That was my last sight of London in these days; and looking back upon it, I cannot help feeling that this squalid tragedy was symbolical of greater things. The old civilisation went its way, healthy on the surface, full of life and vigour, apparently unshakable in its power. Yet all the while, at the back of it there lurked in odd corners the brutal instincts, darting into view at times for a moment and then returning into the darkness which was their home. Suddenly came the Famine: and civilisation shook, grew weaker and lost its power over men. With that, all the evil passions were unleashed and free to run abroad. Bolder and bolder they grew, till at last civilisation went down before them, feebly attempting to ward them off and failing more and more to protect itself. It was the dying man and the rats on a gigantic scale.
I came back to the Clyde Valley a very different being. Now I knew what had to be fought if our Fata Morgana was to rise on solid foundations; and the task appalled me.
XIII
Reconstruction
When I saw Nordenholt again after my return, I found that I had no need to describe my experiences. He seemed to know exactly where I had been and what had happened to me. I suspect that Glendyne must have furnished him with a full report of the night’s doings.
“Well, Jack,” he greeted me; “what do you think of things now?”
“I’m down in the depths,” I confessed frankly. “If that’s what lies at the roots of humanity, I see no chance of building much upon such foundations. The trail of the brute’s over everything.”
“Of course it is! The whole of our machine is constructed on a brute basis. Did you need to go to London to see that? Why, man, every time you walk you swing your left hand and your right foot in time with each other; and that’s only a legacy of some four-footed ancestor which ran with the near foreleg and off hind-leg acting in unison. Of course the brute is the basis. A wolf-pack will give you a microcosm of a nation: family life, struggles between wolf and wolf for a living, cooperation against an external enemy or prey. But don’t forget that humanity has refined things a little. Give it credit for that at least. People laugh at the calf-love of a boy; but in many cases that has no sexual feeling in it; it has touched a less brutal spring somewhere in the machine. There’s altruism, too; it isn’t so uncommon as you think. And patriotism isn’t necessarily confined to a mere tooth-and-claw grapple with a hated opponent; it might still exist even if wars were abolished. I know you’re still under the cloud, Jack; but don’t think that the sun has gone down for good simply because it’s hidden. All I wanted you to see was that you must be on your guard in your reconstruction. You and Elsa were planning for an ideal humanity. I want you to make things bearable for the flesh-and-blood units with which you have to work. Don’t strain them too high.”
“I wish I could find my way through it all,” I said. “But anyway I see your point. What you wanted was to let me know which was sand and which was rock to build on, wasn’t it? You were afraid I was mistaking it all for solid ground?”
“That’s about it. Remember, with decent luck you ought to have a clean slate to start with. Most of our old troubles have solved themselves, or will solve themselves in the course of the next few months. There’s no idle class in the Nitrogen Area; money’s only a convenient fiction and now they know it by experience; there’s no Parliament, no gabble about Democracy, no laws that a man can’t understand. I’ve made a clean sweep of most of the old system; and the rest will go down before we’re done.”
“I know that, but to tell the truth I don’t know where to begin building. It seems an impossible business; the more I look at it the less confidence I have in myself.”
“Don’t worry so much about that. You’ll see that it will solve itself step by step. It’s not so much cut-and-dried plans you need as a flexible mind combined with general principles. It’s the principles that will worry you.”
“I suppose you are right,” I said.
“It’s obvious if you look at it. Your first stages will be the getting of these five million people into two sets: one on the land to cultivate it; the other still working on nitrogen. That’s evident. The whole of that part of the thing is a matter of statistics and calculation; there’s nothing in it, so far as thinking goes. After that, you have to arrange to get the best out of the people mentally and morally; and I think Elsa will be a help to you there. By the way, she refuses to leave me.”
“Then how am I going to get her help?”
“Oh, I’ve arranged that she is to have lighter work and she’ll have the evenings free; so you and she can consult then, if you will.”
This seemed to be enough to go on with.
“There’s another thing, Jack,” he continued, “I’ve got good news for you. It appears from the work that the bacteriologists are doing
