The Sirian Experiments

by Doris Lessing

  Meanwhile 3 (1) was being surveyed and prepared.

  I visited there, I suppose it could be said, from curiosity, though there was not much on the place to feed interest.

  It was arid, chilly, dusty.

  There were semifrozen marshes, maintaining some sluggish lizards and frogs.

  The vegetation was lichens, and a curious form of marsh weed that seemed half-animal. At any rate, while being anchored at one end in mud or slushy ice, the fronds, branches, feelers, crawled about all over the surface of the soil, sometimes even lifting and overturning stones and rocks, or burrowing down into mud, for the primitive insects and crustaceans. Sometimes these branches were half an R-mile long, and a single plant could cover a square mile. These animal-plants were a danger to our technicians, One was walking through what she believed to be quite ordinary, if unfamiliar vegetation, when the creature reached up with its ‘hands’ or feelers, and tugged her over, and when she was rescued, it was only just in time, for the ‘plant’ had already begun to dismantle her spacesuit, undoing screws and fastenings in search of the – obviously – delectable food within. This ‘plant’ caused much excitement among our naturalists, it goes without saying; but as for me, I had a more localized interest in the place, namely, whether it would indeed be possible to change the planet’s climate, as our experts claimed. It had one great advantage from our point of view: there was oxygen locked up in the soil.

  This moon revolves about Planet 3 four times in its year, and spins on its axis once. Planet 3 is far from its sun, and is itself on the cold and lethargic side.

  I left instructions to follow our experts’ recommendations that thermonuclear explosions should be tried, with the aim of warming the planet, and returned to the settlement of our experimentees on the mountainside of Isolated S.C. II.

  Enough time had passed for the first generation to have died out, and it was now a question of examining their progeny for signs of possible failure. None was found. Although they were existing on an oxygen supply of two-thirds of their familiar conditions on C.P. 9, they seemed to be thriving. I therefore took a decision: instead of giving them a further intermediate acclimatization period, I ordered them to be transferred at once to as high as it was possible for animals to subsist. This was at over 15,000 R-feet, more than twice the height of their previous station, and the drop in oxygen level was severe, not only in comparison with that station halfway up the range but particularly in comparison with their Home Planet. The experts reported their lungs were already enlarging. I saw them established. It was now such an effort for them to accomplish what was needed that I ordered an abandonment of our usual policy and had housing installed for them. As it happened, it was possible to get this from a Canopean settlement on the Isolated Northern Continent – I was interested, more than interested, in how this happened. I was pondering about how to get this housing easily, for while we had settlements over the other side of the mountain range – this was not far, relatively speaking, from my settlement of the old days, in the time of the Lombis – it happened that we were short of suitable aircraft. It was at this moment that I had a message from Klorathy offering the materials I needed. I record that I merely noted that this was Klorathy, that he was at work so close, in the continent north of this one, and that he had known where I was. I noted it, and went on with my task.

  I did not meet the fleet of their cargocraft as they arrived on the sea parallel with the mountains we were on, for I was convinced that Klorathy would not be there personally. The materials were lifted to the high plateaux by our craft. The settlement was soon in existence, double-storey wooden buildings, set out according to a plan that was found attached to the consignments of dismantled dwellings. I merely ordered this plan to be put into effect.

  The Planet 9 animals were not the most attractive I have known! Again, they were of small build, not more than three to four R-feet. They were stocky, and their original hairiness was already enhanced, because of these cold heights they were adapting to. Very bright glassy blue eyes peered from under shelves of reddish fur. They had bred three or four or even five to a litter, but already were giving birth to only two or at the most three. They were strong, physically, but more importantly – as we believed – strong by moral nature. That is, they were not subject to emotional collapse under difficulties.

  I watched these animals in their snowy valley lifted high up among those dreadful peaks, moving slowly in packs and groups, turning as one to face a new challenge – as, for instance, my appearance among them, or that of their supervisors. They stabilized their balance on long thick staves, and set their furry legs wide apart … the slow difficult turn of their heads, and the careful swivel of the cold blue eyes … the baffled glassy stare … all this was to see, or to fancy that one did, animals drugged, or tranced. I had seen this species on their Planet 9, where they are hardly a volatile or quick-moving kind, but at least did have some native liveliness. I was sorry for them, I admit. They had been told, on being rounded up for this experiment, that they were to accomplish a task of the greatest importance to Sirius, and that they would be honoured by the Empire if they succeeded: and what now remained in their progeny of this sense of importance was a feeling of having been chosen, or set apart. The supervisors reported that their instruction to their young was centred on their ‘special destiny’ and their ‘superior qualities’. All this was satisfactory.

  Their high valley, with its beautiful lake, enjoyed three months of summer, when they were able to grow brief crops of a cereal we introduced from our Central Cereal Stocks that was able to flourish in high dry places, and to come to fruition within the three months. This was their staple, but they grew, too, various kinds of marrow and pumpkin. They kept some sort of sheep for milk and meat. But they were not able wholly to maintain themselves, so slow and difficult were their lives, and so prolonged their periods of snow; and so we supplied them yearly with additional foodstuffs, telling them it was an expression of the gratitude of the Empire. After all, it was not our intention to breed a species self-sufficient under any difficult circumstances, but to breed one able to stay alive in the early stages of the new existence of 3 (1).

  I did not stay long on that trip. I had heard that the intermediary settlement, on the mountainside, had been visited by observers from a ‘kingdom’ further north along the mountain chain, and that attempts had been made to kidnap some of the animals. Presumably as slaves. It was a slave state, of a particularly unpleasant sort. Further attempts would probably be made.

  So went my reports. I then made a mistake. Believing that the extreme height of the new settlement would be enough of a deterrent, I did not order an increase in the supervisory force.

  I ordered, however, a visit by spies into this ‘kingdom’, and asked that their report should be sent to me where I would be on the other side of the mountain chain on the foothills above the great jungles that now covered so much of the continent.

  I wished to visit Ambien I, whom I had not seen for a long time.

  Ever since the unfortunate ‘events’ on Rohanda, which had knocked the axis askew and caused seasons, involving changes of vegetation and weather of a sometimes spectacular nature, it had been fashionable for certain of the more advantaged of our citizens to spend holidays on both southern continents to observe these ‘seasons’. Not only the well off; there were also excursions for officials of the more lowly kind, or even of ordinary citizens, particularly the elderly. In other words, there were two different sorts of visitor to Rohanda, for whom two standards of accommodation were prepared. My old friend Ambien I was put in charge of arranging the accommodation for the second class of our citizens and colonists. This did not mean more than a supervisory eye on the work of underlings. But he had indicated he would appreciate a chance to spend time in the better class of place, where I would join him.

  As this most agreeable visit has nothing to do with this account of mine, I shall merely say that I flew down to a holiday settlement, from whi
ch one was able to see the high mountains on one side, and over the top of the jungles on the other, and where we watched the snows of the winter dwindle off the mountain ranges, and rush everywhere in fountains and torrents of sparkling water. Meanwhile Ambien and I caught up with news and gossip of what turned out to be – when we added it all up – fifty thousand R-years! We had in fact last met on this planet, on a joint mission connected with the inspection of our laboratories.

  That meeting had seemed to us short enough; but this new one was even shorter, for the reports of our spies in the threatening kingdom reached me, and it was clear that something had to be done at once. An expeditionary force had been sent up into the mountains, and it had succeeded in capturing over 2,000 of the poor animals, whose future, judging from what I was finding out about Grakconkranpatl, was dark indeed.

  Ambien I and I talked it all over, and I made my plans. Leaving him, reluctantly, I flew away from this holiday place, full of species from every part of our Empire, all revelling in the sharp new sensations to do with changing weather, the delightful emotions associated with the ‘seasons’ – which pleasures are to be found only on Rohanda, or only to such a prodigal and always unexpected extent.

  It was as a result of this meeting of ours, and what we observed together of the reactions around us, that we recommended a team of medical experts to visit the Southern Continents, to see whether sojourns in places where the changes of the ‘seasons’ were particularly marked could benefit certain psychological conditions, such as melancholia, or an exaggerated dose of ‘the existentials’ – an irreverent name among the young for this emotional affliction. Our recommendations were followed; a team of medical technicians did explore possibilities on both continents; they agreed with our – tentative – conclusions; clinics were set up on appropriate sites; and it was not long before Rohanda became the most favoured place for the treatment of these afflictions.

  A side benefit was that a new branch or department of literature resulted. It is categorized in our libraries as Effluvia of the Seasons. I wonder how many now realize that this honoured, not to say hoary, branch of our great literature originated in Rohanda with that – now long-past – era of its use by us as a holiday station and emotional-adjustment area?

  GRAKCONKRANPATL

  As usual, I began my investigation with an aerial survey. I had to decide whether I wanted this to be noticed, and interpreted to Sirian advantage. After deliberation I decided on minimum visibility, choosing a surveillance aircraft that, if seen, could easily be dismissed as the result of freak atmospheric effects. Whirling at extreme speed, at the worst it would be seen as a kind of crystalline glisten. I chose a day of high winds, last-moving white cloud, and bright sun, and hovered over Grakconkranpatl long enough for a good survey.

  I certainly did not like what I saw: for one thing, I observed our poor Colony 9 animals being sadly misused. I had to retire with my observations to my old headquarters in the foothills that once had monitored the Lombi and other experiments, for an opportunity for solitary thought.

  What I had seen was this.

  Descending through gaps in the mountain ranges, my eyes filled with the blue sweep of the ocean, below me was what at first glance could seem to be an assemblage of vast stone cubes assembled on a high place between peaks. The vegetation was heavy, a dense green, kept back from the piled stone by brief clearings showing the reddish soil. The massive cubes were of a dull greyish blue, the same colour as certain ticks I had seen infesting animals. These great blocks crammed and piled together were the city, and closer analysis showed they were built of uniformly cut stones, fitted together. Their lowering colour, their massing and crowding arrangement, gave an impression of hostility and threat, and even of great size. Yet it was not a large city. There were no gardens or green. No central open space, only a not overlong avenue, or narrow rectangle, that lay between two very large buildings, facing each other. These two opposing facades had no openings or windows. There were few windows anywhere, and once observed, this fact explained the sombreness and the threat of the place. The roofs, however, did offer some relief, for they were flat, and each was crowded.

  I had never before seen a city like this, and if it had not been for our spies’ reports, would not have been able to interpret it. The social structure could not easily be inferred from it. I knew this to be a wealthy culture with a large ruling class of one race, and slaves and menials of other captured races.

  There was no sign here of rich and poor buildings, or rich and poor quarters of the city. Each of these vast blocklike buildings was a microcosm of the society, housing the rich and their attendants. The rich, as it was clear, lived on the top layers, where there were more windows, and on the roofs, which were equipped with awnings and shades and wind screens of all kinds. The slaves were down in the dungeonlike bottom layers where there was very little light. Life was never communal or public; there were no festivals or common amusements; no eating places, no baths, no shops.

  Around this central city, the heart of Grakconkranpatl, on lower slopes, were the farms and the mines. These stretched in every direction for long distances. The farms were worked with gangs of slaves. They lived in heavy stone buildings, built in regular blocks. From the air they looked depressingly uniform. They were prisons. Even from the height of my observation craft I could see that where there was a cluster of working slaves, there were lines of supervisors, with weapons. I thought of our encampment in the heights where our Colony 9 animals were being acclimatized, and the regular patterns of wooden huts in which they were kept, and could not help a pang, wondering if they perhaps felt not very different from the poor wretches I could see slaving below me. But after all, our supervision was only for their benefit, to keep them in health and of course to prevent them from running away, which would do them no good. And our punishments were hardly of the kind I knew were used here.

  All the same, I must record that I did not enjoy the comparisons I was being forced to make; and I suffered more than a few moments of attack from the existential problem.

  At various distances from the central city, beyond the farming areas, were mines; the culture made extensive use of minerals. The same dark and forbidding patterns of barracks showed where the mines were. Down the mountainside from Grakconkranpatl ran an absolutely straight paved road, a dark grey streak through the lush forests. This road can only be described as insane. It made no concession to the terrain, to ups and downs or even mountains and precipices. Where there was a mountain it did not wind about it, but drove straight through. A long precipitous decline of several R-miles had been filled with rubble and the road taken over it. What it looked like was that some tyrant in a fit of hauteur had commanded: Make me a road straight to the ocean!

  In fact I learned later that this was what had happened: hundreds of thousands of slaves had died in its making.

  From my craft, I could watch long trains of transport animals with their loads of fish from the sea making their way up to the city on its high place. I could see that it was joined all along its length by smaller, equally straight roads, for the transport of farm produce and minerals.

  I had to decide how best to present myself.

  I was handicapped by not having experienced this particular type of society before. ‘Religions’, of course, are to be found in one form or another everywhere. Only on Rohanda, due to the influence of Shammat – so I came to understand later – were theocracies common: that is, societies where the social structure was identical with the hierarchies of the religion. The ruling class was the priesthood, was hereditary, was all-powerful. The slaves were kept in order by the priesthood.

  The root of my problem, so it seemed to me, was the degree of cynicism of the priesthood.

  In other words, could they be frightened through ‘religion’ or could they not? I studied the reports for accounts of their ceremonies and practices, and concluded that since – for Rohanda – they were well established, not to say ancient, having la
sted for over a thousand years, and since this same ruling class had been perpetuated for so many generations, there was a likelihood that they in fact believed their repulsive inventions.

  The practice on which this ‘religion’ based itself was murder – ritual murder. This has always struck me as uneconomic, quite apart from its barbarity. One has to postulate a population organized to renew itself in excess of the needs of labour and breeding; or if not, then accessible to weaker cultures for the capture of slaves.

  Not only were large numbers of unfortunate creatures ‘sacrificed’ continually, the method was most disgusting. The heart was cut out while the victim was still alive. This had been going on, as I say, for centuries. This fact raises problems and questions that as an administrator cannot help but fascinate me, to do with the nature of what subject classes and races can be made to believe, or submit to.

  The thought that occurred to me when I read of this practice was, of course, how had it originated? Memories of meetings with Canopus, reports from our agents, came to my aid. Canopus always and everywhere on Rohanda attempts to modify and soften the effects of Shammat by enjoining a moderation of the natural appetites, sometimes referred to as ‘sacrificing the heart’. I concluded that this emotive and rhetorical phrase had, due to the continuous degeneration on Rohanda about which Nasar had been so eloquent, come to be taken literally. If this was the case, it seemed to me to indicate that Rohanda had, in the long interval since I had been involved there last, made a further step, and a large one, into brutishness.