by Emile Calvet
“In sum, if human genius had been indefinitely struck by inertia, instead of finding ourselves in a marvelous world that the most audacious imaginations would not have dared to conceive, we would be wandering at this moment in the midst of the burrows dug by our ancestors.”
XI. The Atmospheric Railway and the River
The four men had returned to their departure point.
“It’s half past ten, Messieurs,” said Herber, after having darted a glance at the vast electric clock-face ornamenting the rear fronton of the school museum, “We’re going to go to the nearby station, which is three hundred meters away.”
The travelers followed the schoolmaster, who traversed the courtyard. When reached the extremity of the planted area, he went to an immense oak door, ornamented by shiny bans of polished steel. In response to a light pressure exerted on a spring fixed in the wall, the two battened swung majestically on their hinges. They passed under an elegant stone arch, while the monumental door slowly closed behind them.
Herber and his guests went along a path that opened on to a rectangular plaza covered with bushy chestnut-trees arranged in quincunxes. In the distance, fifty Parisians of all ages and both sexes were waiting in the vicinity of an elegant structure disposed as a shelter.
The group was presumably composed of inhabitants of the neighborhood, for they all tipped their hats to the schoolmaster, who replied with an all-round greeting.
Suddenly, the sound of a powerful horn was heard to the right, and a few moments later, a train composed of ten luxurious carriages towed by a powerful machine came to a stop opposite the shelter.
The travelers stepped on to the footplates, and the train moved off again.
A hundred meters away it suddenly plunged into a broad tunnel illuminated by resplendent globes attached to the walls. The train had already resumed its customary speed, and the electric lamps fled backwards like dazzling meteors.
“We’re going at least sixty kilometers an hour,” said the physicist.
“Seventy,” said Herber. “It’s the regulation speed.”
“The carriages are admirably suspended,” observed the doctor. “One doesn’t experience the movement of trepidation that shook travelers on ancient railways. I also noticed that the wheels are solid and rather massive, which favors our relative comfort.”
“What I find charming,” said Gédéon, “is the essentially comfortable disposition of the carriages. There are wide, soft seats for Epicureans, and a balcony surrounding the entire train for those in a peripatetic mood.” As the train emerged into the open, he added: “But it seems to me that the track is curved.”
“The track is absolutely circular,” the schoolmaster replied. “I can explain our intramural circulation to you briefly. A dozen circular tracks, almost equally spaced, divide the city into concentric zones. On the other hand, a great many radii converge toward the center, but without reaching it, for they stop at the fifth zone, establishing numerous connections between the various points of the outer lines. The spaces within the mesh of that gigantic network are served by electric carriages that cross them in all direction, in such a way that there isn’t a single point in the city that can’t be rapidly reached on leaving one’s house.
“You must have observed, when we set off, that no one paid in order to board the train. That singularity will be explained when you know that every inhabitant pays a special tax that constitutes an obligatory subscription. Only pupils in schools and universities, professors and members of scientific societies enjoy complete gratuity, from which their guests benefit. As for foreigners passing through, they pay a price proportional to the duration of their stay—an insignificant expense, which the less fortunate are spared.”
“I see with satisfaction, and, I might say, with pride, that members of the educational profession not only enjoy the highest consideration here but some very enviable immunities.”
“It can certainly be said that occupy the highest rank in the social scale,” replied Herber, “but the position is one of the most difficult to acquire. It is only after ten years of effort, labor, struggle, examinations and competitions that it is possible for a few people to achieve the envied title of schoolmaster. As for that of director of an establishment, it is only conferred on those who have the merit and good fortune to be singled out by some significant discovery.”
“You have several masters under your orders, then?” asked Terrier.
“Under my orders is not the proper expression; they are my auxiliaries, for I don’t have the right to determine who they teach.”
“Their position, without being equal to yours, is doubtless very satisfactory from the material viewpoint?”
“Yes. They’re very comfortably lodged in the school buildings. Their salary is twenty thousand francs, and if, in accordance with what you’ve told me, my ideas are correct regarding monetary comparisons, that corresponds to the situation of someone in your homeland who possesses an annual income of thirty thousand francs.”
“The present-day conditions of education, my dear colleague,” the professor said, “plunge us into a profound astonishment. In the society that we have just left, the career is full of disappointments. It is the refuge of poverty, often that of misery.”
“You surprise me equally,” the schoolmaster replied. “Our role is, however, the most important in the entire social estate. It is into our hands that a being is put whose mind, heart, conscience and will are still drifting in the void, and which the hazard of currents might as easily draw toward evil as toward good. It is reserved for us to develop, fortify and direct all the forces of which he is unaware himself.
“Although, in a remote epoch, a frightful moralist dared to write that the executioner is the key to society’s vault,18 today, Messieurs, everyone is firmly convinced that it is the schoolmaster. As the great Leibniz said: The man who is the master of education can change the face of the world.”
For a few minutes, Gédéon had been giving signs of an extraordinary agitation. Suddenly, he lunged toward his companions, exclaiming in a loud voice; “Look, Messieurs—of all the magnificent things we have seen, there is the one that appears to me the most grandiose and the most astonishing.” Pointing westwards, he showed the amazed scientists a magnificent bridge six hundred meters long, a colossal construction, presenting five cast iron arches and three hundred feet of opening, admirable crowned with sculpted stone masonry.
At that moment a dull and prolonged rumble indicated that the train was passing over the river, half a kilometer upstream of the monumental bridge. It was as if the train were suspended above the river, which was deployed in all its splendor, flowing with the profound metallic noise that is the prerogative of great masses of moving liquid.
“That’s what I call a river!” exclaimed Gédéon, to the astonishment of the passengers. “It could swallow the old Seine three times over without swelling by an inch. What majesty there is in those broad quays, bordered with splendid palaces! What incomparable richness in the prodigious number of works of art!”
This series of passionate interjections was suddenly interrupted by the disappearance of the train between two high walls.
“It’s certain,” said Terrier, addressing the schoolmaster, “that to bring the Seine to that enormous width, terrible difficulties must have been overcome. In what epoch was the river-bed extended?”
“The works are contemporary with those of the lake,” Herber replied.
“But the monuments that were on the banks must have been demolished!” exclaimed Antius.
“You’re talking as they did a long time ago, Doctor. When the engineers set to work, serious objections were raised by the Archeological Society, who wished to conserve the ruins of the Louvre, after having succeeded in obtaining respect for those of the ancient cathedral, Notre-Dame de Paris. We have got past that point, and the river has a similar breadth for an extent of thirty kilometers. It is traversed within the city by fifteen bridges, in different styles,
but all as magnificent as one another. Ships of large tonnage once went upriver as far as two thousand meters beyond the old ramparts.”
“That enterprise must have cost hundreds of millions,” Terrier remarked, “for, in addition to the works, properly speaking, fabulous sums must certainly have been paid out for the expropriations.”
“The expense was indeed very considerable; however, thanks to the perfection and power of machinery, and especially by reason of the dilapidation of the riverside constructions, both public and private, it had been calculated in advance that the expense would be considerably inferior to what it would have been in other conditions, when the project would rightly have been considered utopian.
“The economic benefits realized surpassed the most optimistic predictions, and the city finally possesses a magnificent river, absolutely necessary to a seaport. The enormous widening of the river bed has reduced the speed of the current, a circumstance favorable to navigation.”
“The honorable corporation of Seine boatmen must have undergone a fabulous development,” hazarded Gédéon, strongly agitated by the memory of his nautical exploits.
“Of course,” Herber replied. “Navigation for pleasure is one of the complementary branches of gymnastics, which is the general basis of corporeal education.”
The horn resounded again and some of the passengers got up in order to get off at the next station. The train decelerated rapidly and, after a few seconds, came to a stop beside a new shelter. A hundred passengers launched themselves out of the carriages and were replaced by an almost equal number of newcomers. The signal-horn blared again and the train moved forward.
“We’re getting off at the next station,” Herber said. “We’ll only be fifty paces from the warehouse. I didn’t have to bring you so far, for we have one of the twelve shops near the school, but this one is directly on the way to the lake.
“What! There are only twelve shops to clothe all Paris?” the young man exclaimed. “Everyone must employ thousands of hands.”
“A few hundred,” the schoolmaster replied, “for humans today only have to supervise, command and direct. Humans leave labor largely to a worker of incomparable strength, nourished by fire and chemical agents, who extends a hundred thousand arms, though which life circulates incessantly, relentlessly and untiringly. Thanks to that prodigious strength, the difference between the price of raw materials and that of the finished article is not very great.”
The stop signal sounded a few minutes later, and, a hundred meters further on, the train, which had gradually reduced its speed, came to a halt.
The travelers got down, and, guided by their host, they went along a broad shady thoroughfare. A short distance from the station, the suddenly found themselves in front of an immense building ornamented with columns and attributes. On the central fronton a semicircular shield bore the embossed words CLOTHING STORE.
Followed by his guests, Herber climbed the steps of the peristyle and went into a vast hall.
A young man who was walking with a measured step, hands behind his back, seemingly enduring his sentry duty philosophically, turned round when the visitors came in, advanced toward them and bowed.
Herber handed him a card. The employee’s face suddenly expressed surprise and deference. “Monsieur,” said the schoolmaster, “I have brought these friends to your store. They have come a long way and desire to abandon, at least for a while, the fashions of their own country in order to dress like us.”
“We’re very honored by your visit, Messieurs,” the young man replied. “Someone will take you to the clothing gallery.” He pressed a bell-push, and a few seconds later, the two battens of a lateral door opened. A colleague appeared in the doorway, making vain efforts to stifle an expressive yawn, but he very kindly put himself at the disposal of his clients.
Twenty minutes later, the fur visitors, dressed in an almost uniform manner, left the warehouse, not without having darted a glance into the workshops, where several hundred looms were only waiting for a simple electric contact to become animated once again.
XII. The Lake
The profoundly blue sky had not a single cloud, and the sun was pouring torrents of light and heat on to the earth. The caravan set off under the shady vault of tall trees, in the midst of a cheerful and noisy crowd that was going in the same direction.
“Everyone’s going to the fête,” said Herber.
“I don’t really understand the general excitement,” hazarded Antius. “When one has a speed of transportation in excess of a hundred and twenty meters an hour available, a thousand meters above ground, it seems to me unimportant to know whether one pleasure-boat can move a little less slowly than another.”
“The races on the lake always attract an immense crowd of spectators, for several reasons,” the schoolmaster replied. “In the first place, Parisian youth, since the remotest times, has always been passionate about nautical sports, and the ship that the city bears on its coat of arms is a telling symbol. Secondly, rowing is a gymnastic exercise much esteemed by people of all ages. Finally, Parisians are very proud of their lake and seize every opportunity, or every pretext, that can take them to its shores.”
The avenue along which they were walking sloped upwards sensibly, and the silvery sheet of the Seine appeared to their gaze occasionally through lateral gaps.
“If I’m not mistaken,” the doctor said, “we’re going up toward a part of the city once occupied by the eminently peaceful quarter known as Passy.”
“Your conjecture is correct,” Herber replied. “As soon as we’ve reached the end of the avenue, we’ll see the lake at our feet.”
“In which part of the ancient city has it been hollowed out?” asked he physicist.
“The lake has absorbed in total, on the left bank of the river, the part of the city and the suburb that our ancestors once called the plain of Grenelle, and on the right bank, the entire territory of Boulogne. Around its periphery it’s delimited by the hills of Issy, Bellevue, Sèvres, Saint-Cloud, Ville-d’Avray and Passy. Those heights, one scantily inhabited, are now covered with palaces and constitute an ensemble of marvels unrivaled in the entire world. All the habitations are preceded by magnificent terraces, from which the gaze embraces an admirable panorama. The lake, at its greatest width, measures more than three thousand meters; its length extends for nearly two leagues.”
At that moment, the travelers arrived on the plateau. Guided by Herber, they went into the trees of a vast garden. Wide pathways roofed with verdure ran parallel all the way to a terrace bordered by a stone ramp supported by sculpted columns. Scarcely had they emerged from the park than they instinctively hastened their steps, and a triple cry of admiration escaped them at the same time.
The lake, like an immense gleaming mirror, extended at their feet. Several thousand spectators were sitting on the inclined lawn, whose slope extended into the waves. An innumerable quantity of walkers was strolling along a wide circular boulevard, which made an admirable frame for the liquid expanse. From top to bottom, the hills were covered with luxuriant parks and splendid palaces.
The magical scene, bathed by the ardent effluvia of the sun, presented the most grandiose and gripping sight. The three travelers, mute with admiration, devoured the marvelous spectacle with their eyes, while the number of walkers flowing over the terrace became ever larger. On the lake, several hundred pleasure boats of every shape and size were tracing rapid furrows.
Races were held at the same time in several parts of the basin From time to time, the faint echo of distant applause announced a victory. In response to an invitation from the schoolmaster, the travelers went down a sloping path that led to the foot of the hill. Following the shore of the lake, they took a long walk, discovering further magnificence at every stride.
The sun was sinking toward the horizon when Herber asked his guests to climb back up the bank to go to the nearest station.
As they reached the vast estuary where the river flowed into the lake, Géd
éon stopped. “What is that solitary and motionless biped doing, perched on the water’s edge on that tree-trunk?” he asked.
“That’s an angler,” Herber replied.
“An angler! I suspected as much.” The sight of the placid fisherman had awakened his memories of the furious arguments in which, in his capacity as a freshwater sailor, he had once engaged with inoffensive citizens of that category. “The last angler will survive the last century,” he remarked, in a lyrical tone. “The worlds will fall apart before that impassive being, half-human and half-vegetable, rooted to the bank. It’s him to which the words of Horace might apply: Impavidum ferient ruinae.”19
A judicious observation by the schoolmaster regarding the hour of departure extracted him from his contemplation. They hastened their steps, and, ten minutes later, went into the courtyard of the station, encumbered at that moment by a compact crowd of city-dwellers waiting for the train.
The horn-signal did not take long to sound, and a powerful machine towing a long line of carriages came to a stop beside the shelter. The mass of travelers broke up, and the carriages were taken by storm. The train moved off again and went over a monumental bridge.
Twenty minutes later, the schoolmaster and his guests came into the main courtyard of the school.
Madame Herber and her daughter, running down the steps of the perron, came to meet them. The foreigners bowed respectfully to the young woman, who asked about their excursion with interest.
Antius was concluding an account full of color, corroborated by the expressive gestures of his companions, when the carillon of an electric bell was heard.
“Dinner is ready,” said Madame Herber.
Antius rounded his arm and offered it to his charming hostess. The guests started walking toward the dining-room. A few moments later, they were sitting around a sumptuous table.