章节正文
thousands of dining halls, chapels, theatres, markets
and places of assembly, a synthesis of enterprises, of
which he chiefly was the owner. People had their
sleeping rooms, with, it might be, antechambers,
rooms that were always sanitary at least whatever the
degree of comfort and privacy, and for the rest they
lived much as many people had lived in the new-made
giant hotels of the Victorian days, eating, reading,
thinking, playing, conversing, all in places of public
resort, going to their work in the industrial quarters
of the city or doing business in their offices in the
trading section.
He perceived at once how necessarily this state of
affairs had developed from the Victorian city. The
fundamental reason for the modern city had ever been
the economy of co-operation. The chief thing to prevent
the merging of the separate households in his
own generation was simply the still imperfect civilisation
of the people, the strong barbaric pride, passions,
and prejudices, the jealousies, rivalries, and violence
of the middle and lower classes, which had necessitated
the entire separation of contiguous households. But
the change, the taming of the people, had been in
rapid progress even then. In his brief thirty years of
previous life he had seen an enormousextension of
the habit of consuming meals from home, the casually
patronised horse-box coffee-house had given place to
the open and crowded Aerated Bread Shop for
instance, women's clubs had had their beginning, and
an immense development of reading rooms, lounges
and libraries had witnessed to the growth of social
confidence. These promises had by this time attained
to their complete fulfillment. The locked and barred
household had passed away.
These people below him belonged, he learnt, to the
lower middle class, the class just above the blue
labourers, a class so accustomed in the Victorian
period to feed with every precaution of privacy that
its members, when occasion confronted them with a
public meal, would usually hide their embarrassment
under horseplay or a markedly militant demeanour.
But these gaily, if lightly dressed people below, albeit
vivacious, hurried and uncommunicative, were
dexterously mannered and certainly quite at their ease
with regard to one another.
He noted a slight significant thing; the table, as
far as he could see, was and remained delightfully neat,
there was nothing to parallel the confusion, the
broadcast crumbs, the splashes of viand and condiment, the
overturned drink and displaced ornaments, which would
have marked the stormy progress of the Victorian meal.
The table furniture was very different. There were
no ornaments, no flowers, and the table was without a
cloth, being made, he learnt, of a solid substance
having the texture and appearance of damask. He
discerned that this damask substance was patterned with
gracefully designed trade advertisements.
In a sort of recess before each diner was a complete
apparatus of porcelain and metal. There was one
plate of white porcelain, and by means of taps for hot
and cold volatile fluids the diner washed this himself
between the courses; he also washed his elegant white
metal knife and fork and spoon as occasion required.
Soup and the chemical wine that was the common
drink were delivered by similar taps, and the remaining
covers travelled automatically in tastefully arranged
dishes down the table along silver rails. The diner
stopped these and helped himself at his discretion.
They appeared at a little door at one end of the table,
and vanished at the other. That turn of democratic
sentiment in decay, that ugly pride of menial souls,
which renders equals loth to wait on one another, was
very strong he found among these people. He was so
preoccupied with these details that it was only just as
he was leaving the place that he remarked the huge
advertisement dioramas that marched majestically
along the upper walls and proclaimed the most
remarkable commodities.
Beyond this place they came into a crowded hall,
and he discovered the cause of the noise that had
perplexed him. They paused at a turnstile at which a
payment was made.
Graham's attention was immediately arrested by a
violent, loud hoot, followed by a vast leathery voice.
"The Master is sleeping peacefully," it vociferately.
"He is in excellent health. He is going to devote the
rest of his life to aeronautics. He says women are
more beautiful than ever. Galloop! Wow! Our
wonderful civilisation astonishes him beyond measure.
Beyond all measure. Galloop. He puts great trust
in Boss Ostrog, absolute confidence in Boss Ostrog.
Ostrog is to be his chief minister; is authorised to
remove or reinstate public officers--all patronage will
be in his hands. All patronage in the hands of Boss
Ostrog! The Councillors have been sent back to their
own prison above the Council House."
Graham stopped at the first sentence, and, looking
up, beheld a foolish trumpet face from which this was
brayed. This was the General Intelligence Machine.
For a space it seemed to be gatheringbreath, and a
regular throbbing from its cylindrical body was
audible. Then it trumpeted "Galloop, Galloop," and
broke out again.
"Paris is now pacified. All resistance is over.
Galloop! The black police hold every position of
importance in the city. They fought with great bravery,
singing songs written in praise of their ancestors
by the poet Kipling. Once or twice they got out of
hand, and tortured and mutilated wounded and captured
insurgents, men and women. Moral--don't go
rebelling. Haha! Galloop, Galloop! They are
lively fellows. Lively brave fellows. Let this be a lesson
to the disorderly banderlog of this city. Yah!
Banderlog! Filth of the earth! Galloop, Galloop!"
The voice ceased. There was a confused murmur
of disapproval among the crowd. "Damned niggers."
A man began to harangne near them. "Is
this the Master's doing, brothers? Is this the
Master's doing?"
"Black police!" said Graham." What is that?
You don't mean--"
Asano touched his arm and gave him a warning
look, and forthwith another of these mechanisms I
screamed deafeningly and gave tongue in a shrill voice.
"Yahaha, Yahah, Yap! Hear a live paper yelp!
Live paper. Yaha! Shocking outrage in Paris.
Yahahah! The Parisians exasperated by the black
police to the pitch of assassination. Dreadful
reprisals. Savage times come again. Blood! Blood!
Yaha!" The nearer Babble Machine hooted stupendously,
"Galloop, Galloop," drowned the end of the
sentence, and proceeded in a rather flatter note than
before with novel comments on the horrors of disorder.
"Law and order must be maintained," said the nearer
Babble Machine.
"But," began Graham.
"Don't ask questions here," said Asano, "or you
will be involved in an argument."
"Then let us go on," said Graham, "for I want to
know more of this."
As he and his companion pushed their way through
the excited crowd that swarmed beneath these voices,
towards the exit, Graham conceived more clearly the
proportion and features of this room. Altogether,
great and small, there must have been nearly a thousand
of these erections, piping, hooting, bawling and
gabbling in that great space, each with its crowd of
excited listeners, the majority of them men dressed
in blue canvas. There were all sizes of machines,
from the little gossipping mechanisms that chuckled
out mechanical sarcasm in odd corners, through a
number of grades to such fifty-foot giants as that which
had first hooted over Graham.
This place was unusuallycrowded, because of the
intense public interest in the course of affairs in Paris.
Evidently the struggle had been much more savage
than Ostrog had represented it. All the mechanisms
were discoursing upon that topic, and the repetition
of the people made the huge hive buzz with such
phrases as "Lynched policemen," "Women burnt
alive," "Fuzzy Wuzzy." "But does the Master allow
such things? " asked a man near him. "Is this the
beginning of the Master's rule?"
Is __this__ the beginning of the Master's rule? For a
long time after he had left the place, the hooting,
whistling and braying of the machines pursued him;
"Galloop, Galloop," "Yahahah, Yaha, Yap! Yaha!"
Is this the beginning of the Master's rule?
Directly they were out upon the ways he began to
question Asano closely on the nature of the Parisian
struggle. "This disarmament! What was their
trouble? What does it all mean?" Asano seemed
chieflyanxious to reassure him that it was "all right."
"But these outrages!" "You cannot have an omelette,"
said Asano, "without breaking eggs. It is only
the rough people. Only in one part of the city. All
the rest is all right. The Parisian labourers are the
wildest in the world, except ours."
"What! the Londoners? "
"No, the Japanese. They have to be kept in order."
" But burning women alive! "
"A Commune!" said Asano. "They would rob
you of your property. They would do away with
property and give the world over to mob rule. You
are Master, the world is yours. But there will be no
Commune here. There is no need for black police
here.
"And every consideration has been shown. It is
their own negroes--French speaking negroes. Senegal
regiments, and Niger and Timbuctoo."
"Regiments?" said Graham, "I thought there was
only one--."
"No," said Asano, and glanced at him. "There is
more than one."
Graham felt unpleasantly helpless.
"I did not think," he began and stopped abruptly
He went off at a tangent to ask for information
about these Babble Machines. For the most
part, the crowd present had been shabbily or even
raggedly dressed, and Graham learnt that so far as
the more prosperous classes were concerned, in all
and places of assembly, a synthesis of enterprises, of
which he chiefly was the owner. People had their
sleeping rooms, with, it might be, antechambers,
rooms that were always sanitary at least whatever the
degree of comfort and privacy, and for the rest they
lived much as many people had lived in the new-made
giant hotels of the Victorian days, eating, reading,
thinking, playing, conversing, all in places of public
resort, going to their work in the industrial quarters
of the city or doing business in their offices in the
trading section.
He perceived at once how necessarily this state of
affairs had developed from the Victorian city. The
fundamental reason for the modern city had ever been
the economy of co-operation. The chief thing to prevent
the merging of the separate households in his
own generation was simply the still imperfect civilisation
of the people, the strong barbaric pride, passions,
and prejudices, the jealousies, rivalries, and violence
of the middle and lower classes, which had necessitated
the entire separation of contiguous households. But
the change, the taming of the people, had been in
rapid progress even then. In his brief thirty years of
previous life he had seen an enormousextension of
the habit of consuming meals from home, the casually
patronised horse-box coffee-house had given place to
the open and crowded Aerated Bread Shop for
instance, women's clubs had had their beginning, and
an immense development of reading rooms, lounges
and libraries had witnessed to the growth of social
confidence. These promises had by this time attained
to their complete fulfillment. The locked and barred
household had passed away.
These people below him belonged, he learnt, to the
lower middle class, the class just above the blue
labourers, a class so accustomed in the Victorian
period to feed with every precaution of privacy that
its members, when occasion confronted them with a
public meal, would usually hide their embarrassment
under horseplay or a markedly militant demeanour.
But these gaily, if lightly dressed people below, albeit
vivacious, hurried and uncommunicative, were
dexterously mannered and certainly quite at their ease
with regard to one another.
He noted a slight significant thing; the table, as
far as he could see, was and remained delightfully neat,
there was nothing to parallel the confusion, the
broadcast crumbs, the splashes of viand and condiment, the
overturned drink and displaced ornaments, which would
have marked the stormy progress of the Victorian meal.
The table furniture was very different. There were
no ornaments, no flowers, and the table was without a
cloth, being made, he learnt, of a solid substance
having the texture and appearance of damask. He
discerned that this damask substance was patterned with
gracefully designed trade advertisements.
In a sort of recess before each diner was a complete
apparatus of porcelain and metal. There was one
plate of white porcelain, and by means of taps for hot
and cold volatile fluids the diner washed this himself
between the courses; he also washed his elegant white
metal knife and fork and spoon as occasion required.
Soup and the chemical wine that was the common
drink were delivered by similar taps, and the remaining
covers travelled automatically in tastefully arranged
dishes down the table along silver rails. The diner
stopped these and helped himself at his discretion.
They appeared at a little door at one end of the table,
and vanished at the other. That turn of democratic
sentiment in decay, that ugly pride of menial souls,
which renders equals loth to wait on one another, was
very strong he found among these people. He was so
preoccupied with these details that it was only just as
he was leaving the place that he remarked the huge
advertisement dioramas that marched majestically
along the upper walls and proclaimed the most
remarkable commodities.
Beyond this place they came into a crowded hall,
and he discovered the cause of the noise that had
perplexed him. They paused at a turnstile at which a
payment was made.
Graham's attention was immediately arrested by a
violent, loud hoot, followed by a vast leathery voice.
"The Master is sleeping peacefully," it vociferately.
"He is in excellent health. He is going to devote the
rest of his life to aeronautics. He says women are
more beautiful than ever. Galloop! Wow! Our
wonderful civilisation astonishes him beyond measure.
Beyond all measure. Galloop. He puts great trust
in Boss Ostrog, absolute confidence in Boss Ostrog.
Ostrog is to be his chief minister; is authorised to
remove or reinstate public officers--all patronage will
be in his hands. All patronage in the hands of Boss
Ostrog! The Councillors have been sent back to their
own prison above the Council House."
Graham stopped at the first sentence, and, looking
up, beheld a foolish trumpet face from which this was
brayed. This was the General Intelligence Machine.
For a space it seemed to be gatheringbreath, and a
regular throbbing from its cylindrical body was
audible. Then it trumpeted "Galloop, Galloop," and
broke out again.
"Paris is now pacified. All resistance is over.
Galloop! The black police hold every position of
importance in the city. They fought with great bravery,
singing songs written in praise of their ancestors
by the poet Kipling. Once or twice they got out of
hand, and tortured and mutilated wounded and captured
insurgents, men and women. Moral--don't go
rebelling. Haha! Galloop, Galloop! They are
lively fellows. Lively brave fellows. Let this be a lesson
to the disorderly banderlog of this city. Yah!
Banderlog! Filth of the earth! Galloop, Galloop!"
The voice ceased. There was a confused murmur
of disapproval among the crowd. "Damned niggers."
A man began to harangne near them. "Is
this the Master's doing, brothers? Is this the
Master's doing?"
"Black police!" said Graham." What is that?
You don't mean--"
Asano touched his arm and gave him a warning
look, and forthwith another of these mechanisms I
screamed deafeningly and gave tongue in a shrill voice.
"Yahaha, Yahah, Yap! Hear a live paper yelp!
Live paper. Yaha! Shocking outrage in Paris.
Yahahah! The Parisians exasperated by the black
police to the pitch of assassination. Dreadful
reprisals. Savage times come again. Blood! Blood!
Yaha!" The nearer Babble Machine hooted stupendously,
"Galloop, Galloop," drowned the end of the
sentence, and proceeded in a rather flatter note than
before with novel comments on the horrors of disorder.
"Law and order must be maintained," said the nearer
Babble Machine.
"But," began Graham.
"Don't ask questions here," said Asano, "or you
will be involved in an argument."
"Then let us go on," said Graham, "for I want to
know more of this."
As he and his companion pushed their way through
the excited crowd that swarmed beneath these voices,
towards the exit, Graham conceived more clearly the
proportion and features of this room. Altogether,
great and small, there must have been nearly a thousand
of these erections, piping, hooting, bawling and
gabbling in that great space, each with its crowd of
excited listeners, the majority of them men dressed
in blue canvas. There were all sizes of machines,
from the little gossipping mechanisms that chuckled
out mechanical sarcasm in odd corners, through a
number of grades to such fifty-foot giants as that which
had first hooted over Graham.
This place was unusuallycrowded, because of the
intense public interest in the course of affairs in Paris.
Evidently the struggle had been much more savage
than Ostrog had represented it. All the mechanisms
were discoursing upon that topic, and the repetition
of the people made the huge hive buzz with such
phrases as "Lynched policemen," "Women burnt
alive," "Fuzzy Wuzzy." "But does the Master allow
such things? " asked a man near him. "Is this the
beginning of the Master's rule?"
Is __this__ the beginning of the Master's rule? For a
long time after he had left the place, the hooting,
whistling and braying of the machines pursued him;
"Galloop, Galloop," "Yahahah, Yaha, Yap! Yaha!"
Is this the beginning of the Master's rule?
Directly they were out upon the ways he began to
question Asano closely on the nature of the Parisian
struggle. "This disarmament! What was their
trouble? What does it all mean?" Asano seemed
chieflyanxious to reassure him that it was "all right."
"But these outrages!" "You cannot have an omelette,"
said Asano, "without breaking eggs. It is only
the rough people. Only in one part of the city. All
the rest is all right. The Parisian labourers are the
wildest in the world, except ours."
"What! the Londoners? "
"No, the Japanese. They have to be kept in order."
" But burning women alive! "
"A Commune!" said Asano. "They would rob
you of your property. They would do away with
property and give the world over to mob rule. You
are Master, the world is yours. But there will be no
Commune here. There is no need for black police
here.
"And every consideration has been shown. It is
their own negroes--French speaking negroes. Senegal
regiments, and Niger and Timbuctoo."
"Regiments?" said Graham, "I thought there was
only one--."
"No," said Asano, and glanced at him. "There is
more than one."
Graham felt unpleasantly helpless.
"I did not think," he began and stopped abruptly
He went off at a tangent to ask for information
about these Babble Machines. For the most
part, the crowd present had been shabbily or even
raggedly dressed, and Graham learnt that so far as
the more prosperous classes were concerned, in all
- assembly [ə´sembli]
n.集会；装配；与会者 (初中英语单词) - chiefly [´tʃi:fli] ad.主要地；尤其 (初中英语单词)
- whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
- industrial [in´dʌstriəl] a.工业的，产业的 (初中英语单词)
- economy [i´kɔnəmi] n.经济；机制；组织 (初中英语单词)
- generation [,dʒenə´reiʃən] n.发生；世代；同龄人 (初中英语单词)
- enormous [i´nɔ:məs] a.巨大地，很，极 (初中英语单词)
- beginning [bi´giniŋ] n.开始，开端；起源 (初中英语单词)
- immense [i´mens] a.广大的，无限的 (初中英语单词)
- reading [´ri:diŋ] n.(阅)读；朗读；读物 (初中英语单词)
- learnt [lə:nt] learn 的过去式(分词) (初中英语单词)
- lightly [´laitli] ad.轻微地，稍微 (初中英语单词)
- parallel [´pærəlel] a.平行的 n.平行线 (初中英语单词)
- confusion [kən´fju:ʒən] n.混乱(状态)；骚乱 (初中英语单词)
- chemical [´kemikəl] a.化学的 n.化学制品 (初中英语单词)
- sleeping [´sli:piŋ] n.&a.睡着(的) (初中英语单词)
- measure [´meʒə] n.量度；范围 vt.测量 (初中英语单词)
- absolute [´æbsəlu:t] a.绝对的 n.绝对 (初中英语单词)
- minister [´ministə] n.部长；大臣 v.伺候 (初中英语单词)
- sentence [´sentəns] n.判决 vt.宣判；处刑 (初中英语单词)
- beheld [bi´held] behold的过去式(分词) (初中英语单词)
- intelligence [in´telidʒəns] n.智力；消息 (初中英语单词)
- breath [breθ] n.呼吸；气息 (初中英语单词)
- resistance [ri´zistəns] n.抵抗；抵制；耐力 (初中英语单词)
- lively [´laivli] a.活泼的；热烈的 (初中英语单词)
- savage [´sævidʒ] a.野蛮的 n.蛮人 (初中英语单词)
- flatter [´flætə] vt.阿谀，奉承；胜过 (初中英语单词)
- companion [kəm´pæniən] n.同伴；同事；伴侣 (初中英语单词)
- canvas [´kænvəs] n.帆布；油画(布) (初中英语单词)
- mechanical [mi´kænikəl] a.机械的；力学的 (初中英语单词)
- anxious [´æŋkʃəs] a.担忧的；渴望的 (初中英语单词)
- consideration [kən,sidə´reiʃən] n.考虑；原因；体谅 (初中英语单词)
- prosperous [´prɔspərəs] a.繁荣的；顺利的 (初中英语单词)
- necessarily [´nesisərili] ad.必定，必然地 (高中英语单词)
- separation [,sepə´reiʃən] n.分离；分开；分居 (高中英语单词)
- extension [ik´stenʃən] n.延长；扩展；延期 (高中英语单词)
- crowded [´kraudid] a.充(拥)满了的 (高中英语单词)
- precaution [pri´kɔ:ʃən] n.预防 vt.预先警告 (高中英语单词)
- hurried [´hʌrid] a.仓促的，慌忙的 (高中英语单词)
- significant [sig´nifikənt] a.重要的；意义重大的 (高中英语单词)
- recess [ri´ses] n.休息；休会 (高中英语单词)
- elegant [´eligənt] a.文雅的；优美的 (高中英语单词)
- trumpet [´trʌmpit] n.喇叭；小号 (高中英语单词)
- forthwith [fɔ:θ´wið] ad.立刻 (高中英语单词)
- shrill [ʃril] a.(声音)尖锐的 (高中英语单词)
- outrage [´aut,reidʒ] n.残暴 vt.虐待；伤害 (高中英语单词)
- reassure [,ri:ə´ʃuə] vt.使放心 (高中英语单词)
- concerned [kən´sə:nd] a.有关的；担心的 (高中英语单词)
- sanitary [´sænitəri, -teri] a.卫生的 n.公共厕所 (英语四级单词)
- privacy [´praivəsi, -pri] n.隐退；独处；秘密 (英语四级单词)
- imperfect [im´pə:fikt] a.不完全的；未完成的 (英语四级单词)
- texture [´tekstʃə] n.(织物等的)质地 (英语四级单词)
- porcelain [´pɔ:slin] n.瓷 a.瓷的；精美的 (英语四级单词)
- automatically [ɔ:tə´mætikli] ad.自动地；无意识地 (英语四级单词)
- patronage [´pætrənidʒ] n.保护；赞助 (英语四级单词)
- gathering [´gæðəriŋ] n.集会，聚集 (英语四级单词)
- babble [´bæbəl] v.&n.唠叨；胡言乱语 (英语四级单词)
- graham [´greiəm] a.&n.用全麦粉做的 (英语四级单词)
- unusually [ʌn´ju:ʒuəli] ad.异常地；非常 (英语四级单词)
- parisian [pə´riziən] n.&a.巴黎人(的) (英语四级单词)
- victorian [vik´tɔ:riən] a.维多利亚女王时代的 (英语六级单词)
- delightfully [di´laitfuli] ad.大喜，欣然 (英语六级单词)
- damask [´dæməsk] n.锦缎 a.缎子的 (英语六级单词)
- disapproval [,disə´pru:vəl] n.不赞成；非难 (英语六级单词)
- shocking [´ʃɔkiŋ] a.令人震惊的；可怕的 (英语六级单词)
- assassination [ə,sæsi´neiʃən] n.暗杀；暗杀事件 (英语六级单词)
- speaking [´spi:kiŋ] n.说话 a.发言的 (英语六级单词)
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章节正文
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