Part 15 (1/2)

State politics here move, like individual affairs, upon the great principle of contempt for earthly things. The state is willing to destroy itself for the good of other states; but as other states are in the same position, nothing can result. In times of war the object of each army is to honor the other and benefit it by giving it the glory of defeat. The contest is thus most fierce. The Kosekin, through their pa.s.sionate love of death, are terrible in battle; and when they are also animated by the desire to confer glory on their enemies by defeating them, they generally succeed in their aim. This makes them almost always victorious, and when they are not so not a soul returns alive. Their state of mind is peculiar. If they are defeated they rejoice, since defeat is their chief glory; but if they are victorious they rejoice still more in the benevolent thought that they have conferred upon the enemy the joy, the glory, and the honor of defeat.

Here all shrink from governing others. The highest wish of each is to serve. The Meleks and Kohens, whom I at first considered the highest, are really the lowest orders; next to these come the authors, then the merchants, then farmers, then artisans, then laborers, and, finally, the highest rank is reached in the paupers. Happy the aristocratic, the haughty, the envied paupers! The same thing is seen in their armies. The privates here are highest in rank, and the officers come next in different graduations. These officers, however, have the command and the charge of affairs as with us; yet this is consistent with their position, for here to obey is considered n.o.bler than to command. In the fleet the rowers are the highest cla.s.s; next come the fighting-men; and lowest of all are the officers. War arises from motives as peculiar as those which give rise to private feuds; as, for instance, where one nation tries to force a province upon another; where they try to make each other greater; where they try to benefit unduly each other's commerce; where one may have a smaller fleet or army than has been agreed on, or where an amba.s.sador has been presented with gifts, or received too great honor or attention.

In such a country as this, where riches are disliked and despised, I could not imagine how people could be induced to engage in trade.

This, however, was soon explained. The laborers and artisans have to perform their daily work, so as to enable the community to live and move and have its being. Their impelling motive is the high one of benefiting others most directly. They refuse anything but the very smallest pay, and insist on giving for this the utmost possible labor.

Tradesmen also have to supply the community with articles of all sorts; merchants have to sail their s.h.i.+ps to the same end--all being animated by the desire of effecting the good of others. Each one tries not to make money, but to lose it; but as the compet.i.tion is sharp and universal, this is difficult, and the larger portion are unsuccessful.

The purchasers are eager to pay as much as possible, and the merchants and traders grow rich in spite of their utmost endeavors. The wealthy cla.s.ses go into business so as to lose money, but in this they seldom succeed. It has been calculated that only two per cent in every community succeed in reaching the pauper cla.s.s. The tendency is for all the labors of the working-cla.s.s to be ultimately turned upon the unfortunate wealthy cla.s.s. The workmen being the creators of wealth, and refusing to take adequate pay, cause a final acc.u.mulation of the wealth of the community in the hands of the ma.s.s of the non-producers, who thus are fixed in their unhappy position, and can hope for no escape except by death. The farmers till the ground, the fishermen fish, the laborers toil, and the wealth thus created is pushed from these incessantly till it all falls upon the lowest cla.s.s--namely, the rich, including Athons, Meleks, and Kohens. It is a burden that is often too heavy to be borne; but there is no help for it, and the better-minded seek to cultivate resignation.

Women and men are in every respect absolutely equal, holding precisely the same offices and doing the same work. In general, however, it is observed that women are a little less fond of death than men, and a little less unwilling to receive gifts. For this reason they are very numerous among the wealthy cla.s.s, and abound in the offices of administration. Women serve in the army and navy as well as men, and from their lack of ambition or energetic perseverance they are usually relegated to the lower ranks, such as officers and generals. To my mind it seemed as though the women were in all the offices of honor and dignity, but in reality it was the very opposite. The same is true in the family. The husbands insist on giving everything to the wives and doing everything for them. The wives are therefore universally the rulers of the household while the husbands have an apparently subordinate, but, to the Kosekin, a more honorable position.

As to the religion of the Kosekin, I could make nothing of it. They believe that after death they go to what they call the world of darkness. The death they long for leads to the darkness that they love; and the death and the darkness are eternal. Still, they persist in saying that the death and the darkness together form a state of bliss. They are eloquent about the happiness that awaits them there in the sunless land--the world of darkness; but for my own part, it always seemed to me a state of nothingness.

CHAPTER XVII

BELIEF AND UNBELIEF

The doctor was here interrupted by Featherstone, who, with a yawn, informed him that it was eleven o'clock, and that human endurance had its limits. Upon this the doctor rolled up the ma.n.u.script and put it aside for the night, after which supper was ordered.

”Well,” said Featherstone, ”what do you think of this last?”

”It contains some very remarkable statements,” said the doctor.

”There are certainly monsters enough in it,” said Melick--

”'Gorgons, and hydras, and chimeras dire.'”

”Well, why not?” said the doctor.

”It seems to me,” said Melick, ”that the writer of this has peopled his world with creatures that resemble the fossil animals more than anything else.”

”The so-called fossil animals,” said the doctor, ”may not be extinct.

There are fossil specimens of animals that still have living representatives. There is no reason why many of those supposed to be extinct may not be alive now. It is well known that many very remarkable animals have become extinct within a comparatively recent period. These great birds, of which More speaks, seem to me to belong to these cla.s.ses. The dodo was in existence fifty years ago, the moa about a hundred years ago. These great birds, together with others, such as the epiornis and palapteryx, have disappeared, not through the ordinary course of nature, but by the hand of man. Even in our hemisphere they may yet be found. Who can tell but that the moa or the dodo may yet be lurking somewhere here in the interior of Madagascar, of Borneo, or of Papua?”

”Can you make out anything about those great birds?” asked Featherstone. ”Do they resemble anything that exists now, or has ever existed?”

”Well, yes, I think so,” said the doctor. ”Unfortunately, More is not at all close or accurate in his descriptions; he has a decidedly unscientific mind, and so one cannot feel sure; yet from his general statements I think I can decide pretty nearly upon the nature and the scientific name of each one of his birds and animals. It is quite evident to me that most of these animals belong to races that no longer exist among us, and that this world at the South Pole has many characteristics which are like those of what is known as the Coal Period. I allude in particular to the vast forests of fern, of gigantic gra.s.ses and reeds. At the same time the general climate and the atmosphere seem like what we may find in the tropics at present.

It is evident that in More's world various epochs are represented, and that animals of different ages are living side by side.”

”What do you think of the opkuk?” asked Featherstone, with a yawn.

”Well, I hardly know.”

”Why, it must be a dodo, of course,” said Melick, ”only magnified.”

”That,” said the doctor, gravely, ”is a thought that naturally suggests itself; but then the opkuk is certainly far larger than the dodo.”

”Oh, More put on his magnifying-gla.s.ses just then.”

”The dodo,” continued the doctor, taking no notice of this, ”in other respects corresponds with More's description of the opkuk. Clusius and Bontius give good descriptions and there is a well-known picture of one in the British Museum. It is a ma.s.sive, clumsy bird, ungraceful in its form with heavy movements, wings too short for flight, little or no tail, and down rather than feathers. The body, according to Bontius, is as big as that of the African ostrich, but the legs are very short. It has a large head, great black eyes, long bluish-white bill, ending in a beak like that of a vulture, yellow legs, thick and short, four toes on each foot solid, long, and armed with sharp black claws. The flesh particularly on the breast, is fat and esculent. Now, all this corresponds with More's account, except as to the size of the two, for the opkuks are as large as oxen.”

”Oh, that's nothing,” said Melick; ”I'm determined to stand up for the dodo.” With this he burst forth singing--