumbent position and was -conducted forward upon the softly carpeted -deck and presented to a score of others who -received me with every token of marked respect, -unkempt and bedraggled as I was. They -were men of unusual physique, a composite of -the highest types of the human race I had ever -seen or read of. Each possessed a distinctive -mien and personality, as individuals, yet presenting -a harmonious whole, taken collectively.</p> - -<p>Xamas, as I afterward learned to know him, -when I saw him presiding as First Citizen over -this wonderful people, said to his fellows:</p> - -<p>"This is Giles Henry Anderton, a citizen of -the interior of the great Republic of North -America. I have fathomed him and know that -he is worthy our respect and considerate treatment. -He has dreamed longingly of the things -whereof we know, and which he has never even<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span> -recognized as a possibility. It will be our mission -to show him the grand possibilities of -human life before we restore him to his kindred -and friends.</p> - -<p>"Not understanding that Nature had lain all -treasures worth possessing in lavish profusion -at his feet in his own land, and guided by -merely commercial instincts, he sought for -paltry gold in distant lands and seas, and, escaping -the vortex of death, has been placed in -our hands for some great purpose. He will be -addressed in the English tongue until it is determined -whether he is to be admitted to ours."</p> - -<p>This was spoken in a language absolutely -unknown to me, and not a word of which I was -capable of framing, and yet I understood it as -fully as though spoken in English. So great -was my amazement that he should know my -nativity, my name, my hopes, my ambitions -and my purposes, I could scarcely reply to the -salutations extended to me.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span></p> - -<p>"Do not be surprised," said Xamas, reading -my inmost thoughts, "at what I say, nor need -you ask how I became possessed of your history. -All that will be made plain to you hereafter."</p> - -<p>Turning to one who stood near, he said: -"Conduct Mr. Anderton to my apartments and -see that he has proper 'tendance and is supplied -with suitable clothing."</p> - -<p>With that I was conducted below to a charming -suite of apartments lying amidships, bathed, -was massaged and shaven by an attendant, -as lofty of mien as Xamas himself, and furnished -with clothing suitable to the company -with which I was to mingle, not more unlike -the workmanship of my American tailor than -his would be unlike the handiwork of his -French, English or German fellow-craftsmen, -and yet so unlike all of them as to fit perfectly -into the ensemble of the habiliments of my new -friends.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span></p> - -<p>The ship, or Merocar, as I subsequently -learned was its general designation, was a marvellous -affair, unlike any water craft I had -ever seen. Its length was fully one hundred -and fifty feet, and its greatest breadth thirty, -gently sloping both to stem and stern, where -it rounded in perfect curves. The upper, or -proper deck, extended over all. The lower -deck was a succession of suites and apartments, -richly but artistically furnished, opening -from either side into a wide and roomy -aisle. All the work was so light, both the -woods, and the metals, that it seemed fragile -and unsafe, but its great strength was shown -by the fact that none of its parts yielded to -the weight or pressure upon it.</p> - -<p>There was not a mast, a spar nor a sail on -board. The light and richly wrought hammocks -swung on lithe and polished frames, apparently -intended to sustain the weight of fifty -pounds, yet capable of sustaining five or ten<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> -times as much. They were unprotected by -awnings. Sunlight rather than shade was apparently -the desideratum.</p> - -<p>In some unaccountable way the long and -lithe Merocar was propelled at any desired -rate of speed, and was turned, as on a pivot, -at the will of the man who acted as captain, -pilot and engineer. There was no steam, no -furnace belching black volumes of smoke, no -whirr of machinery, no strain or creaking as -the craft shot, sometimes swiftly, sometimes -slowly, through the rippling water. Even motion -was not perceptible to the physical senses.</p> - -<p>The captain-pilot-engineer did not tug at a -wheel in his railed-in apartment, elevated a few -feet above the center of the upper deck. He -placed his hand upon the table before him and -it shot forward with incredible speed; he -touched another point and it stood still, without -jar or vibration. A movement of the hand, -and the prow of the Merocar swept gracefully<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span> -from north to east in less than its length, to -pass between two beautiful islets or round -some sharp promontory. Hundreds of other -Merocars, differing in size and form, were -visible.</p> - -<p>How they were propelled was so incomprehensible -to me that I attributed it to supernatural -agencies. I learned that it was a simpler -process than the utilization of oars, or -sails, or steam, which the progenitors of these -mariners had abandoned before the days of -Tyre and Sidon and Memphis and Thebes.</p> - -<p>Rejoining the company, I endeavored to carry -on a conversation with them, but I fear I made -little headway, so deeply was I absorbed in the -wonderful panorama that lay before me.</p> - -<p>Raising my eyes from the shimmering, island-studded -and beauty-bestrewn sea to the blue -above, I uttered an ejaculation of surprise at -what I beheld. There I saw "the airy navies" -of which Tennyson had written under the spell<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> -of an inspiration which must have been wafted -from this unknown land, but marred by the -hostile environments of his own.</p> - -<p>Every quarter of the heavens disclosed graceful -barques sailing hither and thither, passing -and repassing each other, gathering in groups, -filled with people, many of them holding -mute communications with my companions, as -though friend were talking with friend, without -utterance, sign or gesture.</p> - -<p>"I am beyond the confines of earth," I said -to Xamas. "This is a higher and spiritual -sphere, and I am not Giles Henry Anderton, -but his disembodied spirit."</p> - -<p>"You are at fault. You are within the mundane -sphere, but with a people infinitely in -advance of yours—a people who, by evolutionary -processes, have unlocked a large proportion -of the secrets of Nature and the Universe, -and turned them to ennobling ends, not to -selfish purposes. These facts will come to you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span> -in time, and you will be convinced.</p> - -<p>"See," he continued, "the city is slowly coming -into view across the horizon."</p> - -<p>My glance followed to the point indicated, -and I saw a city of ineffable magnificence, softly -rising from the bosom of the deep, as though -obedient to the wand of a master magician.</p> - -<p>Soon I could see that it swept around the -broad semicircle of the bay, many miles in -extent and artistically perfect in contour, the -land rising gently from the strand into a grand -and massive elevation, cut into great squares -and circles, and crowned with noble buildings, -great and small, in a style of architecture which -embraced all the beauties and none of the -blemishes of European and American creations. -It was the full and perfect flower of the -crude buds of other lands.</p> - -<p>For a time my companions remained silent -as I contemplated the entrancing scene and -drank in its beauties. Then Xamas interrupted -me:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></p> - -<p>"Yesterday the allied armies of the Western -Nations entered the capital of China, and are -now bivouacked in the Forbidden City, from -which the Empress, Emperor and Court have -fled."</p> - -<p>I shook my head incredulously:</p> - -<p>"When I sailed from New York six months -ago there was no thought of war between any -of the Western Nations and the Chinese Empire. -Russia may have invaded one of its provinces -by way of reprisal. That is a possibility."</p> - -<p>"Great events focus and transpire within six -months. What I tell you is true. The hostile -standards of England, Russia, Germany, -France, Japan, and your own Republic, which -has departed from its wise traditions, flout the -Yellow Dragon in the precincts of his own citadel -and temple. Is not this true, Maros?" -turning to one who looked the prophet and -seer.</p> - -<p>"Aye, indeed, and the best loved of this man's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> -kindred fell in the assault. He will know if I -am permitted to name him."</p> - -<p>"Shall he be permitted?"</p> - -<p>"Freely."</p> - -<p>"Albert Marshall, a sergeant of Marines, -your playmate and foster brother, the next beloved -of your mother, the son of her deceased -sister; your mother reared him as her own son, -and she knows, as yet, nothing of the disaster -which has befallen you nor the loss of her foster -son. He was of your own age, and like you -tall, athletic and vigorous, with fair hair and -complexion and blue eyes, the very counterpart -of yourself—a man fit for a higher destiny -than butchery."</p> - -<p>"O Albert! O unhappy, stricken mother!" I -cried in agony.</p> - -<p>"Revered sir, I believe your words. They -are absolutely convincing. Tell me how you -came into possession of this strange information."</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span></p> - -<p>"In time; but be patient. Lament not for -the dead; sorrow not for the living. We must -presently debark. Come to my garden tomorrow. -It lies within the shadow of the Temple -of Thought, Memory and Hope. My home is -unpretentious, but you will be welcome. There -is need that you should come. Tomorrow your -mother will be apprised of the death of your -kinsman; almost simultaneously will come rumors -of your shipwreck. She must be assured -of your safety within twenty-four hours, if you -hope to meet her again."</p> - -<p>"But how can I com——"</p> - -<p>"Peace, patience; sufficient unto tomorrow -is the labor and issue thereof."</p> - -<p>The Merocar gently ran into its slip, and we -debarked, Xamas carrying me to his home in a -vehicle of strange design and mysterious power -of propulsion.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span></p> - - - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="II" class="nobreak">II.</h2> -</div> - -<blockquote> - -<p>XAMAS, THE FIRST CITIZEN, EXPLAINS -THE POLITY AND PRINCIPLES -GOVERNING THE COMMONWEALTH -AND PROMOTING -THE INTERESTS OF ALL THE -PEOPLE OF INTERMERE.</p></blockquote> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span></p> - - - - -<p class="chapnum">II.</p> - -<p class="chap">THE FIRST CITIZEN.</p> -<hr class="r10" /> - -<p>I shall so far anticipate as to say that -the city in which I found myself was known as -the Greater City, in contradistinction of the -Lesser City, lying at the opposite end of the -inland sea or mere.</p> - -<p>This body of water extends in an oval shape -or form north and south, its length being approximately -four hundred miles, and its greatest -width at the latitudinal center two hundred -miles, gradually narrowing toward the opposite -extremes, where it gently expands into -rounded bays, forming the extended water -fronts of both cities.</p> - -<p>The Greater City was clearly the original -seat of the present civilization, from which it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span> -extended southward along both shores until -it met at the southern apex and became the -Lesser City. I was able, however, to distinguish -but little, if any, difference between the two.</p> - -<p>The twelve hundred miles of shore line is -studded with farms, gardens, towns, villages, -hamlets, private residences and public edifices, -extending over highland and plain, as far as I -was permitted to see, toward the outer boundaries, -the location and character of which I -can not even conjecture.</p> - -<p>Many rivers, limpid and sparkling, coming -through level and spreading valleys, and from -almost every point, contribute their waters to -the mere.</p> - -<p>The current of the mere is phenomenal—not -violent, but distinctively marked. Twice within -every twenty-four hours it sweeps entirely -around the oval, affecting one-half of the mere -as it moves. With the early hours of the morning<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span> -and evening it sweeps from north to south -throughout the eastern, and with noon and -midnight through the western half of the sea.</p> - -<p>This current may be described as anti- or -trans-tidal; that is, the general water level -falls or is lowered on the side where the current -runs, and rises correspondingly in the opposite -half.</p> - -<p>The effect is this: From 6 a. m. to 12 noon -and from 6 p. m. to midnight, throughout the -eastern half, the tide runs in from those rivers -falling in from the east, and correspondingly -rises and moves inland in those falling in from -the west, and then the current flows north on -the western side from 12 noon to 6 p. m. and -from midnight to 6 a. m., so that for half the -time the rivers on either side ebb or flow into -the sea, and for the other twelve hours rise and -flow to the interior, east or west as the case -may be.</p> - -<p>The effect of this is singular indeed, or it was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span> -to me. The rivers appear to run inland from -the sea a part of the time, and then run from -the landward into the sea for twelve hours, or -an equal period, while the sea itself appears -to be a subdivided river forever flowing in an -elongated circle along the opposite shores.</p> - -<p>The description of the Egyptian high priest, -carefully guarded by his successors for nine -thousand years, then revealed to Solon, and by -Solon narrated to Plato, and by Plato transmitted -to the modern world, must have had its -basis here. Is not this the Atlantis which enthralled -the Egyptian sage, philosopher and -priest more than ten cycles ago?</p> - -<p>To the Egyptian the ever-flowing rivers returned -to their common source through valleys -and landscapes of ravishing beauty, renewing -themselves forever. They laved the feet of cities, -irrigated the endless succession of farms, -gardens and residential demesnes, and mirrored -the mountains, clothed with perpetual<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span> -verdure and crowned with the stately monuments -of genius, wisdom, art, civilization, -learning and human progress, a century of -centuries agone.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>I have spoken of the singular vehicle in -which, with Xamas, I left the pier and ascended -the gentle slope into the city. It might be -likened, faintly however, to the best types of -our automobiles. But the comparison would -be much like that between the ox-cart and the -landau.</p> - -<p>It more resembled a double-seated chair set -upon several small elastic wheels, scarcely -visible beneath the rich trappings which -dropped almost to the smooth street, as scrupulously -clean as a ballroom floor.</p> - -<p>Xamas pushed a tiny lever, almost hidden in -the rich upholstery of the arm-rest, and it -moved swiftly and noiselessly forward without -jar or oscillation. A delicate and a deftly concealed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span> -spring guided it along the graceful -curves of the streets, or sent it at a right angle -when the streets crossed at tangents.</p> - -<p>An adjustment lowered the speed to a strolling -pace; another movement gave a high speed, -while the reversal of the lever brought us to a -standstill that I might silently admire some -stately architectural pile or revel in the contemplation -of some lovely private home.</p> - -<p>As we journeyed Xamas said: "Ask with all -frankness such questions as you desire. Wisdom -is the child of patience, so be neither impatient, -if the answer is not immediate, or if -it is at first incomprehensible. It will be some -time before your understanding can grasp all -that you see or all that you hear.</p> - -<p>"Your people undertake the impossible feat -of putting a gallon of grain into a pint vase. -Result: The vase is crushed and broken and -the grain is spilled and lost. The human mind -is the vase; Knowledge is the grain, from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span> -which Wisdom will germinate. The vase expands -by a process too subtle for your comprehension. -To crowd it beyond its capacity with -the idea of expanding its receptiveness is a -dangerous and fatal folly. That is why mental -dwarfs multiply and mental giants diminish -in proportion to the increase of your people. -Two things are uppermost in your mind:</p> - -<p>"First, you believe you are in a supernatural -sphere and surrounded by a supernatural people. -In this you are absolutely at fault. Accept -this assurance without reservation. You -will tarry with us long enough to fully comprehend -that fact. You will see nothing during -your stay that can not be accounted for on -natural and scientific grounds.</p> - -<p>"Second, you are consumed with curiosity to -know how I propel this Medocar and make it -obey my every wish, so to speak. The full explanation -of that I shall delegate to another, -who will acquaint you with our mechanisms<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span> -and the principle that moves them.</p> - -<p>"When you have patiently and intelligently -listened to him you will know that we have -achieved what your wisest and deepest and -least appreciated thinkers have but vaguely -dreamed of and hoped for during long and intermittent -periods. But here we are at my -residence. Let us enter and I will introduce -you to my family and friends."</p> - -<p>The Medocar halted with the last word in -front of a two-storied, many-gabled house with -broad verandas, situated in the center of spacious -grounds, beautified with trees and shrubs -and flowers and bubbling fountains.</p> - -<p>Ushering me into a spacious reception hall, -he presented me to his wife and children—grown-up -sons and daughters—and then to a -number of men and women who had called -to greet him, some on social affairs and some -on matters of public business, concluding with: -"Mr. Anderton is a castaway from the other<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span> -side of the world, who is entitled to our sympathy -and care."</p> - -<p>If my newly made acquaintances were curious -as to my being, personality and history, -they had masterful control of their feelings. -In all things they treated me with the most refined -courtesy and gentle consideration. They -did not embarrass me with expressions of pity -or consolatory suggestions.</p> - -<p>They addressed me in my own language, -made me feel that I was welcome to their society. -Each extended an invitation to me to -visit them at their homes, some of them in -distant provinces, and these invitations were -gratefully accepted. There could be no mistaking -the deep sincerity they implied.</p> - -<p>After an hour's pleasant conversation on -many and varied subjects with my host and -his guests, Xamas led me to a suite of apartments -intended for my use, and said:</p> - -<p>"Attendants will provide you with refreshments<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span> -and ascertain your every want. Rest -and fully recuperate. Later in the day I shall -explain to you the polity of our Commonwealth, -in which I perceive you are deeply interested."</p> - -<p>What a remarkable man! He seemed to read -my inmost thoughts.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>As the sun was hanging like a softly beaming -lamp above a cone-like mountain beyond -the western line of the Greater City, Xamas -and I were alone upon an open veranda, overgrown -with clambering vines of many kinds -in full bloom, radiant with exquisite colors and -shades. He abruptly said to me:</p> - -<p>"This Commonwealth is a pure democracy. -Titles and offices confer no merely meretricious -distinctions. They temporarily impose additional -responsibilities, duties and burdens; the -chief distinction of the citizen is conferred by -labor, for labor is honorable and praiseworthy -above all things else. The second is justice.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span> -When and where all men labor and all men are -just, there can be no wrong, no sin, no evil. -Where there is labor and not justice, the strong -enjoy, the weak suffer and endure, opulence -flourishes for the few, pain and poverty afflict -the many. Where there is neither labor nor -justice, where might makes right, barbarism -in its worst form curses the land.</p> - -<p>"The ascent from the third condition to the -first is a highway leading through the second, -where labor is oppressed and justice is a stranger, -until at last justice and labor join hands -and produce a happy and a great people. I -touch only on the three cardinal points. The -process of ascent is slow and purely evolutionary—an -evolution that constantly conforms -itself to ever-changing environments.</p> - -<p>"Your own so-called Declaration of Independence, -which so many of your people do not -care to comprehend, was drawn from the keystone -of our own national arch—Human Equality,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span> -the climax of human civilization and happiness.</p> - -<p>"Thousands of years before the feet of the -more modern Europeans trode the soil of your -continent we had reached this point, and discovered -that we had but reached the initial -period of our usefulness and higher destiny.</p> - -<p>"It required centuries to expel first the animal -instincts, and then the barbarian nature -from our race, not by savage repression and -ruthless aggression and slaughter, but by the -study and application of the laws of Nature -and the Universe, which at last ultimated in -the principle and entity of Brotherhood and -the equality of all men—not equality of stature, -mental equipment or material endowment, -but the equality of common rights and common -opportunities. Labor and Justice maintain -and preserve this equality and Brotherhood.</p> - -<p>"Thousands of years before Magna Charta<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span> -we had founded our Commonwealth on the -great principles of human equality and the -right of life, liberty and the pursuit of rational -happiness, and my ancestors, comprehending -the profound laws of Nature unknown to yours, -wafted to them these precious seed, trusting -that they would fall on genial and generous -soil, and the inspiration thus transmitted -through the agency of our progenitors was inscribed -by yours upon rescript of your national -autonomy.</p> - -<p>"Its growth, once so promising, has become -painful and pitiable. The upas of human greed -and selfishness withers it, and the prophecy of -bloom and fruitage is unfulfilled. The animal -instinct and the barbarous appetite which -reaches after the gaud and tinsel of excessive -wealth and accumulation, the two aggressive -forms of selfishness combined in one, hold civilization -and human progress in check, and -may in your case, as in a thousand others, lead<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span> -back to the fen and morass of primal barbarism.</p> - -<p>"No, this is not the Paradise of Socialism, as -you call it," said he, interpreting the thread of -my thought. "That is but an idle dream, the -recrudescence of primal, undeveloped and undesirable -conditions, which occasionally flashes -through irresolute minds, unfitted to solve the -great problem of human existence and happiness.</p> - -<p>"This is the land of absolute individuality -as well as absolute equality. Every man who -reaches maturity becomes the individual owner -of property in one or more of its forms, the -foundation being the soil for residence or productive -purposes, or both, at his option. All -lands are subject to individual ownership, -within clearly defined limits, the public domain -being held in reserve to meet new demands -of increasing population. It is the -common property of all until it passes into<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span> -individual ownership, to be used for agricultural -or other purposes, under fixed rules, a specific -proportion of the product, or its equivalent, -being turned into the common treasury, -to prosecute public improvements and for other -public purposes.</p> - -<p>"This stands in lieu of taxation in other -countries, and it is only on rare occasions that -it is necessary to supplement it with a direct -tax on the people, except as to the municipal -and provincial taxes for local purposes, in -which case each man of mature age, or twenty-five -years, pays the one hundredth part of his -earnings monthly into the treasury, the sum -thus paid being evenly divided between the -treasuries of the province and municipal division. -When a surplus equal to the previous -year's expenditures accumulates this tax is remitted -for the ensuing year.</p> - -<p>"A man may own a home and a separate -farm or garden, or business or manufacturing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span> -site; nor may he engage in more than one business -or employment, except the public service, -at the same time. He may change from one -line of business to another, but may not buy -or sell real estate for mere speculation. He -may not acquire property other than his earnings -until he reaches maturity, and designs to -marry and become the head of a family. If -his intent fail, or remains unfulfilled for three -years, the home thus acquired becomes public -property, and may be sold to another who assumes -the marital relation, and the proceeds -divided equally between the municipal treasury -or bank and the former owner.</p> - -<p>"Residences may be exchanged, as may -farms, gardens, business sites and factories, -including the line of business or manufacturing, -but neither may be alienated by the owner, -except with the approval of the Custodian of -the Municipality upon a satisfactory showing -of the reasons therefor.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span></p> - -<p>"All persons of both sexes must take up an -occupation at the age of twenty, and continue -therein, or in some other occupation, until sixty -years of age, unless incapacitated, and deposit -in the municipal bank or treasury at least one-twentieth -of their monthly earnings. At sixty -they may retire from active life, and their accumulations -are subject to their wants and demands -under salutary rules. The residue, along -with their other personal property, is distributed -pro rata among their direct descendants, -and if there be none, in is turned into the general -treasury of the Commonwealth.</p> - -<p>"Women are entitled to their earnings, but -may not own real estate, the policy being that -men shall be the home-makers and women the -home-keepers. The wife is entitled to the prevailing -wage from her husband for attending -to his household affairs, in addition to the other -provisions for household matters and economies -which he must make.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span></p> - -<p>"Under our system there is neither opulence -nor poverty in the land. Great wealth has no -existence with us, and therefore has no allurements. -Charity is not a gaunt pack-horse, overloaded -with offerings which come after the -eleventh hour. The equality of opportunity -closes every inlet to the wolves of Hunger and -Poverty which ravage other lands amid the -riotous revelry of the unjustly opulent. We -have had, at intervals, persons who rebelled, -through recurrent heredity perhaps, against -our admirable system, and to them we administer -lex dernier—they are transported to some -other land, by methods known only to ourselves, -there to mingle with a new people, with -but a faint conception of their nativity. They -constitute those mysterious beings found in all -other countries, whose origin is forever hidden, -and as a rule they are excellent and strangely -wise citizens, for they are permitted to carry -with them much of the knowledge, with some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span> -of the wisdom, of their ancestry."</p> - -<p>I shall abbreviate much that Xamas gave in -great detail. From him I learned that every -male is entitled to participate in all public affairs, -including the right of franchise. All are -eligible to office. The Commonwealth is composed -of twenty-four provinces, each province -being composed of twelve municipal divisions.</p> - -<p>The elective officers are, in their order: -1. First Citizen of the Commonwealth. 2. Chief -Citizen of the Province. 3. Custodian of the -Municipality.</p> - -<p>The First Citizen is the executive head of -the Commonwealth, serves but a single year, -and is not eligible to re-election. The Chief -Citizens, or executives of the provinces, constitute -his Board of Counselors to determine -all matters affecting the public welfare and -to select the various Curators of the divisional -interests of the entire Commonwealth. They -meet to perform these duties twice each year,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span> -alternating between the Greater and Lesser -Cities.</p> - -<p>The Chief Citizens are the executive heads -of the Provinces, the Custodians of the Municipalities -constituting their respective Boards -of Counsellors. They, too, meet twice each -year to consider and determine matters of -provincial interest, and to decide all questions -of difference which may come up from the -Municipalities. Their tenure of office is two -years, and they are not eligible to re-election.</p> - -<p>The Custodians are the sole heads of the -Municipalities, and decide all questions arising -therein, and appeal lies from their decisions -to the Provincial Board of Counsellors, who -determine the question finally. They hold the -office three years, and may not be re-elected. -The above officials appoint all the necessary -clerical and other assistants necessary to carry -out the duties imposed on them.</p> - -<p>None of the elective officers receive salaries,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span> -but are allowed out of their respective treasuries -20 media per day for all necessary expenses.</p> - -<p>The media is equivalent to 20 cents American -currency, and is the unit of exchange. It -is divided into four equal parts, the coin being -designated quatro, while a third coin, equivalent -to 5 media, is denominated cinque, so -that the three coins are quatro, silver; media, -gold; and cinque, gold and platinum in equal -parts, of nearly equal size and weight, representing -five, twenty, and one hundred cents of -our currency, and nearly the size of an American -quarter-dollar.</p> - -<p>Twenty media is the wage of the master -artisan, and 15 media the wage of all other -males. Females receive a wage of from 8 to 15 -media. The master artisan's wage is the compensation -of all official assistants in whatever -capacity, as well as the expense allowance of -the actual officials.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span></p> - -<p>In addition to the above officials of the Commonwealth -there are: Curator of Revenues; -Curator of Works and Polity; Curator of -Learning and Progress; Curator of Scientific -Research and Application, and Curator of Useful -Mechanical Devices. Their duties are suggested -by their titles. They receive the expense -allowance, no salaries, are chosen for -terms of seven years, ineligible to a second -term, by the First Citizen and his Counsellors, -and appoint their own subordinates and assistants.</p> - -<p>There is a Curator of Revenue appointed by -the Chief Citizen of each Province to care for -the provincial, and by the Municipal Custodian -to care for the Municipal revenues.</p> - -<p>The marriageable age of men is from 25 to -30, and women from 20 to 25. The offspring -of the marriage relation varies from two to six, -seldom less than two, or more than six, the -average being four, hence population increases<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span> -slowly, while the great majority live from 80 -to 100 years, retaining both physical and mental -faculties to the last.</p> - -<p>"There is no mercenary incentive to hold -office," said Xamas, "and it is absolutely open -to all, and men leave it, not with regret, but -with the consciousness of having performed -a necessary duty and service. Three months -hence I will leave the chief office of the State, -and resume my occupation as mechanical engineer -under one with whom I have been for -a score or more of years. He is now my Secretary, -but that is nothing unusual. It is a -leading part of our history.</p> - -<p>"But it is time for rest. You have an important -engagement with Maros, our Curator -of Scientific Research and Application, tomorrow -morning, and he exacts promptitude."</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span></p> - - - - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="III" class="nobreak">III.</h2> -</div> - -<blockquote> - -<p>MAROS PLACES ANDERTON IN -COMMUNICATION WITH HIS -MOTHER, AND DISSIPATES HIS -SUPERSTITIOUS IDEAS AND -OTHERWISE ENLIGHTENS HIM -AS TO THE POSSIBILITIES OF -SCIENCE.</p></blockquote> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span></p> - - - - -<p class="chapnum">III.</p> - -<p class="chap">A DAY WITH MAROS.</p> -<hr class="r10" /> - -<p>I called on Maros, the Curator of Scientific -Research and Application, as per appointment, -and found him surrounded with -everything calculated to contribute to the enjoyments -of earthly existence. His residence -differed in many respects from that of Xamas. -All its appointments and environments were -in the most exquisite taste. But this may be -said, once for all, of every private residence -and public edifice in Intermere. The taste of -architects and occupants differed, but all were -on lines of beauty, comfort and convenience.</p> - -<p>There is no luxury in Intermere, as we use -the term. Luxury is a merely comparative -term in the rest of the world, distinguishing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span> -those who have much from those who have -little or nothing. Here every rational taste -is gratified in all particulars. The people have -clearly discovered the hidden springs of Nature's -kindly intentions toward man, and utilize -them at individual and collective will.</p> - -<p>"You are prompt," said Maros, seating me -in his study. "Let us proceed with the matter -in which you are interested."</p> - -<p>He placed before me a perfectly drawn map -of a section of the United States, embracing -the place of my nativity, and asked me to point -out the exact vicinity of my mother's home. I -found it readily.</p> - -<p>"The point you now occupy is the lineal opposite. -Turn to the point, or direction, you -have designated, and direct your concentrated -thought there. If a responsive impression -comes to you, communicate its purport to me."</p> - -<p>I sat in silent thought a few moments, Maros -closely regarding me.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span></p> - -<p>"I am impressed that my mother is prostrated -with grief; that she has just learned of -the death of my kinsman; that rumors of the -loss of the Mistletoe have reached her, being -first cabled from Singapore to New York, and -from thence transmitted to the press, and that -she is impressed with the belief that I, too, am -dead. I fear that she will not survive the double -shock."</p> - -<p>"Frame such a thought as you would wish -impressed upon your mother's consciousness -and faith, and tell me what follows."</p> - -<p>This is the thought I framed: "Mother, I am -alive and well in an unknown land, surrounded -by kind friends, and will ere long return to -you."</p> - -<p>Later to Maros: "I am convinced. My mother -has partially recovered from the shock. My -death would have been the fatal blow. She -smiles with pious resignation, through the -tempest of her grief, and extends her arms as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span> -if to embrace me. This, however, is wholly an -impression; I do not see or hear her, but we -seem to stand face to face, and both realize it."</p> - -<p>"Give yourself no further concern, nor seek -further communication with her until you -meet her in person. She knows you are alive -and will return to her. Nothing she will hear -will change that belief."</p> - -<p>"Tell me by what divine or celestial power -I am thus enabled to project my thoughts -across unknown seas and continents, and receive -responsive thoughts. Only supernatural -agencies could accomplish this."</p> - -<p>"You have what you call the telephone?"</p> - -<p>"Yes."</p> - -<p>"You communicate alike with friends and -strangers hundreds of miles distant in an ordinary -tone of voice?"</p> - -<p>"Yes."</p> - -<p>"Is that supernatural?"</p> - -<p>"No; it is the result of scientific achievement<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span> -and natural phenomena."</p> - -<p>"Would one, coming out of the depths of absolute -ignorance of scientific achievement, as -you call it, regard it as a supernatural -agency?"</p> - -<p>"He undoubtedly would."</p> - -<p>"What would you think of his conclusion?"</p> - -<p>"That it was the result of superstition."</p> - -<p>"And yet you who have just stepped out of -the dawn into the full day; you who have transmitted -uttered thoughts to remote distances -through a coarse steel or copper wire and received -other uttered thoughts in return, regard -with superstitious awe, as supernatural, -what you have just experienced. Wherein do -you differ from the untutored barbarian?"</p> - -<p>I sat in silence.</p> - -<p>"The telephone wire is to the thread of sentient -thought which may span the universe -itself, what the horseback mail-rider is to your -modern methods of communication—what the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span> -earliest dawn is to the full day."</p> - -<p>Maros explained at full length how he became -possessed of the knowledge of my identity, -family connections and my misfortunes, -summing up:</p> - -<p>"When you were found in the remote and -outer ocean and brought within the precincts -of Intermere, you were physically unconscious, -but still possessing partially dormant mental -faculties; that is, you continued to think feebly -and intermittently. We traced your two intermittent -lines of thought to your mother in -America, and to, or rather toward, your kinsman -at some unknown point. Tracing again -to your parent we learned that Marshall had -accompanied the American expedition to China -from Manila. Following this clew, we ascertained -that he had been killed, and that that -fact would reach his home in due course, as -well as the fact that information of the loss -of your ship would reach America almost<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span> -simultaneously. What your mother now regards -as premonitions of impending evil or -misfortunes were communications with her -consciousness, far more refined and perfect -than the subsequent cable communications, -but quite as natural, and in no sense supernatural."</p> - -<p>"This is indeed amazing!" I exclaimed.</p> - -<p>He further said that this was an individual -case and purely the result of my condition. -"We do not seek, as a rule, knowledge of individualities -in the outside world, but confine -our inquiries to matters of general moment. -We know of the steps of progress, retrogression, -of savagery and butchery and wrong and -oppression which dominate an embryotic civilization. -Amuse yourself for a time with the -pictures and tapestries, and I will give you a -record of the outer world's important matters -of yesterday."</p> - -<p>He opened a cabinet, and assumed the mien<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span> -of expectant inquiry and meditation. Soon -his hands began to move with rhythmic rapidity -over the curiously inlaid center of the flat -surface of the open cabinet. At the end of ten -or fifteen minutes his manipulations ceased, -a compartment above noiselessly opened, and -eight beautifully printed pages, four by six -inches, bound in the form of a booklet, fell -upon the table.</p> - -<p>It was printed in characters more graceful -than our own Roman letters, from which they -might have been evolved, or the Roman Alphabet -might have deteriorated from what appeared -before me. The English language was -not used, and yet I could readily read and -comprehend the lines. The pages before me -comprised a compendium of yesterday's doings -of the entire world, and included a note of my -own case.</p> - -<p>They told of all the military operations in -China, in the Philippines, in South Africa,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span> -in the far East and in the remote West; of -labor troubles in the mining districts of America; -the strike of the textile operatives on our -Atlantic border; the unrest of the Finns and -Slavs; of plots and counterplots, and political -assassination and revolution, attempted or accomplished, -and the full catalogue of such happenings, -with now and then a flash of loftier -civilization.</p> - -<p>"What you read is being reproduced in every -divisional municipality of the Commonwealth, -with such a number of instantaneous -duplications as may be required for the perusal -and study of all who desire to compare -tinseled and ornamented barbarism with true -civilization.</p> - -<p>"Selfishness, oppression, slaughter, pride, -conquest, greed, vanity, self-adulation and -base passions make up ninety-nine one-hundredths -of this record. What a commentary -on such humanity! To it love, brotherhood<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span> -and mutual helpfulness are too trivial for serious -consideration.</p> - -<p>"The nations and their rulers, differing -somewhat as to degree, stand for organized -and dominant wrong, based primarily on selfishness—the -exact reverse of the conditions -that should exist."</p> - -<p>"This," said I, still contemplating the pages, -"compares with our newspapers."</p> - -<p>"As two objects may compare with each -other as to bulk or form, but in no other respect. -This is to promote wisdom. The newspaper -to feed vicious or depraved appetite, as -well as to convey useful information. This is -the cold, colorless, passionless record of facts -and information, from which knowledge and -wisdom may be deduced to some extent. Your -newspaper is the opposite, taken in its entirety. -It consists of the inextricable mingling -together of the good and the bad, of the useful -and the useless, and the elevating and the degrading,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span> -the latter always in the ascendant.</p> - -<p>"It foments discord instead of promoting -profitable discussion, which is the bridle-path -leading into the highway of wisdom. It is built -upon the cornerstone of selfishness, the other -name of commercialism, and is thoroughly imbued -with the spirit of greed.</p> - -<p>"It caters to the public demand regardless -of the spirit or the depravity behind it. 'Quatro! -Quatro! Quatro!' is the burden of its cry, -and for quatro it is willing to lead the world -forward or backward, as the case may be. It -has been growing in stature and retrograding -in usefulness for fifty years throughout the -world, in all save increasing facilities, and -avidity for pandering to the worst and most -uncivilized propensities of mankind, and it -will probably continue to grow worse for a -century to come.</p> - -<p>"Fifty years ago it was blindly controversial, -but there was enough of reason in its discussions<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span> -to give hope for the future. Now it is -a mere mental and moral refuse car, and its so-called -religious form is devoted only to a more -refined class of refuse, if that expression is -allowable.</p> - -<p>"As a whole, it represents classes and not -the whole community; prejudices, and not -principles; it advocates selfish, not general interests; -it panders to petty jealousies; it indulges -in tittle-tattle in mere wantonness, and -has no aim save the grossly materialistic."</p> - -<p>I winced under his fierce arraignment and -invective, for I am a newspaper man myself.</p> - -<p>"I know that I have touched you in a sensitive -spot, but I speak of the newspaper in a -general sense. There are worthy exceptions, -despite all the untoward environments; but, -unfortunately, their influence is limited. Your -masses read and re-read accounts of how two -beings beat each other out of human semblance -on a wager, and pass, unread and unnoticed,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span> -the best thoughts of your greatest -scientists and profoundest thinkers. It is not -the canaille who do this alone, but your statesmen -and rulers, men of large affairs and men -of the learned professions."</p> - -<p>I turned the conversation, saying:</p> - -<p>"It is incomprehensible to me how you produced -this record of events in so short a time -and without apparent mechanical or physical -effort."</p> - -<p>"Doubtless, but not more incomprehensible -to you than your linotype machines and perfecting -press would have been to Gutenberg. -And your discoveries and inventions would be -no more incomprehensible to him than would -his types and crude multiplying press be to -the papyrus writers, scriveners and hieroglyphants -of the earlier world.</p> - -<p>"The transition from the work of the papyrians -to the achievements of the Intermereans -is the result of that evolution known as scientific<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span> -research into Nature's beneficence, in -which mechanical invention is a mere incident, -and its application to a high, unselfish and -noble purpose, instead of selfish, base and -ignoble ends.</p> - -<p>"We had outstripped your present ideals ages -before the Chinese began block printing, or -Gutenberg fashioned his types and press. Both -these, as well as your own advanced mechanism, -as well as your every other great achievement -in science and research, were the result -of the thought-seed sown or diffused from this -land, but which fell on absolutely barren soil, -or only grew in puny or defective forms, far -short of ripening or maturity.</p> - -<p>"Your Franklin comprehended the supreme -and all-pervading power and genius of the -Universe, the knowledge of and the power to -utilize which makes man godlike, but the -dense ignorance and gross materialism of his -day prevented him from enlightening his -people.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span></p> - -<p>"Your Morse conceived and executed the -scheme of telegraphic signals cycles after we -had discarded it.</p> - -<p>"Your nameless and unknown discoverers, -whose weak but apprehending genius was utilized -by Bell, gave you the telephone ages after -it had been supplanted here by our more nearly -perfect system of intelligent communication -with the entire terrestrial world, and we -are now exploring, with it, the adjacent systems -of the Universe with promising results.</p> - -<p>"Your Edison and other electrical discoverers -are more than a cycle behind us, and have -as yet but touched the outer surface of the -great secret. To them and to others the current -of the Universe is a constant menace and -a danger. To us it as gentle and as harmless -as the flowers that bloom by the wayside, and -responds to our every wish and use with absolute -tractability.</p> - -<p>"The fault of the rest of the world is that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span> -all great discoveries, all the unlockings of Nature's -treasure-house, are turned to selfish -ends, to the aggrandizement of the few, and -the detriment, if not the oppression, of the -many; hence civil commotions, wars, tyrannies, -the insolence of opulence, and the failure -to carry forward the process of civilization -and the elevation of the race by the unselfish -application of attained wisdom. The barbarian -spirit of Self is dominant.</p> - -<p>"You were about to ask if you might carry -this record home. No. You will be permitted -to inspect it and others similar during your -sojourn, and carry their remembrance with -you, and thus be enabled to compare them -with your own current records of contemporaneous -dates; but that is all.</p> - -<p>"The Western nations have opened their -own gates and invited eventual destruction by -this apparently temporary invasion of the -East. This war, if it may be so called, will be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span> -of short duration, followed by the oppression -inseparable from selfish greed, commercialism -and the love of conquest and arbitrary power -which compels the unwilling obedience of -peoples.</p> - -<p>"But the 400,000,000 Chinese and affiliated -races, are more insidiously dangerous than -you know. They will cultivate the seed now -being sown, and prepare the dragon's harvest -of blood. In the remoter provinces they will -soon breed soldiers and captains, who will -eclipse the bloody and destructive achievements -of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane, profiting -by your present superior knowledge of -mechanism and the arts of war, which they -will appropriate and assimilate, and turn to -terrible final account.</p> - -<p>"The commercial greed of the West will be -the enemy of the Western peoples themselves. -It will fit and arm the aroused avengers for -their world-wide invasion and conflict. Selfish<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span> -capitalists will do this in spite of all inhibitions, -under the plea of creating prosperous -conditions and extending commerce, and their -people and their posterity will perish by the -enginery which selfish commercial greed -placed in the hands of their enemies."</p> - -<p>Maros presented me to another official, and -politely dismissed me to visit the places of interest -in the city. Upon my return to America -I compared the contemporaneous history of -the world with the daily records I had been -permitted to inspect, the remembrance of -which I vividly retained, and found every fact -therein to be absolutely correct.</p> -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span></p> - - - - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="IV" class="nobreak">IV.</h2> -</div> - -<blockquote> -<p>A TRIP BY AIR AND LAND AND -WATER THROUGH THE PROVINCES, -CITIES, HAMLETS AND -GARDENS, WITH MATCHLESS -BEAUTY AND ENJOYMENT ON -EVERY HAND.</p> -</blockquote> -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span></p> - - - - -<p class="chapnum">IV.</p> - -<p class="chap">A TOUR OF SIGHT-SEEING.</p> -<hr class="r10" /> - -<p>What a wonderful land is Intermere, -and what a wonderful people live and enjoy -life in it to the full!</p> - -<p>Twenty days of visiting ten of the interior -provinces, bordering on the mere, was more -like a dream of happiness, sight-seeing and indescribable -enjoyment to me than a reality. -For reasons not explained to me I was not carried -into the fourteen remaining provinces, -which evidently lay in all directions toward the -exterior borders of the land. I rather suspect -that this was because it might have enabled -me to form some definite idea of the geographical -location of Intermere.</p> - -<p>What I saw and experienced I still retain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span> -as a beautiful and ineffaceable memory, but it -is a picture I can not wholly reproduce or describe -in anything like complete details. I -can at best only give the impressions I still -retain.</p> - -<p>The delightful journey was under the direction -of Karmas, the Custodian of Works and -Polity, accompanied by other chief officers, -and the officials of the provinces, the title and -character of which had already been given me -by Xamas.</p> - -<p>They have three modes of travel: by Medocar, -by Aerocar, and by Merocar. By the first -you travel on land; by the second through the -air; by the third on the water. While these -vehicles of transportation are divided into -three general classes as designated, they comprise -thousands of beautiful and curious designs, -upon which individual names are bestowed, -as we bestow names upon our horses -and our ships.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span></p> - -<p>There is no preference as to the mode and -method of journeying. Each of them seems -absolutely perfect. There is no physical sense -of motion in either, as we realize it.</p> - -<p>They glide over the broad, smooth and perfectly -kept roadways, through the depths of -the ether, or along the waters, with the same -imperceptible motion, and can be put to a rate -of speed that makes our limited railway trains -seem like lumbering farm wagons. All resistance -of the elements seems absolutely overcome.</p> - -<p>The power of propulsion was wholly incomprehensible -at first, and later I was only able -to learn as to its principle, and left wholly to -conjecture as to its application.</p> - -<p>Roadways, or, perhaps more properly, boulevards, -interlace the whole country. They are -the perfection of road-building—smooth, even-crowned, -and free from dust, water or other -offensive substance. The surface is like a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span> -newly asphalted street, but hard and impervious, -with no depressions, cracks or flaws. -The engineering could hardly be improved -on. Accepting the statements made to me -that the most of these highways have been in -use for centuries, with few if any repairs, they -may be looked on as not only permanent but -indestructible.</p> - -<p>The purpose of each of them is self-evident. -Every rod of it is for use and to meet some -requirement that presents itself. They are -bordered, wherever they extend, with beautiful -homes, monuments and temples, commemorative -of some great achievement in civilization -and progress.</p> - -<p>The residential grounds, farms and gardens -are marvels of exquisite taste without an exception, -so far as I was able to note, modeled -after countless designs, which give the earth's -surface a versatility of beauty that is enchanting.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span></p> - -<p>There are farms and gardens everywhere except -in a limited number of the compact -squares of cities, small and perfectly kept, and -productive in a sense and to a degree absolutely -incredible to the dwellers of any other -land.</p> - -<p>As to these roadways: They are of the uniform -width of two hundred feet wherever you -find them, whether skirting sea, lake or river, -penetrating valleys or clambering around and -around the ascent of the mountains from base -to apex, where some monument or temple, or -both, are perched, overlooking hundreds of -square miles.</p> - -<p>As already stated, they are everywhere as -smooth and kept as clean as a tiled floor, with -a sense or quality of elasticity, and seemingly -indestructible. I would have regarded them -as natural phenomena had I not seen a mountain -being terraced and a roadway being -graded and finished without any of the paraphernalia<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span> -of our own methods of engineering -and construction.</p> - -<p>Earth and rock seemed to melt and become -mobile under the influence of some unseen -power, and gangs of men, following with levelers -of light machinery, modulated the grades -and contours of the crumbled rock and soil. -Others followed these, compounding, expanding -and laying down a plastic and rapidly -hardening envelope, thus finishing the surface -like the roads over which we were gliding, -some of which, I was told, had been in use for -many centuries without the slightest change -of condition.</p> - -<p>I expressed a doubt as to their longevity.</p> - -<p>Karmas smiled and said:</p> - -<p>"You judge by experience. In your cities -you import material from some distant country -or island, and by mechanical manipulation -and chemical combination and processes fit it -to be laid down as a pavement. When finished<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span> -it looks almost as smooth and beautiful as -yonder landway being newly constructed to -accommodate the expanding population of the -district. But the resemblance ends here.</p> - -<p>"Your chemists and engineers and constructors -have only the crudest ideas of landway or -terraneous works. The asphalt is a suggestion, -but the builder's compound turns it in -the direction of deterioration. Instead of going -forward, they go backward. They know -little of the character of the materials they -seek to utilize, and nothing of the true principles -of chemical combination.</p> - -<p>"Our material is at hand, as it is at hand -everywhere, containing the elements which -need only to be properly combined and assimilated -to become practically indestructible.</p> - -<p>"You take a clay, and by machinery, crude -perhaps, reduce it to dust, then moisten it back -into pliable clay, fashion it, subject it to an -intense but unrefined heat, and you have what<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span> -will retain its form and consistence for centuries, -and resist the elemental attacks longer -even than granite. This is but the dawn of -possibilities. The semi-barbarous, thousands -of years ago, went further and made them flexible -as well as durable. Their discoveries were -long ago forgotten.</p> - -<p>"Your people never go beyond the point of -discovery. They stop short of the possibilities. -They lose these possibilities in material and -commercial utilization. Ego stands between -the discoverer and the world, and progress -ends.</p> - -<p>"While the rest of the world has thus, again -and again, stood still on the threshold, or -moved backward or forward intermittently, for -obvious and selfish reasons, we have steadily -moved forward in scientific discovery and research, -and the application of great principles.</p> - -<p>"The example is before you. Without any -of your crude and cumbersome machinery, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span> -mountain is being terraced and fitted for the -abode of man, the elemental constituents are -being disintegrated, properly disposed, rearranged -and the surface recombined in a new -form and proportion by natural laws, and remote -generations will find yonder landway as -our workmen will leave it. They could level -the mountain as readily as they terrace it, distributing -it over the adjacent plain, leaving it -a level and fertile glebe, instead of a towering -height of rock and sand overspread with soil.</p> - -<p>"All that you see or will see is the result of -knowledge and wisdom turned to noble and -unselfish ends for the common betterment and -elevation of the race.</p> - -<p>"Your progenitors learned to dig the hard -and soft ores from the earth and produce iron, -then took a step forward and converted it into -steel, of greater strength and durability, capable -of light forms and high polish, and there -you have stopped at the very beginning. You<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span> -are incapable of saving your own handiwork -from disintegration. The elements corrode -your finest steel products, and they flake away -to the original conditions of the crude ore, losing -a large proportion of their original virtues -and constituents. We have, on the contrary, -gone forward to the ultimate.</p> - -<p>"You have denuded your lands of forests to -use as a cumbersome material for building, -and furniture and other purposes, the wood, -which decays and is soon destroyed. You -have, without understanding the process, macerated -and reduced woods to a pulp and fashioned -it into paper, which in several forms you -utilize, but you have stopped at the beginning -of the journey.</p> - -<p>"We have carried it forward, and a large -proportion of the material used in the construction -of our houses and furniture and -bridges and cars are the product of our forests -in a new and better and more enduring form—light<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span> -and capable of the most graceful fashioning. -This is used in combination with the -metals in all departments of our economies."</p> - -<p>I had already noticed the fact that but little -of the woodwork was in the natural form, and -that while it was incredulously light, it was -incredibly strong. The same was true of the -wrought metals, all of which differed from our -own forms.</p> - -<p>In my examinations of the bridges across -streams, both large and small, I noted the fact -that they were constructed in about equal -parts of wood, or a substance I took therefor, -and metal, differing greatly from the metals -we use, yet not wholly unlike them. Both materials -were of tubular construction, appearing -almost fragile in their lightness, but -strong and firm, and showing none of the ravages -of time and the elements.</p> - -<p>So far as I was able to judge no paints were -used, but everything was perfectly polished. -The bridges were light, airy constructions,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span> -swung from lofty and graceful piers, a span -of a thousand feet appearing to be as firm and -strong as one of fifty.</p> - -<p>I also noticed that in their construction of -cars, furniture, houses, and the like, the woods -and metals were indiscriminately used, more -for beauty and ornamentation, perhaps, than -for strengthening purposes or utility. Lightness -and gracefulness were in evidence everywhere. -There were panels and inlays of wood -in its natural state, highly wrought and polished, -as hard and impervious as the metals.</p> - -<p>"You seem to be able to make everything -indestructible," I said to Karmas.</p> - -<p>"It is your privilege to draw your own conclusions," -was his reply.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The people I met and mingled with, both -men and women, were superb specimens of the -human race, full of life, full of hope, full of -high ambitions, and capable of infinite enjoyments.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span></p> - -<p>Games, sports and social amenities were the -order of their daily life, albeit every one of -them engaged in some laborious or business -occupation during a part of each day. I learned -that under their system of economy less than -four hours out of the twenty-four were necessary -for the comfort, sustenance and requirements -of each adult, so that labor did not degenerate -into slavery. Every fifth day was a -holiday, during which no labor was performed, -except such as was necessary for the enjoyments -of the day.</p> - -<p>Manufacturing and business of different -kinds were diffused in proportion to the population. -There were no great factories or business -houses, but innumerable small ones. No -manufacturer employed more than ten persons, -usually but five, and two or three employes -were sufficient for the business houses.</p> - -<p>The remarkable discoveries and inventions -of the land revolutionized all our ideas of manual<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span> -labor and mechanics. Heavy and bulky -machinery is entirely unknown.</p> - -<p>There were no smoking furnaces, no clangor -of machinery. The factory was as neat and -practically as noiseless as the private home. -Useful and necessary devices and machinery -were turned out as quietly as a housewife disposes -of her routine labors. Science had apparently -solved the rough and knotty problem -of labor and production.</p> - -<p>Nowhere did I see a furnace; in fact, fire was -visible nowhere; and yet I could see its offices -performed everywhere. I asked Karmas to -explain the phenomena.</p> - -<p>"That," he replied, "will be explained to you -by Remo, Custodian of Useful Mechanical Devices. -That is his official sphere."</p> - -<p>Another incredible phenomenon presented -itself during the journey. We passed through -one province early in that journey, and my attention -was called to the fact that the farmers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span> -were sowing their cereals, which, by the way, -greatly resemble our own, but in a much higher -state of cultivation and infinitely more nutritious.</p> - -<p>Ten days later we repassed the same spot, -and they were harvesting the ripened grain.</p> - -<p>"In my country," I said to Karmas, "from -eight to ten months, dependent upon the season, -elapses between the sowing and the harvesting -of wheat. Here the period is reduced -to from eight to ten days. I can not understand -the discrepancy."</p> - -<p>"But it is an absolute mystery to you?"</p> - -<p>"It is."</p> - -<p>"And yet your own people have approached -the twilight of its solution. By selection of -seeds and combination of soils, and other perfectly -natural processes, they have been able -to change the nature of vegetation and produce -new vegetable being. The period for the -growth and maturing of nearly all your grains<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span> -and vegetables has been perceptibly shortened, -and entirely new forms produced, within the -past century, and largely within the period of -your own lifetime.</p> - -<p>"Your floriculturists and horticulturists -have carried the evolution the furthest, and -yet they do not even faintly comprehend the -real principle which produces results. We understand -and intelligently apply it. Hence -with us but ten days elapse between seedtime -and harvest, and shorter periods in the production -of our common vegetables.</p> - -<p>"We are able to produce flowers of all shapes -and colors at will, and with the absolute certainty -of the operation of fixed and immutable -laws, while your florists, groping in the dark, -occasionally stumble on a result, knowing -nothing of the law that produces it, and give -their fellows a nine-days' wonder.</p> - -<p>"Yesterday you asked me why all the farms -were so diminutive—'merely a ten-acre field,'<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span> -as you expressed it. The explanation is before -you. Each of these small farms is capable of -producing food for one thousand persons with -their constantly duplicated crops. There is -room for a million such farms in the Commonwealth, -without impinging upon the residential -demesnes or cities.</p> - -<p>"There is no need to put these farms to the -full test of their productiveness. The twentieth -part suffices. We have a population of -50,000,000, increasing at the rate of scarcely -one per cent each year, and two-thirds of the -Commonwealth is public domain, for the benefit -of the countless generations yet unborn. -Each year and each day brings their immediate -needs, and they are met with plenteous -fullness."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Karmas later gave me a fuller idea of the -general polity of the Commonwealth.</p> - -<p>All men become voters at 25, if they are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span> -married, and participate in the choice of officers. -All are eligible to office. On the day -fixed for the election of public officials the -voter calls up the office of the Municipal Custodian -and registers his choice in the ballot-receiver, -which automatically records, and at -the end of the balloting announces the result. -If for provincial officers, it is instantaneously -transmitted to the capital of the province, and -if for Commonwealth officers to the Greater -City. In your land this would open the door to -fraud, but in Intermere there is neither fraud -nor chicane.</p> - -<p>There are no armies, no warships, no police, -no peace or distress officers, and no courts and -no lawyers. Sometimes citizens may differ, as -they differ in other lands, as to their respective -rights or obligations. In such case they repair -to the Municipal Custodian and state the -respective sides of their case. The Custodian -decides at once, and that ends forever the controversy,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span> -unless one or the other appeals to -the Chief Citizen of the Province and his -Counselors, who consider the original statements -submitted to the Custodian and render -the final judgment. It is seldom an appeal is -taken, and seldom that an original decision is -revised.</p> - -<p>The educational period continues from birth -to 20 years of age, in what may be called a -common school, held in the temples, which all -enter at the age of ten.</p> - -<p>The spheres of the two sexes are clearly -marked, and both live within them, that of the -female being regarded as the highest and most -sacred. The men make the homes and the -women care for and beautify them, and receive -the homage universally accorded them.</p> - -<p>Neither sex looks upon necessary labor as a -drudgery or in any manner degrading. They -all receive a like education, and the superior -mental equipment invariably asserts itself in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span> -some appropriate direction.</p> - -<p>Almost invariably the children of the household -marry in the order of their birth, being absolutely -free to choose their mates. There are -no marriages for convenience and no second -marriages. All are the result of affection and -natural affinity.</p> - -<p>The last child to marry inherits the homestead -at the death of the father. The surviving -mother becomes the Preferred Guest of her -child during the remainder of her life, and is -treated as such. If the father survives, he -retains his position as head of the household. -The personal estate of a deceased parent is -divided equally among the children.</p> - -<p>"In short," said Karmas, "We aim to dispose -the burdens and distribute the enjoyments of -life equally and justly among all.</p> - -<p>"Tomorrow we will be accompanied by Alpaz, -the Curator of Learning and Progress, -who will answer the other questions in your -mind."</p> -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span></p> - - - - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="V" class="nobreak">V.</h2> -</div> - -<blockquote> - -<p>THE PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE, AND -THE FACULTY OF ITS ENJOYMENT -AS PERSONIFIED IN THE -PERSONS AND VOCATIONS OF -THE ENTERTAINERS.</p></blockquote> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span></p> - - - - -<p class="chapnum">V.</p> - -<p class="chap">SOME OF THE PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE.</p> -<hr class="r10" /> - -<p>The environments of life have much -to do with its philosophy. This thought impressed -itself forcibly on me in Intermere.</p> - -<p>The environments of its people contribute -much, if not most, to their philosophy, or the -faculty of life's enjoyments.</p> - -<p>They are pleasantly housed, handsomely -habilitated, physically and intellectually employed, -sans the driving spur of necessity or -greed, with profound and earnest aspirations -beyond their present stage of existence. This -is not confined to the few, but animates and -elevates all.</p> - -<p>Learning, in a loftier sense than we understand -the term; art, music and all the senses<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span> -of physical and mental enjoyment, and the promotion -of all of them, are pitched in a high -and harmonious key.</p> - -<p>Personal adornment and physical beauty in -both sexes have no tinge of vanity, and awake -no envy in others. Intermerean dress and its -adjuncts are as closely looked after as their -wonderful mechanism and its mysterious soul -or motor-spirit, which enables them to travel -with celerity and safety by land or air or sea, -or that subtler principle by which men and -women, separated by distance, talk to each -other by thought instead of speech, and would -render the clumsy deception of our own diplomats -and other hypocrites an impossibility.</p> - -<p>The clothing of the Intermereans, wrought -from native materials not wholly unlike, except -an to quality, those utilized by other peoples, -is of a texture and finish beyond the conception -of the outer world, and of such colors -and combinations of tints as to breathe, as it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span> -were, both art and aptitude.</p> - -<p>The garments of both sexes more nearly resemble -those in Europe and America than any -others, and yet they are very unlike in striking -points. Speaking of this similitude, I may -say that the polity and institutions, and mental -and physical characteristics of the people -who live under them, more nearly resemble -those of America than of any other nation or -people.</p> - -<p>But at that, how wide and deep and apparently -impassable is the gulf that separates -them. Ours is but the faint promise; theirs -the fulfillment of the completed prophecy.</p> - -<p>Did we start on the journey? Have we -halted just beyond the first milestone? Will -the journey be resumed? Will our remoter -generations reach the Ultima Thule? What -splendid hope or what illimitable despair and -misery depend upon the Sphinx's answer to -these questions!</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span></p> - -<p>While Intermere is not sown with diamonds -and pearls and precious stones and metals, -they were to be seen in profusion everywhere, -not as matters of garish display, but of artistic -taste. I doubt not that the Intermereans, -through their successful study of Nature, possess -the Philosopher's Stone, capable of combining -and transmuting every substance into -the riches for which men die and women sacrifice -more than life, and nations crush nations, -and peoples destroy peoples, gathering the -Dead Sea fruits that turn to bitter ashes on -their lips.</p> - -<p>These people place no more commercial -value upon these than they do upon the tints -of the rainbow, or the purple haze that hangs -like a halo above the mountain tops. To them -they are but artistic types of beauty that add -to life's true enjoyments.</p> - -<p>In mingling socially with the men and -women—they do not speak of them as ladies<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span> -and gentlemen—of Intermere, I was struck -with their ease and delicate frankness of entertainment. -They were very human indeed -in every way. There was no affectation in -speech or manner. They were good listeners -as well as good talkers, fond of art and the -lofty literature in which they were naturally -at home; anxious to learn something about the -outside world from their visitor, and yet not -inquisitive, never asking an embarrassing -question.</p> - -<p>Their literary and social entertainments, -many of which I attended, while altogether -new and strange to me, were none the less -thoroughly enjoyable. Their social games -were unique—to me—and in all respects I was -struck with their great superiority, and -forcibly impressed with the belief that their -lives were indeed worth living.</p> - -<p>Their conceptions of art were of the highest -and most exalted character. Their tastes were<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span> -not only refined but sublimated, and I felt -abashed at my own inability to follow them -rapidly, or fully comprehend them on the -moment.</p> - -<p>The women were splendid types of physical -beauty as well as mental endowment; the men -were trained athletes, and the devotees of -physical as well as mental culture, and I -watched with keen zest their prowess in the -athletic games everywhere indulged in. I did -not see a physical, mental or moral derelict in -the land. All were robust and perfectly -formed.</p> - -<p>There were no classes. Laborers and officials -met on an equal footing. There were no -telltale differences in dress to indicate sets, -circles, position or titles among the men. The -same was true of the women. Mental superiority -or maturity was discernible to me and -recognized on every hand, not to be envied or -decried, but to serve as the guide to other feet.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span></p> - -<p>And all this was easily reconcilable to me. -All were coequal laborers. All were coequal -sharers of the common benefits of their governmental -system, and they all had a common -incentive—to ennoble and dignify the race by -ennobling and dignifying themselves individually, -but contributing alike to the common -stock of blessings.</p> - -<p>Never before did I fully realize the meaning -of the Divine Master when He said: "Whatsoever -ye would that men should do to you, do -ye even so to them." Before me and around -me was the literal fulfillment of the injunction -in the form of the model government for mankind, -founded upon the highest attribute of -Divinity.</p> - -<p>But there was neither cant nor affected -solemnity in the never-ending performance of -this duty. It had become absolutely and essentially -a part of their nature, and was at -once the cornerstone and the Temple of their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span> -Religion; but their ideas of Religion were -widely different from ours. They never expounded, -but lived it.</p> - -<p>Delightful people accompanied us if we -traveled in Aerocars; delightful people met us -with Medocars when we came to terra firma, -and accompanied us through the bewildering -lanes and mazes of beauty by land; and delightful -people met us with fairy-like Merocars -when we sought to thread the enchanting -islands of the strange pulsating, moving sea.</p> - -<p>Thus day by day I was carried from province -to province, from city to city, from valley -to valley and from mountain to mountain; relays -of entertainers met us at every stopping-point -to take the places of those who had accompanied -us thither. Nothing could have -seemed more unreal; nothing could have been -more exquisitely enjoyable.</p> - -<p>Now we wound through gardens smiling -with beauty and redolent with balm and fragrance;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span> -anon we were in orchards plucking -the ripened fruit; then in the harvest fields of -the husbandman, and next in shops, factory -or store; I wondering at all I saw, and my conductors -kindly wondering at me, no doubt, but -of that they gave no significance or sign.</p> - -<p>Almost literally speaking there is no night -in Intermere. With the twilight myriads of -lights flash out everywhere along the streets, -highways, lanes, and from residences, temples -and monuments, more luminous than our electric -lamps, diffusing a mellow and pleasing -light everywhere. But one sees no wires, as -with us, to feed the lamps of many sizes and -shades of light, each one of which, so far as -we can see and realize, is independent of all -others and everything.</p> - -<p>Merry parties make moonlight and starlight -trips by Aerocar. I enjoyed one of them, and -there are no words adequate to the description -of what I saw and enjoyed. With the moon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span> -and stars above and the millions of lights below, -with music, song and laughter ringing -through the ethereal depths, I was in a new -world, and one beyond ordinary human conceptions, -much less description. The Aerocars -themselves were studded with countless lights -of all the colors and shades, and shone like -trailing meteors at every angle of inclination, -singly here, grouped there, and in processions -beyond.</p> - -<p>It may be said in this connection that while -the Intermereans eat the flesh of both domestic -and wild animals and fowls, resembling in -general features our own, and fish, they subsist -chiefly on a vegetable diet, especially between -the age of infancy and twenty years, -and after sixty.</p> - -<p>One of the mysteries confronting me was -that of cookery. They used no fire, nor any -of our ordinary cooking utensils, and yet they -served hot meals and drinks, prepared in what<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span> -may be called, for lack of a better name, chafing -dishes and urns, and yet there was no -sense of heat or fire, except when in close contact -with the utensils.</p> - -<p>In a chafing dish they broiled or roasted or -baked; in an adjoining urn they brewed a delightful -hot drink resembling coffee, while in -another near by they made the most delicious -ices.</p> - -<p>The housewife maintained neither dining-room -nor kitchen. Meals were prepared and -served wherever most convenient, on veranda -or in the house proper. The table was spread -in beautiful style with exquisite furnishment, -and presided over by the housewife. A woman -assistant, or more than one, according to the -requirements of the occasion, had charge of -a suitable sideboard, where the entire meal -was prepared, and from which it was served -to the company as desired. There were no -odors from the cooking, and nothing to suggest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span> -the kitchen or scullery.</p> - -<p>This is so unlike our methods that its appropriateness -can not be realized short of the -actual experience. The culinary utensils are -rather ornamental than otherwise, and the -preparation of the dishes occupies an incredibly -short period of time.</p> - -<p>On our various journeys by land and sea -and air, I found that a full stock of provisions -was carried, along with the culinary paraphernalia, -and were served regularly and with -as much care and taste as in any residence. -Ices and confections were made as readily in -mid-air as on land or sea, by some mysterious -and never-failing process.</p> - -<p>One day as we rested in a charming suburb -of the Lesser City, Alpaz, the Curator of -Learning and Progress, appeared in a splendidly -appointed Aerocar, accompanied by his -entire family and attended by a fleet of Aerocars -carrying his assistants, provincial officials<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span> -and men and women, who made up his entourage. -It proved to be a most delightful company.</p> - -<p>After sailing overhead for hundreds of -miles we descended to an island, along the -beach of which lay a complement of Merocars, -to accommodate the entire party, as well as -some of the insular citizens who begged to accompany -us.</p> - -<p>Then ensued a voyage the memory of which -still lingers with me. Such dreamlike beauty -I never expect to see this side the gates of -eternity. It changed with every moment, and -never palled nor paled. Through this maze of -land and water and bewildering enchantment -we journeyed, listening to conversation and -music, till finally touching the mainland, we -found the Chief Citizen of the Province, and -his attendants and officials, with Medocars, -in which the entire party was carried to his -capital, which crowned a grand elevation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span> -some two hundred miles inland.</p> - -<p>Here we were entertained in magnificent -simplicity for a day, and here Alpaz discoursed -to me on the many matters in which I was interested, -and which fell within the sphere of -his Curatorship. I cannot recount them all, -but shall endeavor to bring out the main -points.</p> - -<p>"You would learn something of our educational -system?" he said, as though I had plied -him with a question.</p> - -<p>"It is quite simple. It involves no complexities. -We follow only the path of nature. -From birth to the age of ten the infant is in -the exclusive control and tutorship of the -mother. She alone is entirely capable of -moulding the infantile mind, and setting its -feet aright in the pathway of manhood and -womanhood.</p> - -<p>"In your land, as in others, all too often she -delegates this great duty to alien and unfit<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span> -hands, and reaps the bitter harvest of sorrow -in the afternoon of motherhood.</p> - -<p>"At the age of ten, when the mother has fitted -the mind for stronger impressions, the child -enters the broader field of learning. Our temples, -which you meet everywhere, are our -schoolhouses, our altars of Learning and -Knowledge, the cherubim of Wisdom.</p> - -<p>"These temples are the abode of Knowledge -and Wisdom, handed down in the records of -the ages, showing each successive step taken -and to what it led. Here they are taught by -the older men and women, who having retired -from the activities of life, with a competence -assured them, matured in thought, filled with -knowledge and possessed of wisdom, perform -their final labor, a labor of love for the younger -generation.</p> - -<p>"At the age of fifteen every boy and every -girl develops the line of effort to which they -incline in the respective spheres of the sexes,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span> -and thereafter, to the age of twenty for females -and twenty-five for males, they are instructed -along these lines by their tutors, in -the meantime devoting a part of their time to -some useful occupation. The result is men -and women in every way fitted to fulfill their -destiny.</p> - -<p>"No; we have no clergy, no ministers as you -term them, to teach either the old or the young -in what you name religion. We have no -churches. Reverence for the Supreme Principle -of the Universe is instilled into every -mind, from infancy up, and all our people live -these teachings. They do not listen to them -one day in seven and neglect to follow all or -the majority of them for six.</p> - -<p>"We know nothing, except as lamentable -facts, of the various so-called religious divisions -which convulse the rest of the world—Confucianism, -Hindooism, Mohammedanism, -Buddhism, Taoism, Shintoism, Judaism, Polytheism<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span> -and Christianity, and the many warring -or antagonistic sects into which they divided -and subdivided.</p> - -<p>"We know only loving reverence for the Supreme -Principle of the Universe, filial love -and piety, and justice to all creatures. This -is the soul and essence of your religion, Christianity, -and the basic principle of all others. -We prefer the last analysis to the inchoate -mass of contending creeds, that have drenched -the earth with blood for time out of mind, and -filled it with doubt and misery; and even now, -in the twilight of your Nineteenth Century, -and in the name of the Child of Nazareth, promulgates -Christianization and evangelization -at the cannon's mouth and with the sword and -torch, of peoples whose only offense is that -they believe that their God requires thus and -so at their hands as a prerequisite to their entrance -into His heavenly kingdom.</p> - -<p>"By gentler and educatory teachings, untainted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span> -by the corroding canker of selfishness, -they might be turned in the right direction -and their generations be led into the light, -provided that your educational system moved -on a loftier plane than theirs; but blood and -violence, and all the carnal lusts that follow -like jackals in their wake, can only eventuate -in driving them into lower depths.</p> - -<p>"The spiritual instructors of the outer world, -past and present, are and have been, in the -main, sincere and earnest, but with a limited -idea of the spiritualism they essay to teach. -Powerful prelacies have grown up in all the -religious divisions, ambitious of temporal -power, and untold evils have resulted, not -from the system of religion, but from the love -of power and authority, non-spiritual in its -nature, and as a result the spirit or principle -of religion has suffered undeserved obloquy.</p> - -<p>"To us the ideal God of your religious people -is strangely contradictory and irreconcilable.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span> -He is portrayed not as a spiritual being, -but as a common mortal in many of the essentials. -Their conception of Deity is that He -rules as a king in heaven, before whom the redeemed -and the saints forever prostrate themselves -in adoration or sing praises by voice, -and adulate Him with harp and lute and other -musical instruments, confessing hourly their -unworthiness to come into His presence.</p> - -<p>"This is an earthly, barbarous conception -of the Supreme Power of the Universe. It was -probably of Chinese or Oriental origin in the -days of supreme despotism, when every subject -must prostrate himself in the dust in the -presence of majesty.</p> - -<p>"This idea was transmitted to Christendom -in the West when royalty proclaimed itself -the symbol of Godhood and religion. The subject -was taught that the monarch was the direct -representative of God, and his court was -modeled after the court of the King of kings,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span> -where homage and adoration and humiliation -were the endless order of all future life.</p> - -<p>"We have an entirely different conception -of the Supreme Principle, and do not regard -it in the light of a ruler or king, in the mortal -sense, but the embodiment of justice and love, -that neither exacts nor receives adoration of -those who pass to the world beyond, the returning -children of the great and enduring -Principle which exists everywhere, strengthened -and broadened by a previous state or -states of existence, wherein they were clothed -about with mortal and perishable habiliments.</p> - -<p>"We look forward to the passage from this -world to a better one beyond with joyous expectation, -and with no sense of terror or apprehension, -and there come us no pangs of dissolution. -We have sought diligently to live -up to the law of love in this life, and have the -fullest assurance that our efforts will meet -the approval of the Supreme Principle, whose<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span> -beneficences invite and permit us to enter the -broader fields and more perfect worlds of a -higher existence.</p> - -<p>"Death, or the exchange of worlds, has neither -terrors for those who go, nor the stings -of affliction for those who tarry. It is but the -inevitable and necessary parting of friends -and relatives for a little period, and we know -that the shores of reunion lie just beyond the -filmy veil of the future.</p> - -<p>"The end or change is never hastened nor -retarded by the violation of Nature's sacred -laws. There are but few partings or deaths in -the earlier periods of life. They go with joyful -alacrity, as to a feast, at four or five score, -and their memory, works and examples cheer -and sustain those who remain.</p> - -<p>"No; we have no physicians. If, perchance, -some law of Nature is violated and mortal ailment -ensues, it needs no specialist to discover -that fact, or recommend the proper method of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span> -rectifying it. That is a part of the education -of all. Literally, we neither know nor care to -know what physic is. We live simply and in -accordance with Nature's laws, and disease, -such as prevails in your land and others, is -unknown in this, and has been for ages. Science -and scientific discovery, as we utilize and -employ them, have freed us from disease and -made death but the exchange of lives. We -know more than we care to tell of the life beyond."</p> - -<p>He ceased abruptly after saying:</p> - -<p>"Tomorrow you will be the guest of Remo, -the Curator of Useful Mechanical Devices. -You may learn much from him."</p> -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span></p> - - - - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="VI" class="nobreak">VI.</h2> -</div> - -<blockquote> - -<p>THE SECRET OF INTERMERE -PARTIALLY REVEALED TO ANDERTON, -AND WHEN HE LEAST -EXPECTS IT HE IS RESTORED -TO HIS HOME AND KINDRED, -MUCH TO HIS REGRET.</p></blockquote> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span></p> - - - - -<p class="chapnum">VI.</p> - -<p class="chap">THE SECRET OF INTERMERE.</p> -<hr class="r10" /> - -<p>The secret of Intermere—its great mechanical -secret—was revealed to me, but, alas! -only in part. It was as if the sun be pointed -out to a child who is told that it shines and is -a prime factor in the growth of all forms of -life, animal and vegetable.</p> - -<p>The child realizes that the orb of day shines, -but remains wholly in the dark as to the processes -of its rays; why it inspires animals and -vegetation with life and growth, and produces -the prismatic colors of the rainbow.</p> - -<p>So with me. I know the fountain-head or -cause that gave momentum to all the mechanism -of the land, shortened the period between -germination and maturity in vegetation,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span> -banished fire while retaining warmth, -turned the night into a season of beauty equaling -the full day, kept every street and highway -free from debris, prevented foul emanations, -with their contaminations, and did -countless other things which our own scientists -demonstrate are desirable and necessary, -but still unattainable. But of the details, of -the why and the wherefore, of the effects and -the processes by which so many different results -emanated from the same apparent cause, -I learned nothing.</p> - -<p>One morning, after a season of delicious, invigorating -slumber, as I walked in the spacious -grounds of my host, the Chief Citizen of -the Province—grounds sweeter and fairer -than the fabled Gardens of Gulistan—I saw a -fleet of Aerocars approaching, led by one of -the most magnificent, and by far the largest, -that I had yet seen. It could not have been -less than one hundred feet in length and twenty<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span> -in breadth at the midway point, and yet it -seemed to float as lightly as a feather in the -aerial depths.</p> - -<p>When almost directly overhead the fleet -halted, and remained stationary, as though -firmly anchored to some immovable substance, -and then the leading craft slowly sank to the -earth at my feet, as lightly as you have seen -a bird alight.</p> - -<p>It was the Aerocar of Remo, containing a -score of people. I had not hitherto met Remo, -the Curator of Useful Mechanical Devices. -However, he needed no introduction to me or -I to him. The recognition was mutual.</p> - -<p>He came forward and greeted me cordially, -and later presented me to his fellow voyagers, -and said:</p> - -<p>"I know you are anxious to learn something -of the motive principle of our mechanisms. -That I shall impart to you, at least partially. -Our journey will begin to suit your convenience.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span> -We will breakfast en route."</p> - -<p>I hastened to say my adieux to the Chief -Citizen, Alpaz, and the members of the household, -and then entered the Aerocar, taking a -seat near Remo. At a signal to the pilot, the -craft rose as lightly and majestically as it had -descended.</p> - -<p>I looked about me at the passengers, hampers -of provisions, culinary utensils and table -equipment, and estimated that the Aerocar -was carrying not less than four thousand -pounds of dead weight.</p> - -<p>"You are wondering how so much bulk and -weight ascend without apparent cause."</p> - -<p>I assented to the proposition.</p> - -<p>"When you are at home and see an inflated -balloon ascend, carrying a man weighing one -hundred and fifty pounds, with seventy-five -pounds of sand ballast, you can understand -how it ascends?"</p> - -<p>"Readily."</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span></p> - -<p>"By mechanical contrivance of immense -comparative bulk, aided by chemical product, -the power of gravitation is sufficiently overcome -or neutralized that a disproportionately -small amount of weight is carried into the -upper air. We ascend for the same general -reason, the resultant of a greater, a different -and a fixed principle.</p> - -<p>"Our pilot, by means of the mechanical and -other power at his command, neutralized the -attraction of gravitation, and without the aid -of any other appliance arose, carrying a weight -of more than four thousand of your pounds -avoirdupois. It has ascended in a direct or -perpendicular line, despite the breeze, which -would otherwise have carried us at a western -angle. I will have the pilot produce an equilibrium, -stopping all movement."</p> - -<p>A signal was given the pilot, and, after a -slight manipulation, it stood still.</p> - -<p>"Now we will descend, first perpendicularly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span> -and then at an angle of forty-five degrees."</p> - -<p>One signal and one manipulation, and the -Aerocar described the first motion. A second -signal and manipulation, and it described the -other.</p> - -<p>"Now we will ascend, first by the reverse -angle and then by the perpendicular."</p> - -<p>Again the signals and again the manipulations, -and again the exact movements through -space.</p> - -<p>"If your flying machine and airship builders -could do that, what would your people think?"</p> - -<p>"That the world had been revolutionized."</p> - -<p>"But the world will not be thus revolutionized -until science is freed of gross materialism -and human aspiration becomes something -higher than selfish greed, commercialism, war, -conquest, opulence, and the despotisms they -engender. You must expel all the gods with -whom you most closely commune, before you -may commune with the true God or Supreme<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span> -Principle of the Universe."</p> - -<p>In the meantime the Curator's Aerocar had -rejoined its consorts, and we floated away to -the northeast, where a great semicircle of -mountains were dimly outlined, and then descended -upon a city looking like a pearl in a -semicircular valley, bisected by a broad river, -spanned with bridges at short intervals as far -as the vision reached.</p> - -<p>With my watch I had timed the voyage. It -had lasted two hours and thirty minutes.</p> - -<p>"How far have we traveled?" I inquired of -Remo.</p> - -<p>"One thousand of your miles."</p> - -<p>"That is four hundred miles to the hour; -six and two-thirds miles each minute."</p> - -<p>"The speed might easily have been doubled."</p> - -<p>My amazement was unbounded, but I did -not doubt Remo's statement then. Later, -I recognized it as an easy possibility.</p> - -<p>Remo detained me until the rest of the company<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span> -had left the Aerocar, and then said abruptly: -"You would learn the secret of the -motive principle that moves our mechanical -devices and performs other offices which seem -to you miraculous. It is this: It is the electric -current which we take direct from the atmosphere -at will—electricity, which is the life-giving, -life-preserving and life-promoting principle, -the superior and fountain of all law affecting -the material Universe and intervening -space. To command that is to command everything.</p> - -<p>"This is the capital of my Curatorship. Here -all my predecessors have served the Commonwealth; -hither all my successors will come. -Here every mechanical device is tested, approved -or rejected, and from hence their production -is directed, as a public right, in every -municipal division of the Commonwealth.</p> - -<p>"Nearly every monument you have seen, as -you have doubtless noticed, is dedicated to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span> -some Chosen Son of Wisdom, and some of -them date back tens of centuries. Whoever -makes a great discovery, such as taking the -electric current direct, or dividing its capabilities -into useful and necessary directions, or -perfects some great mechanism, securing the -full beneficence of the current, brings it here -and dedicates it to the Commonwealth and its -sons and daughters. Its benefits are common -to all.</p> - -<p>"His reward is that he is elected by universal -acclaim as the Chosen Son of Wisdom, a -monument commemorative of his achievement -is erected at once, and he is installed in -a home furnished out of the public revenues, -receives a stipend of fifty or five cinque media -daily, and is the honored guest on all public -and private occasions.</p> - -<p>"I shall show you many of our devices; some -of them will be self-explanatory, some will, to -a degree, be explained, others left to your conjecture,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span> -and for obvious reasons."</p> - -<p>With this he led me through a large number -of what we would look upon as diminutive -manufacturing establishments. In the first -one visited he exhibited to me two crystalline -elongated globes, the size of an egg each, connected -by a small tube or cylinder of the same -material two or three inches in length.</p> - -<p>The globes were filled with a whitish substance, -or granulation, the upper intensely -white, the lower somewhat shaded. The upper -one was fitted with a movable disk, and -could be opened by touching a lever. A cluster -of rather coarse wires, apparently an amalgam -of several metals, rose above the granulated -contents. A double coil of wires, of a -different material or combination, running in -opposite directions, filled the connecting cylinder, -while a cluster of almost imperceptibly -fine wires, of still a different material or combination, -projected from the bottom of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span> -lower globe.</p> - -<p>These globes resembled glass, and were, to -all appearances, extremely fragile. Remo -dashed it upon the hard floor, as though he -would destroy it. It rebounded, and he caught -it as an urchin would catch a rebounding ball.</p> - -<p>"I did this," he said, "to show you that these -appliances are not amenable to accident. This -is the accumulator or receiver of the current."</p> - -<p>He touched the lever and opened a small -aperture directly over the cluster of wires in -the upper globe.</p> - -<p>"Hold your hand below the lower portion," -he said.</p> - -<p>I complied, and instantly my hand was -moved away with such resistless force that I -was turned completely around and sent across -the room. Remo smiled at my undisguised -consternation, and said:</p> - -<p>"You will not be harmed. What you experienced -was the flow of the electric current,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span> -but it has not harmed you. It is physically -harmless. You would call this a twenty-horse-power -motor in your country, although it looks -like a toy. Take it and handle it as I direct. -You may handle it with perfect safety. Place -it horizontally near that fly-wheel and push -the lever."</p> - -<p>He pointed to a fly-wheel scarcely a foot in -diameter, with seven radiating flanges set -slightly at an angle. I did, and opened the -aperture. In less time than it takes to tell it -the wheel was revolving at a rate of speed so -high that it seemed like a solid motionless and -polished mirror.</p> - -<p>"Close the aperture, go to the side in which -direction it is revolving, and again open it to -the current."</p> - -<p>I did so, and instantly the wheel was motionless.</p> - -<p>He pointed to a huge block of granite, which -rested on a metal framework a dozen inches -above the floor, and said: "Banish all nervousness,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span> -invert the accumulator, and hold it under -the center of the block, which weighs five -of your tons."</p> - -<p>I did so, and it slowly rose toward the -ceiling.</p> - -<p>"Close the aperture slowly, and finally close -it entirely."</p> - -<p>This I did, and it settled back to its original -place.</p> - -<p>"There," said Remo, "you have the direct -current and its direct application to machinery -and inert bodies. You know enough about -mechanics to understand what that means. -The ascent and flight and movements and descent -of the Aerocar; the running of the Medocar -and the sailing of the Merocar, are not -such a profound mystery to you as they were -yesterday."</p> - -<p>He conducted me into another factory and -exhibited a number of accumulators, each -filled with apparently the same granulated<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span> -substance, but of different colors and admixture -of colors. Remo opened the apertures of -a long line of them upon a wire rack, and they -flashed into brilliant lamps of every hue and -color and shade—a light that was as steady -as that of the stars. He closed them one by -one, showing the absolute independence of -each.</p> - -<p>"Our lamps, with which we beautify the -night, are no longer a mystery to you—that is, -not an absolute mystery."</p> - -<p>In another factory he exhibited more accumulators -with varicolored materials in the -globes. He opened one and directed its power -toward an ingot of metal. It melted like wax. -Turning its force upon a fragment of rock, it -was transformed into the ordinary dust of our -roadways. With another he turned a vessel -of water into a solid block of ice.</p> - -<p>"Our topographical construction, our culinary -economy and the absence of fire are now<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span> -plainer than they were."</p> - -<p>"But how do you achieve all these different -results with apparently the same means?"</p> - -<p>"The first device shown you is the primary; -the others are subsequent discoveries. By the -primary medium we were able to produce or -secure the electric current in the form of dynamic -power, eminently tractable and harmless -with ordinary prudence. New combinations -of the medium gave us all the other results, -at intervals, subsequent to the original -discovery. And the field is not exhausted."</p> - -<p>Remo explained that the crystalline substance -in the upper globe of the accumulator -induced or gathered the electric current, giving -it controllable direction as well as defined -volume, while that in the lower determined -its significance or divisional use.</p> - -<p>In the minuter accumulators, for the lamps -only, did the current present itself in the form -of light, spark or flame. All the colors, from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span> -pure white to deep purple, with their prismatic -variations, were the direct result of their differing -chemical combinations in the lower -globe, each of the silk-like wires throwing off -countless rays of unvarying intensity and -steadiness, but gave off no electric phenomena -or effects.</p> - -<p>The heat accumulators gave moderate or intense -heat, according to the chemical combinations -through which the primary current passed, -but there was neither glow nor light-flash. -So, too, the cold accumulators gave off varying -degrees of cold, for the same reason.</p> - -<p>In none of them was there either the electric -shock or its effects, and all were tractable and -free from danger in what we may term the -electrical sense. The dynamic force of the -primary and the intense heat or cold of the -divisional currents, common prudence avoids. -Still it would be easily possible, by chemical -combination, to produce a current destructive<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span> -of life and capable of annihilating nations, -without hope or possibility of escape.</p> - -<p>"Your own scientists know," said Remo, -"that with the direct current all that you -have seen, and infinitely more, is but the result -of a simple process, capable of infinite -multiplication."</p> - -<p>"But what are the constituents of the medium -in the accumulator, and what are the -formulas of the various combinations?"</p> - -<p>"If you knew that you would know as much -as we."</p> - -<p>This was the nearest a jest I had heard in -Intermere, but I knew from the character of -Remo's speech that the rest of the secret would -remain hidden from me.</p> - -<p>As we sat at his table later he said:</p> - -<p>"You have been nearer to our secret than -any one else in the outer world, and we shall -see whether the seeds will grow into the tree<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span> -of Knowledge and produce the fruits of Wisdom. -Neither your people nor any other people -could be trusted with this secret in their -present moral condition. A few learned men -dependent upon the rulers in one nation, knowing -it, could and would plot the destruction -and exploitation of all others. The sacrifice -of human life and the accumulation of human -woe and misery would be appalling.</p> - -<p>"If your leaders, with the suddenly awakened -hunger for conquest and dominion, could -literally command the thunderbolts and control -the elements as against the rest of the -world, they would sack Christendom in the -name of Liberty, Humanity and the Babe of -Bethlehem, but in the spirit of Mammon, Greed -and selfish love of power and riches.</p> - -<p>"You will make some progress in discoveries -along scientific and mechanical lines, but -no real good to the race can result until these -discoveries are turned to a nobler purpose<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span> -than that of seizing commercial supremacy, -subjugating alien and unwilling peoples, -slaughtering those who resist, exploiting those -who lay down their arms, gathering wealth -regardless of justice and the rights of mankind -and building up an artificial race in the -form of a ruling class, who base their right to -exclusive privileges on wealth and the perversion -of every principle of justice and the Christianity -they profess.</p> - -<p>"You have been wondering why, with our -great knowledge and achievements, we do not -go forth and dominate the world. What would -it profit us? Could we find anything that -would contribute to our enjoyments, our hopes, -our aspirations? No.</p> - -<p>"Even we are not proof against the paralyzing -touch of deterioration. We pay more -heed to the world's history than do the nations -and peoples who made that history, during the -centuries. History is but the lighthouse which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span> -warns against the reefs and rocks where -countless argosies have been lost. The mariners -who sail the ships of state dash recklessly -upon the rocks of destruction, despite the -friendly warnings of the dead and engulfed -who have gone before."</p> - -<p>Turning to lighter themes, Remo spoke of -the various economies of the Commonwealth, -and explained how the obstacles which confront -our civilization are overcome. Garbage -and all debris, for instance, are disposed of by -instantaneous reduction to original conditions, -and then a recombination and distribution -upon the grounds, farms and gardens. The -sewage question, the standing menace of all -dense and even sparse populations, is solved -by the same process of purification and -recombination. This work is constantly performed -under the eye of the municipal authorities, -and under fixed rules and service. Thus -the absolute cleanliness which prevailed everywhere<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span> -was readily explained.</p> - -<p>In answer to my query why Intermere had -so long escaped discovery from navigators, he -said, interrogatively:</p> - -<p>"Would it not be possible, with our superior -knowledge and wisdom, to put their reckoning -at fault whenever they came within a fixed -sphere of proximity?"</p> - -<p>To my question as to the equability of the -seasons, the absence of storms, and the regularity -of the descent of moisture in the form -of gentle rains, he said:</p> - -<p>"Do not imagine that our scientific knowledge -stops with the mere discovery of the direct -electric current or our mechanical devices."</p> - -<p>Nothing further could I elicit from him or -any other Intermerean on these or kindred -subjects. The Book of Knowledge had been -opened and apparently closed.</p> - -<p>After two days' stay in Remo's capital the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span> -Aerocars took up a goodly entourage, and we -moved softly and swiftly to the Greater City.</p> - -<p>There Xamas and all his officials awaited us, -along with every Intermerean of both sexes I -had met in my journeys, as well as every Municipal -Custodian of the realm, and in addition -the Chief Citizens of the fourteen Provinces I -had not visited.</p> - -<p>A reception fete was given me in the chief -temple of the city, hoary with age and instinct -with wisdom. There were songs and music by -the young and happy, and apropos discourses -by the older. I essayed the role of orator, -thanked my entertainers for their many courtesies -and the happy hours they had conferred -upon a wanderer in a strange land. The afternoon -and evening were a season of unalloyed -happiness.</p> - -<p>As I dropped into slumber in the house of -Xamas I soliloquized: "This kindness and -these honors seem significant. Perhaps the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span> -Intermereans intend to adopt me into all their -knowledge and wisdom. Perhaps"——</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>I felt that I was tossing on the swell of the -ocean. Then there was a sensation of physical -pain, as if from long exposure to the elements.</p> - -<p>So keen was this sensation that I awoke -fully, started up and looked around me. It -was a grayish dawn, purpling in lines near the -horizon. Towering above me I saw the outlines -of a great ship, lying at anchor and lazily -nodding as the swells swept into the harbor.</p> - -<p>I found myself in one of the individual Merocars, -intended for a single passenger, but the -compartments containing the accumulatory -motors had been removed and the marks of removal -deftly concealed.</p> - -<p>It was one of the most finished Merocars of -its class with the exception of the motor, constructed -entirely of prepared wood, resembling -a piece of wicker work, but impervious to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span> -sea, and floated like a cork or a feather.</p> - -<p>I was trying to determine where I was and -how I came to be in my present situation. -Then came to me this in the Language of Silence:</p> - -<p>"You have been safely delivered to those -who will restore you to your land and home. -Discretion is always commendable."</p> - -<p>I knew whence this thought came, and soon -the increasing light showed me that I was in -the harbor of Singapore, lashed with a silken -cord to the forechains of an East Indian merchantman.</p> - -<p>To my infinite regret I found that I was clad -in the same clothes I wore when the Mistletoe -went to the bottom. The same trinkets and a -few coins and the other accessories were still -in the pockets.</p> - -<p>But the handsome and natty garments of -Intermere were gone. I was back in the world -just as I left it, how long ago I could not tell,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span> -for the memories of Intermere seemed to cover -a decade at least, and I estimated that those -who lived to one hundred enjoyed a thousand -years of life.</p> - -<p>The lookout on the ship finally discovered me, -and shortly after I and my curious boat were -lifted to the deck and became the center of a -gaping crowd.</p> - -<p>As I could not account for myself reasonably, -I became merely evasive and did not account -for myself at all, and left the crew and passengers -equally divided as to whether I was a -lunatic of a cunning knave.</p> - -<p>Among those on board was one whose presence -suggested Intermere. I listened and observed, -and learned that he was the Secretary -of a native Rajah on board the ship. He inspected -me with curious disappointment. The -Merocar he seemed to worship both with eyes -and soul.</p> - -<p>"Sell it to him, for you need money."</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span></p> - -<p>That was Maros; I could not be mistaken.</p> - -<p>The Secretary motioned me to a distant part -of the deck and said abruptly:</p> - -<p>"I will give you five thousand rupees for the—for -the"——</p> - -<p>"Merocar."</p> - -<p>He started as though shocked by a bolt of -lightning.</p> - -<p>"I dare not talk—I cannot remember—but I -dare not talk. Will you sell it me for five -thousand rupees, Sahib? It is all I have, but -I will give it freely."</p> - -<p>"It is yours."</p> - -<p>He went below and soon returned with the -amount in bills of exchange upon the bank at -Hong Kong.</p> - -<p>He carried his purchase to his stateroom, -amid the laughter of passengers and sailors, -who did not conceal their merriment that any -man would pay such a price for a wicker basket, -and my cunning and hypnotic knavery -were thoroughly established.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span></p> - -<p>I remained a few days in Singapore, converting -my bills partly into cash and partly -into exchange on London and New York.</p> - -<p>Sailing later to Hong Kong, I there fell in -with an American military officer whom I -knew, and who gave me the full particulars of -Albert Marshall's death. With him I made -arrangements for the shipment of my cousin's -remains to his old home, via San Francisco.</p> - -<p>Two days later I sailed for London, and -within six weeks reached New York, and the -home of my childhood. I shall not describe -the meeting with my mother, nor speak of -what was said in relation to the strange and -brief communications which passed between -us months before.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2 id="VII">VII.</h2> - -<p class="chap">LE ENVOI.</p> -<hr class="r10" /> - -<blockquote> - -<p>I HAVE READ THE FOREGOING. -IT IS A FAITHFUL REPRODUCTION -OF WHAT I WAS ABLE TO -COMMUNICATE TOUCHING MY -EXPERIENCES. AND YET THE -PICTURE DRAWN IS FAINT, -HAZY AND FAR AWAY. COMPARED -WITH THE BEAUTIFUL -REALITY, IT IS "AS MOONLIGHT -UNTO SUNLIGHT, AS WATER -UNTO WINE." G. H. A. </p> -<p>Glenford, 1901.</p> -<p> -<br /> -</p></blockquote> - - - - - - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Intermere, by William Alexander Taylor - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INTERMERE *** - -***** This file should be named 53193-h.htm or 53193-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/3/1/9/53193/ - -Produced by Ralph and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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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. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Intermere - -Author: William Alexander Taylor - -Release Date: October 2, 2016 [EBook #53193] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INTERMERE *** - - - - -Produced by Ralph and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - -Transcriber's Note: - - Italic text is denoted by _underscores_. - Punctuation and possible typographical errors have been changed. - Archaic and variable spelling have been preserved. - The Table of Contents has been added by the transcriber. - - - - -CONTENTS - - Page - - CHAPTER I - The tourist lost in mid-ocean is mysteriously introduced - into Intermere, and meets the first citizen and other chief - officials. 10 - - CHAPTER II - Xamas, the first citizen, explains the polity and principles - governing the Commonwealth and promoting the interests of all - the people of Intermere. 30 - - CHAPTER III - Maros places Anderton in communication with his mother, and - dissipates his superstitious ideas and otherwise enlightens him - as to the possibilities of science. 54 - - CHAPTER IV - A trip by air and land and water through the provinces, cities, - hamlets and gardens, with matchless beauty and enjoyment on - every hand. 73 - - CHAPTER V - The philosophy of life, and the faculty of its enjoyment as - personified in the persons and vocations of the entertainers. 95 - - CHAPTER VI - The secret of Intermere partially revealed to Anderton, and - when he least expects it he is restored to his home and kindred, - much to his regret. 119 - - CHAPTER VII - Le envoi. 148 - - - - -[Illustration] - - - - - INTERMERE. - - _BY - WILLIAM - ALEXANDER - TAYLOR,_ - - COLUMBUS, OHIO. - - 1901 - - - 1902 - - THE XX. CENTURY PUB. CO. - - - - - COPYRIGHT BY - WM. A. TAYLOR, - 1901. - - - - - THIS IS THE STRANGE AND REMARKABLE STORY, IN SUBSTANCE, AND LARGELY IN - DETAIL, AS NARRATED BY GILES HENRY ANDERTON, JOURNALIST AND AMERICAN - TOURIST. - - - - -I. - - THE TOURIST LOST IN MID-OCEAN IS MYSTERIOUSLY INTRODUCED INTO - INTERMERE, AND MEETS THE FIRST CITIZEN AND OTHER CHIEF OFFICIALS. - - - - -I. - -THE MISTLETOE. - - -The Mistletoe, staunch, trim and buoyant, steamed across the equator -under the glare of a midday sun from a fleckless sky, and began to -ascend toward the antarctic circle. - -Three days later we came in sight of a great bank of fog or mist, which -stood like a gray wall of stone across the entire horizon, plunged into -it and the sun disappeared--disappeared forever to all except one of -the gay and careless crew and passengers. - -For days, as was shown by the ship's chronometers, we steamed slowly on -our course, surrounded by an inky midnight, instinct with an oppressive -and fearsome calm. As we approached the fortieth parallel of south -latitude a remarkable change set in. The deathly calm was suddenly -broken by the rush of mighty and boisterous winds, sweeping now from -one point of the compass, and then suddenly veering to another, -churning up the waters and spinning the Mistletoe round and round like -a top. - -In the midst of the terror and confusion, heightened by the unheeded -commands of the officers, a glittering sheeny bolt, like a coruscating -column of steel, dropped straight from the zenith, striking the -gyrating Mistletoe amidships. - -There was a deafening report, the air was filled with serpentine lines -of flame, followed simultaneously by the dull explosion of the boilers, -the hissing of escaping steam, the groaning of cordage and machinery, -the lurching of the vessel as the water poured in apparently from a -score of openings, a shuddering vibration of all its parts, and then, -amid cries and prayers and imprecations, the wrecked vessel shot like -a plummet to the bottom. - -I felt myself being dragged down to the immeasurable watery depths, -confused with roaring sounds and oppressed with terrors indescribable -and horrible. The descent seemed miles and miles. Then I felt myself -slowly rising toward the surface, followed by legions of submarine -monsters of grotesque shapes and terrifying aspects. - -With accelerated motion I approached the surface and, shooting like a -cork above the now calm sea, fortunately fell upon a piece of floating -wreckage. Looking upward as I lay upon it, I saw the blue sky and -the brilliant stars far overhead. The fierce winds and inky darkness -and blackness of the night were disappearing beyond the northeastern -horizon. - -I tried to concentrate my scattered thoughts and piece out the awful -catastrophe that had befallen the ship and my companions, but the -effort was too great a strain and I ceased to think--perhaps I ceased -to exist. - - * * * * * - -I seemed to be passing through a vague twilight of sentient existence. -Thought was rudimentary with me, if, indeed, there were any thoughts. -They were mere sensations, perhaps, or impressions imperfectly shaped, -but I remember them now as being so delightful, that I prayed, in -a feeble way, that I might never be awakened from them. And then -gradually the senses of sight, hearing, and full physical and mental -existence returned to me. - -At length I was able to determine that I lay on something like a -hammock on the deck of a smoothly gliding vessel. Turning my head first -to the right and then to the left, I imagined that I was indeed in -Paradise, only the reality before me was so infinitely more beautiful -than the most vivid poetic descriptions I had ever read of the longed -for heaven of endless peace and happiness. But this could not be the -Paradise of the disembodied souls, for I realized I was there in all my -physical personal being. - -I was sailing through a smooth, shimmering sea, thickly studded with -matchlessly beautiful islands. They lay in charming profusion and -picturesque irregularity of contour on the right and the left, each a -distinct type of beauty and perfection. I could make out houses and -gardens and farms and people on each of them. - -Looking to the right I saw what appeared to be a mainland with majestic -and softly modulated mountains and broad valleys, running from the -distance down to the sands of the seashore. Above the mountains shone -the unobscured sun, but not the burning orb I had known of old in the -lower latitudes. It kissed me with a tenderness that was entrancing, -filling my weakened frame with new life. - -The breezes toyed with my tangled and unkempt locks, fanned my brow -and whispered such things to me as did the zephyrs when I stood upon -the threshold of guileless boyhood. - -Finally I was able to frame a consecutive thought, in the interrogative -form, and it was this: - -"Where am I? Is this the Heaven my mother taught me to seek?" - -I had as yet seen no one aboard the ship, or whatever it was, although -I had heard the hum of what seemed to be conversation from some point -beyond the line of vision. Again I silently repeated my mental question. - -As if in response to my unuttered query, a being, or a man, of striking -and pleasing appearance came to my side and laying his hand softly -on my forehead, addressed me in a tongue at once familiar but wholly -unknown, as paradoxical as that may sound. - -I remained silent and he again addressed me. - -I did not feel disconcerted or awed by his appearance and said: "I -speak French and German imperfectly; English with some fluency." - -His rejoinder was in English: "You speak English, but are not an -Englishman except by partial descent. You are an American. Not a native -of the eastern portion of the continent, but from west of the range of -mountains which separate the Atlantic seaboard from the great central -valley of the continent. You are from the tributary Ohio valley, and -are, therefore, better fitted to comprehend what you will be permitted -to see and hear, than the average habitant of the eastern seashore, -especially of its great cities." - -You can possibly imagine, in a faint way, my unbounded surprise to be -thus addressed by one who was more than a stranger to me. - -"You asked yourself two questions. I will answer the first: You are in -Intermere." - -"And where is Intermere?" - -"It lies at your feet and expands on every hand about you. Let that -suffice. - -"No, this is not the Heaven to which your mother taught you to aspire. -It is a part of your own planet, inhabited by beings sprung from the -same parent stock as yourself, but differing from all other nations -and peoples; a people who are many steps nearer to the higher and -better life, and is, by comparison, the Paradise or Eden that masks the -gateway of the true Heaven, in a sphere beyond in the great Universe." - -He motioned to some one, and two persons appeared with refreshments. - -"Partake," he said, "and renew your exhausted physical and mental -powers." - -The proffered refreshments and cordials seemed to be the acme of the -gustatorial dreams of my former life: the suggestion of other things, -yet unlike them. After I had partaken, a new life thrilled every nerve -and fibre of my physical being and pulsated through every mental -faculty. - -I arose from my recumbent position and was conducted forward upon the -softly carpeted deck and presented to a score of others who received me -with every token of marked respect, unkempt and bedraggled as I was. -They were men of unusual physique, a composite of the highest types of -the human race I had ever seen or read of. Each possessed a distinctive -mien and personality, as individuals, yet presenting a harmonious -whole, taken collectively. - -Xamas, as I afterward learned to know him, when I saw him presiding as -First Citizen over this wonderful people, said to his fellows: - -"This is Giles Henry Anderton, a citizen of the interior of the great -Republic of North America. I have fathomed him and know that he is -worthy our respect and considerate treatment. He has dreamed longingly -of the things whereof we know, and which he has never even recognized -as a possibility. It will be our mission to show him the grand -possibilities of human life before we restore him to his kindred and -friends. - -"Not understanding that Nature had lain all treasures worth possessing -in lavish profusion at his feet in his own land, and guided by merely -commercial instincts, he sought for paltry gold in distant lands and -seas, and, escaping the vortex of death, has been placed in our hands -for some great purpose. He will be addressed in the English tongue -until it is determined whether he is to be admitted to ours." - -This was spoken in a language absolutely unknown to me, and not a word -of which I was capable of framing, and yet I understood it as fully as -though spoken in English. So great was my amazement that he should know -my nativity, my name, my hopes, my ambitions and my purposes, I could -scarcely reply to the salutations extended to me. - -"Do not be surprised," said Xamas, reading my inmost thoughts, "at what -I say, nor need you ask how I became possessed of your history. All -that will be made plain to you hereafter." - -Turning to one who stood near, he said: "Conduct Mr. Anderton to my -apartments and see that he has proper 'tendance and is supplied with -suitable clothing." - -With that I was conducted below to a charming suite of apartments lying -amidships, bathed, was massaged and shaven by an attendant, as lofty -of mien as Xamas himself, and furnished with clothing suitable to the -company with which I was to mingle, not more unlike the workmanship -of my American tailor than his would be unlike the handiwork of his -French, English or German fellow-craftsmen, and yet so unlike all of -them as to fit perfectly into the ensemble of the habiliments of my new -friends. - -The ship, or Merocar, as I subsequently learned was its general -designation, was a marvellous affair, unlike any water craft I had -ever seen. Its length was fully one hundred and fifty feet, and its -greatest breadth thirty, gently sloping both to stem and stern, where -it rounded in perfect curves. The upper, or proper deck, extended over -all. The lower deck was a succession of suites and apartments, richly -but artistically furnished, opening from either side into a wide and -roomy aisle. All the work was so light, both the woods, and the metals, -that it seemed fragile and unsafe, but its great strength was shown by -the fact that none of its parts yielded to the weight or pressure upon -it. - -There was not a mast, a spar nor a sail on board. The light and richly -wrought hammocks swung on lithe and polished frames, apparently -intended to sustain the weight of fifty pounds, yet capable of -sustaining five or ten times as much. They were unprotected by -awnings. Sunlight rather than shade was apparently the desideratum. - -In some unaccountable way the long and lithe Merocar was propelled -at any desired rate of speed, and was turned, as on a pivot, at the -will of the man who acted as captain, pilot and engineer. There was -no steam, no furnace belching black volumes of smoke, no whirr of -machinery, no strain or creaking as the craft shot, sometimes swiftly, -sometimes slowly, through the rippling water. Even motion was not -perceptible to the physical senses. - -The captain-pilot-engineer did not tug at a wheel in his railed-in -apartment, elevated a few feet above the center of the upper deck. He -placed his hand upon the table before him and it shot forward with -incredible speed; he touched another point and it stood still, without -jar or vibration. A movement of the hand, and the prow of the Merocar -swept gracefully from north to east in less than its length, to pass -between two beautiful islets or round some sharp promontory. Hundreds -of other Merocars, differing in size and form, were visible. - -How they were propelled was so incomprehensible to me that I attributed -it to supernatural agencies. I learned that it was a simpler process -than the utilization of oars, or sails, or steam, which the progenitors -of these mariners had abandoned before the days of Tyre and Sidon and -Memphis and Thebes. - -Rejoining the company, I endeavored to carry on a conversation with -them, but I fear I made little headway, so deeply was I absorbed in the -wonderful panorama that lay before me. - -Raising my eyes from the shimmering, island-studded and beauty-bestrewn -sea to the blue above, I uttered an ejaculation of surprise at what I -beheld. There I saw "the airy navies" of which Tennyson had written -under the spell of an inspiration which must have been wafted from -this unknown land, but marred by the hostile environments of his own. - -Every quarter of the heavens disclosed graceful barques sailing hither -and thither, passing and repassing each other, gathering in groups, -filled with people, many of them holding mute communications with -my companions, as though friend were talking with friend, without -utterance, sign or gesture. - -"I am beyond the confines of earth," I said to Xamas. "This is a higher -and spiritual sphere, and I am not Giles Henry Anderton, but his -disembodied spirit." - -"You are at fault. You are within the mundane sphere, but with a -people infinitely in advance of yours--a people who, by evolutionary -processes, have unlocked a large proportion of the secrets of Nature -and the Universe, and turned them to ennobling ends, not to selfish -purposes. These facts will come to you in time, and you will be -convinced. - -"See," he continued, "the city is slowly coming into view across the -horizon." - -My glance followed to the point indicated, and I saw a city of -ineffable magnificence, softly rising from the bosom of the deep, as -though obedient to the wand of a master magician. - -Soon I could see that it swept around the broad semicircle of the bay, -many miles in extent and artistically perfect in contour, the land -rising gently from the strand into a grand and massive elevation, cut -into great squares and circles, and crowned with noble buildings, great -and small, in a style of architecture which embraced all the beauties -and none of the blemishes of European and American creations. It was -the full and perfect flower of the crude buds of other lands. - -For a time my companions remained silent as I contemplated the -entrancing scene and drank in its beauties. Then Xamas interrupted me: - -"Yesterday the allied armies of the Western Nations entered the capital -of China, and are now bivouacked in the Forbidden City, from which the -Empress, Emperor and Court have fled." - -I shook my head incredulously: - -"When I sailed from New York six months ago there was no thought of -war between any of the Western Nations and the Chinese Empire. Russia -may have invaded one of its provinces by way of reprisal. That is a -possibility." - -"Great events focus and transpire within six months. What I tell you is -true. The hostile standards of England, Russia, Germany, France, Japan, -and your own Republic, which has departed from its wise traditions, -flout the Yellow Dragon in the precincts of his own citadel and temple. -Is not this true, Maros?" turning to one who looked the prophet and -seer. - -"Aye, indeed, and the best loved of this man's kindred fell in the -assault. He will know if I am permitted to name him." - -"Shall he be permitted?" - -"Freely." - -"Albert Marshall, a sergeant of Marines, your playmate and foster -brother, the next beloved of your mother, the son of her deceased -sister; your mother reared him as her own son, and she knows, as -yet, nothing of the disaster which has befallen you nor the loss of -her foster son. He was of your own age, and like you tall, athletic -and vigorous, with fair hair and complexion and blue eyes, the very -counterpart of yourself--a man fit for a higher destiny than butchery." - -"O Albert! O unhappy, stricken mother!" I cried in agony. - -"Revered sir, I believe your words. They are absolutely convincing. -Tell me how you came into possession of this strange information." - -"In time; but be patient. Lament not for the dead; sorrow not for the -living. We must presently debark. Come to my garden tomorrow. It lies -within the shadow of the Temple of Thought, Memory and Hope. My home -is unpretentious, but you will be welcome. There is need that you -should come. Tomorrow your mother will be apprised of the death of your -kinsman; almost simultaneously will come rumors of your shipwreck. She -must be assured of your safety within twenty-four hours, if you hope to -meet her again." - -"But how can I com----" - -"Peace, patience; sufficient unto tomorrow is the labor and issue -thereof." - -The Merocar gently ran into its slip, and we debarked, Xamas carrying -me to his home in a vehicle of strange design and mysterious power of -propulsion. - - - - -II. - - XAMAS, THE FIRST CITIZEN, EXPLAINS THE POLITY AND PRINCIPLES GOVERNING - THE COMMONWEALTH AND PROMOTING THE INTERESTS OF ALL THE PEOPLE OF - INTERMERE. - - - - -II. - -THE FIRST CITIZEN. - - -I shall so far anticipate as to say that the city in which I found -myself was known as the Greater City, in contradistinction of the -Lesser City, lying at the opposite end of the inland sea or mere. - -This body of water extends in an oval shape or form north and south, -its length being approximately four hundred miles, and its greatest -width at the latitudinal center two hundred miles, gradually narrowing -toward the opposite extremes, where it gently expands into rounded -bays, forming the extended water fronts of both cities. - -The Greater City was clearly the original seat of the present -civilization, from which it extended southward along both shores until -it met at the southern apex and became the Lesser City. I was able, -however, to distinguish but little, if any, difference between the two. - -The twelve hundred miles of shore line is studded with farms, gardens, -towns, villages, hamlets, private residences and public edifices, -extending over highland and plain, as far as I was permitted to see, -toward the outer boundaries, the location and character of which I can -not even conjecture. - -Many rivers, limpid and sparkling, coming through level and spreading -valleys, and from almost every point, contribute their waters to the -mere. - -The current of the mere is phenomenal--not violent, but distinctively -marked. Twice within every twenty-four hours it sweeps entirely -around the oval, affecting one-half of the mere as it moves. With the -early hours of the morning and evening it sweeps from north to south -throughout the eastern, and with noon and midnight through the western -half of the sea. - -This current may be described as anti- or trans-tidal; that is, the -general water level falls or is lowered on the side where the current -runs, and rises correspondingly in the opposite half. - -The effect is this: From 6 a. m. to 12 noon and from 6 p. m. to -midnight, throughout the eastern half, the tide runs in from those -rivers falling in from the east, and correspondingly rises and moves -inland in those falling in from the west, and then the current flows -north on the western side from 12 noon to 6 p. m. and from midnight to -6 a. m., so that for half the time the rivers on either side ebb or -flow into the sea, and for the other twelve hours rise and flow to the -interior, east or west as the case may be. - -The effect of this is singular indeed, or it was to me. The rivers -appear to run inland from the sea a part of the time, and then run from -the landward into the sea for twelve hours, or an equal period, while -the sea itself appears to be a subdivided river forever flowing in an -elongated circle along the opposite shores. - -The description of the Egyptian high priest, carefully guarded by his -successors for nine thousand years, then revealed to Solon, and by -Solon narrated to Plato, and by Plato transmitted to the modern world, -must have had its basis here. Is not this the Atlantis which enthralled -the Egyptian sage, philosopher and priest more than ten cycles ago? - -To the Egyptian the ever-flowing rivers returned to their common source -through valleys and landscapes of ravishing beauty, renewing themselves -forever. They laved the feet of cities, irrigated the endless -succession of farms, gardens and residential demesnes, and mirrored the -mountains, clothed with perpetual verdure and crowned with the stately -monuments of genius, wisdom, art, civilization, learning and human -progress, a century of centuries agone. - - * * * * * - -I have spoken of the singular vehicle in which, with Xamas, I left -the pier and ascended the gentle slope into the city. It might be -likened, faintly however, to the best types of our automobiles. But the -comparison would be much like that between the ox-cart and the landau. - -It more resembled a double-seated chair set upon several small elastic -wheels, scarcely visible beneath the rich trappings which dropped -almost to the smooth street, as scrupulously clean as a ballroom floor. - -Xamas pushed a tiny lever, almost hidden in the rich upholstery of the -arm-rest, and it moved swiftly and noiselessly forward without jar or -oscillation. A delicate and a deftly concealed spring guided it along -the graceful curves of the streets, or sent it at a right angle when -the streets crossed at tangents. - -An adjustment lowered the speed to a strolling pace; another movement -gave a high speed, while the reversal of the lever brought us to a -standstill that I might silently admire some stately architectural pile -or revel in the contemplation of some lovely private home. - -As we journeyed Xamas said: "Ask with all frankness such questions as -you desire. Wisdom is the child of patience, so be neither impatient, -if the answer is not immediate, or if it is at first incomprehensible. -It will be some time before your understanding can grasp all that you -see or all that you hear. - -"Your people undertake the impossible feat of putting a gallon of grain -into a pint vase. Result: The vase is crushed and broken and the grain -is spilled and lost. The human mind is the vase; Knowledge is the -grain, from which Wisdom will germinate. The vase expands by a process -too subtle for your comprehension. To crowd it beyond its capacity -with the idea of expanding its receptiveness is a dangerous and fatal -folly. That is why mental dwarfs multiply and mental giants diminish in -proportion to the increase of your people. Two things are uppermost in -your mind: - -"First, you believe you are in a supernatural sphere and surrounded by -a supernatural people. In this you are absolutely at fault. Accept this -assurance without reservation. You will tarry with us long enough to -fully comprehend that fact. You will see nothing during your stay that -can not be accounted for on natural and scientific grounds. - -"Second, you are consumed with curiosity to know how I propel this -Medocar and make it obey my every wish, so to speak. The full -explanation of that I shall delegate to another, who will acquaint you -with our mechanisms and the principle that moves them. - -"When you have patiently and intelligently listened to him you will -know that we have achieved what your wisest and deepest and least -appreciated thinkers have but vaguely dreamed of and hoped for during -long and intermittent periods. But here we are at my residence. Let us -enter and I will introduce you to my family and friends." - -The Medocar halted with the last word in front of a two-storied, -many-gabled house with broad verandas, situated in the center of -spacious grounds, beautified with trees and shrubs and flowers and -bubbling fountains. - -Ushering me into a spacious reception hall, he presented me to his wife -and children--grown-up sons and daughters--and then to a number of -men and women who had called to greet him, some on social affairs and -some on matters of public business, concluding with: "Mr. Anderton is -a castaway from the other side of the world, who is entitled to our -sympathy and care." - -If my newly made acquaintances were curious as to my being, personality -and history, they had masterful control of their feelings. In all -things they treated me with the most refined courtesy and gentle -consideration. They did not embarrass me with expressions of pity or -consolatory suggestions. - -They addressed me in my own language, made me feel that I was welcome -to their society. Each extended an invitation to me to visit them at -their homes, some of them in distant provinces, and these invitations -were gratefully accepted. There could be no mistaking the deep -sincerity they implied. - -After an hour's pleasant conversation on many and varied subjects with -my host and his guests, Xamas led me to a suite of apartments intended -for my use, and said: - -"Attendants will provide you with refreshments and ascertain your -every want. Rest and fully recuperate. Later in the day I shall explain -to you the polity of our Commonwealth, in which I perceive you are -deeply interested." - -What a remarkable man! He seemed to read my inmost thoughts. - - * * * * * - -As the sun was hanging like a softly beaming lamp above a cone-like -mountain beyond the western line of the Greater City, Xamas and I were -alone upon an open veranda, overgrown with clambering vines of many -kinds in full bloom, radiant with exquisite colors and shades. He -abruptly said to me: - -"This Commonwealth is a pure democracy. Titles and offices confer no -merely meretricious distinctions. They temporarily impose additional -responsibilities, duties and burdens; the chief distinction of the -citizen is conferred by labor, for labor is honorable and praiseworthy -above all things else. The second is justice. When and where all men -labor and all men are just, there can be no wrong, no sin, no evil. -Where there is labor and not justice, the strong enjoy, the weak suffer -and endure, opulence flourishes for the few, pain and poverty afflict -the many. Where there is neither labor nor justice, where might makes -right, barbarism in its worst form curses the land. - -"The ascent from the third condition to the first is a highway leading -through the second, where labor is oppressed and justice is a stranger, -until at last justice and labor join hands and produce a happy and a -great people. I touch only on the three cardinal points. The process of -ascent is slow and purely evolutionary--an evolution that constantly -conforms itself to ever-changing environments. - -"Your own so-called Declaration of Independence, which so many of your -people do not care to comprehend, was drawn from the keystone of our -own national arch--Human Equality, the climax of human civilization -and happiness. - -"Thousands of years before the feet of the more modern Europeans trode -the soil of your continent we had reached this point, and discovered -that we had but reached the initial period of our usefulness and higher -destiny. - -"It required centuries to expel first the animal instincts, and then -the barbarian nature from our race, not by savage repression and -ruthless aggression and slaughter, but by the study and application of -the laws of Nature and the Universe, which at last ultimated in the -principle and entity of Brotherhood and the equality of all men--not -equality of stature, mental equipment or material endowment, but the -equality of common rights and common opportunities. Labor and Justice -maintain and preserve this equality and Brotherhood. - -"Thousands of years before Magna Charta we had founded our -Commonwealth on the great principles of human equality and the right of -life, liberty and the pursuit of rational happiness, and my ancestors, -comprehending the profound laws of Nature unknown to yours, wafted -to them these precious seed, trusting that they would fall on genial -and generous soil, and the inspiration thus transmitted through the -agency of our progenitors was inscribed by yours upon rescript of your -national autonomy. - -"Its growth, once so promising, has become painful and pitiable. The -upas of human greed and selfishness withers it, and the prophecy -of bloom and fruitage is unfulfilled. The animal instinct and the -barbarous appetite which reaches after the gaud and tinsel of excessive -wealth and accumulation, the two aggressive forms of selfishness -combined in one, hold civilization and human progress in check, and may -in your case, as in a thousand others, lead back to the fen and morass -of primal barbarism. - -"No, this is not the Paradise of Socialism, as you call it," said he, -interpreting the thread of my thought. "That is but an idle dream, the -recrudescence of primal, undeveloped and undesirable conditions, which -occasionally flashes through irresolute minds, unfitted to solve the -great problem of human existence and happiness. - -"This is the land of absolute individuality as well as absolute -equality. Every man who reaches maturity becomes the individual owner -of property in one or more of its forms, the foundation being the soil -for residence or productive purposes, or both, at his option. All lands -are subject to individual ownership, within clearly defined limits, the -public domain being held in reserve to meet new demands of increasing -population. It is the common property of all until it passes into -individual ownership, to be used for agricultural or other purposes, -under fixed rules, a specific proportion of the product, or its -equivalent, being turned into the common treasury, to prosecute public -improvements and for other public purposes. - -"This stands in lieu of taxation in other countries, and it is only -on rare occasions that it is necessary to supplement it with a direct -tax on the people, except as to the municipal and provincial taxes for -local purposes, in which case each man of mature age, or twenty-five -years, pays the one hundredth part of his earnings monthly into the -treasury, the sum thus paid being evenly divided between the treasuries -of the province and municipal division. When a surplus equal to the -previous year's expenditures accumulates this tax is remitted for the -ensuing year. - -"A man may own a home and a separate farm or garden, or business or -manufacturing site; nor may he engage in more than one business or -employment, except the public service, at the same time. He may change -from one line of business to another, but may not buy or sell real -estate for mere speculation. He may not acquire property other than his -earnings until he reaches maturity, and designs to marry and become the -head of a family. If his intent fail, or remains unfulfilled for three -years, the home thus acquired becomes public property, and may be sold -to another who assumes the marital relation, and the proceeds divided -equally between the municipal treasury or bank and the former owner. - -"Residences may be exchanged, as may farms, gardens, business sites -and factories, including the line of business or manufacturing, but -neither may be alienated by the owner, except with the approval of -the Custodian of the Municipality upon a satisfactory showing of the -reasons therefor. - -"All persons of both sexes must take up an occupation at the age of -twenty, and continue therein, or in some other occupation, until sixty -years of age, unless incapacitated, and deposit in the municipal bank -or treasury at least one-twentieth of their monthly earnings. At sixty -they may retire from active life, and their accumulations are subject -to their wants and demands under salutary rules. The residue, along -with their other personal property, is distributed pro rata among their -direct descendants, and if there be none, in is turned into the general -treasury of the Commonwealth. - -"Women are entitled to their earnings, but may not own real estate, -the policy being that men shall be the home-makers and women the -home-keepers. The wife is entitled to the prevailing wage from her -husband for attending to his household affairs, in addition to the -other provisions for household matters and economies which he must -make. - -"Under our system there is neither opulence nor poverty in the -land. Great wealth has no existence with us, and therefore has no -allurements. Charity is not a gaunt pack-horse, overloaded with -offerings which come after the eleventh hour. The equality of -opportunity closes every inlet to the wolves of Hunger and Poverty -which ravage other lands amid the riotous revelry of the unjustly -opulent. We have had, at intervals, persons who rebelled, through -recurrent heredity perhaps, against our admirable system, and to them -we administer lex dernier--they are transported to some other land, by -methods known only to ourselves, there to mingle with a new people, -with but a faint conception of their nativity. They constitute those -mysterious beings found in all other countries, whose origin is forever -hidden, and as a rule they are excellent and strangely wise citizens, -for they are permitted to carry with them much of the knowledge, with -some of the wisdom, of their ancestry." - -I shall abbreviate much that Xamas gave in great detail. From him -I learned that every male is entitled to participate in all public -affairs, including the right of franchise. All are eligible to office. -The Commonwealth is composed of twenty-four provinces, each province -being composed of twelve municipal divisions. - -The elective officers are, in their order: 1. First Citizen of the -Commonwealth. 2. Chief Citizen of the Province. 3. Custodian of the -Municipality. - -The First Citizen is the executive head of the Commonwealth, serves -but a single year, and is not eligible to re-election. The Chief -Citizens, or executives of the provinces, constitute his Board of -Counselors to determine all matters affecting the public welfare and to -select the various Curators of the divisional interests of the entire -Commonwealth. They meet to perform these duties twice each year, -alternating between the Greater and Lesser Cities. - -The Chief Citizens are the executive heads of the Provinces, the -Custodians of the Municipalities constituting their respective Boards -of Counsellors. They, too, meet twice each year to consider and -determine matters of provincial interest, and to decide all questions -of difference which may come up from the Municipalities. Their tenure -of office is two years, and they are not eligible to re-election. - -The Custodians are the sole heads of the Municipalities, and decide all -questions arising therein, and appeal lies from their decisions to the -Provincial Board of Counsellors, who determine the question finally. -They hold the office three years, and may not be re-elected. The above -officials appoint all the necessary clerical and other assistants -necessary to carry out the duties imposed on them. - -None of the elective officers receive salaries, but are allowed out of -their respective treasuries 20 media per day for all necessary expenses. - -The media is equivalent to 20 cents American currency, and is the -unit of exchange. It is divided into four equal parts, the coin being -designated quatro, while a third coin, equivalent to 5 media, is -denominated cinque, so that the three coins are quatro, silver; media, -gold; and cinque, gold and platinum in equal parts, of nearly equal -size and weight, representing five, twenty, and one hundred cents of -our currency, and nearly the size of an American quarter-dollar. - -Twenty media is the wage of the master artisan, and 15 media the wage -of all other males. Females receive a wage of from 8 to 15 media. The -master artisan's wage is the compensation of all official assistants -in whatever capacity, as well as the expense allowance of the actual -officials. - -In addition to the above officials of the Commonwealth there are: -Curator of Revenues; Curator of Works and Polity; Curator of Learning -and Progress; Curator of Scientific Research and Application, and -Curator of Useful Mechanical Devices. Their duties are suggested by -their titles. They receive the expense allowance, no salaries, are -chosen for terms of seven years, ineligible to a second term, by the -First Citizen and his Counsellors, and appoint their own subordinates -and assistants. - -There is a Curator of Revenue appointed by the Chief Citizen of each -Province to care for the provincial, and by the Municipal Custodian to -care for the Municipal revenues. - -The marriageable age of men is from 25 to 30, and women from 20 to -25. The offspring of the marriage relation varies from two to six, -seldom less than two, or more than six, the average being four, hence -population increases slowly, while the great majority live from 80 to -100 years, retaining both physical and mental faculties to the last. - -"There is no mercenary incentive to hold office," said Xamas, "and it -is absolutely open to all, and men leave it, not with regret, but with -the consciousness of having performed a necessary duty and service. -Three months hence I will leave the chief office of the State, and -resume my occupation as mechanical engineer under one with whom I have -been for a score or more of years. He is now my Secretary, but that is -nothing unusual. It is a leading part of our history. - -"But it is time for rest. You have an important engagement with Maros, -our Curator of Scientific Research and Application, tomorrow morning, -and he exacts promptitude." - - - - -III. - - MAROS PLACES ANDERTON IN COMMUNICATION WITH HIS MOTHER, AND DISSIPATES - HIS SUPERSTITIOUS IDEAS AND OTHERWISE ENLIGHTENS HIM AS TO THE - POSSIBILITIES OF SCIENCE. - - - - -III. - -A DAY WITH MAROS. - - -I called on Maros, the Curator of Scientific Research and Application, -as per appointment, and found him surrounded with everything calculated -to contribute to the enjoyments of earthly existence. His residence -differed in many respects from that of Xamas. All its appointments -and environments were in the most exquisite taste. But this may be -said, once for all, of every private residence and public edifice in -Intermere. The taste of architects and occupants differed, but all were -on lines of beauty, comfort and convenience. - -There is no luxury in Intermere, as we use the term. Luxury is a -merely comparative term in the rest of the world, distinguishing -those who have much from those who have little or nothing. Here every -rational taste is gratified in all particulars. The people have clearly -discovered the hidden springs of Nature's kindly intentions toward man, -and utilize them at individual and collective will. - -"You are prompt," said Maros, seating me in his study. "Let us proceed -with the matter in which you are interested." - -He placed before me a perfectly drawn map of a section of the United -States, embracing the place of my nativity, and asked me to point out -the exact vicinity of my mother's home. I found it readily. - -"The point you now occupy is the lineal opposite. Turn to the point, or -direction, you have designated, and direct your concentrated thought -there. If a responsive impression comes to you, communicate its purport -to me." - -I sat in silent thought a few moments, Maros closely regarding me. - -"I am impressed that my mother is prostrated with grief; that she has -just learned of the death of my kinsman; that rumors of the loss of -the Mistletoe have reached her, being first cabled from Singapore to -New York, and from thence transmitted to the press, and that she is -impressed with the belief that I, too, am dead. I fear that she will -not survive the double shock." - -"Frame such a thought as you would wish impressed upon your mother's -consciousness and faith, and tell me what follows." - -This is the thought I framed: "Mother, I am alive and well in an -unknown land, surrounded by kind friends, and will ere long return to -you." - -Later to Maros: "I am convinced. My mother has partially recovered from -the shock. My death would have been the fatal blow. She smiles with -pious resignation, through the tempest of her grief, and extends her -arms as if to embrace me. This, however, is wholly an impression; I -do not see or hear her, but we seem to stand face to face, and both -realize it." - -"Give yourself no further concern, nor seek further communication with -her until you meet her in person. She knows you are alive and will -return to her. Nothing she will hear will change that belief." - -"Tell me by what divine or celestial power I am thus enabled to project -my thoughts across unknown seas and continents, and receive responsive -thoughts. Only supernatural agencies could accomplish this." - -"You have what you call the telephone?" - -"Yes." - -"You communicate alike with friends and strangers hundreds of miles -distant in an ordinary tone of voice?" - -"Yes." - -"Is that supernatural?" - -"No; it is the result of scientific achievement and natural phenomena." - -"Would one, coming out of the depths of absolute ignorance of -scientific achievement, as you call it, regard it as a supernatural -agency?" - -"He undoubtedly would." - -"What would you think of his conclusion?" - -"That it was the result of superstition." - -"And yet you who have just stepped out of the dawn into the full day; -you who have transmitted uttered thoughts to remote distances through -a coarse steel or copper wire and received other uttered thoughts in -return, regard with superstitious awe, as supernatural, what you have -just experienced. Wherein do you differ from the untutored barbarian?" - -I sat in silence. - -"The telephone wire is to the thread of sentient thought which may span -the universe itself, what the horseback mail-rider is to your modern -methods of communication--what the earliest dawn is to the full day." - -Maros explained at full length how he became possessed of the knowledge -of my identity, family connections and my misfortunes, summing up: - -"When you were found in the remote and outer ocean and brought within -the precincts of Intermere, you were physically unconscious, but still -possessing partially dormant mental faculties; that is, you continued -to think feebly and intermittently. We traced your two intermittent -lines of thought to your mother in America, and to, or rather toward, -your kinsman at some unknown point. Tracing again to your parent we -learned that Marshall had accompanied the American expedition to -China from Manila. Following this clew, we ascertained that he had -been killed, and that that fact would reach his home in due course, -as well as the fact that information of the loss of your ship would -reach America almost simultaneously. What your mother now regards -as premonitions of impending evil or misfortunes were communications -with her consciousness, far more refined and perfect than the -subsequent cable communications, but quite as natural, and in no sense -supernatural." - -"This is indeed amazing!" I exclaimed. - -He further said that this was an individual case and purely the -result of my condition. "We do not seek, as a rule, knowledge of -individualities in the outside world, but confine our inquiries -to matters of general moment. We know of the steps of progress, -retrogression, of savagery and butchery and wrong and oppression which -dominate an embryotic civilization. Amuse yourself for a time with the -pictures and tapestries, and I will give you a record of the outer -world's important matters of yesterday." - -He opened a cabinet, and assumed the mien of expectant inquiry and -meditation. Soon his hands began to move with rhythmic rapidity over -the curiously inlaid center of the flat surface of the open cabinet. -At the end of ten or fifteen minutes his manipulations ceased, a -compartment above noiselessly opened, and eight beautifully printed -pages, four by six inches, bound in the form of a booklet, fell upon -the table. - -It was printed in characters more graceful than our own Roman letters, -from which they might have been evolved, or the Roman Alphabet might -have deteriorated from what appeared before me. The English language -was not used, and yet I could readily read and comprehend the lines. -The pages before me comprised a compendium of yesterday's doings of the -entire world, and included a note of my own case. - -They told of all the military operations in China, in the Philippines, -in South Africa, in the far East and in the remote West; of labor -troubles in the mining districts of America; the strike of the textile -operatives on our Atlantic border; the unrest of the Finns and Slavs; -of plots and counterplots, and political assassination and revolution, -attempted or accomplished, and the full catalogue of such happenings, -with now and then a flash of loftier civilization. - -"What you read is being reproduced in every divisional municipality of -the Commonwealth, with such a number of instantaneous duplications as -may be required for the perusal and study of all who desire to compare -tinseled and ornamented barbarism with true civilization. - -"Selfishness, oppression, slaughter, pride, conquest, greed, vanity, -self-adulation and base passions make up ninety-nine one-hundredths -of this record. What a commentary on such humanity! To it love, -brotherhood and mutual helpfulness are too trivial for serious -consideration. - -"The nations and their rulers, differing somewhat as to degree, stand -for organized and dominant wrong, based primarily on selfishness--the -exact reverse of the conditions that should exist." - -"This," said I, still contemplating the pages, "compares with our -newspapers." - -"As two objects may compare with each other as to bulk or form, -but in no other respect. This is to promote wisdom. The newspaper -to feed vicious or depraved appetite, as well as to convey useful -information. This is the cold, colorless, passionless record of facts -and information, from which knowledge and wisdom may be deduced to -some extent. Your newspaper is the opposite, taken in its entirety. It -consists of the inextricable mingling together of the good and the bad, -of the useful and the useless, and the elevating and the degrading, -the latter always in the ascendant. - -"It foments discord instead of promoting profitable discussion, which -is the bridle-path leading into the highway of wisdom. It is built upon -the cornerstone of selfishness, the other name of commercialism, and is -thoroughly imbued with the spirit of greed. - -"It caters to the public demand regardless of the spirit or the -depravity behind it. 'Quatro! Quatro! Quatro!' is the burden of -its cry, and for quatro it is willing to lead the world forward or -backward, as the case may be. It has been growing in stature and -retrograding in usefulness for fifty years throughout the world, in all -save increasing facilities, and avidity for pandering to the worst and -most uncivilized propensities of mankind, and it will probably continue -to grow worse for a century to come. - -"Fifty years ago it was blindly controversial, but there was enough of -reason in its discussions to give hope for the future. Now it is a -mere mental and moral refuse car, and its so-called religious form is -devoted only to a more refined class of refuse, if that expression is -allowable. - -"As a whole, it represents classes and not the whole community; -prejudices, and not principles; it advocates selfish, not general -interests; it panders to petty jealousies; it indulges in tittle-tattle -in mere wantonness, and has no aim save the grossly materialistic." - -I winced under his fierce arraignment and invective, for I am a -newspaper man myself. - -"I know that I have touched you in a sensitive spot, but I speak of -the newspaper in a general sense. There are worthy exceptions, despite -all the untoward environments; but, unfortunately, their influence -is limited. Your masses read and re-read accounts of how two beings -beat each other out of human semblance on a wager, and pass, unread -and unnoticed, the best thoughts of your greatest scientists and -profoundest thinkers. It is not the canaille who do this alone, but -your statesmen and rulers, men of large affairs and men of the learned -professions." - -I turned the conversation, saying: - -"It is incomprehensible to me how you produced this record of events in -so short a time and without apparent mechanical or physical effort." - -"Doubtless, but not more incomprehensible to you than your linotype -machines and perfecting press would have been to Gutenberg. And your -discoveries and inventions would be no more incomprehensible to him -than would his types and crude multiplying press be to the papyrus -writers, scriveners and hieroglyphants of the earlier world. - -"The transition from the work of the papyrians to the achievements of -the Intermereans is the result of that evolution known as scientific -research into Nature's beneficence, in which mechanical invention is -a mere incident, and its application to a high, unselfish and noble -purpose, instead of selfish, base and ignoble ends. - -"We had outstripped your present ideals ages before the Chinese began -block printing, or Gutenberg fashioned his types and press. Both -these, as well as your own advanced mechanism, as well as your every -other great achievement in science and research, were the result of -the thought-seed sown or diffused from this land, but which fell on -absolutely barren soil, or only grew in puny or defective forms, far -short of ripening or maturity. - -"Your Franklin comprehended the supreme and all-pervading power and -genius of the Universe, the knowledge of and the power to utilize which -makes man godlike, but the dense ignorance and gross materialism of his -day prevented him from enlightening his people. - -"Your Morse conceived and executed the scheme of telegraphic signals -cycles after we had discarded it. - -"Your nameless and unknown discoverers, whose weak but apprehending -genius was utilized by Bell, gave you the telephone ages after it had -been supplanted here by our more nearly perfect system of intelligent -communication with the entire terrestrial world, and we are now -exploring, with it, the adjacent systems of the Universe with promising -results. - -"Your Edison and other electrical discoverers are more than a cycle -behind us, and have as yet but touched the outer surface of the great -secret. To them and to others the current of the Universe is a constant -menace and a danger. To us it as gentle and as harmless as the flowers -that bloom by the wayside, and responds to our every wish and use with -absolute tractability. - -"The fault of the rest of the world is that all great discoveries, -all the unlockings of Nature's treasure-house, are turned to selfish -ends, to the aggrandizement of the few, and the detriment, if not the -oppression, of the many; hence civil commotions, wars, tyrannies, the -insolence of opulence, and the failure to carry forward the process of -civilization and the elevation of the race by the unselfish application -of attained wisdom. The barbarian spirit of Self is dominant. - -"You were about to ask if you might carry this record home. No. You -will be permitted to inspect it and others similar during your sojourn, -and carry their remembrance with you, and thus be enabled to compare -them with your own current records of contemporaneous dates; but that -is all. - -"The Western nations have opened their own gates and invited eventual -destruction by this apparently temporary invasion of the East. This -war, if it may be so called, will be of short duration, followed -by the oppression inseparable from selfish greed, commercialism and -the love of conquest and arbitrary power which compels the unwilling -obedience of peoples. - -"But the 400,000,000 Chinese and affiliated races, are more insidiously -dangerous than you know. They will cultivate the seed now being sown, -and prepare the dragon's harvest of blood. In the remoter provinces -they will soon breed soldiers and captains, who will eclipse the bloody -and destructive achievements of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane, profiting -by your present superior knowledge of mechanism and the arts of war, -which they will appropriate and assimilate, and turn to terrible final -account. - -"The commercial greed of the West will be the enemy of the Western -peoples themselves. It will fit and arm the aroused avengers for their -world-wide invasion and conflict. Selfish capitalists will do this -in spite of all inhibitions, under the plea of creating prosperous -conditions and extending commerce, and their people and their posterity -will perish by the enginery which selfish commercial greed placed in -the hands of their enemies." - -Maros presented me to another official, and politely dismissed me to -visit the places of interest in the city. Upon my return to America -I compared the contemporaneous history of the world with the daily -records I had been permitted to inspect, the remembrance of which -I vividly retained, and found every fact therein to be absolutely -correct. - - - - -IV. - - A TRIP BY AIR AND LAND AND WATER THROUGH THE PROVINCES, CITIES, - HAMLETS AND GARDENS, WITH MATCHLESS BEAUTY AND ENJOYMENT ON - EVERY HAND. - - - - -IV. - -A TOUR OF SIGHT-SEEING. - - -What a wonderful land is Intermere, and what a wonderful people live -and enjoy life in it to the full! - -Twenty days of visiting ten of the interior provinces, bordering -on the mere, was more like a dream of happiness, sight-seeing and -indescribable enjoyment to me than a reality. For reasons not explained -to me I was not carried into the fourteen remaining provinces, which -evidently lay in all directions toward the exterior borders of the -land. I rather suspect that this was because it might have enabled me -to form some definite idea of the geographical location of Intermere. - -What I saw and experienced I still retain as a beautiful and -ineffaceable memory, but it is a picture I can not wholly reproduce or -describe in anything like complete details. I can at best only give the -impressions I still retain. - -The delightful journey was under the direction of Karmas, the Custodian -of Works and Polity, accompanied by other chief officers, and the -officials of the provinces, the title and character of which had -already been given me by Xamas. - -They have three modes of travel: by Medocar, by Aerocar, and by -Merocar. By the first you travel on land; by the second through the -air; by the third on the water. While these vehicles of transportation -are divided into three general classes as designated, they comprise -thousands of beautiful and curious designs, upon which individual names -are bestowed, as we bestow names upon our horses and our ships. - -There is no preference as to the mode and method of journeying. Each of -them seems absolutely perfect. There is no physical sense of motion in -either, as we realize it. - -They glide over the broad, smooth and perfectly kept roadways, -through the depths of the ether, or along the waters, with the same -imperceptible motion, and can be put to a rate of speed that makes our -limited railway trains seem like lumbering farm wagons. All resistance -of the elements seems absolutely overcome. - -The power of propulsion was wholly incomprehensible at first, and -later I was only able to learn as to its principle, and left wholly to -conjecture as to its application. - -Roadways, or, perhaps more properly, boulevards, interlace the -whole country. They are the perfection of road-building--smooth, -even-crowned, and free from dust, water or other offensive substance. -The surface is like a newly asphalted street, but hard and impervious, -with no depressions, cracks or flaws. The engineering could hardly be -improved on. Accepting the statements made to me that the most of these -highways have been in use for centuries, with few if any repairs, they -may be looked on as not only permanent but indestructible. - -The purpose of each of them is self-evident. Every rod of it is for use -and to meet some requirement that presents itself. They are bordered, -wherever they extend, with beautiful homes, monuments and temples, -commemorative of some great achievement in civilization and progress. - -The residential grounds, farms and gardens are marvels of exquisite -taste without an exception, so far as I was able to note, modeled after -countless designs, which give the earth's surface a versatility of -beauty that is enchanting. - -There are farms and gardens everywhere except in a limited number of -the compact squares of cities, small and perfectly kept, and productive -in a sense and to a degree absolutely incredible to the dwellers of any -other land. - -As to these roadways: They are of the uniform width of two hundred -feet wherever you find them, whether skirting sea, lake or river, -penetrating valleys or clambering around and around the ascent of the -mountains from base to apex, where some monument or temple, or both, -are perched, overlooking hundreds of square miles. - -As already stated, they are everywhere as smooth and kept as clean as -a tiled floor, with a sense or quality of elasticity, and seemingly -indestructible. I would have regarded them as natural phenomena had -I not seen a mountain being terraced and a roadway being graded and -finished without any of the paraphernalia of our own methods of -engineering and construction. - -Earth and rock seemed to melt and become mobile under the influence of -some unseen power, and gangs of men, following with levelers of light -machinery, modulated the grades and contours of the crumbled rock and -soil. Others followed these, compounding, expanding and laying down -a plastic and rapidly hardening envelope, thus finishing the surface -like the roads over which we were gliding, some of which, I was told, -had been in use for many centuries without the slightest change of -condition. - -I expressed a doubt as to their longevity. - -Karmas smiled and said: - -"You judge by experience. In your cities you import material from some -distant country or island, and by mechanical manipulation and chemical -combination and processes fit it to be laid down as a pavement. When -finished it looks almost as smooth and beautiful as yonder landway -being newly constructed to accommodate the expanding population of the -district. But the resemblance ends here. - -"Your chemists and engineers and constructors have only the crudest -ideas of landway or terraneous works. The asphalt is a suggestion, but -the builder's compound turns it in the direction of deterioration. -Instead of going forward, they go backward. They know little of the -character of the materials they seek to utilize, and nothing of the -true principles of chemical combination. - -"Our material is at hand, as it is at hand everywhere, containing the -elements which need only to be properly combined and assimilated to -become practically indestructible. - -"You take a clay, and by machinery, crude perhaps, reduce it to dust, -then moisten it back into pliable clay, fashion it, subject it to -an intense but unrefined heat, and you have what will retain its -form and consistence for centuries, and resist the elemental attacks -longer even than granite. This is but the dawn of possibilities. The -semi-barbarous, thousands of years ago, went further and made them -flexible as well as durable. Their discoveries were long ago forgotten. - -"Your people never go beyond the point of discovery. They stop short -of the possibilities. They lose these possibilities in material and -commercial utilization. Ego stands between the discoverer and the -world, and progress ends. - -"While the rest of the world has thus, again and again, stood still on -the threshold, or moved backward or forward intermittently, for obvious -and selfish reasons, we have steadily moved forward in scientific -discovery and research, and the application of great principles. - -"The example is before you. Without any of your crude and cumbersome -machinery, the mountain is being terraced and fitted for the abode -of man, the elemental constituents are being disintegrated, properly -disposed, rearranged and the surface recombined in a new form and -proportion by natural laws, and remote generations will find yonder -landway as our workmen will leave it. They could level the mountain as -readily as they terrace it, distributing it over the adjacent plain, -leaving it a level and fertile glebe, instead of a towering height of -rock and sand overspread with soil. - -"All that you see or will see is the result of knowledge and wisdom -turned to noble and unselfish ends for the common betterment and -elevation of the race. - -"Your progenitors learned to dig the hard and soft ores from the earth -and produce iron, then took a step forward and converted it into -steel, of greater strength and durability, capable of light forms and -high polish, and there you have stopped at the very beginning. You -are incapable of saving your own handiwork from disintegration. The -elements corrode your finest steel products, and they flake away to -the original conditions of the crude ore, losing a large proportion of -their original virtues and constituents. We have, on the contrary, gone -forward to the ultimate. - -"You have denuded your lands of forests to use as a cumbersome material -for building, and furniture and other purposes, the wood, which decays -and is soon destroyed. You have, without understanding the process, -macerated and reduced woods to a pulp and fashioned it into paper, -which in several forms you utilize, but you have stopped at the -beginning of the journey. - -"We have carried it forward, and a large proportion of the material -used in the construction of our houses and furniture and bridges and -cars are the product of our forests in a new and better and more -enduring form--light and capable of the most graceful fashioning. -This is used in combination with the metals in all departments of our -economies." - -I had already noticed the fact that but little of the woodwork was in -the natural form, and that while it was incredulously light, it was -incredibly strong. The same was true of the wrought metals, all of -which differed from our own forms. - -In my examinations of the bridges across streams, both large and small, -I noted the fact that they were constructed in about equal parts of -wood, or a substance I took therefor, and metal, differing greatly from -the metals we use, yet not wholly unlike them. Both materials were of -tubular construction, appearing almost fragile in their lightness, -but strong and firm, and showing none of the ravages of time and the -elements. - -So far as I was able to judge no paints were used, but everything was -perfectly polished. The bridges were light, airy constructions, swung -from lofty and graceful piers, a span of a thousand feet appearing to -be as firm and strong as one of fifty. - -I also noticed that in their construction of cars, furniture, houses, -and the like, the woods and metals were indiscriminately used, more for -beauty and ornamentation, perhaps, than for strengthening purposes or -utility. Lightness and gracefulness were in evidence everywhere. There -were panels and inlays of wood in its natural state, highly wrought and -polished, as hard and impervious as the metals. - -"You seem to be able to make everything indestructible," I said to -Karmas. - -"It is your privilege to draw your own conclusions," was his reply. - - * * * * * - -The people I met and mingled with, both men and women, were superb -specimens of the human race, full of life, full of hope, full of high -ambitions, and capable of infinite enjoyments. - -Games, sports and social amenities were the order of their daily -life, albeit every one of them engaged in some laborious or business -occupation during a part of each day. I learned that under their system -of economy less than four hours out of the twenty-four were necessary -for the comfort, sustenance and requirements of each adult, so that -labor did not degenerate into slavery. Every fifth day was a holiday, -during which no labor was performed, except such as was necessary for -the enjoyments of the day. - -Manufacturing and business of different kinds were diffused in -proportion to the population. There were no great factories or business -houses, but innumerable small ones. No manufacturer employed more -than ten persons, usually but five, and two or three employes were -sufficient for the business houses. - -The remarkable discoveries and inventions of the land revolutionized -all our ideas of manual labor and mechanics. Heavy and bulky machinery -is entirely unknown. - -There were no smoking furnaces, no clangor of machinery. The factory -was as neat and practically as noiseless as the private home. Useful -and necessary devices and machinery were turned out as quietly as a -housewife disposes of her routine labors. Science had apparently solved -the rough and knotty problem of labor and production. - -Nowhere did I see a furnace; in fact, fire was visible nowhere; and yet -I could see its offices performed everywhere. I asked Karmas to explain -the phenomena. - -"That," he replied, "will be explained to you by Remo, Custodian of -Useful Mechanical Devices. That is his official sphere." - -Another incredible phenomenon presented itself during the journey. We -passed through one province early in that journey, and my attention was -called to the fact that the farmers were sowing their cereals, which, -by the way, greatly resemble our own, but in a much higher state of -cultivation and infinitely more nutritious. - -Ten days later we repassed the same spot, and they were harvesting the -ripened grain. - -"In my country," I said to Karmas, "from eight to ten months, dependent -upon the season, elapses between the sowing and the harvesting of -wheat. Here the period is reduced to from eight to ten days. I can not -understand the discrepancy." - -"But it is an absolute mystery to you?" - -"It is." - -"And yet your own people have approached the twilight of its solution. -By selection of seeds and combination of soils, and other perfectly -natural processes, they have been able to change the nature of -vegetation and produce new vegetable being. The period for the growth -and maturing of nearly all your grains and vegetables has been -perceptibly shortened, and entirely new forms produced, within the past -century, and largely within the period of your own lifetime. - -"Your floriculturists and horticulturists have carried the evolution -the furthest, and yet they do not even faintly comprehend the real -principle which produces results. We understand and intelligently apply -it. Hence with us but ten days elapse between seedtime and harvest, and -shorter periods in the production of our common vegetables. - -"We are able to produce flowers of all shapes and colors at will, and -with the absolute certainty of the operation of fixed and immutable -laws, while your florists, groping in the dark, occasionally stumble on -a result, knowing nothing of the law that produces it, and give their -fellows a nine-days' wonder. - -"Yesterday you asked me why all the farms were so diminutive--'merely a -ten-acre field,' as you expressed it. The explanation is before you. -Each of these small farms is capable of producing food for one thousand -persons with their constantly duplicated crops. There is room for a -million such farms in the Commonwealth, without impinging upon the -residential demesnes or cities. - -"There is no need to put these farms to the full test of their -productiveness. The twentieth part suffices. We have a population of -50,000,000, increasing at the rate of scarcely one per cent each year, -and two-thirds of the Commonwealth is public domain, for the benefit -of the countless generations yet unborn. Each year and each day brings -their immediate needs, and they are met with plenteous fullness." - - * * * * * - -Karmas later gave me a fuller idea of the general polity of the -Commonwealth. - -All men become voters at 25, if they are married, and participate -in the choice of officers. All are eligible to office. On the day -fixed for the election of public officials the voter calls up the -office of the Municipal Custodian and registers his choice in the -ballot-receiver, which automatically records, and at the end of the -balloting announces the result. If for provincial officers, it is -instantaneously transmitted to the capital of the province, and if for -Commonwealth officers to the Greater City. In your land this would open -the door to fraud, but in Intermere there is neither fraud nor chicane. - -There are no armies, no warships, no police, no peace or distress -officers, and no courts and no lawyers. Sometimes citizens may differ, -as they differ in other lands, as to their respective rights or -obligations. In such case they repair to the Municipal Custodian and -state the respective sides of their case. The Custodian decides at -once, and that ends forever the controversy, unless one or the other -appeals to the Chief Citizen of the Province and his Counselors, who -consider the original statements submitted to the Custodian and render -the final judgment. It is seldom an appeal is taken, and seldom that an -original decision is revised. - -The educational period continues from birth to 20 years of age, in what -may be called a common school, held in the temples, which all enter at -the age of ten. - -The spheres of the two sexes are clearly marked, and both live within -them, that of the female being regarded as the highest and most sacred. -The men make the homes and the women care for and beautify them, and -receive the homage universally accorded them. - -Neither sex looks upon necessary labor as a drudgery or in any manner -degrading. They all receive a like education, and the superior mental -equipment invariably asserts itself in some appropriate direction. - -Almost invariably the children of the household marry in the order of -their birth, being absolutely free to choose their mates. There are no -marriages for convenience and no second marriages. All are the result -of affection and natural affinity. - -The last child to marry inherits the homestead at the death of the -father. The surviving mother becomes the Preferred Guest of her child -during the remainder of her life, and is treated as such. If the -father survives, he retains his position as head of the household. -The personal estate of a deceased parent is divided equally among the -children. - -"In short," said Karmas, "We aim to dispose the burdens and distribute -the enjoyments of life equally and justly among all. - -"Tomorrow we will be accompanied by Alpaz, the Curator of Learning and -Progress, who will answer the other questions in your mind." - - - - -V. - - THE PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE, AND THE FACULTY OF ITS ENJOYMENT AS - PERSONIFIED IN THE PERSONS AND VOCATIONS OF THE ENTERTAINERS. - - - - -V. - -SOME OF THE PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE. - - -The environments of life have much to do with its philosophy. This -thought impressed itself forcibly on me in Intermere. - -The environments of its people contribute much, if not most, to their -philosophy, or the faculty of life's enjoyments. - -They are pleasantly housed, handsomely habilitated, physically and -intellectually employed, sans the driving spur of necessity or greed, -with profound and earnest aspirations beyond their present stage of -existence. This is not confined to the few, but animates and elevates -all. - -Learning, in a loftier sense than we understand the term; art, music -and all the senses of physical and mental enjoyment, and the promotion -of all of them, are pitched in a high and harmonious key. - -Personal adornment and physical beauty in both sexes have no tinge -of vanity, and awake no envy in others. Intermerean dress and its -adjuncts are as closely looked after as their wonderful mechanism and -its mysterious soul or motor-spirit, which enables them to travel with -celerity and safety by land or air or sea, or that subtler principle -by which men and women, separated by distance, talk to each other by -thought instead of speech, and would render the clumsy deception of our -own diplomats and other hypocrites an impossibility. - -The clothing of the Intermereans, wrought from native materials not -wholly unlike, except an to quality, those utilized by other peoples, -is of a texture and finish beyond the conception of the outer world, -and of such colors and combinations of tints as to breathe, as it -were, both art and aptitude. - -The garments of both sexes more nearly resemble those in Europe and -America than any others, and yet they are very unlike in striking -points. Speaking of this similitude, I may say that the polity and -institutions, and mental and physical characteristics of the people -who live under them, more nearly resemble those of America than of any -other nation or people. - -But at that, how wide and deep and apparently impassable is the -gulf that separates them. Ours is but the faint promise; theirs the -fulfillment of the completed prophecy. - -Did we start on the journey? Have we halted just beyond the first -milestone? Will the journey be resumed? Will our remoter generations -reach the Ultima Thule? What splendid hope or what illimitable despair -and misery depend upon the Sphinx's answer to these questions! - -While Intermere is not sown with diamonds and pearls and precious -stones and metals, they were to be seen in profusion everywhere, not -as matters of garish display, but of artistic taste. I doubt not that -the Intermereans, through their successful study of Nature, possess -the Philosopher's Stone, capable of combining and transmuting every -substance into the riches for which men die and women sacrifice more -than life, and nations crush nations, and peoples destroy peoples, -gathering the Dead Sea fruits that turn to bitter ashes on their lips. - -These people place no more commercial value upon these than they do -upon the tints of the rainbow, or the purple haze that hangs like a -halo above the mountain tops. To them they are but artistic types of -beauty that add to life's true enjoyments. - -In mingling socially with the men and women--they do not speak of them -as ladies and gentlemen--of Intermere, I was struck with their ease -and delicate frankness of entertainment. They were very human indeed in -every way. There was no affectation in speech or manner. They were good -listeners as well as good talkers, fond of art and the lofty literature -in which they were naturally at home; anxious to learn something about -the outside world from their visitor, and yet not inquisitive, never -asking an embarrassing question. - -Their literary and social entertainments, many of which I attended, -while altogether new and strange to me, were none the less thoroughly -enjoyable. Their social games were unique--to me--and in all respects -I was struck with their great superiority, and forcibly impressed with -the belief that their lives were indeed worth living. - -Their conceptions of art were of the highest and most exalted -character. Their tastes were not only refined but sublimated, and -I felt abashed at my own inability to follow them rapidly, or fully -comprehend them on the moment. - -The women were splendid types of physical beauty as well as mental -endowment; the men were trained athletes, and the devotees of physical -as well as mental culture, and I watched with keen zest their prowess -in the athletic games everywhere indulged in. I did not see a physical, -mental or moral derelict in the land. All were robust and perfectly -formed. - -There were no classes. Laborers and officials met on an equal footing. -There were no telltale differences in dress to indicate sets, circles, -position or titles among the men. The same was true of the women. -Mental superiority or maturity was discernible to me and recognized on -every hand, not to be envied or decried, but to serve as the guide to -other feet. - -And all this was easily reconcilable to me. All were coequal laborers. -All were coequal sharers of the common benefits of their governmental -system, and they all had a common incentive--to ennoble and dignify -the race by ennobling and dignifying themselves individually, but -contributing alike to the common stock of blessings. - -Never before did I fully realize the meaning of the Divine Master when -He said: "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so -to them." Before me and around me was the literal fulfillment of the -injunction in the form of the model government for mankind, founded -upon the highest attribute of Divinity. - -But there was neither cant nor affected solemnity in the never-ending -performance of this duty. It had become absolutely and essentially a -part of their nature, and was at once the cornerstone and the Temple of -their Religion; but their ideas of Religion were widely different from -ours. They never expounded, but lived it. - -Delightful people accompanied us if we traveled in Aerocars; -delightful people met us with Medocars when we came to terra firma, -and accompanied us through the bewildering lanes and mazes of beauty -by land; and delightful people met us with fairy-like Merocars when -we sought to thread the enchanting islands of the strange pulsating, -moving sea. - -Thus day by day I was carried from province to province, from city to -city, from valley to valley and from mountain to mountain; relays of -entertainers met us at every stopping-point to take the places of those -who had accompanied us thither. Nothing could have seemed more unreal; -nothing could have been more exquisitely enjoyable. - -Now we wound through gardens smiling with beauty and redolent with -balm and fragrance; anon we were in orchards plucking the ripened -fruit; then in the harvest fields of the husbandman, and next in shops, -factory or store; I wondering at all I saw, and my conductors kindly -wondering at me, no doubt, but of that they gave no significance or -sign. - -Almost literally speaking there is no night in Intermere. With the -twilight myriads of lights flash out everywhere along the streets, -highways, lanes, and from residences, temples and monuments, more -luminous than our electric lamps, diffusing a mellow and pleasing light -everywhere. But one sees no wires, as with us, to feed the lamps of -many sizes and shades of light, each one of which, so far as we can see -and realize, is independent of all others and everything. - -Merry parties make moonlight and starlight trips by Aerocar. I enjoyed -one of them, and there are no words adequate to the description of what -I saw and enjoyed. With the moon and stars above and the millions -of lights below, with music, song and laughter ringing through the -ethereal depths, I was in a new world, and one beyond ordinary human -conceptions, much less description. The Aerocars themselves were -studded with countless lights of all the colors and shades, and shone -like trailing meteors at every angle of inclination, singly here, -grouped there, and in processions beyond. - -It may be said in this connection that while the Intermereans eat -the flesh of both domestic and wild animals and fowls, resembling in -general features our own, and fish, they subsist chiefly on a vegetable -diet, especially between the age of infancy and twenty years, and after -sixty. - -One of the mysteries confronting me was that of cookery. They used no -fire, nor any of our ordinary cooking utensils, and yet they served hot -meals and drinks, prepared in what may be called, for lack of a better -name, chafing dishes and urns, and yet there was no sense of heat or -fire, except when in close contact with the utensils. - -In a chafing dish they broiled or roasted or baked; in an adjoining urn -they brewed a delightful hot drink resembling coffee, while in another -near by they made the most delicious ices. - -The housewife maintained neither dining-room nor kitchen. Meals were -prepared and served wherever most convenient, on veranda or in the -house proper. The table was spread in beautiful style with exquisite -furnishment, and presided over by the housewife. A woman assistant, -or more than one, according to the requirements of the occasion, had -charge of a suitable sideboard, where the entire meal was prepared, and -from which it was served to the company as desired. There were no odors -from the cooking, and nothing to suggest the kitchen or scullery. - -This is so unlike our methods that its appropriateness can not be -realized short of the actual experience. The culinary utensils are -rather ornamental than otherwise, and the preparation of the dishes -occupies an incredibly short period of time. - -On our various journeys by land and sea and air, I found that a full -stock of provisions was carried, along with the culinary paraphernalia, -and were served regularly and with as much care and taste as in any -residence. Ices and confections were made as readily in mid-air as on -land or sea, by some mysterious and never-failing process. - -One day as we rested in a charming suburb of the Lesser City, Alpaz, -the Curator of Learning and Progress, appeared in a splendidly -appointed Aerocar, accompanied by his entire family and attended by -a fleet of Aerocars carrying his assistants, provincial officials -and men and women, who made up his entourage. It proved to be a most -delightful company. - -After sailing overhead for hundreds of miles we descended to an island, -along the beach of which lay a complement of Merocars, to accommodate -the entire party, as well as some of the insular citizens who begged to -accompany us. - -Then ensued a voyage the memory of which still lingers with me. -Such dreamlike beauty I never expect to see this side the gates of -eternity. It changed with every moment, and never palled nor paled. -Through this maze of land and water and bewildering enchantment we -journeyed, listening to conversation and music, till finally touching -the mainland, we found the Chief Citizen of the Province, and his -attendants and officials, with Medocars, in which the entire party -was carried to his capital, which crowned a grand elevation some two -hundred miles inland. - -Here we were entertained in magnificent simplicity for a day, and here -Alpaz discoursed to me on the many matters in which I was interested, -and which fell within the sphere of his Curatorship. I cannot recount -them all, but shall endeavor to bring out the main points. - -"You would learn something of our educational system?" he said, as -though I had plied him with a question. - -"It is quite simple. It involves no complexities. We follow only the -path of nature. From birth to the age of ten the infant is in the -exclusive control and tutorship of the mother. She alone is entirely -capable of moulding the infantile mind, and setting its feet aright in -the pathway of manhood and womanhood. - -"In your land, as in others, all too often she delegates this great -duty to alien and unfit hands, and reaps the bitter harvest of sorrow -in the afternoon of motherhood. - -"At the age of ten, when the mother has fitted the mind for stronger -impressions, the child enters the broader field of learning. Our -temples, which you meet everywhere, are our schoolhouses, our altars of -Learning and Knowledge, the cherubim of Wisdom. - -"These temples are the abode of Knowledge and Wisdom, handed down in -the records of the ages, showing each successive step taken and to what -it led. Here they are taught by the older men and women, who having -retired from the activities of life, with a competence assured them, -matured in thought, filled with knowledge and possessed of wisdom, -perform their final labor, a labor of love for the younger generation. - -"At the age of fifteen every boy and every girl develops the line of -effort to which they incline in the respective spheres of the sexes, -and thereafter, to the age of twenty for females and twenty-five for -males, they are instructed along these lines by their tutors, in the -meantime devoting a part of their time to some useful occupation. The -result is men and women in every way fitted to fulfill their destiny. - -"No; we have no clergy, no ministers as you term them, to teach either -the old or the young in what you name religion. We have no churches. -Reverence for the Supreme Principle of the Universe is instilled into -every mind, from infancy up, and all our people live these teachings. -They do not listen to them one day in seven and neglect to follow all -or the majority of them for six. - -"We know nothing, except as lamentable facts, of the various so-called -religious divisions which convulse the rest of the world--Confucianism, -Hindooism, Mohammedanism, Buddhism, Taoism, Shintoism, Judaism, -Polytheism and Christianity, and the many warring or antagonistic -sects into which they divided and subdivided. - -"We know only loving reverence for the Supreme Principle of the -Universe, filial love and piety, and justice to all creatures. This -is the soul and essence of your religion, Christianity, and the basic -principle of all others. We prefer the last analysis to the inchoate -mass of contending creeds, that have drenched the earth with blood -for time out of mind, and filled it with doubt and misery; and even -now, in the twilight of your Nineteenth Century, and in the name of -the Child of Nazareth, promulgates Christianization and evangelization -at the cannon's mouth and with the sword and torch, of peoples whose -only offense is that they believe that their God requires thus and so -at their hands as a prerequisite to their entrance into His heavenly -kingdom. - -"By gentler and educatory teachings, untainted by the corroding canker -of selfishness, they might be turned in the right direction and their -generations be led into the light, provided that your educational -system moved on a loftier plane than theirs; but blood and violence, -and all the carnal lusts that follow like jackals in their wake, can -only eventuate in driving them into lower depths. - -"The spiritual instructors of the outer world, past and present, are -and have been, in the main, sincere and earnest, but with a limited -idea of the spiritualism they essay to teach. Powerful prelacies have -grown up in all the religious divisions, ambitious of temporal power, -and untold evils have resulted, not from the system of religion, but -from the love of power and authority, non-spiritual in its nature, and -as a result the spirit or principle of religion has suffered undeserved -obloquy. - -"To us the ideal God of your religious people is strangely -contradictory and irreconcilable. He is portrayed not as a spiritual -being, but as a common mortal in many of the essentials. Their -conception of Deity is that He rules as a king in heaven, before whom -the redeemed and the saints forever prostrate themselves in adoration -or sing praises by voice, and adulate Him with harp and lute and other -musical instruments, confessing hourly their unworthiness to come into -His presence. - -"This is an earthly, barbarous conception of the Supreme Power of the -Universe. It was probably of Chinese or Oriental origin in the days of -supreme despotism, when every subject must prostrate himself in the -dust in the presence of majesty. - -"This idea was transmitted to Christendom in the West when royalty -proclaimed itself the symbol of Godhood and religion. The subject was -taught that the monarch was the direct representative of God, and his -court was modeled after the court of the King of kings, where homage -and adoration and humiliation were the endless order of all future life. - -"We have an entirely different conception of the Supreme Principle, -and do not regard it in the light of a ruler or king, in the mortal -sense, but the embodiment of justice and love, that neither exacts nor -receives adoration of those who pass to the world beyond, the returning -children of the great and enduring Principle which exists everywhere, -strengthened and broadened by a previous state or states of existence, -wherein they were clothed about with mortal and perishable habiliments. - -"We look forward to the passage from this world to a better one beyond -with joyous expectation, and with no sense of terror or apprehension, -and there come us no pangs of dissolution. We have sought diligently to -live up to the law of love in this life, and have the fullest assurance -that our efforts will meet the approval of the Supreme Principle, -whose beneficences invite and permit us to enter the broader fields -and more perfect worlds of a higher existence. - -"Death, or the exchange of worlds, has neither terrors for those who -go, nor the stings of affliction for those who tarry. It is but the -inevitable and necessary parting of friends and relatives for a little -period, and we know that the shores of reunion lie just beyond the -filmy veil of the future. - -"The end or change is never hastened nor retarded by the violation -of Nature's sacred laws. There are but few partings or deaths in the -earlier periods of life. They go with joyful alacrity, as to a feast, -at four or five score, and their memory, works and examples cheer and -sustain those who remain. - -"No; we have no physicians. If, perchance, some law of Nature is -violated and mortal ailment ensues, it needs no specialist to discover -that fact, or recommend the proper method of rectifying it. That is a -part of the education of all. Literally, we neither know nor care to -know what physic is. We live simply and in accordance with Nature's -laws, and disease, such as prevails in your land and others, is unknown -in this, and has been for ages. Science and scientific discovery, as we -utilize and employ them, have freed us from disease and made death but -the exchange of lives. We know more than we care to tell of the life -beyond." - -He ceased abruptly after saying: - -"Tomorrow you will be the guest of Remo, the Curator of Useful -Mechanical Devices. You may learn much from him." - - - - -VI. - - THE SECRET OF INTERMERE PARTIALLY REVEALED TO ANDERTON, AND WHEN HE - LEAST EXPECTS IT HE IS RESTORED TO HIS HOME AND KINDRED, MUCH TO HIS - REGRET. - - - - -VI. - -THE SECRET OF INTERMERE. - - -The secret of Intermere--its great mechanical secret--was revealed to -me, but, alas! only in part. It was as if the sun be pointed out to a -child who is told that it shines and is a prime factor in the growth of -all forms of life, animal and vegetable. - -The child realizes that the orb of day shines, but remains wholly in -the dark as to the processes of its rays; why it inspires animals and -vegetation with life and growth, and produces the prismatic colors of -the rainbow. - -So with me. I know the fountain-head or cause that gave momentum to all -the mechanism of the land, shortened the period between germination -and maturity in vegetation, banished fire while retaining warmth, -turned the night into a season of beauty equaling the full day, kept -every street and highway free from debris, prevented foul emanations, -with their contaminations, and did countless other things which our -own scientists demonstrate are desirable and necessary, but still -unattainable. But of the details, of the why and the wherefore, of the -effects and the processes by which so many different results emanated -from the same apparent cause, I learned nothing. - -One morning, after a season of delicious, invigorating slumber, as -I walked in the spacious grounds of my host, the Chief Citizen of -the Province--grounds sweeter and fairer than the fabled Gardens of -Gulistan--I saw a fleet of Aerocars approaching, led by one of the most -magnificent, and by far the largest, that I had yet seen. It could not -have been less than one hundred feet in length and twenty in breadth -at the midway point, and yet it seemed to float as lightly as a feather -in the aerial depths. - -When almost directly overhead the fleet halted, and remained -stationary, as though firmly anchored to some immovable substance, and -then the leading craft slowly sank to the earth at my feet, as lightly -as you have seen a bird alight. - -It was the Aerocar of Remo, containing a score of people. I had not -hitherto met Remo, the Curator of Useful Mechanical Devices. However, -he needed no introduction to me or I to him. The recognition was mutual. - -He came forward and greeted me cordially, and later presented me to his -fellow voyagers, and said: - -"I know you are anxious to learn something of the motive principle of -our mechanisms. That I shall impart to you, at least partially. Our -journey will begin to suit your convenience. We will breakfast en -route." - -I hastened to say my adieux to the Chief Citizen, Alpaz, and the -members of the household, and then entered the Aerocar, taking a seat -near Remo. At a signal to the pilot, the craft rose as lightly and -majestically as it had descended. - -I looked about me at the passengers, hampers of provisions, culinary -utensils and table equipment, and estimated that the Aerocar was -carrying not less than four thousand pounds of dead weight. - -"You are wondering how so much bulk and weight ascend without apparent -cause." - -I assented to the proposition. - -"When you are at home and see an inflated balloon ascend, carrying a -man weighing one hundred and fifty pounds, with seventy-five pounds of -sand ballast, you can understand how it ascends?" - -"Readily." - -"By mechanical contrivance of immense comparative bulk, aided by -chemical product, the power of gravitation is sufficiently overcome -or neutralized that a disproportionately small amount of weight is -carried into the upper air. We ascend for the same general reason, the -resultant of a greater, a different and a fixed principle. - -"Our pilot, by means of the mechanical and other power at his command, -neutralized the attraction of gravitation, and without the aid of any -other appliance arose, carrying a weight of more than four thousand of -your pounds avoirdupois. It has ascended in a direct or perpendicular -line, despite the breeze, which would otherwise have carried us at a -western angle. I will have the pilot produce an equilibrium, stopping -all movement." - -A signal was given the pilot, and, after a slight manipulation, it -stood still. - -"Now we will descend, first perpendicularly and then at an angle of -forty-five degrees." - -One signal and one manipulation, and the Aerocar described the first -motion. A second signal and manipulation, and it described the other. - -"Now we will ascend, first by the reverse angle and then by the -perpendicular." - -Again the signals and again the manipulations, and again the exact -movements through space. - -"If your flying machine and airship builders could do that, what would -your people think?" - -"That the world had been revolutionized." - -"But the world will not be thus revolutionized until science is freed -of gross materialism and human aspiration becomes something higher -than selfish greed, commercialism, war, conquest, opulence, and the -despotisms they engender. You must expel all the gods with whom you -most closely commune, before you may commune with the true God or -Supreme Principle of the Universe." - -In the meantime the Curator's Aerocar had rejoined its consorts, and we -floated away to the northeast, where a great semicircle of mountains -were dimly outlined, and then descended upon a city looking like a -pearl in a semicircular valley, bisected by a broad river, spanned with -bridges at short intervals as far as the vision reached. - -With my watch I had timed the voyage. It had lasted two hours and -thirty minutes. - -"How far have we traveled?" I inquired of Remo. - -"One thousand of your miles." - -"That is four hundred miles to the hour; six and two-thirds miles each -minute." - -"The speed might easily have been doubled." - -My amazement was unbounded, but I did not doubt Remo's statement then. -Later, I recognized it as an easy possibility. - -Remo detained me until the rest of the company had left the Aerocar, -and then said abruptly: "You would learn the secret of the motive -principle that moves our mechanical devices and performs other offices -which seem to you miraculous. It is this: It is the electric current -which we take direct from the atmosphere at will--electricity, which -is the life-giving, life-preserving and life-promoting principle, the -superior and fountain of all law affecting the material Universe and -intervening space. To command that is to command everything. - -"This is the capital of my Curatorship. Here all my predecessors have -served the Commonwealth; hither all my successors will come. Here every -mechanical device is tested, approved or rejected, and from hence their -production is directed, as a public right, in every municipal division -of the Commonwealth. - -"Nearly every monument you have seen, as you have doubtless noticed, -is dedicated to some Chosen Son of Wisdom, and some of them date back -tens of centuries. Whoever makes a great discovery, such as taking the -electric current direct, or dividing its capabilities into useful and -necessary directions, or perfects some great mechanism, securing the -full beneficence of the current, brings it here and dedicates it to the -Commonwealth and its sons and daughters. Its benefits are common to all. - -"His reward is that he is elected by universal acclaim as the Chosen -Son of Wisdom, a monument commemorative of his achievement is erected -at once, and he is installed in a home furnished out of the public -revenues, receives a stipend of fifty or five cinque media daily, and -is the honored guest on all public and private occasions. - -"I shall show you many of our devices; some of them will be -self-explanatory, some will, to a degree, be explained, others left to -your conjecture, and for obvious reasons." - -With this he led me through a large number of what we would look upon -as diminutive manufacturing establishments. In the first one visited he -exhibited to me two crystalline elongated globes, the size of an egg -each, connected by a small tube or cylinder of the same material two or -three inches in length. - -The globes were filled with a whitish substance, or granulation, the -upper intensely white, the lower somewhat shaded. The upper one was -fitted with a movable disk, and could be opened by touching a lever. -A cluster of rather coarse wires, apparently an amalgam of several -metals, rose above the granulated contents. A double coil of wires, of -a different material or combination, running in opposite directions, -filled the connecting cylinder, while a cluster of almost imperceptibly -fine wires, of still a different material or combination, projected -from the bottom of the lower globe. - -These globes resembled glass, and were, to all appearances, extremely -fragile. Remo dashed it upon the hard floor, as though he would -destroy it. It rebounded, and he caught it as an urchin would catch a -rebounding ball. - -"I did this," he said, "to show you that these appliances are not -amenable to accident. This is the accumulator or receiver of the -current." - -He touched the lever and opened a small aperture directly over the -cluster of wires in the upper globe. - -"Hold your hand below the lower portion," he said. - -I complied, and instantly my hand was moved away with such resistless -force that I was turned completely around and sent across the room. -Remo smiled at my undisguised consternation, and said: - -"You will not be harmed. What you experienced was the flow of the -electric current, but it has not harmed you. It is physically -harmless. You would call this a twenty-horse-power motor in your -country, although it looks like a toy. Take it and handle it as I -direct. You may handle it with perfect safety. Place it horizontally -near that fly-wheel and push the lever." - -He pointed to a fly-wheel scarcely a foot in diameter, with seven -radiating flanges set slightly at an angle. I did, and opened the -aperture. In less time than it takes to tell it the wheel was revolving -at a rate of speed so high that it seemed like a solid motionless and -polished mirror. - -"Close the aperture, go to the side in which direction it is revolving, -and again open it to the current." - -I did so, and instantly the wheel was motionless. - -He pointed to a huge block of granite, which rested on a metal -framework a dozen inches above the floor, and said: "Banish all -nervousness, invert the accumulator, and hold it under the center of -the block, which weighs five of your tons." - -I did so, and it slowly rose toward the ceiling. - -"Close the aperture slowly, and finally close it entirely." - -This I did, and it settled back to its original place. - -"There," said Remo, "you have the direct current and its direct -application to machinery and inert bodies. You know enough about -mechanics to understand what that means. The ascent and flight and -movements and descent of the Aerocar; the running of the Medocar and -the sailing of the Merocar, are not such a profound mystery to you as -they were yesterday." - -He conducted me into another factory and exhibited a number of -accumulators, each filled with apparently the same granulated -substance, but of different colors and admixture of colors. Remo opened -the apertures of a long line of them upon a wire rack, and they flashed -into brilliant lamps of every hue and color and shade--a light that was -as steady as that of the stars. He closed them one by one, showing the -absolute independence of each. - -"Our lamps, with which we beautify the night, are no longer a mystery -to you--that is, not an absolute mystery." - -In another factory he exhibited more accumulators with varicolored -materials in the globes. He opened one and directed its power toward an -ingot of metal. It melted like wax. Turning its force upon a fragment -of rock, it was transformed into the ordinary dust of our roadways. -With another he turned a vessel of water into a solid block of ice. - -"Our topographical construction, our culinary economy and the absence -of fire are now plainer than they were." - -"But how do you achieve all these different results with apparently the -same means?" - -"The first device shown you is the primary; the others are subsequent -discoveries. By the primary medium we were able to produce or secure -the electric current in the form of dynamic power, eminently tractable -and harmless with ordinary prudence. New combinations of the medium -gave us all the other results, at intervals, subsequent to the original -discovery. And the field is not exhausted." - -Remo explained that the crystalline substance in the upper globe of -the accumulator induced or gathered the electric current, giving it -controllable direction as well as defined volume, while that in the -lower determined its significance or divisional use. - -In the minuter accumulators, for the lamps only, did the current -present itself in the form of light, spark or flame. All the colors, -from pure white to deep purple, with their prismatic variations, were -the direct result of their differing chemical combinations in the lower -globe, each of the silk-like wires throwing off countless rays of -unvarying intensity and steadiness, but gave off no electric phenomena -or effects. - -The heat accumulators gave moderate or intense heat, according to the -chemical combinations through which the primary current passed, but -there was neither glow nor light-flash. So, too, the cold accumulators -gave off varying degrees of cold, for the same reason. - -In none of them was there either the electric shock or its effects, -and all were tractable and free from danger in what we may term the -electrical sense. The dynamic force of the primary and the intense heat -or cold of the divisional currents, common prudence avoids. Still it -would be easily possible, by chemical combination, to produce a current -destructive of life and capable of annihilating nations, without hope -or possibility of escape. - -"Your own scientists know," said Remo, "that with the direct current -all that you have seen, and infinitely more, is but the result of a -simple process, capable of infinite multiplication." - -"But what are the constituents of the medium in the accumulator, and -what are the formulas of the various combinations?" - -"If you knew that you would know as much as we." - -This was the nearest a jest I had heard in Intermere, but I knew from -the character of Remo's speech that the rest of the secret would remain -hidden from me. - -As we sat at his table later he said: - -"You have been nearer to our secret than any one else in the outer -world, and we shall see whether the seeds will grow into the tree of -Knowledge and produce the fruits of Wisdom. Neither your people nor any -other people could be trusted with this secret in their present moral -condition. A few learned men dependent upon the rulers in one nation, -knowing it, could and would plot the destruction and exploitation of -all others. The sacrifice of human life and the accumulation of human -woe and misery would be appalling. - -"If your leaders, with the suddenly awakened hunger for conquest and -dominion, could literally command the thunderbolts and control the -elements as against the rest of the world, they would sack Christendom -in the name of Liberty, Humanity and the Babe of Bethlehem, but in the -spirit of Mammon, Greed and selfish love of power and riches. - -"You will make some progress in discoveries along scientific and -mechanical lines, but no real good to the race can result until these -discoveries are turned to a nobler purpose than that of seizing -commercial supremacy, subjugating alien and unwilling peoples, -slaughtering those who resist, exploiting those who lay down their -arms, gathering wealth regardless of justice and the rights of mankind -and building up an artificial race in the form of a ruling class, who -base their right to exclusive privileges on wealth and the perversion -of every principle of justice and the Christianity they profess. - -"You have been wondering why, with our great knowledge and -achievements, we do not go forth and dominate the world. What would -it profit us? Could we find anything that would contribute to our -enjoyments, our hopes, our aspirations? No. - -"Even we are not proof against the paralyzing touch of deterioration. -We pay more heed to the world's history than do the nations and -peoples who made that history, during the centuries. History is but -the lighthouse which warns against the reefs and rocks where -countless argosies have been lost. The mariners who sail the ships -of state dash recklessly upon the rocks of destruction, despite the -friendly warnings of the dead and engulfed who have gone before." - -Turning to lighter themes, Remo spoke of the various economies of -the Commonwealth, and explained how the obstacles which confront our -civilization are overcome. Garbage and all debris, for instance, are -disposed of by instantaneous reduction to original conditions, and -then a recombination and distribution upon the grounds, farms and -gardens. The sewage question, the standing menace of all dense and -even sparse populations, is solved by the same process of purification -and recombination. This work is constantly performed under the eye of -the municipal authorities, and under fixed rules and service. Thus the -absolute cleanliness which prevailed everywhere was readily explained. - -In answer to my query why Intermere had so long escaped discovery from -navigators, he said, interrogatively: - -"Would it not be possible, with our superior knowledge and wisdom, to -put their reckoning at fault whenever they came within a fixed sphere -of proximity?" - -To my question as to the equability of the seasons, the absence of -storms, and the regularity of the descent of moisture in the form of -gentle rains, he said: - -"Do not imagine that our scientific knowledge stops with the mere -discovery of the direct electric current or our mechanical devices." - -Nothing further could I elicit from him or any other Intermerean on -these or kindred subjects. The Book of Knowledge had been opened and -apparently closed. - -After two days' stay in Remo's capital the Aerocars took up a goodly -entourage, and we moved softly and swiftly to the Greater City. - -There Xamas and all his officials awaited us, along with every -Intermerean of both sexes I had met in my journeys, as well as every -Municipal Custodian of the realm, and in addition the Chief Citizens of -the fourteen Provinces I had not visited. - -A reception fete was given me in the chief temple of the city, hoary -with age and instinct with wisdom. There were songs and music by the -young and happy, and apropos discourses by the older. I essayed the -role of orator, thanked my entertainers for their many courtesies and -the happy hours they had conferred upon a wanderer in a strange land. -The afternoon and evening were a season of unalloyed happiness. - -As I dropped into slumber in the house of Xamas I soliloquized: "This -kindness and these honors seem significant. Perhaps the Intermereans -intend to adopt me into all their knowledge and wisdom. Perhaps"---- - - * * * * * - -I felt that I was tossing on the swell of the ocean. Then there was a -sensation of physical pain, as if from long exposure to the elements. - -So keen was this sensation that I awoke fully, started up and looked -around me. It was a grayish dawn, purpling in lines near the horizon. -Towering above me I saw the outlines of a great ship, lying at anchor -and lazily nodding as the swells swept into the harbor. - -I found myself in one of the individual Merocars, intended for a single -passenger, but the compartments containing the accumulatory motors had -been removed and the marks of removal deftly concealed. - -It was one of the most finished Merocars of its class with the -exception of the motor, constructed entirely of prepared wood, -resembling a piece of wicker work, but impervious to the sea, and -floated like a cork or a feather. - -I was trying to determine where I was and how I came to be in my -present situation. Then came to me this in the Language of Silence: - -"You have been safely delivered to those who will restore you to your -land and home. Discretion is always commendable." - -I knew whence this thought came, and soon the increasing light showed -me that I was in the harbor of Singapore, lashed with a silken cord to -the forechains of an East Indian merchantman. - -To my infinite regret I found that I was clad in the same clothes I -wore when the Mistletoe went to the bottom. The same trinkets and a few -coins and the other accessories were still in the pockets. - -But the handsome and natty garments of Intermere were gone. I was back -in the world just as I left it, how long ago I could not tell, for -the memories of Intermere seemed to cover a decade at least, and I -estimated that those who lived to one hundred enjoyed a thousand years -of life. - -The lookout on the ship finally discovered me, and shortly after I and -my curious boat were lifted to the deck and became the center of a -gaping crowd. - -As I could not account for myself reasonably, I became merely evasive -and did not account for myself at all, and left the crew and passengers -equally divided as to whether I was a lunatic of a cunning knave. - -Among those on board was one whose presence suggested Intermere. -I listened and observed, and learned that he was the Secretary of -a native Rajah on board the ship. He inspected me with curious -disappointment. The Merocar he seemed to worship both with eyes and -soul. - -"Sell it to him, for you need money." - -That was Maros; I could not be mistaken. - -The Secretary motioned me to a distant part of the deck and said -abruptly: - -"I will give you five thousand rupees for the--for the"---- - -"Merocar." - -He started as though shocked by a bolt of lightning. - -"I dare not talk--I cannot remember--but I dare not talk. Will you sell -it me for five thousand rupees, Sahib? It is all I have, but I will -give it freely." - -"It is yours." - -He went below and soon returned with the amount in bills of exchange -upon the bank at Hong Kong. - -He carried his purchase to his stateroom, amid the laughter of -passengers and sailors, who did not conceal their merriment that any -man would pay such a price for a wicker basket, and my cunning and -hypnotic knavery were thoroughly established. - -I remained a few days in Singapore, converting my bills partly into -cash and partly into exchange on London and New York. - -Sailing later to Hong Kong, I there fell in with an American military -officer whom I knew, and who gave me the full particulars of Albert -Marshall's death. With him I made arrangements for the shipment of my -cousin's remains to his old home, via San Francisco. - -Two days later I sailed for London, and within six weeks reached New -York, and the home of my childhood. I shall not describe the meeting -with my mother, nor speak of what was said in relation to the strange -and brief communications which passed between us months before. - - - - -VII. - -LE ENVOI. - - - I HAVE READ THE FOREGOING. IT IS A FAITHFUL REPRODUCTION OF WHAT I WAS - ABLE TO COMMUNICATE TOUCHING MY EXPERIENCES. AND YET THE PICTURE DRAWN - IS FAINT, HAZY AND FAR AWAY. COMPARED WITH THE BEAUTIFUL REALITY, IT - IS "AS MOONLIGHT UNTO SUNLIGHT, AS WATER UNTO WINE." G. H. A. - - Glenford, 1901. - - - * * * * * - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Intermere, by William Alexander Taylor - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INTERMERE *** - -***** This file should be named 53193.txt or 53193.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/3/1/9/53193/ - -Produced by Ralph and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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