Essential Science Fiction Novels - Volume 2. Edward Bellamy

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СКАЧАТЬ laughed, eyeing Terry mischievously. As a matter of fact we began to feel Jeff something of a traitor—he so often flopped over and took their side of things; also his medical knowledge gave him a different point of view somehow.

      “I’m sorry to admit,” he told them, “that the dog, with us, is the most diseased of any animal—next to man. And as to temper—there are always some dogs who bite people—especially children.”

      That was pure malice. You see, children were the—the RAISON D’ETRE in this country. All our interlocutors sat up straight at once. They were still gentle, still restrained, but there was a note of deep amazement in their voices.

      “Do we understand that you keep an animal—an unmated male animal—that bites children? About how many are there of them, please?”

      “Thousands—in a large city,” said Jeff, “and nearly every family has one in the country.”

      Terry broke in at this. “You must not imagine they are all dangerous—it’s not one in a hundred that ever bites anybody. Why, they are the best friends of the children—a boy doesn’t have half a chance that hasn’t a dog to play with!”

      “And the girls?” asked Somel.

      “Oh—girls—why they like them too,” he said, but his voice flatted a little. They always noticed little things like that, we found later.

      Little by little they wrung from us the fact that the friend of man, in the city, was a prisoner; was taken out for his meager exercise on a leash; was liable not only to many diseases but to the one destroying horror of rabies; and, in many cases, for the safety of the citizens, had to go muzzled. Jeff maliciously added vivid instances he had known or read of injury and death from mad dogs.

      They did not scold or fuss about it. Calm as judges, those women were. But they made notes; Moadine read them to us.

      “Please tell me if I have the facts correct,” she said. “In your country—and in others too?”

      “Yes,” we admitted, “in most civilized countries.”

      “In most civilized countries a kind of animal is kept which is no longer useful—”

      “They are a protection,” Terry insisted. “They bark if burglars try to get in.”

      Then she made notes of “burglars” and went on: “because of the love which people bear to this animal.”

      Zava interrupted here. “Is it the men or the women who love this animal so much?”

      “Both!” insisted Terry.

      “Equally?” she inquired.

      And Jeff said, “Nonsense, Terry—you know men like dogs better than women do—as a whole.”

      “Because they love it so much—especially men. This animal is kept shut up, or chained.”

      “Why?” suddenly asked Somel. “We keep our father cats shut up because we do not want too much fathering; but they are not chained—they have large grounds to run in.”

      “A valuable dog would be stolen if he was let loose,” I said. “We put collars on them, with the owner’s name, in case they do stray. Besides, they get into fights—a valuable dog might easily be killed by a bigger one.”

      “I see,” she said. “They fight when they meet—is that common?” We admitted that it was.

      “They are kept shut up, or chained.” She paused again, and asked, “Is not a dog fond of running? Are they not built for speed?” That we admitted, too, and Jeff, still malicious, enlightened them further.

      “I’ve always thought it was a pathetic sight, both ways—to see a man or a woman taking a dog to walk—at the end of a string.”

      “Have you bred them to be as neat in their habits as cats are?” was the next question. And when Jeff told them of the effect of dogs on sidewalk merchandise and the streets generally, they found it hard to believe.

      You see, their country was as neat as a Dutch kitchen, and as to sanitation—but I might as well start in now with as much as I can remember of the history of this amazing country before further description.

      And I’ll summarize here a bit as to our opportunities for learning it. I will not try to repeat the careful, detailed account I lost; I’ll just say that we were kept in that fortress a good six months all told, and after that, three in a pleasant enough city where—to Terry’s infinite disgust—there were only “Colonels” and little children—no young women whatever. Then we were under surveillance for three more—always with a tutor or a guard or both. But those months were pleasant because we were really getting acquainted with the girls. That was a chapter!—or will be—I will try to do justice to it.

      We learned their language pretty thoroughly—had to; and they learned ours much more quickly and used it to hasten our own studies.

      Jeff, who was never without reading matter of some sort, had two little books with him, a novel and a little anthology of verse; and I had one of those pocket encyclopedias—a fat little thing, bursting with facts. These were used in our education—and theirs. Then as soon as we were up to it, they furnished us with plenty of their own books, and I went in for the history part—I wanted to understand the genesis of this miracle of theirs.

      And this is what happened, according to their records.

      As to geography—at about the time of the Christian era this land had a free passage to the sea. I’m not saying where, for good reasons. But there was a fairly easy pass through that wall of mountains behind us, and there is no doubt in my mind that these people were of Aryan stock, and were once in contact with the best civilization of the old world. They were “white,” but somewhat darker than our northern races because of their constant exposure to sun and air.

      The country was far larger then, including much land beyond the pass, and a strip of coast. They had ships, commerce, an army, a king—for at that time they were what they so calmly called us—a bi-sexual race.

      What happened to them first was merely a succession of historic misfortunes such as have befallen other nations often enough. They were decimated by war, driven up from their coastline till finally the reduced population, with many of the men killed in battle, occupied this hinterland, and defended it for years, in the mountain passes. Where it was open to any possible attack from below they strengthened the natural defenses so that it became unscalably secure, as we found it.

      They were a polygamous people, and a slave-holding people, like all of their time; and during the generation or two of this struggle to defend their mountain home they built the fortresses, such as the one we were held in, and other of their oldest buildings, some still in use. Nothing but earthquakes could destroy such architecture—huge solid blocks, holding by their own weight. They must have had efficient workmen and enough of them in those days.

      They made a brave fight for their existence, but no nation can stand up against what the steamship companies call “an act of God.” While the whole fighting force was doing its best to defend their mountain pathway, there occurred a volcanic outburst, with some local tremors, and the result was the complete filling up of the pass—their only outlet. Instead of a passage, a new СКАЧАТЬ