Their domestic life was so harmonious and perfect that it was a
perpetual pleasure to contemplate.
Human nature finds its sweetest pleasure, its happiest content, within
its own home circle; and in Mizora I found no exception to the rule. The
arrangement and adornment of every house in Mizora were evidently for
the comfort and happiness of its inmates. To purchase anything for
merely outside show, or to excite the envy or jealousy of a neighbor,
was never thought of by an inhabitant of Mizora.
The houses that were built to rent excited my admiration quite as much
as did the private residences. They all seemed to have been designed
with two special objects in view--beauty and comfort. Houses built to
rent in large cities were always in the form of a hollow square,
inclosing a commodious and handsomely decorated park. The back was
adorned with an upper and lower piazza opening upon the park. The suites
of rooms were so arranged as to exclusively separate their occupants
from all others. The park was undivided. The center was occupied by a
fountain large enough to shoot its spray as high as the uppermost
piazza. The park was furnished with rustic seats and shade trees,
frequently of immense size, branched above its smooth walks and
promenades, where baby wagons, velocipedes and hobby horses on wheels
could have uninterrupted sport.
Suburban residences, designed for rent, were on a similar but more
amplified plan. The houses were detached, but the grounds were in
common. Many private residences were also constructed on the same plan.
Five or six acres would be purchased by a dozen families who were not
rich enough to own large places separately. A separate residence would
be built for each family, but the ground would be laid off and
ornamented like a private park. Each of the dozen families would thus
have a beautiful view and the privilege of the whole ground. In this
way, cascades, fountains, rustic arbors, rockeries, aquariums, tiny
lakes, and every variety of landscape ornamenting, could be supplied at
a comparatively small cost to each family.
Should any one wish to sell, they disposed of their house and
one-twelfth of the undivided ground, and a certain per cent. of the
value of its ornaments. The established custom was never to remove or
alter property thus purchased without the consent of the other
shareholders. Where a people had been educated to regard justice and
conscience as their law, such an arrangement could be beneficial to an
entire city.
Financial ability does not belong to every one, and this plan of uniting
small capitals gave opportunity to the less wealthy classes to enjoy all
the luxuries that belong to the rich. In fact some of the handsomest
parks I saw in Mizora were owned and kept up in this manner. Sometimes
as many as twenty families united in the purchase of an estate, and
constructed artificial lakes large enough to sail upon. Artificial
cascades and fountains of wonderful size and beauty were common
ornaments in all the private and public parks of the city. I noticed in
all the cities that I visited the beauty and charm of the public parks,
which were found in all sections.
The walks were smoothly paved and shaded by trees of enormous size. They
were always frequented by children, who could romp and play in these
sylvan retreats of beauty in perfect security.
The high state of culture arrived at by the Mizora people rendered a
luxurious style of living a necessity to all. Many things that I had
been brought up to regard as the exclusive privileges of the rich, were
here the common pleasure of every one. There was no distinction of
classes; no genteel-poverty people, who denied themselves necessities
that they might appear to have luxuries. There was not a home in Mizora
that I entered--and I had access to many--that did not give the
impression of wealth in all its appointments.
I asked the Preceptress to explain to me how I might carry back to the
people of my country this social happiness, this equality of physical
comfort and luxury; and she answered me with emphasis:
"Educate them. Convince the rich that by educating the poor, they are
providing for their own safety. They will have fewer prisons to build,
fewer courts to sustain. Educated Labor will work out its own salvation
against Capital. Let the children of toil start in life with exactly
the same educational advantages that are enjoyed by the rich. Give them
the same physical and moral training, and let the rich pay for it by
taxes."
I shook my head "They will never submit to it," was my reluctant
admission.
"Appeal to their selfishness," urged the Preceptress "Get them to open
their college doors and ask all to come and be taught without money and
without price. The power of capital is great, but stinted and ignorant
toil will rise against its oppression, and innocence and guilt will
alike suffer from its fury. Have you never known such an occurrence?"
"Not in my day or country," I answered "But the city in which I was
educated has such a history. Its gutters flowed with human blood, the
blood of its nobles."
She inclined her head significantly. "It will be repeated," she said
sadly, "unless you educate them. Give their bright and active minds the
power of knowledge. They will use it wisely, for their own and their
country's welfare."
I doubted my ability to do this, to contend against rooted and inherited
prejudice, but I resolved to try. I did not need to be told that the
rich and powerful had a monopoly of intellect: Nature was not partial to
them, for the children of the poor, I well knew, were often handsomer
and more intellectual than the offspring of wealth and aristocratic
birth.
I have before spoken of the positions occupied by those who performed
what I had been bred to regard as menial work. At first, the mere fact
of the person who presided over the kitchen being presented to me as an
equal, was outraging to all my hereditary dignity and pride of birth. No
one could be more pronounced in a consciousness of inherited nobility
than I. I had been taught from infancy to regard myself as a superior
being, merely because the accident of birth had made me so, and the
arrogance with which I had treated some of my less favored schoolmates
reverted to me with mortifying regret, when, having asked Wauna to point
out to me the nobly born, she looked at me with her sweet expression of
candor and innocence and said:
"We have no nobility of birth. As I once before told you, intellect is
our only standard of excellence. It alone occupies an exalted place and
receives the homage of our people."
In a subsequent conversation with her mother, the Preceptress, she said:
"In remote ages, great honor and deference was paid to all who were
born of rulers, and the designation 'noble blood,' was applied to them.
At one time in the history of our country they could commit any outrage
upon society or morals without fear of punishment, simply because they
belonged to the aristocracy. Even a heinous murder would be unnoticed if
perpetrated by one of them. Nature alone did not favor them Imbecile and
immoral minds fell to the lot of the aristocrat as often as to the lowly
born. Nature's laws are inflexible and swerve not for any human wish.
They outraged them by the admixture of kindred blood, and degeneracy was
often the result. A people should always have for their chief ruler the
highest and noblest intellect among them, but in those dark ages they
were too often compelled to submit to the lowest, simply because it had
been _born_ to the position. But," she added, with a sweet smile,
"_that_ time lies many centuries behind us, and I sometimes think we had
better forget it entirely."
My first meeting with the domestics of my friend's house impressed me
with their high mental culture, refinement and elegance. Certainly no
"grande dame" of my own country but would have been proud of their
beauty and graceful dignity.
Prejudice, however deeply ingrained, could not resist the custom of a
whole country, and especially such a one as Mizora, so I soon found
myself on a familiar footing with my friend's "artist"--for the name by
which they were designated as a class had very nearly the same meaning.
Cooking was an art, and one which the people of Mizora had cultivated to
the highest excellence. It is not strange, when their enlightenment is
understood, that they should attach as much honor to it as the people of
my country do to sculpture, painting and literature. The Preceptress
told me that such would be the case with my people when education became
universal and the poor could start in life with the same intellectual
culture as the rich. The chemistry of food and its importance in
preserving a youthful vigor and preventing disease, would then be
understood and appreciated by all classes, and would receive the
deference it deserved.
"You will never realize," said the Preceptress earnestly, "the
incalculable benefit that will accrue to your people from educating your
poor. Urge that Government to try it for just twenty years, long enough
for a generation to be born and mature. The bright and eager intellects
of poverty will turn to Chemistry to solve the problems of cheap Light,
cheap Fuel and cheap Food. When you can clothe yourselves from the
fibre of the trees, and warm and light your dwellings from the water of
your rivers, and eat of the stones of the earth, Poverty and Disease
will be as unknown to your people as it is to mine."
"If I should preach that to them, they would call me a maniac."
"None but the ignorant will do so. From your description of the great
thinkers of your country, I am inclined to believe there are minds among
you advanced enough to believe in it."
I remembered how steamboats and railroads and telegraphy had been
opposed and ridiculed until proven practicable, and I took courage and
resolved to follow the advice of my wise counselor.
I had long felt a curiosity to behold the inner workings of a domestic's
life, and one day ventured to ask my friend's permission to enter her
kitchen. Surprise was manifested at such a request, when I began to
apologize and explain. But my hostess smiled and said:
"My kitchen is at all times as free to my guests as my drawing room."
Every kitchen in Mizora is on the same plan and conducted the same way.
To describe one, therefore, is to describe all. I undertook to explain
that in my country, good breeding forbade a guest entering the host's
kitchen, and frequently its appearance, and that of the cook's, would
not conduce to gastric enjoyment of the edibles prepared in it.
My first visit happened to be on scrubbing day, and I was greatly amused
to see a little machine, with brushes and sponges attached, going over
the floor at a swift rate, scouring and sponging dry as it went. Two
vessels, one containing soap suds and the other clear water, were
connected by small feed pipes with the brushes. As soon as the drying
sponge became saturated, it was lifted by an ingenious yet simple
contrivance into a vessel and pressed dry, and was again dropped to the
floor.
I inquired how it was turned to reverse its progress so as to clean the
whole floor, and was told to watch when it struck the wall. I did so,
and saw that the jar not only reversed the machine, but caused it to
spring to the right about two feet, which was its width, and again begin
work on a new line, to be again reversed in the same manner when it
struck the opposite wall. Carpeted floors were swept by a similar
contrivance.
No wonder the "artists" of the kitchen had such a dainty appearance.
They dipped their pretty hands in perfumed water and dried them on the
finest and whitest damask, while machinery did the coarse work.
Mizora, I discovered, was a land of brain workers. In every vocation of
life machinery was called upon to perform the arduous physical labor.
The whole domestic department was a marvel of ingenious mechanical
contrivances. Dishwashing, scouring and cleaning of every description
were done by machinery.
The Preceptress told me that it was the result of enlightenment, and it
would become the custom in my country to make machinery perform the
laborious work when they learned the value of universal and advanced
knowledge.
I observed that the most exact care was given to the preparation of
food. Every cook was required to be a chemist of the highest excellence;
another thing that struck me as radically different from the custom in
vogue in my country.
Everything was cooked by hot air and under cover, so that no odor was
perceptible in the room. Ventilating pipes conveyed the steam from
cooking food out of doors. Vegetables and fruits appeared to acquire a
richer flavor when thus cooked. The seasoning was done by exact weight
and measure, and there was no stirring or tasting. A glass tube, on the
principle of a thermometer, determined when each article was done. The
perfection which they had attained as culinary chemists was a source of
much gratification to me, both in the taste of food so delicious and
palatable, and in its wholesome effect on my constitution. As to its
deliciousness, a meal prepared by a Mizora cook could rival the fabled
feasts of the gods. Its beneficial effects upon me were manifested in a
healthier tone of body and an an increase of animal spirits, a
pleasurable feeling of content and amiability.
The Preceptress told me that the first step toward the eradication of
disease was in the scientific preparation of food, and the establishment
of schools where cooking was taught as an art to all who applied, and
without charge. Placed upon a scientific basis it became respectable.
"To eliminate from our food the deleterious earthy matter is our
constant aim. To that alone do we owe immunity from old age far in
advance of that period of life when your people become decrepit and
senile. The human body is like a lamp-wick, which filters the oil while
it furnishes light. In time the wick becomes clogged and useless and is
thrown away. If the oil could be made perfectly pure, the wick would not
fill up."
She gave this homely explanation with a smile and the air of a grown
person trying to convey to the immature mind of a child an explanation
of some of Nature's phenomena.
I reflected upon their social condition and arrived at the conviction
that there is no occupation in life but what has its usefulness and
necessity, and, when united to culture and refinement, its dignity. A
tree has a million leaves, yet each individual leaf, insignificant as it
may appear, has its special share of work to perform in helping the tree
to live and perfect its fruit. So should every citizen of a government
contribute to its vitality and receive a share of its benefits.
"Will the time ever come," I asked myself, "when my own country will see
this and rise to a social, if not intellectual equality." And the
admonition of the Preceptress would recur to my mind:
"Educate them. Educate them, and enlightenment will solve for them every
problem in Sociology."
My observations in Mizora led me to believe that while Nature will
permit and encourage the outgrowth of equality in refinement, she gives
birth to a more decided prominence in the leadership of intellect.
The lady who conducted me through the culinary department, and pointed
out the machinery and explained its use and convenience, had the same
grace and dignity of manner as the hostess displayed when exhibiting to
me the rare plants in her conservatory.
The laundry was a separate business. No one unconnected with it as a
profession had anything to do with its duties. I visited several of the
large city laundries and was informed that all were conducted alike.
Steam was employed in the cleaning process, and the drying was done by
hot air impregnated with ozone. This removed from white fabrics every
vestige of discoloration or stain. I saw twelve dozen fine damask
table-cloths cleaned, dried and ironed in thirty minutes. All done by
machinery. They emerged from the rollers that ironed them looking like
new pieces of goods, so pure was their color, and so glossy their
finish.
I inquired the price for doing them up, and was told a cent a piece.
Twelve cents per dozen was the established price for doing up clothes.
Table-cloths and similar articles were ironed between rollers
constructed to admit their full width. Other articles of more
complicated make, were ironed by machines constructed to suit them. Some
articles were dressed by having hot air forced rapidly through them.
Lace curtains, shawls, veils, spreads, tidies and all similar articles,
were by this process made to look like new, and at a cost that I thought
ought certainly to reduce the establishment to beggary or insolvency.
But here chemistry again was the magician that had made such cheap labor
profitable. And such advanced knowledge of chemistry was the result of
universal education.
Ladies sent their finest laces to be renewed without fear of having them
reduced to shreds. In doing up the frailest laces, nothing but hot air
impregnated with ozone was employed. These were consecutively forced
through the fabric after it was carefully stretched. Nothing was ever
lost or torn, so methodical was the management of the work.
I asked why cooking was not established as the laundry was, as a
distinct public business, and was told that it had been tried a number
of times, but had always been found impracticable. One kind of work in a
laundry would suit everyone, but one course of cooking could not. Tastes
and appetites differed greatly. What was palatable to one would be
disliked by another, and to prepare food for a large number of
customers, without knowing or being able to know exactly what the demand
would be, had always resulted in large waste, and as the people of
Mizora were the most rigid and exacting economists, it was not to be
wondered at that they had selected the most economical plan. Every
private cook could determine accurately the amount of food required for
the household she prepared it for, and knowing their tastes she could
cater to all without waste.
"We, as yet," said my distinguished instructor, "derive all our fruit
and vegetables from the soil. We have orchards and vineyards and gardens
which we carefully tend, and which our knowledge of chemistry enables us
to keep in health and productiveness. But there is always more or less
earthy matter in all food derived from cultivating the soil, and the
laboratories are now striving to produce artificial fruit and vegetables
that will satisfy the palate and be free from deleterious matter."