Part 10

It is a shifting of the optical laws, of the entire body of physical laws. Pictures are painted to be heard, music is written to be seen, passion is depicted in odours, dancing aims to make the bystander lick his chops. Mathematics has become an impressionist art, and love, birth, and death are treated arithmetically. Grown men and women clamour for the widest individual freedom, and children, if you will listen to the Princeton professor, should render compulsory service to the State. We are in full revolt; in revolt toward State Socialism, toward Nietzsche, toward Christian idealism, toward the paganism of the Latin Quarter and Montmartre, toward university settlements, toward the cabaret. Are we in a fog? Are we in the clouds striving toward the light? Well, I haven't the least doubt that the mist will roll away and leave us in man's natural position, his feet planted solidly on earth, his face lifted to the sun. But for the moment it's puzzling.

XXVIII

REALISM

(AFTER A-N-LD B-N-ETT)

In the dining-room of her little apartment, from the windows of which one might catch a glimpse of the Place de la Révolution on a clear day, Madame Lafarge was laying the table for supper. She had folded the table-cloth in two. With outstretched arms she held the four ends of the beautifully laundered piece of napery between the thumb and middle-finger of either hand. Suddenly she released two of the corners of the white cloth, transferring her grip with practised deftness to the two other corners, and whipped the flapping sheet across the table with a confident gesture that emphasised the vigour of her ample bosom. The further end of the cloth wrinkled. Perfect mistress of herself, Madame Lafarge walked around the table and patted the offending creases into an unblemished surface. She was extremely proud of her finger-nails, upon which she spent fifteen minutes twice a day.

From the china-closet at one end of the room, Madame Lafarge brought forth two plates, which she placed on the table at either end of a perfect diameter. This diameter she bisected with four salt and pepper casters of cut-glass topped with silver elaborately chased in the bourgeois style. While arranging the spoons she happened to look at the clock and noticed that it was a quarter past five. M. Lafarge would be leaving his shop behind the Palais Royal in half an hour. He would stop at the tobacconist's for his semi-weekly bag of fine-cut Maryland and would probably call at the cobbler's for Madame's second best shoes which she was having resoled for the third time; they would last out the winter. That would bring her husband home within an hour. In another half hour it would be time to put the cutlets on the fire. As she walked into the kitchen she wondered whether there was quite enough flour in the sauce. A heavy sauce made M. Lafarge toss about in bed.

Outside, on the Place, they were guillotining Marie Antoinette....

XXIX

ART

(WHEN EMMY DESTINN SANG IN THE LION CAGE)

First Lion: I'm nervous. Aren't you?

Second Lion: Not in the least.

First Lion: Then why do you keep your tail between your legs?

Second Lion: I always do that when I'm thinking.

First Lion: What I want to know is, what do they want to go and put her in the cage for? The place is crowded as it is and there isn't enough raw beef to go around.

Second Lion: Maybe she is a new kind of beef.

First Lion: I wouldn't touch it for the world-- Now what are you doing? Are you afraid?

Second Lion: Who's afraid?

First Lion: What made you back into me like that and growl when she waved her upper limbs and stepped forward?

Second Lion: Purely reflex action. Do you think she's hungry?

First Lion: For heaven's sake, don't say that. What makes you think so?

Second Lion: She has her mouth wide open and she emits prolonged howls. I wish she wouldn't move forward so abruptly.

First Lion: And I wish you wouldn't back into me like that without warning.

Second Lion: Perhaps she howls because she's afraid.

First Lion: Whom would she be afraid of?

Second Lion: The man outside who is turning the handle of the picture-machine.

First Lion: He has a red face.

Second Lion: He must be juicy. I could fetch him in two leaps if I were feeling just right.

First Lion: There you go again. You'll be backing me against the bars before you know it.

Second Lion: Can't one stretch when one feels bored?

First Lion: The red-faced man must be the new keeper.

Second Lion: Probably, and she is howling for something to eat. I wonder how long this will last.

First Lion: I wonder. This is worse than the circus with nothing between you and a crowd. What is it now?

Second Lion: She's come nearer again and she is stretching out her upper limbs in our direction. Suppose she's hungry and the red-faced man refuses to let her have anything.

First Lion: For heaven's sake, don't speak like that.

XXX

THE PACE OF LIFE

(AS RECORDED BY THE FILM DRAMA AND TIMED BY A DOLLAR WATCH)

From love at first sight to end of successful courtship, 2-1/2 minutes.

Breakfast, 45 seconds.

Ascent of the Jungfrau, 5 minutes.

A riot, 1 minute, 45 seconds.

A wedding, 1-1/2 minutes.

A conflagration, 55 seconds.

A night of restless tossing on a bed of pain, 35 seconds.

From discovery of wife's faithlessness to attempt at suicide, 50 seconds.

Reconciliation between life-long enemies, 1 minute.

Trust monopolist converted to endow a hospital and reorganise business on a profit-sharing basis, 1-1/2 minutes.

A piano recital, 30 seconds.

A battle in Mexico, 1-1/2 minutes.

A major abdominal operation, 19 seconds.

Establishing identity of long-lost heir, 6 seconds.

Buy your hats at O'Grady's--they're different, 2 minutes.

Getting Central on the telephone, instantaneous.

Central gives the right connection, 2 seconds. (Incidentally it may be remarked that the film drama can never hope to reproduce the most powerful comic device of the legitimate stage. This consists in saying to Central, "Yes, I want two-four-six-thr-r-re-e," the most notable advance in dramatic art since the invention of the inflated bladder.)

Restoration of lost memory and discovery of hiding-place of lost documents, 10 seconds.

Orator sways hostile audience, 15 seconds.

Detailed plan for robbing Metropolitan Museum formulated by six conspirators, 15 seconds.

Twenty years pass, 2 seconds.

XXXI

MARCUS AURELIUS, 1914

Let me exaggerate! For in exaggeration there is life and the punch that makes for progress. Whereas no man can manifestly qualify as a live wire who sees things as they are.

Let me exaggerate the number of millions of bacteria to the cubic centimetre in our morning milk; and the hosts of virulent bacilli that make their encampment on the unlaundered dollar-bill; and the anti-social micro-organisms that beset the common drinking-cup.

Let me exaggerate the virtue of assiduously and courageously swatting the common house-fly.

Let me exaggerate the grey and monotonous life of the poor, forgetting the children who dance to the sound of the hurdy-gurdy; and the mothers who smile over their babies in tenement cradles, and the lovers in the parks, and the May parties, and the millions who patronise the moving-picture theatres, and the millions in Coney Island.

Let me exaggerate the grinding, crushing, withering speed of modern industry, forgetting the hundreds of thousands who throng the baseball parks and the additional millions who study the score boards on Park Row.

Let me exaggerate the number of children who go breakfastless to school, since nothing less than 25,000 gets into the newspaper headlines; and the wickedness of regularly ordained clergymen who marry people without asking for a physician's certificate; and the peril of helping an old lady up the Subway steps lest she turn out to be a recruiter of white slaves.

Let me exaggerate the blessings of an age when babies shall be born without adenoids and tonsils, and shall develop just as automatically into clear-eyed little Boy Scouts and Camp-fire Girls.

Let me exaggerate! Teach me that outlook upon life which the highbrow pragmatists describe as the will to believe, and the low-brow describes as pipe dreams! Save me from those twin devils, the Sense of Humour and the Sense of Proportion; for in common sense is stagnation and death, but progress lies in exaggeration!

XXXII

BY THE TURN OF A HAND

In seven different ways has the world been on the point of being regenerated since the Spanish-American War. For the completeness with which the world has been reconstructed consult the current files of the newspapers.

The world was to be made over by the bicycle. The strap-hanger was to abandon his strap and ride joyfully down the Broadway cable-slot, snapping his fingers at traction magnates and imbibing ozone. The factory-hand was to abandon his city flat and live in the open country, going to and from his work through the green lanes at fifteen miles an hour, with his lunch on the handle bars. The old were to grow young again and the young were to dream close to the heart of Nature. The doctors were to perish of starvation. But where is the bicycle to-day?

The world was to be made over by jiu-jitsu. Elderly gentlemen were to regain the waistline of their youth by ten minutes' attention every morning to the secrets of the Samurai. Slim young women, when attacked by heavy ruffians, were to seize their assailants by the wrist and hurl them over the right shoulder. The police were to discard their revolvers and their night sticks, and suppress rioters by mere muscular contraction. The doctors, as before, were to grow extinct through the rapid process of starvation. But where is jiu-jitsu to-day?

The world was to be regenerated by denatured alcohol. Congress had merely to remove the internal revenue tax and a new motive power would be let loose, far transcending the total available horsepower of our coal mines. Denatured alcohol was to drive the farmer's machines, propel our war automobiles, run our factories, and reduce the cost of living to a ridiculous minimum. But where is denatured alcohol to-day?

The world was to be redeemed by the bungalow. The landlord was to disappear and in his place would come a race of free-men bowing the head to no man and raising their own vegetables. Kitchen drudgery was to be eliminated by the simple device of abolishing the kitchen and calling it a kitchenette. With no more stairs to climb, rheumatism would pass into history. So would the doctors. The bungalow is still with us, and alas, so are the doctors.

The world was to be regenerated by sour milk; by the simple life; by sleeping in the open air. But where now are Prof. Metchnikoff and Pastor Wagner? And the pictures of rose-embowered sleeping porches in the garden magazines have been supplanted by pictures of colonial farmhouses transformed into charming interiors by two coats of white-wash and a thin-paper edition of the classics.

Does this show that we must give up all hope of seeing a new world around us before 1915? By no means. We still have Eugenics.

XXXIII

THE QUARRY SLAVE

The tired business man leaves his home in the country just in time to catch the next train. By ten o'clock, at the latest, he is in his office, having ridden up to the thirteenth floor in an express elevator and so gained a distinct advantage over his London competitors who are in the habit of walking up to their offices on the third floor. He finds his mail opened and sorted on his desk. He glances over the most important letters, puts aside those requiring immediate attention, and has his shoes shined. At eleven o'clock he calls up on the telephone and, in the course of fifteen minutes' conversation, transacts a great deal of business which has to be confirmed by letter. His father would merely have written the letter.

Ignoring the primary rule of health which forbids the mingling of work and recreation, he makes a business appointment for lunch, and between one o'clock and half-past three he puts through a deal on which his father would have spent at least half an hour during his busiest hours. Returning to his office he dictates several letters which he dictated the day before and into which a number of vital errors have been introduced in the course of transcription. This necessitates repeated reference to a card catalogue, an operation which takes some time because the young man in charge has been brought up on the phonetic system and experiences some difficulty in determining the proper place of the letter G in the alphabet. From 3:30 to 4:30 the business man is interviewed by an agent who demonstrates the merits of a new labour-saving letter file. Donning his overcoat hastily he runs to make an express which takes eight minutes to reach Grand Central Station, whereas the local trains sometimes take as much as eleven minutes.

Later, exhausted by his efforts of the day, he just manages to purchase two seats on the aisle from a speculator, and staggers to his chair at 8:30 as the curtain rises on the first act of "The Girl and the Eskimo."

XXXIV

MONOTONY OF THE POLES

(AT A FIVE O'CLOCK TEA)

The Lady: It's so good of you to come. It must be wonderful to have been at the Pole. Do you know, when the news first reached us, I was so excited I insisted on calling up all my friends on the telephone and asking them if they had heard. It must have been a wonderful trip. Won't you sit down and tell us all about it?

The Explorer: Thank you. We left our winter camp in latitude 83 degrees 7 minutes on October 24, with five men, four sledges, and thirty-two dogs. The long wait was spent in laying in stocks of seal-meat for the dogs, constructing sledges, breaking the dogs to harness, making meteorological observations, bathing, sleeping, and attending to the dogs. In the cold of the Polar night, work moves on rather slowly, but I always enjoyed the restful half-hour I devoted to winding up my watch. On August 24 we caught the first sign of spring.

The Lady: Of course.

The Explorer: But it was not till October 24 that the sun rose and the Polar day began.

The Lady: How very interesting!

The Explorer: We had been getting impatient. We were afraid the dogs would grow too fat. We were glad when the edge of the sun's disk showed above the horizon.

The Lady: It must have been like the first day of creation; it must have been like the radiant illumination of a great love.

The Explorer: It was indeed. We immediately harnessed the dogs and set out. The sledges had been loaded several days before. The dogs were in excellent physical condition. The ice was smooth. The temperature was minus 28 degrees Centigrade. What this is when expressed in terms of Fahrenheit, madam, you will of course readily ascertain for yourself by multiplying by 9, dividing by 5, and subtracting 32.

The Lady: It is all too wonderful!

The Explorer: On our first day's march we covered forty-three kilometres, the kilometre being equal, as you are aware, to .62121 of a mile. Part of the way we rode upon the sledges. Then the ice grew rough, and we took to our skis. We camped in 83 degrees 29 minutes, and built an igloo, which you will recall is a hut made of ice-blocks and snow. First we fed the dogs. The daily ration for the dogs was one and a half kilogrammes of seal-meat, the kilogramme, I need not tell you, being equal to 2.2046 pounds. Then we turned in.

The Lady: Your first night in the unknown!

The Explorer: As you say, madam. The next day we camped in 83 degrees 53 minutes, fed the dogs as usual, and built an igloo. The day after, we camped in 84 degrees 29 minutes and built another igloo, after feeding the dogs. Nothing happened for the next ten days. The dogs were in good condition. The sledges held well. We made an average daily march of 36 kilometres. But on the eleventh day, at the conclusion of a fairly good march, one of the dogs in sledge number 2--we called him Skraal--attacked and bit a dog we called Ragnar. We parted them with great difficulty. The two days that followed were uneventful, but on the third day Ragnar attacked and bit Skraal. We had to club them apart. On the fifteenth day out Ragnar and Skraal attacked and bit a third dog named Skalder, but he eventually recovered. That was in latitude 85 degrees 87 minutes, at an altitude of 3,700 feet, and the temperature was minus 27 degrees Centigrade. It occurred just after we had finished building an igloo and were preparing to feed the dogs.

The Lady: And always you were drawing nearer the goal!

The Explorer: Naturally, madam. All this time we were busy laying down depots of food for the dogs and the men. Because once we reached the goal we must, of course, get back as fast as we could. We built a depot at every degree of latitude, or, roughly speaking, every 100 kilometres. Our depot in latitude 87 degrees 25 minutes was situated amidst very picturesque surroundings.

The Lady: In that wonderful landscape!

The Explorer: Yes, the spot had some very extraordinary ice-formations. Setting out from that point we marched 37 kilometres over rough ice, fed the dogs, and built an igloo. The next day we marched 70 kilometres over smooth ice, and, having attended to the dogs, built another igloo. The next day we marched 50 kilometres over ice that was partly rough and partly smooth, and had a good night's rest, after putting up an igloo and caring for the dogs. The next day the ice was very soft, and the dogs hung back and complained. However, we managed to cover 27 kilometres that day, reaching 88 degrees 14 minutes. There we camped and--

The Lady: And built another igloo!

The Explorer: No, madam, a food depot. It was on the following day that I first had reason to feel anxious for my men. Skaarmund, my chief assistant, froze his ears. That was in latitude 88 degrees 36 minutes, and the temperature was minus 40 degrees Centigrade. After being vigorously rubbed for several minutes, he was all right again. Almost immediately Knudsen complained of headache and we had to give him some phenacetine. Half an hour later Lanstrup fell down a crevice in the ice.

The Lady: Horrors!

The Explorer: Fortunately the crevice was only two feet deep, and after we had applied peroxide and vaseline, Lanstrup was as well as ever. Owing to the high altitude we all experienced some difficulty in breathing. It was very much like being stalled on a crowded train in your Subway. It was our ambition to reach the Pole on the fifth day after, because that was our national holiday. But we found the going too rough. However, we celebrated the day by giving an extra half-kilogramme of seal-meat to the dogs and a whole cup of coffee to the men. Skaarmund had some cigarettes hidden about his person and we smoked and took an extra hour's rest. Two days later, we were at the Pole.

The Lady: Where no man's foot had trod before! Alone amidst that infinite stretch of virgin snow!

The Explorer: Quite so, madam. Immediately after taking observations and noting the temperature and the velocity of the wind, we built an igloo and picketed the dogs. We remained there for three days, taking additional observations, repairing the sledges, and resting up the dogs. On the third day after we raised the flag over the Pole, we set out on our return journey.

The Lady: What thoughts must have been yours! You were coming back with the prize of the centuries, to find the world at your feet.

The Explorer: Exactly, madam. Not one of the dogs had failed us. Having said farewell to the flag waving proudly at the apex of the globe, we marched fifty-two kilometres. At the end of the march we built an igloo and fed the dogs. At the end of the next day's march we killed two dogs: we gave one to the other dogs, and the other we ate ourselves. It tasted not unlike fresh veal. The following morning we had hardly commenced our march when Malstrom cut his foot on a sharp piece of ice which penetrated his boot. We washed his foot out with witch hazel and made him ride for a mile or two on a sledge. The pain thereupon disappeared. At exactly 89 degrees we built an igloo and slept for ten hours in one stretch. Rising, we killed a dog for breakfast, took our observations, and set out. Malstrom's foot gave him no trouble. That day we camped at 88 degrees 23 minutes, built another igloo, and killed another dog. Our appetites were very active. On the way to the Pole we had allowed ourselves two and one-half kilos of food per day. Now we were consuming over four kilos a day.

The Lady: Fancy eating four kilometres a day.

The Explorer: No, madam, kilogrammes. But at the same time we were travelling at a much faster pace; one day our record was ninety.

The Lady: That was a great deal, wasn't it, ninety kilogrammes a day?

The Explorer: No, madam, kilometres. And in this manner we arrived safely at our winter camp. Five days later we were on board our ship, on the way to civilisation.

The Lady: How happy you must have been!

The Explorer: We were. But perhaps madam may be interested in some of the photographs illustrating incidents of our journey to the Pole?

The Lady: How can you ask!

The Explorer: This picture, you will see, shows our permanent camp, situated in the midst of a snow plain stretching to the horizon in every direction. This is a picture of the South Pole, similarly situated, you will observe, in the midst of a snow plain stretching as far as the eye can see. This is the sledge upon which I travelled to the Pole. The next picture shows the same sledge viewed from the rear and a little to one side, and this is still the same sledge as seen at a distance of 200 feet to the left and from a slight elevation. The next picture shows the sledge with its load, and the one after that shows the load itself resting close to the walls of an igloo which is just going up. In this picture you see the igloo completed and with the dogs lying in front. The next picture shows the same group of dogs with two of the leaders missing. The next two pictures show the sledge as it was before the accident and after. The remaining pictures deal with similar subjects.

The Lady: This has been so delightful! Do you know, your English pronunciation is wonderful for a foreigner!

THE END