The Aerial Valley

by Brian Stableford

  “It certainly is—but it was not by means of tears and blood, but by fraternity alone that it was acquired. But is it not time for you to recover a little strength?”

  Fifteen

  I had forgotten hunger, but I sat down with pleasure at an elegantly-set table in a courtyard planted with trees, into which we had just penetrated.

  My guide told me that we were in Nice. The weather was superb and the orange-trees in the courtyard embalmed that simple dwelling, in the best taste, with their perfumes.

  A young woman served us a modest cheese soup, macaroni, a chicken and a salad, all washed down with an exquisite wine.

  We chatted while eating, but from time to time I darted an anxious glance at a dog that was a short distance away from us and which did not seem to me to be very friendly.

  “It’s a wolf,” my guide told me.

  “A wolf!”

  “Have no fear, there are no more dangerous or wild animals. Come here, Lupus.”

  And Master Lupus advanced awkwardly, as a wolf might advance who wants to be gracious, and licked his hands.

  My guide then continued: “Thus far I’ve only talked about human wings, but progress never arrives alone. Some time afterwards, toward the end of the twentieth century, a Russian Orthodox priest made an exceedingly useful discovery, that of Petrifying Water.

  “What is Petrifying Water?”

  “That’s the name that was given to the discovery that transformed the Russian people, who had lived until then in servitude and misery, into property owners.

  Sixteen

  “The priest had remarked in the countryside in the vicinity of Odessa that the water of a small pond situated a quarter of a league from his parish sometimes became very dense, especially after stormy weather. He had the idea of spreading gravel there.

  “One tempestuous day, while the thunder was rumbling and everyone in the village was involving all the saints of holy Russia, he went on his own to the edge of the pond, armed with a long iron crowbar, and feverishly stirred the gravel that he had thrown into the dormant water. He pronounced cabalistic words, and felt the water and the gravel gradually forming a paste that hardened under the iron.

  “When the storm ceased the pond no longer existed; in its place there was a small quarry of gray stone, easy to carve, appropriate for sculpture and excellent for construction.

  “The good priest, who did not have a storm to hand every day, but who understood all the resources of electricity marvelously, did not make anyone else party to his discovery at first, but he went a league further on, to another pond, which he similarly filled with gravel. He launched electric currents through the layers, and after a certain labor, he obtained the stone again.

  “Soon, the discovery was propagated, and when, with the water and grains of sand, people were able to create stone, huts, shelters and houses rose up everywhere.

  Seventeen

  “That was a great source of union between people, for it is necessary not to hide the fact that the major source of discord and hated between them, for a long time, had been the question of rent.

  “From the day when everyone could easily become a property-owner, life really became cheap.

  “I forgot to tell you that in that epoch, an Arab shepherd found that everywhere, even in the most arid deserts, one could cause a spring to well up by means of a magnetized iron bar perforated in a certain fashion.

  “Progress succeeded progress as if by enchantment. An Italian discovered a method...”

  “Of singing?”

  “Better than that, Mardochée, of reading and calculating, which could be learned in an hour.”

  “And writing?”

  “Writing took longer; it required two days because of the different kinds of strokes.”57

  “That’s strange.”

  “Schools sprang up in every village and education gained a marvelous impetus.

  “Like a river too long dammed, which broke its dykes, there was a sudden rush, a delirium.

  “There were cheap reprints of all the classics and all the books of science; literature and the truth ere laced within the range of the people. Shakespeare, Byron, Schiller, Hugo, Sand, Balzac, Musset and Gautier were in the hands of working people, who devoured their works with delight.

  “Paper was, moreover, very common and printing much cheaper since a grandson of Laligant of Maresquel58 had started making paper with grass and leaves.”

  “With grass!”

  “Yes, Mardochée, with the least of vegetables, and America was exporting paper at one franc per hundred kilos.

  “But what about the fuel, the coal to power the machines?”

  “They could be powered by water, but electricity rendered even greater services. With fifty centimes’ worth of electricity, a machine functioned for a week. Enormous vessels were constructed, and railways trains took on large quantities of wagons.”

  “But what about accidents?”

  “They were no longer to be feared, thanks to a brake-mechanism invented by a Bosnian. Every train had a wagon at the head and the tail fitted with a brake with which the train could be halted instantly, and if encounters took place in thick fog, there was no more than a sight friction that no one except the mechanics perceived. But it’s nearly one o’clock; what it we were to leave this place?” my guide added.

  I made as if to pay.

  “Don’t do that,” said my cicerone, who approached our host.

  The latter came to shake our hands, and offered us cigars that had a delicious perfume.

  “What is this bizarre hotel, then?” I exclaimed.

  “There are no more hotels, Mardochée. All the houses on the globe are open to travelers; everyone receives the same welcome everywhere.”

  “What a century!” I cried. “Why hasn’t it always been thus?”

  “Because people were poor and ignorant before. Now that they’re educated, and comfortable, there are only men as God created them, humane, good and sociable.”

  Eighteen

  “But there no poor people any longer, you say?”

  “Eh? How could there still be any? Not only are there no more poor people, there are no more laborious classes. There are no longer any workers, domestics, slaves or wage-earners.”

  “There are no longer any rich people or aristocrats, then?”

  “What would be the point? Everyone is rich, everyone is noble. There is no longer anything but people who hold one another in esteem, who are equal and who are happy.”

  “What a dream!”

  “But it’s the reality, and it had to arrive in the fullness of time by virtue of the sequence of progressive improvements that removed the links, day by day, from the chain of human misery.”

  “Where are we going?” I said to my companion, for we had bid farewell to our host and had taken to the air again.

  “We can returning to Paris if you like, and I’ll show you the Capital of the world.”

  Nineteen

  And my guide continued his narration.

  “To follow approximately the order of the successive progress brought by the last ten centuries, I should tell you that, from the day when education was generalized and popularized new ideas sprang forth from the most obscure lairs that were easy to realize: utopia one day, routine the next.

  “A large number of periodicals were created: scientific periodicals, humorous periodicals, popular newspapers, always at very low prices.

  “The people were educated, and wanted more and more education.

  “The primitive instruments of labor were improved very rapidly, and arms were folded before the marvelous engines that were constructed to replace them.

  “Compositing machines were invented that could print a poster or a newspaper automatically in less time than it took to correct the proofs, but they could not be printed fast enough for the mass of readers.

  Twenty

  A tailor devised a machine that could produce a hundred overcoats, two hundred pai
rs of trousers or five hundred waistcoats in an hour.

  “A carpenter designed a plane that replaced mechanical saws.

  “A baker constructed an oven in which a thousand loaves were cooked in five minutes.

  “A painter replaced window-glass with colored transparent paper that did not cut the fingers when it broke.

  “Dirigible balloons were made that could carry a hundred passengers.

  “Fires were extinguished with a chemical compound.

  “Bridges were built over the ocean and across all the seas.

  “An Englishman imitated all wines and liqueurs with a few drops of essence.

  “A coal-merchant found diamond in a piece of coke.

  “A simple confectioner was able to mimic all the precious stones.

  “The heart of Africa was penetrated, where no traveler had ever set foot. Forests were found there populated by a highly intelligent species of apes, which, transplanted to every country, replaced humans in all domestic labor.

  “Even agriculture, before the voyage to Ceres that I shall tell you about shortly, had made extraordinary progress; agricultural implements, plows and seed-planters, were all powered by electricity; the price of food diminished, and as all the peasants profited from it, there was no more competition, and life no longer cost anything.

  “Photography had taken giant strides. It had completely dethroned painting.

  “By means of the new methods, people succeeded in immediately depicting forest scenes and entire cities in five minutes, and the walls of the most modest habitations were ornamented with them.

  “Soon, people only worked in order to distract themselves. Shops and restaurants opened in which everything was provided gratuitously. One only had to present oneself to take advantage of them. Theaters put on performances for nothing. Newspapers followed suit, and an advertisement taking up the entire fourth page of every newspaper only cost two francs fifty a month.

  “Mail was replaced by the telegraph and the telephone, each of which were placed in every town, in every house and on every floor, and eventually, thanks to cables connecting the planets, one could communicate very rapidly with any point whatsoever, from one globe to another.

  Twenty-One

  “One rather curious thing happened in the year 2250. There was a great exhibition in the Champ-de-Mars in Paris.

  “The exhibition opened on the first of May.

  “At eight o’clock in the morning the Champ-de-Mars was bare, devoid of constructions and machines; by midday five hundred thousand people of all nations were strolling in magnificent galleries. Everything was functioning; all the industries of the globe were represented there.

  “Splendid cafés were open.

  “There was a marvelous botanic garden: a superb collection of all the plants, all the birds and insects of all lands.

  “Every visitor received a free guide-book to the exhibition, which was printed in front of them, and which included portraits of all the exhibitors.

  “On display at the exhibition were music boxes that could replace entire orchestras, umbrella-hats, sleigh-shoes and the famous night-lights that procured the most magical dreams that anyone could desire.

  Twenty-Two

  “But here we are back in Paris. Let’s sit down outside this café and I’ll tell you in a few words about human excursions to other planets.

  “About a hundred years after the invention of human wings, when all the scientists on Earth had gathered in Paris for a choral festival, it was decided to attempt an expedition to the Moon, all the more so because, for some time, notable changes had been observed in the physiognomy of that planet.

  “In certain parts, in the middle of the night, the Moon took on a vivid red coloration; some astronomers even claimed that it was on fire.

  “An assembly was thus formed, numbering two thousand, the majority consisting of the greatest scientists of the epoch. They did not take any weapons, but cargoes of jewels and precious fabrics to offer to the inhabitants they hoped to encounter. In addition, they were furnished with an enormous quantity of brass wire, which they were to unroll as they rose into the sky, in such a way as to create a telegraphic cable.

  “The weather was magnificent, and the voyage very pleasant; the travelers wore furs in order to traverse the cold currents, but they scarcely perceived any change in temperature because, as they approached the moon, they felt a gentle heat produced by its luminous rays.

  Twenty-Three

  “The voyage lasted two days because of the delay caused by the extension of the cable.

  “Finally, they arrived.

  “Would you believe it, Mardochée? They were awaited with impatience, and the red flames perceived on Earth were produced by the burning of vast forests, which the Lunatics had set ablaze in order to signal to the inhabitants of Earth.

  “A population of extraordinary mildness was found on the Moon. The Lunatics were very learned, almost all astronomers, and very well versed in calculation. For a long time they had been fabricating optical instruments of an extraordinary powers and precision. They spent their lives gazing at other planets, principally Earth.

  “First of all, they had seen human wings functioning. They were very jealous of them, but had been unable to imitate them in spite of all their efforts.

  “They had hoped to see a few Terrans disembarking on their world some day.

  “The sciences and arts on the Moon were at almost the same point as on Earth; they copied our progress from afar.

  “But they were much more gentle and benevolent than Terrans, and had only formed a single family for a long time.

  “In matters of religious belief they had retained the Old Testament but practiced the sound and fraternal maxims of the Gospel.

  Twenty-Four

  “The cable having succeeded perfectly, a dispatch was sent to Earth to announce the success of the voyage and, at the same time, to order the wings that the Lunatics were impatient to acquire.

  “The Moon resembled the Earth very closely. It had mountains, lakes and rivers, as down here.

  “The Lunatics made a gift to the Terrans of a turquoise that had the quality of taming the most ferocious animals and rendering them as meek as sheep.

  “The next day, a second caravan arrived from Earth; it brought a cargo of wings, which were received with enthusiasm, and the Lunatics prepared to make a voyage to the planet Mercury, which was immediately accomplished.

  Twenty-Five

  Mercury had been chosen because the Lunatics had observed that among the Mercurians there were no cripples, nor hunchbacks, nor any other infirm individuals, as there were among them and among Terrans.

  “The reception was extremely cordial.

  “They quickly learned the cause of the perfection of the race of the inhabitants of Mercury. They were admitted to the study of medicine from the most tender infancy, and had discovered secrets that cured paralytics, relieved hunchbacks and enabled the lame to walk straight. There were no invalids among them.

  “Cuts, falls and wounds were healed as if by enchantment.

  “Headaches, toothache and stomach aches were unknown, and the Terrans were very glad to get to know those curious Aesculapians.

  A large number of Mercurians received wings, and joined in with the expedition that was made to Saturn.

  Twenty-Six

  “On that planet there were many other marvels. It was inhabited by an eccentric population that was nourished entirely by bread, and which, with the aid of a certain liquor, had found the means of prolonging existence and no longer aging after thirty years.

  “No one among them was unhappy. No more wrinkles, no more white hair, no more false teeth, no more old age, no more annoyances.

  “An eternal youth reigned throughout that fortunate planet, which chagrins and anxieties never penetrated.

  “They too had seen our wings, but they were not jealous of them.

  “They had no envy at all of mortals, having made a pact agains
t death.

  “On the arrival of the strangers, they welcomed them fraternally, and informed them of the means to remain immortal, like them.

  Twenty-Seven

  “The scientists of Earth were going from one surprise to another, and from one marvel to another. They decided to go to Jupiter. On that planet, they found a population even more amiable than those they had found elsewhere.

  “The inhabitants of Jupiter, too, brought their tribute to science and progress.

  “They had found the means of improving their senses. Thanks to a soap manufactured with the juice of certain plants, which they dissolved in marble vats, they took marvelous baths, on emerging from which the body had obtained extraordinary qualities, which were truly magical. The ears could hear at a distance of a hundred leagues. The eyes could see to infinity. The nose had an extraordinary sense of smell. The hands could break the hardest iron like glass.

  “One could go without sleep for a fortnight without experiencing the slightest fatigue.

  “And what was most advantageous of all was that one was endowed with a second sight so powerful that the most secret thoughts were instantaneously divined.

  They exchanged their soap for human wings and became very good friends with the travelers from other planets.

  Twenty-Eight

  “As you can see, Mardochée, every planet brought humankind a new marvel. The invention of wings was about to change the world, for everyone was to profit from the benefits brought by virtue of voyages.

  “From planet to planet the electric cables were extended. Inhabitants of Earth were arriving all the time, attracted by curious dispatches.

  “On Earth, there were continual celebrations and rejoicing. People embraced in the street, congratulating one another; everyone was crazy.