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The Revolt of the Machines

Page 34

by Brian Stableford


  As I’ve said, several years have already passed since all these events took place, but I didn’t feel strong enough until now and sufficiently recovered from my terrible emotions to attempt to recount my adventures. Now it’s done.

  I suspect that no one will believe me, but I can’t help that. Everyone remembers Anthea, its arrival in the skies of Ecuador and its sudden disappearance…but I alone can say: I was there.

  I have no witnesses that I can call. I can offer no other proof than my sincerity.

  Notes

  1 tr. as “The Secret of the Scaffold” in The Scaffold, Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-932983-01-2.

  2 also tr. as “The Revolt of the Machines” in The Superhumans, Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-935558-77-4.

  3 latter version tr. as Journey to the Land of the Fourth Dimension, Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-934543-37-5.

  4 Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban (1633-1707) was the foremost military engineer of his era, famed for his expertise in building fortifications, and also in breaking through them.

  5 The French verb voler means both to steal and to fly, permitting the observation that “Thieves will fly” to become a rather obvious play on words that only a student would think worth the bother.

  6 “La Flûte” was first published in 1843.

  7 The photophone, involving the transmission of speech by means of a beam of light, was invented by Alexander Graham Bell and Charles Sumner Tainter in 1880; Bell thought it by far his most important invention, but its range was far surpassed by Guglielmo Marconi’s wireless transmission system, and it was superseded, although it was the ancestor of modern transmissions via fiber-optic cable.

  8 Pliny the Younger observed the eruption of Vesuvius that destroyed Pompeii from the home of his uncle, Pliny the Elder, in Misenum; his letters to Cornelius Tacitus describing his experiences have survived.

  9 The physician and surgeon Aristide Verneuil (1823-1895), who collected his various papers in the three-volume Mémoires de chirurgie (1877-88)

  10 A term sarcastically coined by Verneuil to stigmatize excess in his colleagues; it means “the itch to cut”—i.e., operative mania.

  11 Pierre Roux (1853-1933) was one of Louis Pasteur’s closest collaborators, who helped found the Pasteur Institute in the late 1880s and manufactured a serum there from 1891 onwards for the treatment of diphtheria.

  12 Author’s note: “Dr. Déclat, from 1861 onwards, inaugurated surgical antisepsis. Déclat, after Raspail but before Pasteur, glimpsed microbial panspermia and therapeutic microbicide. Among many others, those are titles of immortal glory for the venerated scientist.” The reference is to Gilbert Déclat (1827-1896).

  13 Jules Péan (1830-1896) was a diehard opponent of Pasteur who refused to accept his theories of disease; he implanted the prosthesis in question—an artificial shoulder-joint—in 1893, but it had to be removed in 1895 after becoming infected. J.-P. Michaëls, who published a book on prosthetic apparatus intended to replace bone and cartilage, was a professor at the École Dentiare de Paris. Joseph-Louis Renaut (1844-1917) was a noted histologist who carried out microscopic analyses of degenerating nerve fibres in sufferers from muscular dystrophy.

  14 Henri Moissan (1852-1907) subsequently became famous for his work with fluorine, which earned him a Nobel Prize. His technique for refining acetylene gas was useful, but credit for the early development of the gas as a fuel belongs to Marcellin Berthelot.

  15 Raoul Pictet (1846-1929) succeeded in producing droplets of liquid oxygen in 1877.

  16 Claude Goubet (1837-1903) developed the first electrically powered submarine in 1885, and carried out a much-publicized demonstration of its capabilities in Cherbourg in 1890. The navy preferred a rival model and he died ruined, like many inventors.

  17 This reference is probably fictitious; Eugène-Louis Bouvier (1856-1944), the famous naturalist of that name, was an entomologist, and the popularization of the idea of the latent “third eye” was primarily due to the occultist Helena Blavatsky and her Theosophical scholarly fantasy.

  18 H. R. Cassel patented a method of extracting gold from seawater by means of electrolysis in 1886, but the apparatus he used, which had the side effect of producing sodium hypochlorite, proved much more useful as a means of disinfection, and was widely touted for that purpose in the 1890s. The principle is still used in chlorinating swimming pools.

  19 Nikola Tesla (1856-1943) worked briefly for Thomas Edison, whose main rival he was widely considered to be, and George Westinghouse after emigrating to the U.S.A. The experiments with fluorescent light that he carried out in the 1890s, building on discoveries made in France by Alexandre Becquerel, were widely publicized, but did not lead to any commercially viable product.

  20 There is an untranslatable pun here in Vésigout’s argot. The “eye” in question would be a “slate” in English slang or a “tab” in American.

  21 An untranslatable pun has been omitted here, which links “piquer” (to prick, or inject, although it has numerous other implications, including “to steal” and “to irritate”) to “piquer le nez” (to get drunk, equivalent of English expressions along the lines of “to get off one’s face”). The chapter takes advantage of other ambiguities to make further puns.

  22 I have retained this item of argot as printed; it is presumably a corruption of “eau d’oeuf” [egg-water], the “toddy” being egg-nog.

  23 Either the author is joking or his research has gone awry; it is, of course, the pineal “gland” and not the pituitary that was being touted in the era when the story was written as a vestigial or undeveloped “third eye,” as featured in the similarly implausible operation attempted by the reclusive scientist in Jules Clarétie’s L’Obession (1908; tr. as Obsession).

  24 The reference is to a sensational murder committed at number 3 Rue Tronson-Ducoudray in 1890 by Gabrielle Bompard and Michel Eyraud, who strangled a court usher, Toussaint-Augustin Gouffé, and disposed of the body in a trunk, the identification of which was an early triumph of scientific detection.

  25 The reference to this improvisation—psychotritie in the original—as “limpid” is probably a joke. If the term is derived from Greek roots, it presumably refers to a tripartite division or classification of mental phenomena. An intellectual of Saint-Denis’ stature would surely not have combined Greek and Latin roots, so the second element cannot refer to the analytical process of trituration, even though a less scholarly person might think that the term might make more sense if it did.

  26 Charles Richet (1850-1935) was a physiologist who eventually won a Nobel Prize for his work on anaphylaxis, but was also a litterateur, a pioneer of heavier-than-air aviation and an ardent student of psychic phenomena. He co-founded the journal Annales des Sciences Psychiques in 1891 with the physician Xavier Dariex, who published a book on telepathy in the same year.

  27 Although Theodore Roosevelt’s daughter Alice had recently married Nicholas Longworth III when the story was written, she did not, in fact, have a child until 1925.

  28 Armand Fallières was President of the Republic from 1906-13.

  29 The financier John Pierpont (J.P.) Morgan (1837-1913)

  30 The Savoyard political philosopher Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821) was one of the fiercest critics of the French Revolution, arguing that any attempt to justify government on rational grounds is bound to fail, and that any authority that is not absolute and unquestionable is bound to dissolve into violence and chaos. The only possible salvation for Europe, in his opinion, lay in divine authority channelled through the Pope.

  31 When Pope Pius VII was detained at Fontainebleau by Napoléon in 1812, he is rumoured by some accounts to have replied to Napoléon’s account of his reasons by muttering to himself the single word “Comediante!” [Clown]. Some accounts expanded the remark to “Comediante! Tragediante!” (or the other way around) while others shifted the remark to 1813 and slightly different circumstances. All the versions are probably apocryphal.

  32 Prince Henry [or Heinr
ich] of Prussia (1862-1929), Wilhelm II’s younger brother, had a long career in the Navy. From 1906-9 he was in command of the High Seas Fleet.

  33 Admiral George Dewey (1837-1917) was no longer on active service in 1908, but was still famous for his victory in the Battle of Manila Bay during the Spanish-American War.

  34 Claude-Adrien Nonotte, or Nonnotte (1711-1793) wrote several books, of which by far the most famous was Les Erreurs de Voltaire (1762; revised and expanded 1766).

  35 The designation Homo priscus was first adapted in application to fossil humans in 1888 with regard to remains found in Chancelade in France, but Sageret would also have known that it had earlier been used by Catullus and Virgil to refer, satirically, to old-fashioned individuals of their own species, that being its literal meaning. His conscientious avoidance of the designation sapiens is, of course, key to his argument.

  36 Hugo de Vries (1848-1935), the pioneer of mutation theory, which he developed in the course of modifying the theory of pangenesis—the hypothetical mechanism of heredity developed by Charles Darwin. His notion of the importance of sudden gross transformations is now considered discredited, although it continued to fuel the imagination of writers of speculative fiction to a far greater degree than the more modest gradualist conception.

  37 Author’s note: “The 23rd day of the 7th month of the 211th year of the 2nd cycle.”

  38 Anthea [blossom] was an epithet of the Greek goddess Hera.

  FRENCH SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY COLLECTION

  105 Adolphe Ahaiza. Cybele

  102 Alphonse Allais. The Adventures of Captain Cap

  02 Henri Allorge. The Great Cataclysm

  14 G.-J. Arnaud. The Ice Company

  61 Charles Asselineau. The Double Life

  118 Henri Austruy. The Eupantophone

  119 Henri Austry. The Petitpaon Era

  120 Henri Austry. The Olotelepan

  130 Barillet-Lagargousse. The Final War

  103 S. Henry Berthoud. Martyrs of Science

  23 Richard Bessière. The Gardens of the Apocalypse

  121 Richard Bessière. The Masters of Silence

  26 Albert Bleunard. Ever Smaller

  06 Félix Bodin. The Novel of the Future

  92 Louis Boussenard. Monsieur Synthesis

  39 Alphonse Brown. City of Glass

  89. Alphonse Brown. The Conquest of the Air

  98. Emile Calvet. In A Thousand Years

  40 Félicien Champsaur. The Human Arrow

  81 Félicien Champsaur. Ouha, King of the Apes

  91. Félicien Champsaur. The Pharaoh’s Wife

  03 Didier de Chousy. Ignis

  97 Michel Corday. The Eternal Flame

  113 André Couvreur. The Necessary Evil

  114 André Couvreur. Caresco, Superman

  115 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 1)

  116 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 2)

  117 André Couvreur. The Exploits of Professor Tornada (Vol. 3)

  67 Captain Danrit. Undersea Odyssey

  17 C. I. Defontenay. Star (Psi Cassiopeia)

  05 Charles Derennes. The People of the Pole

  68 Georges T. Dodds. The Missing Link and Other Tales of Ape-Men

  125 Charles Dodeman. The Silent Bomb

  49 Alfred Driou. The Adventures of a Parisian Aeronaut

  -- J.-C. Dunyach. The Night Orchid;

  -- J.-C. Dunyach. The Thieves of Silence

  10 Henri Duvernois. The Man Who Found Himself

  08 Achille Eyraud. Voyage to Venus

  01 Henri Falk. The Age of Lead

  51 Charles de Fieux. Lamékis]

  108 Louis Forest. Someone Is Stealing Children In Paris

  31 Arnould Galopin. Doctor Omega

  70 Arnould Galopin. Doctor Omega & The Shadowmen

  112 H. Gayar. The Marvelous Adventures of Serge Myrandhal on Mars

  88 Judith Gautier. Isoline and the Serpent-Flower

  57 Edmond Haraucourt. Illusions of Immortality

  24 Nathalie Henneberg. The Green Gods

  131 Eugene Hennebert. The Enchanted City

  107 Jules Janin. The Magnetized Corpse

  29 Michel Jeury. Chronolysis

  55 Gustave Kahn. The Tale of Gold and Silence

  30 Gérard Klein. The Mote in Time’s Eye

  90 Fernand Kolney. Love in 5000 Years

  87 Louis-Guillaume de La Follie. The Unpretentious Philosopher

  101 Jean de La Hire. The Fiery Wheel

  50 André Laurie. Spiridon

  52 Gabriel de Lautrec. The Vengeance of the Oval Portrait

  82 Alain Le Drimeur. The Future City

  27-28 Georges Le Faure & Henri de Graffigny. The Extraordinary Adventures of a Russian Scientist Across the Solar System (2 vols.)

  07 Jules Lermina. Mysteryville

  25 Jules Lermina. Panic in Paris

  32 Jules Lermina. The Secret of Zippelius

  66 Jules Lermina. To-Ho and the Gold Destroyers

  127 Jules Lermina. The Battle of Strasbourg

  15 Gustave Le Rouge. The Vampires of Mars

  73 Gustave Le Rouge. The Plutocratic Plot

  74 Gustave Le Rouge. The Transatlantic Threat

  75 Gustave Le Rouge. The Psychic Spies

  76 Gustave Le Rouge. The Victims Victorious

  109-110-111 Gustave Le Rouge. The Mysterious Doctor Cornelius

  96. André Lichtenberger. The Centaurs

  99. André Lichtenberger. The Children of the Crab

  72 Xavier Mauméjean. The League of Heroes

  78 Joseph Méry. The Tower of Destiny

  77 Hippolyte Mettais. The Year 5865

  128 Hyppolite Mettais. Paris Before the Deluge

  83 Louise Michel. The Human Microbes

  84 Louise Michel. The New World

  93. Tony Moilin. Paris in the Year 2000

  11 José Moselli. Illa’s End

  38 John-Antoine Nau. Enemy Force

  04 Henri de Parville. An Inhabitant of the Planet Mars

  21 Gaston de Pawlowski. Journey to the Land of the Fourth Dimension

  56 Georges Pellerin. The World in 2000 Years

  79 Pierre Pelot. The Child Who Walked On The Sky

  85 Ernest Perochon. The Frenetic People

  100 Edgar Quinet. Ahasuerus

  123 Edgar Quinet. The Enchanter Merlin

  60 Henri de Régnier. A Surfeit of Mirrors

  33 Maurice Renard. The Blue Peril

  34 Maurice Renard. Doctor Lerne

  35 Maurice Renard. The Doctored Man

  36 Maurice Renard. A Man Among the Microbes

  37 Maurice Renard. The Master of Light

  41 Jean Richepin. The Wing

  12 Albert Robida. The Clock of the Centuries

  62 Albert Robida. Chalet in the Sky

  69 Albert Robida. The Adventures of Saturnin Farandoul

  95 Albert Robida. The Electric Life

  46 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Givreuse Enigma

  45 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Mysterious Force

  43 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Navigators of Space

  48 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. Vamireh

  44 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The World of the Variants

  47 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. The Young Vampire

  71 J.-H. Rosny Aîné. Helgvor of the Blue River

  24 Marcel Rouff. Journey to the Inverted World

  132 Léonie Rouzade. The World Turned Upside Down

  09 Han Ryner. The Superhumans

  124 Han Ryner. The Human Ant

  122 Pierre de Selenes. An Unknown World

  106 Brian Stableford. The Conqueror of Death

  20 Brian Stableford. The Germans on Venus

  19 Brian Stableford. News from the Moon

  63 Brian Stableford. The Supreme Progress

  64 Brian Stableford. The World Above the World

  65 Brian Stableford. Nemoville

  80 Brian Stableford. Investigations of the Future

  129 B
rian Stableford. Revolt of the Machines

  42 Jacques Spitz. The Eye of Purgatory

  13 Kurt Steiner. Ortog

  18 Eugène Thébault. Radio-Terror

  58 C.-F. Tiphaigne de La Roche. Amilec

  104 Louis Ulbach. Prince Bonifacio

  53 Théo Varlet. The Xenobiotic Invasion (w/Octave Joncquel)

  16 Théo Varlet. The Martian Epic; (w/André Blandin)

  59 Théo Varlet. Timeslip Troopers

  86 Théo Varlet. The Golden Rock

  94 Théo Varlet. The Castaways of Eros

  54 Paul Vibert. The Mysterious Fluid

  IN THE SAME SERIES

  News from the Moon

  The Germans on Venus

  The Supreme Progress

  The World Above the World

  Nemoville

  Investigations of the Future

  The Conqueror of Death

  Edited by Peter Gabbani

  English adaptation and introduction Copyright 2014 by Brian Stableford.

  Cover illustration Copyright 2014 Adam Tredowski.

  Visit our website at www.blackcoatpress.com

  ISBN 978-1-61227-333-4. First Printing. October 2014. Published by Black Coat Press, an imprint of Hollywood Comics.com, LLC, P.O. Box 17270, Encino, CA 91416. All rights reserved. Except for review purposes, no part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The stories and characters depicted in this novel are entirely fictional. Printed in the United States of America.

 

 

 


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