Freeland: A Social Anticipation Part 12

But now for our dinner. David admitted, when I questioned him, that in honour of us a fifth course was added to the customary four. But the charm of the meal consisted, not in the number, but in the superiority of the dishes, and not less in the absence of the attendants, who, not belonging to the society at table, necessarily are a disturbing element. I may say, without exaggeration, that I have seldom seen a meal so excellently prepared, and never one consisting of such choice material. The flesh of young oxen fattened upon the aromatic pastures of the higher hills and of the tame antelopes cannot be matched anywhere else; the vegetables throw the choicest specimens of a Paris Exhibition in the shade; but the special pride of Freeland is the choiceness and multiplicity of its fruits. And now for the mysterious mode of serving. A cupboard in the wall of the dining-room yielded an apparently inexhaustible series of eatables. First Miss Bertha fetched from this cupboard a tureen, which she had to lift carefully by its ivory handles, and which when uncovered was found to contain a delicious soup. Then from another compartment of the same cupboard was brought a fish as cold as if it had just come from the ice.

Then followed, from yet another compartment, a hot ragout, followed by a hot joint, with many vegetables and a salad. Next came ices, with pastry, fruits, cheese. The meal was ended with black coffee made in the presence of the guests, and choice cigars, both, like the beer and the wine, of Freeland growth and manufacture. There was no attendance visible during the meal; the three charming girls fetched everything either out of the mysterious cupboard or from a side-table.

Mrs. Ney now became the cicerone. 'This wall-cupboard,' she explained, 'is one-half ice-cellar--that is, it is cooled by cold air pa.s.sing through it; the other half is a kind of hearth--that is, it is furnished with an electrical heating apparatus. Between the two compartments, and divided from them by non-conducting walls, is a neutral s.p.a.ce at the ordinary temperature. The cupboard has also the peculiarity of opening on two sides--here into the dining-room, and outside into the corridor. Whilst we were at table the Food a.s.sociation brought in quick succession the dishes which had been ordered, in part quite ready, in part--as, _e.g._, the roast meat and the vegetables--prepared but not cooked. The food that was ready was placed in the respective compartments of the cupboard from the corridor; a member of the a.s.sociation cooked the meat and vegetables in a kitchen at the back of the house, furnished also with electrical cooking apparatus. This is not the usual order; when we are alone the cooking is as a rule done in the cupboard, and attended to by my daughters. It takes but a little time, and the smell of the cooking is never perceptible, as the cupboard is both hearth and ice-cellar in one, and therefore possesses the character of a good ventilator. Was.h.i.+ng the dishes, &c., is the business of the a.s.sociation, as is also attendance at table if it is required.'

Coffee was taken out-of-doors on one of the terraces, where the ladies sang to the harp and the piano. Meantime Mr. Ney told us the family relations.h.i.+ps of the two pupil-daughters. Leonora is the child of an agriculturist in Lykipia, Clementina the daughter of one of his heads of departments. The latter information surprised us. 'Why,' I asked, 'do these ladies forsake the parental houses, which must be highly respectable ones?'

Mr. Ney explained that it was not a respectable house that the pupil-daughters sought, but simply the cultured, intellectual housewife.

The husband may be ever so famous and learned, but if the housewife is only an ordinary character, no pupil-daughters will ever cross the threshold.

The inst.i.tution was intended to afford girls the benefit of a higher example, of an enn.o.bling womanly intercourse, and not the splendour of richer external surroundings; which, it may be remarked, had no application to the prevailing circ.u.mstances in Freeland, as, generally speaking, all families here live on the same footing. Clementina's mother is a brave woman with a good heart, but after all only a good practical housekeeper, 'therefore,' said he, with a sparkle in his eye,' she begged my Ellen, who is reckoned among the n.o.blest women in this country which is so rich in fine women, to take her Clementina for a couple of years as a favour.'

I must now conclude for to-day, for I am tired; but I have a great deal more to tell you of my experiences both inside and outside of the house of the Neys.

CHAPTER XV

Eden Vale: July 18, ----.

To-day I take up again the report of our experiences here, which I began a week ago. You will readily imagine that my father and I were both full of curiosity to see the town. Guessing this, Mr. Ney next morning invited us to join him and his son on a tour round Eden Vale. The carriage was already waiting! It was a light and elegant vehicle with steel wheels like those of a velocipede, and with two seats each comfortably accommodating two persons. As we, in response to David's signal, exhibited some hesitation and made no effort to get into the vehicle, David perceived that we missed--the horses! He explained to us that in Freeland, and particularly in the towns, the use of animals to draw vehicles was for many reasons given up in favour of mechanical power, which was safer, cleaner, and also cheaper. This vehicle was a kind of _draisine_, and the driver, whose place is on the right side of the front seat, has nothing to do but to press lightly downwards upon a small lever at his right hand, in order to set the machine in motion, the speed depending upon the strength of the pressure.

The upward motion of the lever slacks the speed or brings the vehicle to a standstill; while a turning to right or left is effected by a corresponding rotary motion of the same lever. The motive power is neither steam nor electricity, but the elasticity of a spiral spring, which is not inseparably attached to the vehicle, but can be inserted or removed at will.

'The cylindrical box, a little over half a yard long and about eight inches deep, here over the front axle,' demonstrated my friend, 'contains the spiral spring. Before being used the spring is wound up and that very tightly--an operation which is effected by steam-engines in the workshops of the a.s.sociation for Transport, the energy present in the steam being thus converted into the energy of the tension of the spring. The power thus laid up in the spring is transferred to the axle by a very simple mechanism, and is sufficient to make the wheel revolve ten thousand times even if the vehicle is tolerably heavily loaded; and as the wheel has a circ.u.mference of about six feet and a half, the spring will carry the vehicle a distance of about twelve miles and a half. The speed depends, on the one hand, upon the load in the vehicle, and on the other hand upon the amount of pressure upon the regulating lever. The maximum speed attained by these ordinary _draisines_, on a good road and with a moderate load, is two and a half revolutions--that is, about thirteen feet--in the second, or a little over eleven miles an hour. But we have what are called racing carriages with which we can attain nearly twice that speed. The force of the spring is exhausted when the wheel has made ten thousand revolutions, which in slow travelling occurs in from one and a quarter to one and a half hours. On longer or more rapid journeys provision must therefore be made for sufficient reserve force, and this is done in various ways. One can take with him one or more springs ready wound up, for carrying which surplus boxes are attached to the back of the vehicle. When the spring is wound up and the escapement secured, it will retain its energy for years.

But as every spring weighs at least nearly eighty pounds, this mode of providing reserve power has its limits. Besides, the changing of the springs is no little trouble. As a rule, a second method is preferred. The Transport a.s.sociation has a number of station-houses for other purposes, on all the more frequented roads. These stations are indicated by flags, and travellers in the _draisines_ can halt at these and get their springs changed. Every station always has on hand a number of wound-up springs; and so travellers can journey about at any time without let or hindrance, particularly if they are prudent enough to furnish themselves with a reserve spring for emergencies. Such stations exist not merely in and around Eden Vale, but in and around all the towns in Freeland as well as on all the more frequented country roads. And as the different a.s.sociations carrying on the same industry all over the country were shrewd enough to adopt the same measure for all their springs, it is possible to travel through the whole of Freeland certain of finding everywhere a relay of springs. But if one would be absolutely sure, he can bespeak the necessary springs for any specified route through the agency of his own a.s.sociation; and in this case nothing would prevent him from leaving the highways and taking the less frequented byways so far as they are not too rough and steep--a contingency which, in view of the perfect development of the Freeland system of roads, is not to be feared except among the most remote mountain-paths. In this way, two years ago, our family went through the whole of the Aberdare and Baringo districts, travelling a distance of above a thousand miles, and doing the whole journey most comfortably in a fortnight.'

At last, with a shake of the head, we consented to get into the automatic carriage. My father sat in front with Mr. Ney, and David and I behind; a pressure by Ney upon the lever, and the machine noiselessly moved off towards the Eden lake. The banks of this lake--except on the north-western side, where quays for the merchant traffic stretch for more than three miles--are bordered by a fourfold avenue of palm-trees, and are laid out in marble steps reaching down to the water, except where occupied by piers covered with lines of rails. At these piers the pa.s.sengers are landed from the steamers which navigate the lake in all directions, but which, in order not to pollute the balmy air, are provided with perfectly effective smoke-consuming apparatus. Even the discordant shriek of the steam-whistle has been superseded in Freeland. For the Eden lake is only incidentally a seat of traffic; its chief character is that of an enormous piece of water for pleasure and ornament. A large portion of the sh.o.r.e is taken up by the luxuriously furnished bathing-establishments which stretch far out into the lake and are frequented by thousands at all times in the day. These baths are for the most part surrounded by shady groves, and near them are to be found the theatres, opera-houses, and concert-halls of Eden Vale, to the number of sixteen, which we on this occasion saw only on the outside. Our hosts told us that the lake looked most charming by moonlight or under the electric light, and that therefore we would visit it in the course of a few evenings.

We then turned away from the lake, and went to the heights which rose in a half-crescent form around Eden Vale. Here we perceived at once, even at a distance of nearly two miles, a gigantic building which must constantly excite the admiration of even those who are accustomed to it, and which fairly bewildered us strangers. It is as unparalleled in size as it is incomparable in the proportions and harmonious perfection of all its parts.

It gives at once the impression of overpowering majesty and of fairy-like loveliness. This wonderful structure is the National Palace of Freeland, and was finished five years ago. It is the seat of the twelve supreme Boards of Administration and the twelve Representative Bodies. It is built entirely of white and yellow marble, surpa.s.ses the Vatican in the area it covers, and its airy cupolas are higher than the dome of St. Peter's. That it could be built for 9,500,000 is explained only by the fact that all the builders as well as all the best artists of the country pressed to be employed in some way in its erection. And--so David told me--the motive that prompted the artists and builders to do this was not patriotism, but pure enthusiasm for art. Freeland is rich enough to pay any price for its National Palace, and no one had a thought of lessening the cost of the building; but the peculiar and impressive beauty of the work as seen in the design had fascinated all artists. David described the feverish excitement with which the commissioners appointed to decide upon the designs sent in announced that a plan had been presented, by a hitherto unknown young architect, which was beyond description; that a new era had been opened in architecture, a new style of architecture invented which in n.o.bility of form rivalled the best Grecian, and in grandeur the most ma.s.sive Egyptian monuments. And all who saw the design shared in this enthusiasm. The compet.i.tors--there were not less than eighty-four, for there had already been a great deal of beautiful building in Eden Vale--without exception withdrew their designs and paid voluntary homage to the new star that had risen in the firmament of art.

We were loth to turn away and look at any other buildings. Not until we had three times been round the National Palace did we consent to leave it. I will spare you the catalogue of the numberless handsome buildings which we hurriedly pa.s.sed by; I will only say that I was quite bewildered by the number and magnificence of the public buildings devoted to different scientific and artistic purposes. The academies, museums, laboratories, inst.i.tutions for experiment and research, &c., seemed endless; and one could see at a glance that they were all endowed with extravagant munificence. I must confine myself to a description of the largest of the three public libraries of Eden Vale, the interior of which we were invited to inspect. I was at once struck with the great number of visitors, and next with the fact that only a part of the magnificent rooms were devoted exclusively to reading, other rooms being filled with guests who were enjoying ices or coffee, or with readers of both s.e.xes who were smoking, or again with people talking and laughing. 'It seems,' said I to Mr. Ney, 'that in Freeland the libraries are also _cafes_ and conversation _salons_.' He admitted this, and asked if I supposed that the number of serious readers was affected by this arrangement. As I hesitated to answer, he told me that at first a considerable party in Freeland saw in this combination of reading with recreative intercourse a desecration of science. But all opposition was given up when it was seen that the possibility of alternating study with cheerful conversation very largely increased the number of readers. Of course the a.s.sociation for Providing Refreshments--for this, and not the library executive, provide the refreshments--was not allowed to enter a certain number of reading-rooms, and in certain of the rooms where refreshments and smoking were allowed talking was forbidden. Thus people visited the library either to study, to amuse themselves with a book, or to converse with acquaintances, according to their mood. The magnificent airy rooms, particularly those with large verandahs communicating with the central pillared court laid out with flower-beds and shrubs, formed, even in the heat of mid-day, a pleasant rendezvous; so that in the public life of Eden Vale the libraries played somewhat the same _role_ as the Agora in that of ancient Athens or the Forum in that of ancient Rome. At times there were as many as 5,000 persons of both s.e.xes a.s.sembled in this building: at least, our host a.s.sured us, as many as that might be found in the two smaller libraries at the northern and western ends of the city; and anyone who cared to take the trouble to examine the eighty-two rooms of the building would probably find that quite one half of those present made a considerable use of the 980,000 volumes which the inst.i.tution already possessed.

After we had pa.s.sed numberless public buildings, the purposes of some of which I could scarcely understand, as our 'civilised' Europe possesses nothing like them--I mention, as an example, merely the Inst.i.tute for Animal Breeding Experiments, the work of which is, by experiment and observation, to establish what influence heredity, mode of life, and food exercise upon the development of the human organism--it occurred to me that we had not pa.s.sed a hospital. As I was curious to see how the world-renowned Freeland benevolence, which for years past had richly furnished half the hospitals of the world with means, dealt with the sick poor in its own country, I asked David to take me to at least one hospital.

'I can show you a hospital as little as I can a prison or a barracks, in Eden Vale, for the very simple reason that we do not possess one in all Freeland,' was his answer.

'The absence of prisons and barracks I can understand; we knew that you Freelanders can manage without criminal laws or a military administration; but--so I thought--sickness must exist here: that has nothing to do with your social inst.i.tutions!'

'Your last sentence I cannot unconditionally a.s.sent to,' said Mr. Ney, joining in our conversation. 'Even diseases have decreased under the influence of our social inst.i.tutions. It is true they have not disappeared--we have sick in Freeland--but no poor sick, for we have no poor at all, either sick or sound. Therefore we do not possess those reservoirs of the diseased poor which in other countries are called "hospitals." We certainly have inst.i.tutions in which sick persons can, at good prices, procure special and careful treatment, and they are largely patronised, particularly in cases requiring surgical operations; but they are private inst.i.tutions, and they resemble both in their const.i.tution and their management your most respectable sanatoria for "distinguished patients."'

I was satisfied with this explanation so far; but now another doubt suggested itself. Without public hospitals there could be no proper medical study, I thought; and anatomy in particular could not be studied without the corpses of the poor for dissecting purposes. But Mr. Ney removed this doubt by a.s.suring me that the so-called clinical practice of Freeland medical men was in many respects far superior to that of the West, and even anatomical studies did not suffer at all. It had become the practice, both in Eden Vale and in all Freeland university towns, for medical students in their third year to a.s.sist practising physicians, whom, with the permission of the patients and under pledge of behaving discreetly, they accompanied in their visits to the sick, of course only in twos, or at most in threes, if the patient required the a.s.sistance of several persons. As all the physicians approved of this practice, which secured to them very valuable gratuitous a.s.sistance of various kinds, and as the patients also for the same reason profited much by it, the people rapidly became accustomed to it. In difficult cases these a.s.sistants were a great boon to the sick, to whom they ministered with indefatigable care, and whose kindness in allowing them to be present they thus repaid by their skilful attention.

When you reflect that in Freeland only _one_ commodity is dear and scarce, the labour of man, it can easily be estimated how valuable, as a rule, such a.s.sistance is both to the physician and to the patient. And in this way on the average the young medical men learn more than is learnt by hospital practice. They do not see so many sick persons, but those whom they do see they see and treat more fully and more considerately. As a layman, he--Mr.

Ney--could not perhaps give sufficiently exhaustive proof of the fact, but he knew that men who had been trained in hospitals admitted that physicians educated as they were in Freeland became better diagnosticians than hospital students. As to anatomical studies, he said, in the first place, that preparations and models afforded--certainly very expensive--subst.i.tutes for many school dissections, and in numerous instances were to be preferred; and, in the next place, that the scarcity of subjects for dissection was by no means so extreme in Freeland as I seemed to think. It was true there were no poor who, against their own will and that of their friends, could be subjected to the dissecting-knife; but on this very account there was to be found here no such foolish prejudice against dissection as was elsewhere entertained by even the so-called cultured cla.s.ses. The medical faculty received great numbers of subjects; and it could scarcely be a detriment to study that the students were compelled to treat these subjects with more respect, and to restore them in a short time to their surviving friends for cremation.

David further told me that in Freeland the physician is not paid by the patient, but is a public official, as is also the apothecary. The study of medicine is nevertheless as free in the universities here as any other study, and no one is prevented from practising as a physician because he may not have undergone an examination or pa.s.sed through a university. This is the inevitable consequence of the principles of the commonwealth. On the other hand, however, the commonwealth exercises the right of entrusting the care of health and sanitation to certain paid officials, as in every other kind of public service. These appointments are made, according to the public needs, by the head of the Education Department, who, like all other heads of departments, is responsible to his own representative board--or parliament of experts, as we may call it. It is the practice for the professors to propose the candidates, who, of course, undergo many severe examinations before they are proposed. Anyone who fails to get proposed _may_ practise medicine, but as the public knows that the most skilful are always chosen with the utmost conscientiousness conceivable, this liberty to practise is of no value. Anyone who thus fails to get proposed, and has neither the energy nor the patience to attempt to wipe off his disgrace at the next opportunity, simply hangs his medical vocation on a nail and turns to some other occupation. The elected physicians are not allowed to receive any payment whatever from their patients. At first their salary is moderate, scarcely more than the average earnings of a worker--that is, 1,800 hour-equivalents per annum; but it is increased gradually, as in the cases of the other officials, and the higher sanitary officials are taken from among the physicians. As the payments are controlled by the departmental parliament, and as this is elected by the persons who in one way or another are interested in this branch of the government, the best possible provision is made to prevent the physicians from a.s.suming an unbecoming att.i.tude towards their patients. No one is obliged to call in any one particular physician. The physicians live in different parts of each town, as conveniently distributed as possible; but everyone calls in the physician he likes best; and as physicians are naturally elected as far as possible upon the Representative Board for Sanitation--whose sittings, it may be remarked in pa.s.sing, are generally very short--the number of votes which the representatives receive is the best evidence of their relative popularity. It goes without saying that foreign physicians also, if they are men of good repute and do not object, have the same right as the Freeland physicians to submit their qualifications to the proposing body of professors. It should be added that in the larger towns, besides the ordinary physicians and surgeons, specialists are also appointed for certain specific diseases.

We had now been in our carriage for four hours, and were tired of riding, as was natural, notwithstanding the easy motion and comfort of the vehicle.

The Neys proposed that we should send the carriage home and return on foot, to which we a.s.sented. We left the carriage at one of the stations of the Transport a.s.sociation, and walked, under the shady alleys with which every street in Eden Vale is bordered. We now had leisure to examine more closely the elegant private houses, which, while they all showed the Eden Vale style of architecture--half-Moorish half-Grecian in its character--were for the rest alike neither in size nor in embellishment. The most conspicuous charm of these villas consists in their wonderfully lovely gardens, with their choice trees, their surpa.s.singly beautiful flowers, the white marble statuary, the fountains, and the many tame animals--especially monkeys, parrots, brightly coloured finches, and all sorts of song-birds--which were sporting about in them among merrily shouting children. We were astonished at the extraordinary cleanness of the streets; and the chief reason of this was said to be that, since the invention of automatic carriages, no draught animals kicked up dust or dropped filth in the streets of Freeland towns.

'Are there no horses here?' I asked; and I was told that there were a great number, and of the n.o.blest breed; but they were used only for riding outside of the town, among the neighbouring meadows, groves, and woods.

'But that must be a very expensive luxury here,' I said. 'The horse itself and its keep may be cheap enough; but, as human labour is the dearest thing in Freeland, I cannot understand how any Freeland income can support the cost of a groom. Or do such servants receive exceptionally low wages here?'

'The last would be scarcely possible among us,' answered Mr. Ney, smiling; 'for who would be willing to act as groom in Freeland? We are obliged to give those who attend to horses the same average payment as other workers; and if, for the seven saddle, horses which I keep in the stables of the Transport a.s.sociation, I had to pay for servants after the scale of Western lands, the cost would be more than the whole of my income. But the riddle is easily solved: the work in the stables is done by means of machinery, so that on an average one man is enough for every fifty horses. You shake your heads incredulously! But when you have soon in how few minutes a horse can be groomed and made to look as bright as a mirror by our enormous cylindrical brushes set in rotation by mechanism; in how short a time our scouring-machines and water-service can cleanse the largest stable of dung and all sorts of filth; and how the fodder is automatically supplied to the animals, you will not only understand how it is that we can keep horses cheaply, but you will also perceive that in Freeland even the "stablemen"

are cultured gentlemen, as deserving of respect and as much respected as everybody else.'

Conversing thus we reached home, where a hearty luncheon was taken, and some matters of business attended to. After the dinner described in my last, our hosts and we went again to the lake, and visited first the large opera-house, where, on that day, the work of a Freeland composer was given.

This piece was not new to us, for it is one of the many Freeland compositions which have been well received and are often performed in other countries. But we were astonished at the peculiar--yet common to all Freeland theatres--arrangement of the auditorium. The seats rise in an amphitheatre to a considerable height; and the roof rests upon columns, between which the outer air pa.s.ses freely. As many as ten thousand persons can find abundant room in the larger of these theatres, without an acc.u.mulation of vitiated air or any excessive heat.

The performance was excellent, the appointments in every respect brilliant; yet the price--which was not varied by any difference of rank--was ridiculously low according to Western notions. A seat cost sixpence--that is in the large opera-house; the other theatres are considerably cheaper.

The undertakers are in all cases the urban communes, and the performers, as well as the managers, act as communal officials. The theatres are all conducted on the economic principle that the cost and maintenance of the building fall upon the communal budget; and the door-money has to cover merely the hire of the performers and the stage expenses.

I learnt from David that Eden Vale possessed, besides the grand opera, also a dramatic opera, and four theatres, as well as three concert-halls, in which every evening orchestral and chamber music and choruses are to be heard. But as a Freeland specialty he mentioned five different theatres for instruction, in which astronomical, archaeological, geological, palaeontological, physical, historical, geographical, natural history--in short, all conceivable scientific lectures were delivered, ill.u.s.trated by the most comprehensive display of plastic representative art. The lectures are written by the most talented specialists, delivered by the most eloquent orators, and placed on the stage by the most skilful engineers and decorators. This kind of theatre is the most frequented; as a rule, the existing accommodation is not sufficient, hence the commune is building two new lecture-houses, which will be opened in the course of a few months. The grandeur of these presentations--as I learnt for myself the next evening--is really astounding; and though the young generally compose the greater part of the audience, adults also attend in large numbers.

When we left the theatre, the Neys engaged one of the gondolas which an a.s.sociation keeps there in readiness, and which is propelled by a screw worked by an elastic spring; and we steered out into the lake. The lake was lit up as brilliantly as if it were day, by elevated electric lights, with reflectors all round the sh.o.r.e. We had that evening the special pleasure of hearing a new cantata by Walter, the most renowned composer of Freeland, performed for the first time by the members of the Eden Vale Choral Society. This society, which generally chooses the Eden lake as the scene of its weekly performances, makes use on such occasions of a number of splendid barges, the cost of whose--often positively fairylike--appointments is defrayed by the voluntary contributions of its members and admirers.

Was it the influence of the very peculiar scenery, or was it the beauty of the composition itself?--certainly the effect which this cantata produced upon me was overwhelming. On the way home I confessed to David that I had never before been so struck with what I might call the transcendental power of music as during the performance on the lake. I seemed to hear the World-spirit speaking to my soul in those notes; and I seemed to understand what was said, but not to be able to translate it into ordinary Italian or English. At the same time I expressed my astonishment that so young a community as that of Freeland should have produced not merely notable works in all branches of art, but in two--architecture and music--works equal to the best examples of all times.

Mrs. Ney was of opinion that this was simply a necessary consequence of the general tendency of the Freeland spirit. Where the enjoyment of life and leisure co-exist the arts must flourish, since the latter are merely products of wealth and n.o.ble leisure. And it could be easily explained how it was that architecture and music were the first of the arts to develop.

Architecture necessarily and at once received a strong stimulus from the needs of a commonwealth of a novel and comprehensive character; and in the case of Freeland the influence of the grand yet charming nature of the country was unmistakable. On the other hand, music is the earliest of all forms of art--that to which the genius of man first turns itself whenever a new era of artistic creation is introduced by new modes of feeling and thinking.

'From the circ.u.mstance that your greatest master has to-day given the public a gratuitous first performance of his new composition, one might almost conclude that in this country the composers, or at any rate some of them, are also public officials. Is it so?' asked my father.

Mr. Ney said it was not so, and added that composers, poets, authors, and creative artists in general, when they produced anything of value, could with certainty reckon upon making a very good income from the sale of their works. As all Freeland families spent large sums in purchasing books, journals, musical compositions, and works of art of all kinds, the conditions of the art-world could not be correctly measured by Western standards. The artistic productions sold during the previous year had realised 300,000,000. Of this sum, however, the greater part represented the cost of reproductions, particularly in the case of printed works; yet the author of an only tolerably popular composition, book, or essay was sure of a very considerable profit. Editions numbering hundreds of thousands were here not at all remarkable; and editions of millions were by no means rare. For instance, Walter had hitherto composed in all six larger and eighteen smaller works, and for the sale of them the Musical Publis.h.i.+ng a.s.sociation had, up to the end of the last year, paid him 21,000. In fact, it could be positively a.s.serted that an author of any kind, who produced only one exceptionally good work, could live very comfortably upon the proceeds of its sale. It had even happened that the public libraries had bought 50,000 copies of a single book. Freeland possesses 3,050 such inst.i.tutions, and the larger of them are sometimes compelled to keep many hundred copies of books which are much sought after. When the interest of the reading public diminishes, the libraries withdraw a part of these copies, and there are yearly large auctions of such withdrawn books, without, however, diminis.h.i.+ng the sales of the publis.h.i.+ng a.s.sociations.

Moreover, the authors of Freeland are continuously and profitably kept busy by thousands of journals of all conceivable kinds which, so far as they offer what is of value, have a colossal sale. Capable architects, sculptors, painters can always reckon upon brilliant successes, for the demand for good and original plans and beautiful statues and pictures is always greater than the supply. The _grand_ art, it is true, finds employment only in public works, but here, as we have seen, it finds it on a most magnificent and most profitable scale. In Freeland they attach extraordinary importance to the cultivation of the beautiful and the n.o.ble; they hold the grand art to be one of the most effectual means of ethical culture; and as the community is rich enough to pay for everything that it thinks desirable, the public outlay for monumental buildings and their adornment finds its limits only in the capacities of the creative artists.

And the happy organisation of the departments which have these things in charge has--hitherto at any rate--preserved the Freelanders from serious blunders. Not everything that has been produced at the public cost is worthy of being accepted as perfect--many works of art thus produced have been thrown into the shade by better ones; but even those subsequently surpa.s.sed creations were at the time of their production the best which the existing art could produce, and to ask for more would be unjust. And I could not avoid perceiving that the population of Freeland are not merely proud of their public expenditure in art, but that they thoroughly enjoy what they pay for; and in this respect they are comparable to the ancient Athenians, of whom we are told that, with solitary exceptions, they all had an intense appreciation of the marvellous productions of their great masters.

'With such a universal taste for the beautiful among your people,' said my father to Mrs. Ney, 'I am surprised that so little attention is given to the adornment of the most beautiful embellishment of Freeland--its queenly women. Certainly their dress is shapely, and I have nowhere noticed such a correct taste in the choice of the most becoming forms and colours; but of actual ornaments one sees none at all. Here and there a gold fastener in the hair, here and there a gold or silver brooch on the dress--that is all; precious stones and pearls seem to be avoided by the ladies here. What is the reason of this?'

'The reason is,' answered Mrs. Ney, 'that the sole motive which makes ornaments so sought after among other nations is absent from us in Freeland. Vanity is native here also, among both men and women; but it does not find any satisfaction in the display of so-called "valuables," things whose only superiority consists in their being dear. Do you really believe that it is the _beauty_ of the diamond which leads so many of our pitiable sisters in other parts of the world to stake happiness and honour in order to get possession of such glittering little bits of stone? Why does the woman who has sold herself for a genuine stone thrust aside as unworthy of notice the imitation stone which in reality she cannot distinguish from the real one? And do you doubt that the real diamond would itself be degraded to the rank of a valueless piece of crystal which no "lady of taste" would ever glance at, if it by any means lost its high price? Ornaments do not please, therefore, because they are beautiful, but because they are dear.

They flatter vanity not by their brilliancy, but by giving to the owner of them the consciousness of possessing in these scarcely visible trifles the extract of so many human lives. "See, here on my neck I wear a talisman for which hundreds of slaves have had to put forth their best energies for years, and the power of which could lay even you, who look upon the pretty trifle with such reverent admiration, as a slave at my feet, obedient to all my whims! Look at me: I am more than you; I am the heiress who can squander upon a trifling toy what you vainly crave to appease your hunger."

That is what the diamond-necklace proclaims to all the world; and _that is why_ its possessor has betrayed and made miserable perhaps both herself and others, merely to be able to throw it as her own around her neck. For note well that ornaments adorn only those to whom they belong; it is mean to wear borrowed ornaments--it is held to be improper; and rightly so, for borrowed ornaments lie--they are a crown which gives to her who wears it the semblance of a power which in reality does not belong to her.

The power of which ornaments are the legitimate expression--the power over the lives and the bodies of others--does not exist in Freeland. Anyone possessing a diamond worth, for example, 600, would here have at his disposal a year's income from one person's labour; but to buy such a diamond and to wear it because it represented that value would, in view of our inst.i.tutions, be to make oneself ridiculous; for he who did it would simply be investing in that way the profits of _his own labour_. Value for value must he give to anyone whose labour he would buy for himself with his stone; and, instead of reverent admiration, he would only excite compa.s.sion for having renounced better pleasures, or for having put forth profitless efforts, in order to acquire a paltry bit of stone. It would be as if the owner of the diamond announced to the world: "See, whilst you have been enjoying yourselves or taking your ease, I have been stinting myself and toiling in order to gain this toy!" In everybody's eyes he would appear not the more powerful, but the more foolish: the stone, whose fascination lies purely in the supposition that its owner belongs to the masters of the earth who have power over the labour of others, and _therefore_ can amuse themselves by locking up the product of so much sweating toil in useless trinkets--the stone can no longer have any attraction for him. He who buys such a stone in Freeland is like a man who should set his heart upon possessing a crown which was no longer the symbol of authority.'

'Then you do not admit that ornaments have any real adorning power? You deny that pearls or diamonds add materially to the charms of a beautiful person?' asked my father in reply.

'That I do, certainly,' was the answer. 'Not that I dispute their decorative effect altogether; only I a.s.sert that they do not produce the same and, as a rule, not so good an effect as can be produced by other means. But, in general, the toy, which has no essential appropriateness to the human body, does not adorn, but, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, rather disfigures, its proud possessor. That in other parts of the world a lady decked with diamonds pleases you gentlemen better than one decked with flowers is due to the same cause that makes you--though you may be staunch Republicans--see more beauty in a queen than in her rivals, though at the bar of an impartial aesthetics the latter would be judged the more beautiful. A certain something, a peculiar witchery, surrounds her--the witchery (excuse the word) of servility; this it is, and not your aesthetic judgment, which cheats you into believing that the diamond lends a higher charm than the rose-wreath. Let the rose become the symbol of authority to be worn only by queens, and you would without any doubt find that roses were the adornment best fitted to reveal true majesty.'

'But the precious metals'--thus I interposed--'are not so completely abjured in Freeland as precious stones and pearls. Is there no inconsistency here?'

'I think not,' answered Mrs. Ney. 'We make use of any material in proportion to its beauty and suitability. If we find gems or pearls really useful for decorative purposes, and sufficiently beautiful when thus used to compensate in their aesthetic attractiveness for their cost, we make use of them without hesitation. But that does not apply to jewels as personal ornaments: the natural rose is, under all circ.u.mstances, a better adornment than its imitation in rubies and diamonds. The precious metals, on the other hand, have certain properties--durability, l.u.s.tre, and extraordinary malleability--which in many cases make it imperative to employ them for decorative purposes. Nevertheless, even their employment is very limited among us. These studs here, and the fillet in my daughter's hair, are not of pure gold, but are made of an alloy the princ.i.p.al ingredient in which is steel, and which owes its colour and immunity from rust to gold, without being as costly as silver. No one wishes to pa.s.s off such steel-gold for real gold; we use this material simply because we think it beautiful and suitable, and would at once exchange it for another which was cheaper and yet possessed the same properties. We use pure gold only exceptionally. Our table-plate, which you perhaps thought to be silver, is made of an alloy which owes to silver nothing but its resistance to most of the acids. If you examine the plate more closely you will see that this silver-alloy differs from pure silver both in being of a lighter colour and in being less weighty. In short, we use the n.o.ble metals never _because_ of, but now and then _in spite of_, their costliness.

'I might say that we women of Freeland are vain, because our desire to please is more p.r.o.nounced than that of our Western sisters. We are not content with being beautiful; we wish to appear beautiful, and the men do all they can to stimulate us in this endeavour; only I must ask you to make this distinction--we do not wish to make a show, but to please. Therefore to a Freeland woman dress and adornment are never ends in themselves, but means to an end. In Europe a lady of fas.h.i.+on often disfigures herself in the cruellest manner because she cares less about the effect produced by her person than about that produced by her clothes, her adornment; she does not choose the dress that best brings out her personal charms, but the most costly which her means will allow her to buy. We act differently. Our own aesthetic taste preserves us from the folly of allowing a dressmaker to induce us to wear garments different from those which we think or know will best bring out the good points of our figure. Besides, we can always avail ourselves of the advice of artistically cultured men. No painter of renown would disdain to instruct young women how to choose their toilette; in fact, special courses of lectures are given upon this important subject.

Naturally there cannot be any uniform fas.h.i.+on among us, since the composition, the draping, and the colours of the clothing are made to harmonise with the individuality of the wearer. To dress the slender and the stout, the tall and the short, the blonde and the brunette, the imposing and the _pet.i.te_, according to the same model would be regarded here as the height of bad taste. A Freeland woman who wishes to please would think it quite as ridiculous if anyone advised her to change a mode of dressing or of wearing her hair which she had proved to be becoming to her, merely because she had been seen too often dressed in this style. We cannot imagine that, in order to please, it is best to disfigure oneself in as many ways as possible; but we hold firmly to the belief--and in this we are supported by the men--that the human form should be covered and veiled by clothing, but not distorted and disfigured.'

We gallantly declared that we thoroughly agreed with these principles of the toilette. The truth is, that a stranger in Freeland, accustomed to the eccentricities of Western fas.h.i.+ons, at first thinks the artistically designed costumes of the women a little too simple, but he ultimately comes to find a return to the Western caricatures simply intolerable. You will remember that in Rome David a.s.sured us that European fas.h.i.+ons gave him exactly the same impression as those of the African savages. After being here scarcely a week, I begin to entertain the same opinion.

But I see that I must conclude without having exhausted my matter.