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 Association 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
circumference 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 Association 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 associations
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 association;
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 passengers 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 shore 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, surpasses 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 nobility of
form rivalled the best Grecian, and in grandeur the most massive Egyptian
monuments. And all who saw the design shared in this enthusiasm. The
competitors--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 passed 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,
institutions 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 sexes who were smoking, or
again with people talking and laughing. 'It seems,' said I to Mr. Ney,
'that in Freeland the libraries are also _cafés_ 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 Association 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 _rôle_ 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 sexes assembled in this building: at least, our host assured 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 institution already possessed.
After we had passed 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 Institute 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 passed 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 institutions!'
'Your last sentence I cannot unconditionally assent to,' said Mr. Ney,
joining in our conversation. 'Even diseases have decreased under the
influence of our social institutions. 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 institutions 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 institutions, and they resemble both in their constitution 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 assuring 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 assist 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 assistance of several persons. As all the
physicians approved of this practice, which secured to them very valuable
gratuitous assistance 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 assistants 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
assistance 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--substitutes 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 classes. 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 passed 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 assuming an
unbecoming attitude 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 passing, 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 assented. We left the carriage at one of the stations of the
Transport Association, 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 surpassingly 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 noblest 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 Association, 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 passes freely. As many as ten thousand persons
can find abundant room in the larger of these theatres, without an
accumulation 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, illustrated 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
association 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 shore. 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 noble 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 circumstance 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 Publishing
Association had, up to the end of the last year, paid him 21,000£. In fact,
it could be positively asserted 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
institutions, 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, diminishing the sales of the publishing associations.
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 noble;
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
surpassed 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 institutions, 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 compassion
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 assert 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 circumstances, a better adornment
than its imitation in rubies and diamonds. The precious metals, on the
other hand, have certain properties--durability, lustre, 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 principal 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 pass 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 noble 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 pronounced 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 fashion 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 fashion 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 _petite_, 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 fashions, 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 assured us that European fashions 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.
Promising to give next time what I have omitted here,
Thine,
----.