Chapter II: Part 2

Of course I was longing to examine the construction of the telephon. I was just about to ask one of the gentlemen present to give me some explanation on the subject, when there was a general demand for silence. The American lady was to afford us another treat. This time she sang an air from Mozart's Don Giovanni, and I was delighted to find that this masterpiece of the great maestro was not forgotten even three centuries after the composer's death.

At the close of her examination, the lady was unanimously declared worthy to appear before the critical public of Londinia, and she received what we might term a musical ovation by means of another telephon working in opposite direction. And here the matter was allowed to rest, it being left to the different managers to endeavour to engage her services. All and each of these gentlemen looked as if they were in possession of some secret or other wherewith to outvie their competitors. They parted, however, on the best of terms, and I retired to my room.

The following morning I was down very early, and, having enjoyed my breakfast, I walked slowly towards the place where I expected to meet my companions of the preceding day. No guide was required in this apparently immense labyrinth, for nothing indeed was easier than to find one's way. All the streets, squares, etc., were namely marked, not by names as formerly, but by a particular set of figures, which, with the assistance of a map, directed me to any given spot; all that was required to know was two figures, indicating the point of destination pretty much as with the latitude and longitude at sea.

I was still at a considerable distance away from it when I caught sight of a vast building, on which I read an inscription in gigantic characters:

General Balloon Company.

I had expected to find our starting-point in some open space, or at least in one of the squares, and was therefore not a little surprised to see that this building was situated in one of the most densely populated neighbourhoods. Perhaps, thought I, this is merely the office where the tickets have to be taken. But when I got nearer, I perceived that the building differed essentially from other houses in this respect, that it had an entirely flat roof, which contained a kind of conveyance, not unlike a ship, but the precise outline of which I could not discover, owing to the glass vault over the street.

Bacon and Miss Phantasia were already on the spot, and after the customary morning greetings we entered to secure our seats. The first thing now was to be weighed; for the price of the passage naturally depended on the volume of our bodily organization. It need not be said that the young lady came off cheapest. We then passed through a door into a small parlour, or waiting-room, where we found a few more passengers. In the centre of the room I noticed a staircase, and up at the ceiling a kind of trap. Against the walls were several cushioned seats, as in a first-class railway carriage. After a short time the whole apartment seemed to move. I heard a gentle rustling along the walls, as if something were sliding down the paper-hangings. But even before I had time to think on the subject there was a lowering of the trap in the ceiling, and a cheerful greeting of "Welcome a-high, ladies and gentlemen!"

We got upstairs through the aperture, and found ourselves on the flat roof of the building, but precisely underneath the air-ship; we entered, however, the open trap constructed in the latter, for we soon found out that the weather was bitterly cold. This, unfortunately, prevented me from becoming more intimately acquainted with the outward appearance of the balloon, and with its locomotive powers. On the other hand, ample opportunity was afforded us for examining its internal arrangements. As soon as we came into what I can but term the "hold" of the vessel, Bacon called my attention to a long narrow cylinder which ran across the whole length of the ship. "Therein lies," said he, "the whole secret of aëronautics. In order that I may explain this to you, I must remind you of this, that it was formerly impossible to steer any balloon except before the wind. An ordinary vessel, when the keel cuts through the water, can sail half or quarter-wind, because she moves in the two intermediate matters of air and water, the latter offering a greater resistance than the former, and thereby supporting the vessel in her movements; to which must be added that the resistance operates in a definite direction, namely, in that of the motion of the ship, so that by supplying the craft with a rudder or helm one is able to turn her at pleasure to the right or the left.

"But," continued Bacon, "this becomes quite a different matter when a vessel is merely surrounded by air. Driven onward by the wind, which means carried along by the atmospheric current, she meets with no resistance, and therefore lacks every point of support whereby to turn herself. She will always offer the largest of her sides to the wind, which falls upon it at right angles, just the same as on a light piece of paper or cloth whirled round by the wind.

"In order, then, to render such balloon voyages possible at all, it was necessary, in the first place, to afford the machine its required support, its resistance, and this was accomplished in the following manner: The long cylinder which runs along the whole of the ship is a bar of malleable iron, surrounded by a spiral copper wire which has been coated with an insulating substance. If, now, a voltaic current is made to pass along that wire, the bar becomes a most powerful electro-magnet, which, when free in its movements, like the needle of a compass, adopts a direction from south to north, with a slight easterly deviation, and also a certain inclination. When driven out of its natural direction by another power, the needle will endeavour to resume its original inclination. As, now, the magnet and the vessel are so joined together as virtually to form but one body, the balloon, or rather the ship, is in itself a gigantic compass. The inclination is removed just the same as with the needle of the compass. One has merely to alter the centre of gravity, and this can be done in several ways. Thus, all that remains is the direction in the magnetic meridian.

"If, now, the wind blows in the same direction that one wishes to travel, then the apparatus is not worked; that is to say, no current is passed through the wire. Should the wind, however, be unpropitious, then the ship is at once changed into a magnet. For example, suppose the wind to be due west, and the sails to be placed at right angles with the wind, then the vessel will be driven neither east nor northward, but towards a point intermediate; just as a vessel at sea when pushed north by the current of the water, and westward by the wind, does not follow either of these directions exclusively, but an intermediate one. It is not difficult, therefore, to perceive that the aëronaut, by the proper joint working of his sails and of the electro-magnetic apparatus, is enabled to turn his ship into any direction he chooses. Nor is that all. The apparatus also serves as a helm or rudder; for as soon as I press this knob the current is at once reversed; the north pole becomes the south pole, and vice versâ. It stands to reason that the vessel must turn under the circumstances, and, of course, according to pleasure; for at any moment the helmsman may interrupt the current, whereby the ship ceases to be a magnet.

"Now, as indeed at sea, the case may be that the wind is too strong, and the power of the magnet insufficient to properly govern the air-ship. In that case we have recourse to those energeiathecs of which I spoke yesterday; these tend to set in circular motion the four-winged screws which you see here and there peeping out of the sides, and this is always done as near as possible at right angles with the direction in which the vessel has a tendency to deviate.

"Thus it is usually possible to keep the ship in the direction required; but should the aëronaut fail in his attempt to do so, even then he has another resource left him which the seaman lacks. He rises or descends with his air-ship in search of a more favourable wind; nor does he do so at hap-hazard, for the meteorological institute has long since issued charts upon which are marked the directions of all the air-currents that will probably be found at any given altitude for any given time. These charts are arranged in the same manner as those formerly published by the institute, which, however, merely showed the probable direction of the wind in the immediate vicinity of the earth's surface.

"With regard to the modes of ascent and descent, they differ somewhat according to the nature of the various apparatuses, and for these, to explain them to you in detail--by which alone you would understand the differences--we should have to go on deck, and it is so bitterly cold there, that we are better where we are. Suffice it to say that the old clumsy process of throwing out ballast for the purpose of rising has long been dispensed with, since it was found that the measure was merely a partial or momentary one, and slightly unacceptable to the denizens of the earth below. The most appropriate method we have learned from nature; it consists, namely, of an imitation of the operation of the swim-bladder in fishes. The latter accomplish their ascent and descent in the water by a greater or lesser compression of that bladder, or of the air contained in it; some of them having even special compression apparatuses for that object. From this you will easily conclude the application of the aquatic locomotion to that of the navigation in the air."

This, I must confess, I did not quite see; but many other points in Bacon's explanation remained to be cleared up. Not a few questions were on the tip of my tongue, but I asked no more. I felt that I was a child of the nineteenth century, too little au courant of the science of modern times to understand all that had been accomplished during the last two hundred years; moreover, I feared that by putting more silly questions I should lower myself in the estimation of my friend.

Travelling Dialect.

Miss Phantasia was of too mercurial a temperament to listen to lengthy descriptions; she had already ascended the steps that led to the saloon, and we now followed her. The compartment looked neat enough, though not comfortable. Everything pointed to the endeavours of rendering all the furniture as light as possible, and this, of course, applied to the whole affair whenever it did not interfere with the necessary solidity. Bamboo canes cut thin and twisted together appeared to be the chief material, and of the metals aluminium was the only one to be seen.

On our entering the waiting-room, I had already noticed that all the passengers conversed with one another in the same tongue, in a dialect of which I certainly recognised a word or two, but yet a foreign idiom to me. On asking my companion what countrymen those gentlemen were, I received the following reply:

"They belong to all sorts of nations. That burly-looking gentleman yonder is a Russian; that ridiculous little man playing with his moustache and ogling all the ladies can only be a Frenchman; the other trunculant figure, who has paid the highest fare, is one of your own countrymen--a Dutchman; those two blue-eyed, flaxen-haired youngsters are Germans, and all the rest are English."

"But how, then, is it that they all speak the same language?"

"They speak the travelling dialect. In our modern days, when many people spend the greater portion of their time in travelling, and all nationalities continually mingle together, such an idiom was created almost spontaneously. True, it is as yet but a language in its infancy; but it will probably, at no great distance of time, become the universal tongue."

I listened as attentively as I dared and could, and I observed very soon that the so-called travelling dialect was a mixture of various tongues, English though preponderating; and this I ascribed to the fact of the majority of the travelling public being generally Englishmen.

No more War!

As I looked about me, it so happened that my eye fell upon some wide tubes peeping out from the sides and the hold of the vessel. I first thought that these were a new kind of cannon; so I asked whether we were on board of a man-of-war? Miss Phantasia smiled, but her smile was a bitter one immediately followed by a sigh. "War!" she echoed, "those chivalrous times we only know from history; our modern men are manufacturers, merchants, engineers, scholars, legislators, and so forth; but as for soldiers--well, you may see them on the stage occasionally, but our numerous force of constables is the only approach to soldiery we have."

"Is it possible?" cried I; "no more war, and no more standing armies! At last then the idea has triumphed of the peace-men, Cobden, Bright, and their followers; at last the present generation has acknowledged that war was an eternal disgrace to humanity, reducing reasoning men to the level of the unreasoning brute, and causing them to destroy each other's lives in the blindest fury, instead, alas! of dwelling together on this beautiful earth in unity, peace, and concord, for the promotion of mutual happiness!"

"I doubt very much indeed," muttered Bacon in his teeth, "whether any such considerations as those have brought about the reign of peace. Mankind, my dear sir, is still swayed by passion; quite as much, I venture to say, as in bygone days. Men still deserve the epithet once served upon them by a foreign poet: 'angel half, half brute!' and so it will be in the future, although it can never be denied that society, as a whole, progresses in a moral sense. But for this, that 'circumstances alter cases,' I am afraid there would be war still. Only circumstances are altered, and war has become an impossibility.

"In the first place, our present condition of peace has been chiefly brought about by the universal state-bankruptcy at the close of the nineteenth century, when the combined debts of the would-be civilised nations (in consequence of the immense expense involved in the large standing armies) had become to surpass the joint national capitals.

"In the second place, the present state of affairs is due to the marvellous improvements lately made in the weapons of attack and defence.

"When, in the last war, now about a century ago, the navies of England, France, Russia, and America had mutually destroyed one another; when, through a bombardment from both sides of the channel, the capitals of England and France had simultaneously been set on fire; when the losses on both sides had become incalculable, not to say irreparable, then, but not until then, people began to ask themselves whether even a victory was worth such enormous sacrifices. And it finally dawned in the public mind that in all wars the conqueror is likewise the loser.

"But that which has mainly contributed to render war gradually a matter of rare occurrence, and which, we trust, will ultimately lead to its complete abolition, is the vastly increased intercourse between the peoples of various nationalities, by which all those silly inherited national antipathies have slowly become absorbed; then again, we have had the application of the principles of free trade, the removal of all those barriers that separated nations from nations, an universal system of coinage and weights and measures, an increase in the means of locomotion and communication, and the fusion of the individual interests of particular nations into one great universal 'public weal.' Nations have ceased to stand opposite, against one another, they flourish side by side; by thousands and thousands of bonds they are joined and held together; and if the nineteenth century has witnessed the introduction of the principle of nationality, ours has made another step in the right direction, and produced the recognition of the principle of humanism." [11]

Free Trade; Universal Locomotion.

I was much impressed with the justness of the last words of my companion. It now became clear to me how every new railroad, every new telegraph line, the removal of every obstacle in the process of exportation and importation, does not only directly promote the general interest and welfare, but that they are as many links in the great chain by which men are united together in brotherhood as members of one and the same household. And yet methought I perceived a threatening cloud at this bright horizon. "If then," said I, "all wars have ceased to be, and if in consequence thereof, as well as through other propitious circumstances of various kinds, commerce and industry have been constantly progressing, surely you must have witnessed an alarming increase of population; and the production of the necessary food can hardly have kept pace with its consumption."

"If you suppose that we have now, as formerly, many indigent people and others occasionally starving in some of the over-peopled districts, then, of course, you are right; but I do not grant that, on the whole, pauperism has been on the increase; I am rather inclined to believe the contrary, although during the last two hundred years the population of Europe has almost doubled itself. Two things you should not lose sight of; in the first place, the increase in the means of transport having brought about a more equal distribution of food; and secondly, of nothing now-a-days being wasted, but, on the contrary, everything finding its way to where necessity exists. In consequence of a now universal free trade, every country produces exactly that which thrives best in its own soil and climate. Then, again, numberless acres of waste land have long been, and are still being, cultivated; whilst progressive science has rendered imperishable services to the practical agriculturist by pointing out to him various new modes and processes whereby to increase the crops and fruits of his fields. Thus, for example, we know now everything connected with the quality and quantity of all matters used in the cultivation of vegetables; moreover, every agriculturist has become, in our days, a manufacturer. To him the plants are the tools through means of which the so-called inorganic matter imbedded in the soil and atmosphere is to be worked and shaped into organic matter, i.e., into matter fit for consumption; and therefore, as with any other manufacturer, his efforts are constantly directed towards obtaining the original rude material as cheap and as good as possible. Among this 'rude material' not a little is to be found that was formerly looked upon as mere waste, or, worse than that, mixed with the water or the soil of the towns, to the great injury of the public health. We are wiser now in the twenty-first century. Everything by which the produce of the fields can be increased is carefully collected, and life is thereby much better protected."

Modern Telescopes.

I had already noticed, during the conversation, that our aërial conveyance had assumed a gentle swinging position; and when Bacon paused in his remarks, Miss Phantasia cried to me, "Do, now, apply your eye to these pseudo-cannons, and tell us, pray, where we are."

I found at once that those tubes which I had mistaken for cannons were enormous telescopes; but my mistake was pardonable enough, so far as their outward appearance went. They were certainly much wider, from which I concluded, à priori, that they must be powerful machines; but when I came to look through them, I discovered that their great width did in no way interfere with the sharp outlines of the images, and I was not only very much struck with their immense magnifying power, but at the same time with their great extent of the field of vision.

Following Miss Phantasia's finger direction, the first thing I saw before me through the telescope at the stern of the vessel was an immense city, which I fancied could be no other than Londinia, from whence we had started. A vast cluster or mass of houses presented itself, with the sharpest outline, in the somewhat dull background, but no idea of smoke; I therefore concluded that wherever coals were still used, one knew how to pass the smoke through the cowl or fire-grate in accordance with the wise Act of Parliament passed in 1850.

As I looked through the different telescopes which we had on board, I could not help admiring the scenery around and about us, which seemed to rush and rush on before our eyes whilst the ship was apparently lying still. Ascending, it was as if the earth went down beneath us. Shortly after, we caught the first glance of the sea, and right before us, opposite, we perceived the Belgian and French coasts. A black wire seemed to cross the narrowest strait of the Channel, so as to join the two opposite shores together.

Channel Bridge.

As we came nearer I began to suspect that this wire might be a tubular bridge of some kind, and this surmise grew into certainty when Bacon assured me that a company had already been formed for the purpose of constructing a second one; "for," added my informant, "this one has become utterly inadequate to the extensive communication between England and the continent."

North Holland Submerged.

A slight north-north-easterly direction, and a few minutes sufficed to bring us near to my native home, which to us, from our vessel, looked like its outline in an atlas. Only how terrified I was to see that there was something wanting on the map. The whole province of North Holland, [12] minus a few diminutive islands, seemed to have disappeared. Not even trusting my eyes, I asked the "trunculant figure" who, Bacon said, was my countryman: Was the whole of North Holland imbedded in the sea?

"So it is," was the answer. "That's the result of not heeding the advice of common-sense, prudent people. A handful of bragging citizens of Amsterdam insisted upon it, that they should have a canal right across into the sea. They had one already, in which they might have made some improvements, but that would not satisfy them. Well, after a good deal of agitation, they got their canal. How much it may have cost them I do not pretend to know; no doubt a good deal more than many of them must have liked. However, now that they had it, it proved, after all, 'a fair-weather Jack;' for as soon as the wind lost its temper--and such things do happen along our coast--the skippers did not venture to come too near to the shore. At the first November storm the harbour became full of sand, to clear which would have been to wash the negro.

"Thus the canal had had little power to benefit navigation. Still, matters did not come to the worst until, in 1980, the springtide fell in simultaneously with a storm such as the memory of living man could not trace. Sluices and dykes gave way, and North Holland, the greater portion of which was situated from one to five meters [13] below the mean level of the sea, was rapidly swallowed up by the raging element. Shortly after the play-going public of Rotterdam enjoyed a new drama, entitled 'The Horse of Troy.'" [14]

"Terrible, terrible!" I could not refrain from exclaiming, although the man who supplied me with the "terrible" information did not appear to see it. I had already inferred from the latter part of his remarks that he was a native of Rotterdam, and this suggested to me the idea of once more looking through the telescope, and turning my looks towards the city where I had passed the earlier part of my youth. At first I did not feel at home at all. So much had the city of the Meuse enlarged itself into every direction, and so densely populated was the whole province of South Holland, that the towns of Leiden, the Hague, Delft, Schiedam, and Rotterdam seemed to form but one large city.

Utrecht, too, appeared to have grown in extent. My eye fell accidentally on a bright dazzling spot, lighted up by the rays of Phoebus; and, anxious to find out what that was, I applied a stronger "oculaire" to the telescope, and soon recognised the golden sun of Justice, the well-known armorial bearings of the Utrecht University, on the top of a large and magnificent building. I thought that must be the University building, and inquired of the "trunculant figure;" but the latter answered curtly, "That's entirely out of my line, sir; those are things with which I have nothing to do." Fortunately for me, Bacon had heard my question, and he at once supplied me with the necessary information. "You have guessed rightly," said he; "when, after many years' waiting, there came at last a bill regulating the higher education in the Netherlands, some wealthy inhabitants of the city of Utrecht, at their own expense, founded this magnificent and imposing building, and by so doing furnished a living illustration of their interest in science, and of their affection for the alma mater to which many of them owed their education and social position."

Thanking Bacon for this valuable piece of information, I further ventured to inquire whether in the new educational bill the principle had been recognised "that it is a matter of perfect indifference where any candidate had obtained the knowledge required by the law, and that the state had no other right but to demand this of the candidate, that he satisfy the government examiners with regard to his abilities."

"Here you are doubtless touching a knotty point," answered my companion; "for this has been a matter of discussion for some time; and, strange to say, those that have given the most definite opinions on it are exactly those that were least competent to judge in the matter of public examinations. At first sight the principle you have laid down certainly appears reasonable enough. Those who, with you, appear to have accepted it, argue mathematically as follows: Given a certain quantity of linseed, then by the same press, and with the same amount of pressure, it will yield a certain amount of oil, and the latter will consequently indicate the exact relative value of the different kinds of linseed. It all amounts to this, to find a good press, one in regular working order. It is not otherwise with public examinations. These, too, are a kind of press, under which are to be brought the persons to be examined, and out of them are to be squeezed a dose of knowledge prescribed as the sine quâ non of their admission. It only requires to have a good examination press, and the results will always admit of comparison; that is to say, they will be just and fair.

"But here a curious difficulty had to be surmounted. It is easy enough to construct presses from iron or wood that will work regularly; but with examination presses that is altogether a different affair. Especially with regard to those for the higher branches of education the matter is not so easily procurable. And then there is another thing; neither are the examiners composed of wood and iron, nor are the students that have to be examined usually made of linseed; both classes of persons are more likely to be rational beings; the contract between them entails action and reaction, with thousandfold variations, so that there can never be any question of absolutely comparable results, least of all when the examiners and the examined are more or less strangers to each other. Leaving out other difficulties, there would still remain the very natural resistance which such heterogeneous elements would exercise towards each other, a resistance which will always be commensurate with the greater or lesser difference of interests in the parties concerned.

"In order now to overcome this difficulty, and to save the principle that "those aspiring to equal rights should satisfy equal conditions," the Government issued certain text-books in the form of examination guides. And what was the consequence? Industrious persons arose, and contrived to invent means by which to make those works essentially practical, and the examinations as light as possible; they composed little books containing questions and answers, something like catechisms, for every branch of science. This appeared to some people to be the height of examinatorial equality; but when, in spite of all this, the same complaints continued to be heard about the unfairness and arbitrary ways of examiners, the still more novel idea was mooted, whether it was not possible to solve the examination problem by a direct method, viz., physico-mechanically. For a long time past we had had speculums for the eye, for the ear, for the throat, etc.; why should we not succeed in inventing a speculum for the brain? There were already self-registering thermometers, barometers, magnetometers, photometers, etc.; why should we not have the self-registering enkephalometer? machines which in a few minutes, and by means of a few figures, would indicate the exact degree and amount of knowledge acquired by the individual to whose cerebrum the instrument might be applied! What a splendid invention, both for examiners and candidates, this would have been! Unfortunately the thing always proved impracticable; and the idea now ranks with the visions of perpetual motion and squaring of the circle.

University Education.

"Meanwhile those exaggerated systems of examination had led to some experience, beneficial, though rather unpleasant. It gradually became to be noticed by competent persons that, in proportion as the students prepared for the required and enforced government examinations, there grew a dislike or decline of free study, an aversion to pure science, which is more dependent upon clear judgment than practised memory. And thus was lost the principal aim of all higher instruction which is not the 'training' for certain professions, but the complete and entire development of all the slumbering faculties of man. [15] The Dutch people began to see that they had been following the example of the Chinese, who surpass every nation under the sun in the length of their examinations; indeed, they found that they had run great risk of becoming the Chinese of Europe. It became generally recognised that every principle, however good in itself, may be 'overdone;' that examinations, however difficult to dispense with altogether, will always remain a sad necessity; and that it is perfectly chimerical to think of government examinations so arranged as to not only produce an universal and incontestable standard or measure of knowledge, but also to be a means of judging the theoretical and practical abilities of the candidates. It was further discovered that it was a gross error to suppose that government examinations were to be the stimulants for university study; in fact, that what was wanted was not means of discouragement, but of encouragement. The human mind is like a liquid given to fermentation. Without leaven there cannot be any fermentation; and the latter is promoted by heat, depressed by cold. What you want in order to stimulate higher education in the higher sense of the word is a staff of competent tutors supplied with ample means for advancing and furthering knowledge in every possible direction; encouragement for all efforts to cultivate sound science, and nothing but the most beneficial results will accrue to society at large. Universities, at the dawn of their existence, were, as a rule, endowed with certain rights and privileges, like moral corporations; but these were swept away through the tide of progress having ceased to be adapted to the conditions of modern society. One right, let us say one duty, only remained vested in the universities, that of conferring degrees on its scholars after the passing of certain examinations; but the latter were subject, like all other examinations, to this, that they could never give a sufficiently satisfactory guarantee. Yet, while the defects of these were largely advertised, their advantages were often overlooked, until they were ultimately abolished, or replaced by the examining authority of government commissions. When at last it was found, after endless experiments, that people had been jumping from the frying-pan into the fire, one gradually began to recognise the truth of the French proverb, that 'Better is the enemy of good,' and one came back to the old system slightly altered and improved. At the same time additional means were devised to render access to the universities, as seats of learning, more easy to deserving men; the fees were considerably lowered, and distinguished students received henceforth pecuniary assistance and support from those who were morally convinced that in the knowledge which they would acquire they would repay to society at large both capital and interest. And hence the number of scholars has so increased lately at your universities, that there no longer exists the semblance of necessity for admitting others to the exercise of the learned professions, than those who have enjoyed academical education. If to this some persons were to reply that such a restriction of the professional cyclus is rather hard upon those who have acquired their knowledge elsewhere, independent of the recognised universities, I would meet them with the counter-remark that the interests of the individual must give way to those of society at large, and that there is an intimate connection between the latter and the continuing prosperity of the universities."

I looked about me to see whether I could discover any more places of my native land. So far as I could see, the northern and north-eastern districts had almost doubled their population, for the towns looked twice their original size; but what struck me most was that the city of Arnhem looked apparently deserted. I was the more surprised at this, because I remembered quite well that about the middle of the nineteenth century the place had been rapidly increasing, both in extent and prosperity, owing to the many "old residents" who, having returned with colossal fortunes from India, purposed to pass the remainder of their days in this beautiful neighbourhood.

I must have allowed a suppressed cry of astonishment to escape me on noticing the crippled state of the city; for the "trunculant figure" once more addressed me in the native tongue: "Yes, sir," said he, "you are rightly surprised. From a large city Arnhem has become a third-rate town. Such things will happen when children attempt to govern their parents."

I did not exactly see the drift of this common-sense remark until my countryman continued as follows: "I am going to tell you a story."

Loss of Dutch Colonies.

"Once upon a time a gentleman had a beautiful bird, and the beauty of this beautiful bird was this, that he laid every year a golden egg. Naturally enough, the man was very much afraid that this bird should escape, or perhaps be stolen from him. He therefore first cut its wings, and then put it into a solid cage. When the children of that gentleman grew up, they gradually became of opinion that the bird had not been properly treated by their father. One thought that some portion of the golden egg ought to be used in ornaments on the cage of the bird. Another hinted that not only should the cage be embellished, but also enlarged; the bird would then enjoy more liberty, and might perhaps lay two golden eggs in a twelve-month, 'in which case,' whispered he, 'I myself might come in for a little windfall.' The third son went another step further; he would like to see the cage not only enlarged and gilded, but completely renewed as well; it ought to have much thinner bars to allow the bird more light and more air; this was its natural birth-right; for no bird was ever created to drag along its dreary existence in the dark. Finally, the fourth of the sons went so far as to say that it was 'a burning shame' to have cut the bird's wings. That was simply misusing the right of the stronger, and showed great want of foresight in him that had entrusted his 'governor' with the bird.

"The old gentleman was not a little embarrassed. He was not blind to the danger of all these juvenile counsels, but he was an indulgent parent, and never turned a deaf ear upon his children. First then the cage was gilded, then enlarged, and ultimately replaced by another, brand new, and as light as light could be. Meanwhile the bird's wings had been daily growing, and the animal at last managed to do that which every other bird would have done in its place. It escaped through the thin bars, and flew away."

"I fully understand; the bird's name was Java?" [16]

"Exactly so," replied the "trunculant figure."

"But what became ultimately of the bird?" I inquired.

"Ah, sir! it was after all a silly thing for the bird to fly away; it was not so badly off in its master's house; but birds will be birds. It had not flown far yet when it was attacked by two enormous birds of prey; they pulled it right and left with their sharp talons, and thereby injured one another severely. Of course the weaker bird lost a good deal of its plumage, and was bandied from the talons of one vulture into those of the other. At last the two monsters dropped their prey on the ground in piteous condition, whilst they pursued the combat between them with their own weapons, until both were so crippled and exhausted that there could have been no question on either side of looking after the weaker bird."

"If then I rightly understand your metaphor, France and England have both been compelled to let the island slip, and the Javanese are a free people by this time."

"Oh, free, of course; so is the dormouse," answered the Dutchman.

I suggested that his former remarks appeared to me to be more liberal.

"Those concerned the land, but not the people."

"Well?"

"The Javanese will never change their skin. Those of the present day are simply a few grades lazier than their progenitors. Since the last great war Java has been declared a neutral territory; all nationalities have equal rights to trade on it, and what do you think has been the result? That of the few hundred-weights of coffee and sugar which the island continues to produce, scarcely anything finds its way to our own market; most of it goes to Marseilles and other parts of the Mediterranean."

At this point Bacon interrupted our conservative friend, and spoke as follows: "I am no trader, sir; but unless I am improperly informed, the Javanese people feel much happier now than when they were under the rule of the East Indian Company or the Culture System. It appears to me that possessions which are not colonies proper impose peculiar obligations on the temporary possessor, and that the latter is hardly justified in dealing with the inhabitants as the leech does with the patient. Wherever a superior race holds sway over an inferior one, it is the duty of the former to raise its inferiors to any such state of culture as they may prove themselves susceptible of. From the nature of things, such rule is always temporary, as history has often taught us. The time must come when the bonds will be rent asunder; but they will hold so much longer together, and be so much more easily dissolved, as the government has less borne the character of oppression. A moral ascendancy is on the whole the most powerful, and that maintains itself best by fair and just treatment of the weaker by the stronger. I for one feel perfectly convinced that the only reason why your country has even kept the island as long as it has, was exclusively owing to the few necessary reforms which your government consented to make in the nineteenth century. But for those concessions, Java would have been lost to you long before; and with regard to the shifting of the market, don't you think yourself, sir, that that was chiefly brought about by the Suez Canal?"

"Perhaps so," replied the Hollander, not very good-naturedly; "I won't argue the point with you; you are an Englishman, and you fellows think that you know everything better than we do; this, however, I maintain, that if this kind of thing is to continue, we shall go down as fast as we can."

I silently rejoiced to think that my telescopical observations had more than convinced me of this, that my countrymen had by no means so visibly yet come down, and I was inclined to conclude from this consoling fact that they had known in time how to apply the old Dutch proverb: "When the tide turns, turn your beacons." However, I did not venture to set my thoughts to words, for I should certainly have given offence to the "trunculant figure," whose solitary line of conduct apparently went along his own individual interests, and whose knowledge of political economy and of the rights of man was evidently at a very low ebb.

Railway Nets.

During this somewhat prolonged conversation we had slightly deviated from our former course. We now moved along in south-easterly direction, and the native towns gradually disappeared from my sight. Looking towards the east, I observed a small black speck which obviously moved with great rapidity along the surface of the earth, and seemed to advance nearer and nearer to us. It became larger and larger as it approached our conveyance, under which it finally glided away. I had just had sufficient time to recognise an immense train of huge waggons in the fleeting meteor below us. "From where," asked I, "did this train start?" Bacon consulted his railway guide. "That's the morning train," replied he, "which left Pekin the day before yesterday, and runs along the great central-east-west-line."

"From Pekin? Right across or over the high mountains of Central Asia and Ural?"

"Oh, my friend, such obstacles have ceased to exist in the twenty-first century. Surely you yourself remember the piercing of Mount Cenis? You will soon observe that what was done in your time between France and Italy has since been accomplished between Italy and Switzerland."

There could be no doubt in the matter; for the white-coated tops of the Alps already appeared at the horizon. The mountains themselves had not been affected by the hand of time or civilization, but the route went no longer across the Splügen, the Simplon, or the Saint Bernard, but underneath the mountain range, so that the same trains which we saw enter the tunnels on the Swiss side, made their appearance very shortly afterwards on the Italian side, and proceeded in their course through the plains of the valley of the Po.

I was in hopes that we should touch Rome on our way, for I was anxious to know what had become of that most venerable and ancient of cities; but I was sadly disappointed in my expectations.

Geographical Changes in Europe.

We floated over Venice, where the Italian standard waved from the top of St. Mark's, although I could recognise a few Austrian vessels by their immense double eagle. Now ascending, then again descending, it was often impossible for us to discover where we found ourselves, until I noticed Constantinople; but nowhere could I descry a single crescent, nor any other emblem that might have led me to conclude what Government had got possession of the ancient capital of the Eastern empire.

Crossing the Black Sea, and leaving the Caucasus behind us, we got a full view of the valley of the Euphrates; but I was again disappointed, in as far as I did not get anything to see in the shape of Eastern scenery. All the districts over which we travelled had quite a European cut about them. Nothing was there to show us that we were on another continent.

Among the buildings which I could clearly distinguish, one struck me as being in quite peculiar style. The numerous and large domes would have led me to suspect that it was a church or a mosque, but for the side wings and adjacent buildings, which looked like ordinary European houses, except that they were surrounded by colonnades. This edifice, or shall I say this cluster of buildings, was situated on a rocky hill, whence the view was a most extensive one.

Astronomical Observatories.

I asked Bacon did he know what this edifice was intended for? He looked through the telescope, and replied, "Why, that is the famous observatory of Orumiah. I know it by an illustration of the building which I have in my library. I have not been there myself, but it must be well worth seeing."

"But how did they come to erect a building of such gigantic dimensions so far beyond the circle of civilization?"

"Simply for the sake of saving time," was the answer; "now-a-days only those spots are selected for astronomical observations where they can be made most conveniently and in the shortest possible time. In Europe the nights are scarcely ever sufficiently clear to use our now so powerful glasses to advantage. There, on the contrary, during several months of the year the sky is so bright and transparent that one can even with the naked eye observe the moons of Jupiter and the phases of Venus. This had been known many years ago to the American Stoddard, who even called Herschel's attention to the fact, but that was not the time for taking advantage of such excellent opportunities. Not until the beginning of this century was the foundation-stone to be laid of the central observatory, as it is called; the glorious building was erected at the joint expense of all civilised nationalities, the latter including the Persians themselves, who have long ceased to be behind us Europeans. I need scarcely assure you that this institution is amply provided with the most excellent instruments, and that it has a staff of scientific men second to none for making the necessary observations."

Calculatoria.

"Then at last," said I, "the science of astronomy has wandered back to the cradle of its infancy, the soil of Chaldea. But what has become of the once so celebrated observatories of Leiden, Greenwich, the Pulkowa, etc., etc.?"

They have been changed into calculatoria, as in fact they had been already for some time past. Among them are distributed the observations made at the central observatory, and these they have to work out. At the same time these calculatoria continue to be of some use to the young astronomer; having there to encounter no end of difficulties, he may learn the value of the Latin adage, Per ardua ad astera, and so grow ultimately into a hard-working and accurate observer.

With regard to the practical results already obtained at the Orumiah observatory--in consequence of our knowledge of the celestial bodies having so considerably increased--I merely wish to call your attention for a moment to yonder map and the words printed underneath. I will rather not offend you by giving you any warning or advice in the matter.

Tin Mines in the Moon.

I followed the direction of his finger, and saw an immense "poster," on which I recognised at a glance the well-known lunar district of Tycho; of course I was acquainted with its ring mountains and the bright silver beams radiating as from a common centre; these were the words on the placard:

GREATEST DISCOVERY OF THE AGE!

INEXHAUSTIBLE TIN MINES IN THE MOON!

WHOSOEVER MEANS TO GET RICH

HAD BETTER ASSOCIATE HIMSELF WITH THE NEWLY ESTABLISHED

MOON TIN EXPLORATION COMPANY, TYCHO.

I had already risen from my seat in order to examine the map, and to convince myself that the words were actually there. As I turned round, Bacon must have guessed or gauged the degree of my astonishment; for he addressed me as follows: "You apparently do not believe in this kind of discoveries. Yet there is some truth in the first part of the announcement; nay, more perhaps than it is intended to convey; for those tin mines are incontestably inexhaustible, and for this simple reason, that they will never admit of being explored at all. Tin mines, however, they are. Careful observations with the great parabolic reflector provided with a hyperbolic 'oculaire' and a spectrum analysis system for the reflected rays have abundantly proved that those brilliant stripes radiating from Tycho are nothing but metallic tin. You will be less surprised to hear this when you remember that the moon has neither water nor atmosphere. So it is that metals which on our earth generally present themselves in an oxydal condition of some kind or other, on the contrary preserve their glossy surface on the moon just as with us silver, gold, and platina."

I now perfectly remembered that through the invention of spectrum analysis in the latter half of the nineteenth century it had indeed become possible to discover metals and several other elements in the different celestial bodies, and I conceived some faint idea of the possibility of recognising, with the aid of greatly improved apparatus, even the chemical character of such small portions of the lunar surface as for example the Tycho stripes. The only thing quite inexplicable to me was this, how could there be people left in the twenty-first century so credulous as to believe in the exploration of tin mines in the moon by us, the inhabitants of the earth? When I put this question to Bacon, the following was his reply: "My dear sir, on this point, as on many others, men have not much altered. At all times there have been dupes, the victims of those that preyed upon them and of their own cupidity. The originators of this unlimited liability company know full well that there is no possibility of getting at the tin mines in the moon; all they want to explore is the cheque-books of the public at large. In former centuries we have had the same speculations; at that time in the shape of tin, copper, and lead mines that existed nowhere except on imaginary maps, or in the form of landed estates, which on closer examination of the facts often dwindled down into pigstyes, or in the cultivation of fertile soil, which turned out to be mere wildernesses; very often a clever array and combination of figures was resorted to, and people were often brought to believe that one and one are four, and that two times two are ten. So it has been, and always will be. Think of the very old maxim, Mundus vult decipi. All that is required for such adventurers is an elastic conscience, a good deal of "brass," and a certain knack not to squeeze people's credulity too much, but to blind the masses by an artificial coating of truth. In former times--before science had to dispose of its enormous resources--had any one proposed to fetch tin from the moon, the commonest clown would have looked upon him as an addle-pate; but now-a-days so great is the number of recent discoveries and inventions, which to the uneducated mind savour almost of miracles, that many end in believing almost anything, and to my mind this is not to be wondered at. Start a company for parcel delivery by electric telegraph, issue a prospectus stuffed with learned twaddle, and an elaborate quasi-scientific demonstration of your scheme--above all, hold out hopes of a wonderful profit--and you are sure to find shareholders enough."

Universal Suffrage, etc.

"Poor children of man!" I thought. "Will you then always remain the same, always and for ever, always the slaves of your passions, and thereby the tools of those who take advantage of your weaknesses?" But my thoughts wandered into a different direction as soon as I noticed another placard simply containing this (although in monstrous figures and characters):

Anti 1-2 League.