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  The
  Mania of the Nations
  on the Planet Mars
  and its Terrific Consequences

  A Combination of Fun and Wisdom
  by
  A. CALMADENKER

  Published in the Year 55 E.D. on Mars
  (1915 A.D. on Earth)
  BY THE DENKER PUBLISHERS, INC.
  30 CHURCH STREET, NEW YORK




  Copyright, 1915
  by THE DENKER PUBLISHERS, INC.




THE MANIA OF THE NATIONS ON THE PLANET MARS


Many millions of centuries ago, when the celestial globe on which
we live and struggle started to emerge from the hot-air habit and
commenced to cool down and come to its senses, a huge mass of
syrup-like material sagged down toward the lower end of the cooling
ball and, upon further cooling, formed a high promontory at what we
to-day call the South Pole. As a consequence we now find there a
plateau of an elevation far exceeding in height the highest mountains
found elsewhere on our venerable globe.

You may imagine if you can how cold it must be there. The North Pole
is supposed to be cool enough for anybody who hates to go to sleep in
an overheated bedroom; but it has been shown to be a depression in
the earth’s crust filled with ice, and it therefore does not mount
far above sea level, while the South Pole, aside from lacking the
sun’s comforting perpendicular rays, reaches besides so high up in the
atmospheric layers as to preclude all possibility of the prevalence of
hot birds. Cold bottles are about the only means of enjoyment which the
tourists, thirsting for amusement, find there at their disposal.

Professor FANSEE of the Dreemo University was a courageous man. He may
have been afflicted with a creepy feeling in the still, mysterious
shadows of the night; he may have had a constant fear of spooks and all
sorts of ferocious beasts; he may have stood in perpetual awe of his
innocent-looking wife; but it must be said to his everlasting glory
that he was not at all afraid of the cold. It is being whispered that
after many years of married life his affectionate spouse had at last
succeeded in more or less accustoming him to frigidity.

Professor FANSEE, moreover, was an expert in astronomy, chemistry and
electricity. With a smile of derision he had watched for years the
futile efforts on the part of certain scientists to communicate with
the planet Mars. Long ago an idea had ripened in his fertile brain
that he knew would ultimately lead to the desired end. The highest
plateau on earth having been shown to be located at the South Pole,
he decided to direct his Zee-rays from this cool and calm promontory.
For this purpose he caused an enormous hollow globe to be built of
non-conducting material, so arranged that the inner chambers would
retain an upright position while the ball would be merrily rolling
along. By means of powerful storage batteries within this potent
structure the apparatus was made self-propelling. With this rolling
vehicle at his beck and call, he needed no ships to cross the Antarctic
ocean, no derricks to hoist his globular observatory to the highest
peak; and without notifying the press, unostentatiously as befits a
serious-minded scientist, he arrived one fine morning at the highest
point of that celestial conveyance which we call the earth.

From this elevation he industriously worked his ingenious device. For
six months he shot his Zee-rays day and night at the unsuspecting
Martians. For six months his endeavors seemed utterly fruitless. Then,
of a sudden, in the middle of the night, a faint wail was heard in
the Professor’s receiving apparatus; a manifestation of the first
indication that his brain-child had actually come into healthful
being. For two weeks, at intervals of twenty minutes, Professor FANSEE
cautiously manipulated his quivering wires. Then, at last, to his
unbounded joy and satisfaction, the first communication from Mars
became intelligible. From that moment on, it took but a few days to
come to an understanding with the mystic inhabitants of our misty
neighbor; and an interesting narrative was thus obtained of conditions
prevailing on the presumably canal-infested planet.

Professor FANSEE unfortunately breathed his last before returning to
his native land. But I had had the honor of acting as his assistant and
confidant. And although to my keen disappointment the globe in which we
traveled was wrecked on the rocks while making a landing on the shores
of New Zealand, I had the good fortune of safely swimming ashore and of
saving the papers containing the interesting revelations. So, with due
credit to Professor FANSEE, and with fond recollections of his erudite
personality, I believe myself justified in revealing the Martian
episode to my terrestrial fellowmen.

The marked similarity with events on our own celestial empire may
strike my readers as a singular coincidence. But according to
prehistoric astrologers, all events are controlled by the position of
the stars. And, if they do control the course of events on our earth,
it seems but natural that they should similarly affect some of the
other members of our solar system.

First of all, as Professor FANSEE had always been profoundly interested
in questions of religion, and as his first inquiries consequently
dealt with this highly important subject, it should be stated that for
eighteen centuries and a half the ruling religion on the planet Mars
had been the religion of NAZARRO. NAZARRO was a God who, according
to the Martians, materialized in human form on the planet Mars. This
God preached a gospel of peace, of the curbing of passions, and of
equal division of wealth. So the Roamani and the Heebrons, among whom
he dwelt, sought to punish His revolutionary agitations by hanging
Him on the gallows. Thus the sign of the gallows became a sign of
sanctity revered by NAZARRO’S followers, and the emblem of a new faith.
The members of the religious sect so created and which for fifteen
centuries continued to grow in power were known as the Nazarranos.

About the end of the fifteenth century E.N. (the Era of NAZARRO) the
trend of civilization commenced to take a somewhat different direction.
If the Nazarranos had limited themselves to spreading the precepts of
NAZARRO unchanged, our Martian informer thought, all of the inhabitants
of Mars would unswervingly have recognized their excellence. But only
a few among the Martians were mentally as lofty as had been the
Great Nazarrano Teacher. Consequently, when the Nazarranos organized
a Nazarrano corporation under the personal direction of certain lower
and higher functionaries, these functionaries, supposedly for the honor
of NAZARRO, often resorted to methods of which NAZARRO Himself would
never have approved. The unavoidable result was that certain Martians
seriously began to doubt the superiority of the whole Nazarrano faith.

Meanwhile, from remote antiquity down to this interesting era,
the minds of the Martians had gradually developed to ever greater
efficiency; and it so happened that at this time they commenced to
investigate the phenomena of Nature far more systematically than they
had ever done before. In connection with the Nazarrano faith a mystic
story had been preached of the creation of the Universe, gathered from
the Heebron manuscripts, and which made the Martians believe that Mars
was a flat slice of land floating on water, around which the remainder
of the Universe majestically rotated. So when a Martian by the name
of GALELIAH discovered that Mars was a globe, and that Mars rotated
round the Sun, and not the Sun around Mars, the Nazarrano corporation
officials strenuously objected, for they saw in his suggestion the
first signs of disbelief. Notwithstanding the opposition of the
Nazarrano officials, various sciences began to develop in other
directions, until the Nazarranos were forced, little by little, to
change their views of creation. In every instance the Nazarrano
dignitaries registered their objections in vain with greater or lesser
vehemence. At last, in the year 1859 E.N., a new prophet arose, bearing
the euphonic name of DARVINO. In the country of the Frank-Aulians,
otherwise known as the Fringe, a book had previously been published by
LAMARCKEESO, suggesting that the development of the Universe was due
to a process of evolution; and the intrepid DARVINO rigged a ship to
search for proofs, and published these proofs convincingly in the said
memorable year 1859 E.N.

From that time on, a new faith began to conquer the minds of the
Martians. To a numerous group of scientists the year 1861 E.N. became
the year 1 E.D. (Era of DARVINO). A new religious sect came into
being known as the Darvinianos. And although a large majority of
the Nazarranos continued to profess their older faith, their views
of the Universe as well as their conceptions of proper living were,
nevertheless, ever more definitely influenced by the Darviniano
conclusions.

Now the belief in personal Gods, of which the Nazarrano faith had been
the latest outgrowth, had prevailed on the planet Mars for innumerable
centuries. The Martian idea of morality had for an almost unlimited era
been taught to the young in so close a connection with the faith in
personal and semi-human Deities, that it seemed to the Martians that
this faith was the rock on which moral conduct was necessarily to be
founded. The faith in personally supervising Divinities had penetrated
the customs and moral conceptions not only of the Nazarranos, but well
nigh of all the Martian nations and religious sects. It had grown to be
to all appearances inseparable from the Martians’ way of giving vent
to their emotional longings and inclinations. On the other hand, the
Darviniano conclusions contained nothing of an emotional nature. They
sprang from the intellect, and appealed to the intellect only.

As the year 1859 E.N. on Mars corresponds exactly with the year 1859
A.D. on earth, it may readily be seen that at the time of Professor
FANSEE’S intercourse with our neighboring planet, the Darviniano faith
had prevailed only for a little over half a century. Of course, new
faiths, new religions, new philosophies, cannot ripen to completeness
in so short a lapse of time. Hence, in order to satisfy their emotional
longings and moral desires, the Martians continued to resort to the
Nazarrano manuscripts, adopting meanwhile the intellectual views
of the Darvinianos, and trying as best they could to harmonize the
two systems of thought. But try as they might, they were ever and
again confronted by disturbing contradictions. This inevitably gave
rise to an unsettled emotional condition, which our Martian informer
indeed seemed deeply to deplore, but which--in his clearly expressed
opinion--would beyond doubt make way for a renewed era of moral
stability and mental ease, so soon as the Darviniano faith had been
made more nearly complete--and hence more satisfactory--by an infusion
of the emotional element.

Having in this way concisely explained the religious situation on the
whirling Canal-globe, our informant, who evidently was an erudite
philosopher delegated for this purpose, suddenly changed the subject
in order that he might acquaint us with the principal international
political events that had occurred on Mars during the Nazarrano era.

To our astonishment we received the unmistakable impression that
the social conditions on the earthlike planet are as yet extremely
primitive. It seems that, in ancient times, those groups of Martians
who inhabited territories surrounded by mountains and forests or
bordered by oceans and rivers, were forced to consider these natural
boundaries as insurmountable barriers, and that these barriers made
their communication with other groups of Martians almost impossible.
Each of these groups was thus for many long centuries constrained to
lead an isolated existence. The tribes that occupied one valley never
came in contact with the inhabitants of other valleys. One group of
Martians would dwell at one side of some large forest; on the other
side some other group would be struggling along; but the two groups
never met to interchange their views or to learn in what way the other
had increased the comforts of life. Naturally, therefore, each group
developed a language and crude civilization of its own, and the result
was the division of the inhabitants of Mars into separate nations, each
with its own peculiar customs and ideals.

As science advanced, the communication between these isolated nations
was ever more facilitated, and their mutual relations became ever more
intimate. At the time at which Professor FANSEE received his remarkable
message, perfect intercommunication had been established by means of
railroads, steamship lines, telegraphs and telephones. The Martians
had even commenced to travel through the air from one country to
another. In this manner all the nations were enabled to benefit by the
scientific progress made by any one of them.

Now if each nation had been sufficient unto itself, if each country
had from its own resources provided all the ingredients it needed
under its more progressive form of civilization, it might to an extent
have been sensible for the various groups of Martians to say to one
another: “We are mighty glad to come in contact with you, and we are
deeply interested in your customs and ideals, which seem at first sight
so very much at variance with our own, and which are nevertheless at
bottom so very similar to ours; but as we do not see the slightest
benefit in changing the conditions that be, we prefer not to destroy
our national individuality. For our national pride has grown to be a
sacred idol among us, with which no higher ideals of a more expanded
brotherhood should be permitted to interfere.” But our Martian informer
stated that in actuality none of the Martian nations really _is_
sufficient unto itself. With the broadened requirements of life which
inevitably followed in the wake of scientific development and mental
expansion, it was found that each nation produces articles of some
special type, of which all the other nations are keenly and continually
in need. The soil of one country is rich in certain products not found
in other countries, even though these other countries require them as
well. In fact, it was soon disclosed that all civilized nations are
utterly dependent upon each other, both mentally and physically.

Under these circumstances, the unprejudiced observer would naturally
expect the nations to form some sort of an alliance or federation
for mutual protection, and with a view to a sensible combination of
interests. Yet so short-sighted have been the evidently narrow-minded
Martians until now, that they have utterly failed to take any such
step. Nay, instead of cooperating with each other, the nations
actually antagonize one another with blind stupidity. Small-minded
jealousies and hatreds, expressing themselves especially in a peculiar
international science which the Martians call dip-low-macy, keep the
nations aloof from one another, and make sworn hereditary enemies of
nations that should entertain naught but friendly and cooperative
relations. Even those nations which have acquired the same faith, the
same hopes, the same aspirations, continue to lead their isolated
national existence, carefully nursing their mutual petty hatreds
and malice against other nationalities. Inasmuch as pretty nearly
all the Martian nations seem to be afflicted with this malicious
nationality-mania, the planet Mars, as seen from the earth, inevitably
makes the impression of one vast lunatic asylum, nationality-mania
being the dreadful malady from which the Mars-bound patients are
unfortunately suffering. Their minds seem to be as much in a whirl as
is the rolling planet which they inhabit.

This most unfortunate mental disease even disrupts and destroys the
much vaunted bonds of a common religious faith.

On the planet Mars, aside from the Nazarranos, another religious
sect flourishes, founded by a prophet whose name, as far as we could
decipher, was MOE HAMID. This MOE HAMID strictly prohibited the
use of the mussel as an article of nourishment. And by the law of
contradiction or by the irony of fate, the sect has ever since been
known as the Musselmen. Now these Musselmen, although dispersed among
different nationalities, have really formed a sort of brotherhood
founded on their faith. Whenever a holy war is declared in earnest, all
Musselmen stand together. That the members of this sect should refer
to the Nazarrano-Darvinianos as dogs, may be deplorably one-sided,
but can readily be understood. At any rate the Musselmen are known to
stick together. Among the Darvinized Nazarranos, however, cooperative
brotherhood is totally lacking. One of the Nazarrano-Darviniano nations
looks upon another such nation as a contemptible pack of dogs; one
nation considers the other to be an aggregate of low barbarians; and
every single nation among them envies all the others any political
power or industrial prosperity which by long-continued effort they may
have attained.

Even though both NAZARRO and DARVINO were fervent advocates of peace
and tolerance, the nations which are supposed to follow these two
Masters direct their best intelligence and scientific accomplishments
toward the invention of infernal devices with which to maim and
destroy one another. Every new discovery made by scientific searchers
is at once seized upon for the purpose of making these engines of
torture ever more deadly, ever more maliciously destructive. As he
deciphered these words one dreary night, Professor FANSEE whispered to
me in confidence that he had absolutely lost his belief in the actual
existence of Hell; but that this revelation was making him reconsider
his non-belief. And, he added, if there is such a place, I am fully
convinced that, then, I have beyond doubt located it on the planet
Mars. Think of this insensate chaos of low emotions, of this ceaseless
courting of suffering, death and devastation among nations which should
have formed a solid bond of friendship and mutual respect, and which,
had they done so, might all have peaceably enjoyed all the wealth of
the Universe. And when you behold their primitive lack of all kindly
feeling, reflect that these nationality-maniacs are so utterly deluded
as to bluntly call themselves Nazarranos and to pray to the God of
NAZARRO for success in their wantonly destructive pursuits!

Stirred to the depth by this display of unutterable stupidity or
seemingly hopeless irrationality, we anxiously waited for further
details. Little by little, we subsequently succeeded in deciphering
them. It seems that among the antagonistic Nazarrano-Darviniano nations
there were two to whom our Martian informer referred with particular
emphasis.

One of these, inhabiting a country called Two-Tonia, seems to be known
to the Martians as the TWO-TONS. Upon inquiry it was found that on Mars
the names by which the nations are known are in some instances derived
from their mental characteristics. The Two-Tons have the reputation of
being mentally heavy. Each Two-Ton is supposed to carry two tons of
brain matter; and in many individual cases this weight unfortunately
becomes so oppressive as to make them apparently incapable of acquiring
or developing the amiable and pliable mental graces that adorn the
minds of a few other nationalities.

The Two-Tons excel many other nations in depth and scientific
thoroughness. They have increased their depth by digging very deep
into any subject to which they devote their attention. That in their
arguments in connection with the Darviniano philosophy, aside from
empirical pursuits, they are apt to dig in the wrong direction, our
Martian informer promised to demonstrate. Digging as deep as they do,
one may easily understand, if they really start digging in the wrong
direction, how very far from their philosophic object they are likely
to wind up in the end.

Among those nationalities whose national pride stands in the way of
an appreciation of the merits of other nations, the Two-Tons must be
counted foremost. To them all other Nazarrano-Darviniano nations seem
utterly worthless and absurdly inferior. For this reason they prefer
occasional association or alliance with the Musselmen, although they
are supposed to be praying to the Nazarrano God, placing meanwhile
their faith in the Darviniano philosophy. Their contempt for other
Nazarrano nations knows no limit. They consider themselves the creators
and guardians of a special form of civilization, endlessly superior to
the degree of mental growth reached in other countries. However absurd
and conceited this may seem, it must at the same time be acknowledged
that the brain-weight of the Two-Tons has led to some remarkably
constructive results. In the short lapse of time of forty years, making
use of the material gathered in earlier periods, they have succeeded
in erecting a palatial edifice of science and industry far exceeding
in excellence and unity of construction the many isolated buildings
erected for the same purpose in the course of a few centuries in other
countries. How great and rich this nation could therefore have grown,
had they quietly fostered in their own hearts their elation at their
wonderful progress, and had they not permitted contradictory delusions
to mar the solidity of their accomplishments!

It should be mentioned that among the products which this nation was
preparing with scientific care was a dangerous explosive that was
placed upon the national market under the name of Militarism. Every
able-bodied male citizen was compelled to devote a certain number
of years to the manufacture of this highly explosive product. As a
consequence there was such a superabundance of the stuff in their
country, that they decided to store barrels upon barrels of it in the
basement of their wonderfully constructed edifice. Moreover, they
placed a fuse in every room and hall of the well-constructed building,
so that they might be in a position to blow the whole structure up at a
moment’s notice, apparently just for spite, in case of a quarrel with
some other nation. Great engines were constructed of precious metal
from which this explosive was to hurl huge balls, scientific stinkpots
and other malicious missiles into the ranks of the contemplated enemy.
And as these engines were wont to cough up their deadly projectiles
with an earsplitting noise, the factory where the engines were produced
was facetiously referred to as the CROUP-factory. The time indeed came
when an explosion did occur, of which the terrific results are as yet
incapable of compilation.

Another product of a very different kind, manufactured by the Two-Tons,
was mentioned by our Martian informer, the real character of which
Professor FANSEE had some difficulty in deciphering. At first the
Professor translated its name as Koaltar, but as the word was repeated,
it proved to be some sort of national talisman to which they give the
name of Kooltoor. The real meaning of this word is still wrapped in
mystery. It would seem, however, that just as our word Culture refers
to the mental development of the individual, so is the word Kooltoor
used to denote the mental and physical development of the Two-Ton
nation as a whole. I expect that Two-Tonia will be mentioned later in
Professor FANSEE’S manuscript in connection with further international
Martian events.

The other nation most frequently mentioned by our unseen communicant on
Mars seems to be known on that planet by the name of ANGLERS-AXSONS,
and was at other times referred to under the name of BRITS. There is
no doubt but that the two names refer to the same nation, for in one
instance the word Axsons was left out, and our kind Martian spoke
distinctly of the Anglers or Brits. They dwell apparently on a group of
islands called Anglia or Brittia. It further seems that one of these
islands is specifically known as the Ire-island, because the ire of
its inhabitants is so very easily aroused. According to a legend, the
nation of the Brits was founded by a fisherman who drove the snakes
off the islands for the permanent protection of the angleworms. This
fisherman having been a prehistoric patriarch, whose name has failed to
come down the sky-reaching slope of the centuries, the nation is simply
known as the Anglers. The ocean has been the field of their conquests
and the means toward their development, which took about three
centuries, so that their national efforts commenced some two centuries
and a half before the Two-Tons started theirs.

They are so wholeheartedly devoted to fishing, it is said that during
all this stretch of time they continually have had their baited hooks
ready to grab and appropriate anything to be found in, on or near the
ocean. They have not been unsuccessful in their fishing enterprise.
Sometimes they catch fish. At other times they catch islands, coaling
stations, countries occupied by so-called inferior tribes, a canal here
and there built by the laborious efforts of other nations; in fact they
have gathered all sorts of oceanic treasures whenever the other nations
failed to see them first. The surname Ax-sons is probably derived from
the fact that but a few hundred years ago they were mere Skandalnavying
savages whose only weapon of offense and defense was the battle-ax.

As to the name Brits, by which they seem in fact to be most commonly
known, it must be confessed that Professor FANSEE had never succeeded
in discovering its intrinsic meaning. When I returned to civilization,
however, I decided to investigate; and by carefully scanning all
the dictionaries contained in all the famous libraries of the Fidji
Islands, I discovered that the word Brit applies to a young herring,
once thought to be a distinct species. I furthermore found that this
word denotes the food of the whalebone whales, consisting of small
crustaceans, pteropods (whatever that is), and other minute surface
swimming animals whose mammas have cursed them with fancy names. It is
possible that the Brits made at one time the fishing of brit their
national industry, and that they thus became known by the name of
the fish they sold, dished up, and in other ways used for their own
sel-fish purposes. On the other hand it is equally plausible that the
name refers to their propensity of grabbing little islands and coaling
stations from the ocean, just small enough to escape the attention of
others and to pass through the elastic dip-low-matic rake, yet in the
aggregate of sufficient bulk considerably to increase their national
weight and importance.

Speaking of dip-low-macy, the Brits are great adepts at this
low-dipping effort. It should be known that in this peculiar Martian
pursuit the facial muscles are not permitted to betray the schemes that
are hatching in the brain. You think and mean one thing, you say and
appear to mean something else. The heavy bulk of brain that burdens
the Two-Tons prevents these scientific people from dissimulating their
mental activity. They are forced by nature to be blunt and candid,
except when they have caused some calamity and foxily try to throw the
blame on somebody else, as curiously may be shown by subsequent events.
But the brains of the Brits are not quite so heavy. By means of rowing,
swimming, football, polo, golf, tennis, cricket and other strenuous
outdoor sports, they have acquired perfect control over their muscles.
Especially is this ability apparent in their clever manipulation of the
muscles of the face.

At frequent occasions the Brits have covered their angling activities
with a veneer of apparently noble purposes, so beautifully polished
you could almost use the veneer as a curved looking-glass. For
instance, when they were spreading their own nationality all over
the hilly surface of good old Mars, their facial expression was
extremely innocent and noble while pretending merely to be spreading
the Nazarrano faith. While they did do their share toward Nazarrizing
the globe on which they live, they did not, in accordance with the
Nazarrano precepts, look for their reward in heaven, but they sold
their virtues for cash and took their reward by force of arms and
dip-low-macy right on Mars itself. Their plan was very simple. They
would send a missionary to spread the faith; subsequently they would
send him plenty of assistants. Then they would start trading, always
looking out--as tradesmen should--for their own interests. This
inevitably led to disagreement with the natives. And as the engines of
destruction used by the unobtrusive natives had not reached as high
a phase of physical civilization as had those of the Brits, all the
latter had to do at this phase of the game was to send some of their
own little destruction-machines to the nation involved, and, after a
little fighting, to make the territory their own. They would then start
to colonize to clinch the one-sided deal.

To the development of science and industry they also have contributed
a very important share. But as they believed in Culture and failed to
develop that national unity brought about by the Two-Ton Kooltoor,
their scientific and industrial buildings have never as yet been
combined into one great edifice, such as so skilfully erected in
Two-Tonia. It is possible that the greater development of animal
spirits among the Brits _versus_ the greater mental momentum of the
Two-Tons had something to do with this difference in type of growth.
It is possible that it was simply due to the fact that the minds of
the great Brit thinkers and scientists had developed in one direction,
while those among the Two-Tons had developed in a very different
direction. Yet there can be but little doubt but that one of the most
important causes of this divergency is to be found in the circumstance
that the Two-Tons started to build their unified nation at a time when
the sciences had reached a high state of advancement, and after a new
philosophic sect had arisen among the Two-Tons, who were popularly
known as the Social-Mists, and who laid particular stress on the
advantages of cooperation; while, on the contrary, the foundation
of the Brit institutions had been laid during a period, when the
development of modern science had not given even its first signs of
life.

In regard to the science of dip-low-macy, previously referred to, it
may here be stated that this facial endeavor is by no means limited
to the Brits alone. It seems that this quasi-scientific deception
is practised with similar skill by other Martian nations. And even
allowing for the deplorable fact that most of these nations are
suffering from a pitiable mental malady, it still is astounding to the
terrestrial onlooker that this ability to manipulate the facial muscles
is among the Martians regarded as a highly meritorious attainment.
Many dignitaries of the Nazarrano corporation occupy high places of
honor on the strength of it. Nay, among most of the Martian nations
even the making and the interpretation of the country’s laws is almost
exclusively entrusted to those who excel in this deceitful pursuit. For
the attainment to high political office it seems to be an absolutely
essential accomplishment. Our Martian informer expressed the fervent
belief that, were it not for this irrational and habitual deception,
much of the petty malice between nation and nation could have been
avoided or allayed.

We have heretofore found occasion to mention that the national activity
of the Brits covered a period of some three hundred years, while that
of the Two-Tons was limited to a span of forty years. This apparent
difference in national duration is due to the fact that for many years
up to the year 11 E.D. (1871 E.N.) the Two-Tons had been divided into a
number of small principalities, each leading a semi-national existence
of its own. In the year mentioned, after a destruction-chief by the
name of MOULD-KEY had conquered the Frank-Aulians popularly known as
the Fringe, a Two-Ton leader called BEES’MARK, because he left the
mark of a very busy bee upon Two-Tonia, united the principalities into
one great Two-Ton empire. Two chiefs reigned for a short time over
the new-born nation, and then were succeeded by another ruler, a man
of strenuous activity, bearing the high-sounding name of WILMOSTASH.
This man seems to have had a prominent influence on the Two-Tonian
growth; and the Two-Tons are convinced that their natural development
is in essence due to the tireless efforts of this ruler, whose facial
adornments indeed reach up toward the distant heavens.

The industrial preparations among the Two-Ton principalities previous
to their federation, were now by the Two-Tons regarded as of but little
consequence. Especially the younger generations saw naught but the
growth of the united nation since the year 11 E.D. (1871 E.N.). And
when they realized that they occupied an industrial position on the
planet Mars at least as important as that of any other nation, they
were impressed with the idea that in three, four decades they had
accomplished what had taken other nations three, four centuries to
reach. This impression could not but vastly increase their national
pride, so that the nationality-mania, so common among the deluded
Martians, was in Two-Tonia brought to an acute phase, overshadowing in
depth and seriousness the similar mental malady prevalent among other
nations.

As a consequence, as they gradually attained their important industrial
position, they aspired at a political position of similar importance.
But being--as a consequence of their brain-weight--less nimble and more
blunt than many of the other races, they frequently assumed in the
counsel of nations a high-toned attitude which the others looked upon
as arrogant, and by force of which they frequently attempted to dictate
the final decisions on international problems.

Had the nations not been deluded by their antagonistic and ever
suspicious nationality-mania, they would have reasoned with the
Two-Tons, they would have endeavored better to understand their ideals
and their motives, and they might have learned much from them, just as
the Two-Tons themselves in earlier years had learned a great deal from
the others. But as a consequence of the deplorable Martian delusion,
this attitude on the part of the Two-Tons had the effect of emphasizing
all the more the malice that one nation bore another, and even resulted
in a combination of the ill-will of various otherwise mutually
unfriendly nations, in aggregate directed against the Two-Tons. As the
neighboring nations watched with anxiety the profuse production of the
militaristic explosive in the Two-Tonian empire, and as they scented
an imminent danger of an explosion, they--by means of combinations and
alliances--commenced to take measures to protect themselves against the
Two-Tonian aggression which, they thought, was bound sooner or later to
change from a merely mental attitude into a series of acts of physical
violence. Among the nations so combined, special mention should be made
of the FRANK-AULIANS or FRINGE, who, besides watching with suspicion
the growing militaristic activity of their neighbor, were moreover
animated by their desire to obtain redress for the damage done them
in 1871 E.N., when they lost the territories of All-Sass and Low-Rain
to the Two-Tons. Indeed, though this desire--at first vehemently
proclaimed--had largely diminished in fervor as time wore on, still it
was one of the undercurrents conscientiously to be taken into account
in the judgment one might attempt to pass upon later developments.
In the anti-Two-Tonian protective combinations, the Fringe no doubt
figured prominently.

It is characteristic of the primitive condition of Martian civilization
that a nation’s political influence is determined, not by the wisdom it
displays in international counsel, but by the size of the territory it
controls, and partly, therefore, by the extent of its colonies. Now,
during three long centuries various nations had explored the oceans
and snapped up all the territories fit for colonization; and owing to
the successful angling of the Brits, many of these colonies had in the
end fallen into their hands. Next in colonial possessions came the
Fringe, and another nation known as the Whole-landers also controlled
considerable outlying territory. But as all these nations had been
engaged in this accumulation-process for so long a span of time, the
Two-Tons, when they commenced to search for similar far-off fields of
expansion, found but little left over. And not being as perfect in
dip-low-matic attainments as other nations, the Two-Tons, as other
nations had feared all along, came to the conclusion that the only way
in which they could attain to the same type of political influence,
was by force of arms, in other words, by a free and very inconsiderate
use of their national explosive on other nations’ territories. I am
here tempted to call attention to the marked influence which political
conditions exert over the mental activity of a nation’s philosophic
authors.

This temptation is so great that I shall overcome my reluctance, and
reveal what our Martian communicant secretly confided to Professor
FANSEE one memorable night, when both were looking for relaxation
from the strain of their protracted labor. On this indeed very rare
occasion our Martian philosopher confided to Professor FANSEE some of
his own personal earlier experiences. From these it appeared that the
Martian--I picture him in my imagination as a tall, lean man with a
long white beard--had originally been a fervent follower of the faith
of NAZARRO, and that afterwards he had been converted to Darvinianoism.
And so profoundly had the Darviniano conclusions obtained a hold on
his mentality, that he finally refused to look upon the Heebron and
Nazarrano manuscripts as in any way authoritative in regard to what did
and what did not constitute morality. With my deeper understanding of
Nature, he then had said to himself, let me go back to her, and Nature
herself shall teach me the laws of proper conduct. But when he had
commenced conscientiously to observe the methods of Nature with this
purpose in view, he soon discovered that the conduct of Nature as a
whole greatly differs from the conduct deemed just and proper by the
Martians. He found that Nature may at any time produce an upheaval of
the soil, by which libraries, printing-presses, art museums, temples,
churches, factories, institutes of industry and learning, would in a
few hours be wantonly destroyed, without the slightest discrimination
between the criminal and the virtuous, between things evil and things
beneficial to the Martians. In this then, he mused, we cannot follow
Nature.

Then, seeking for better guidance, he had bethought himself of the
law of the survival of the fittest. This law, he reflected, we may be
able consciously to apply to our conduct. But how? It is evident that
this law refers essentially to physical impediments and obstructions,
to physical conditions only. An icy blast may sweep the top of a high
hill and wipe out the tribe that inhabits it, and those living in the
valley may survive. Yet, had those in the valley been at the pinnacle,
they would have perished, and had those at the pinnacle lived in the
valley, they would in turn have survived. And if one were to ask what
would have happened had the blast struck both tribes at the same time,
we answer, those physically the fittest would have survived, absolutely
independent of their virtues or vices or of the degree of their
intelligence.

Has intelligence then been of no consequence whatever in the activity
of this law? Does not the fact that an intelligent race has survived
races of animals physically far more ferocious furnish proof positive
of the influence of intelligence on the operation of the great law?
No, had the Martian concluded, it furnishes no such proof whatever. An
intelligent race has survived, not in consequence of the physical law
of survival, but in opposition to it. It survived because it devised
means of protection wherewith to oppose the indiscriminating physical
forces by which survival had theretofore been determined. And when
one compares the individual members of that intelligent race with one
another, one soon discovers that those of superior intelligence are
often physically far more frail than are the dull-minded specimens,
and hence frequently far less fit to withstand the onslaught of
antagonistic physical forces.

Do we seek to apply this much quoted law of survival to morality,
we find to our dismay that not infrequently the unscrupulous thief
and deceiver and the blunt bully grow and prosper, while the honest
and virtuous thinker, less tricky or less self-assertive, is the
unfortunate and suffering underdog. Of course, if this law of survival
were indeed to be applied to our international views, we could only
praise and admire those who have acquired power: we certainly would
have no good cause to hate them.

We shall soon discover that the Martian spoke in detail on this subject
to Professor FANSEE, because it had an important bearing upon the
further political events on Mars. And it may therefore be proper for
me, also to quote to what conclusion the Martian philosopher came at
the end of his revelations.

Would anyone think, he exclaimed, of trying to advocate the law of
gravitation as a guide to proper conduct? No one would, because it
would be utterly absurd. For no Martian can add one iota to its power
or take away one iota from its everlasting activity by conscious
effort. We can add to or subtract from it no more than we could add
to or subtract from the material of which our Universe is composed.
And just as little good or bad as our conscious scheming can do to the
law of gravitation, just as little can it aid or hamper the law of the
survival of the fittest, except in so far as we may be able to protect
ourselves against its indiscriminate lack of consideration. That law
has ruled long before there was any self-consciousness, long before
there was intelligence in the living entities, long before one group of
specimens of a deluded species envied another group its industrial or
political importance. If life were to be ruled by this law, it would be
absurd to devise remedies against epidemics. In that case, we should
allow the disease to ravage the nation all it wants to. Nature would
thus render the Martians a special favor by destroying those unfit to
survive that particular disease. And after epidemic Number One had
passed, we might allow some new epidemic to destroy all the survivors,
even though among those killed by the first disease there might have
been many who could successfully have survived epidemic Number Two, had
they only still been alive to face it.

The absurdity of the proposition of being guided by this automatic law
had, therefore, become plainly apparent to our Martian philosopher.
And then it was, he told Professor FANSEE, that he began to realize
the truth of what had been said by others, that the moral precepts
contained in the Heebron and Nazarrano manuscripts had sprung from
the verdicts of human reason, after many centuries of experience and
observation of social requirements; and that they had become obnoxious
to certain Darvinianos, not because they were in themselves wrong or
misleading, but because they had until now always been imparted as if
inseparably founded on a devoted faith in personal semi-human Deities.
Separate them from that ancient faith, and they are strong enough in
themselves to remain standing, fastened deep into the rock of human
experience, as efficient guide-posts on the road that leads through the
labyrinth of life. As experience erected them, experience may perhaps
later still further improve them. Not your experience alone, or my
experience alone, but the experience of all the Martians combined,
scientifically founded on the decrees of further advanced logic.

After this relaxation by way of a heart-to-heart confession, our noble
Martian returned to his narrative of the struggling nations, and here
he showed at once in what way his confession was connected with his
interesting little chapter of political history.

The Two-Ton philosophers, he said, like himself profoundly impressed
with the Darviniano faith, had commenced to look to the laws of Nature
for moral guidance. And having started to dig in this direction, the
momentum of their brain-weight prevented them from changing their
course. Thus it came about that NEETCH-UR, a philosopher of note in
Two-Tonia, utterly cast aside all Nazarrano precepts. Why cure,
protect or aid the weak? Let the strong survive as Nature naturally
would let them. Will they be less intelligent? Blame Nature. Will they
be less considerate of their brothers’ well-being? It’s the fault of
Nature who then apparently wanted it that way. What NEETCH-UR taught,
therefore, was the moral excellence of physical and mental power,
inconsiderately overriding all those whose powers are less mighty, even
if this “moral” attitude should lead the Martians to a condition of
total im-morality.

NEETCH-UR was an oratorical author productive of high-sounding maxims,
who never endeavored to test their efficiency by the road of logic.
Though his ideals were evidently floating in the wrong direction,
he nevertheless had some of the marks of the genius. Nationality
was to him a minor consideration. He addressed his advocacy of the
rule of the powerful to all the inhabitants of Mars, and if a Brit
or a Skandalnavying were more powerful than a Two-Ton, he would have
witnessed with satisfaction the Two-Ton’s overthrow by the Brit or the
sturdy Skandalnavying.

To the Two-Tons, influenced as they were by the Martian
nationality-mania, this view of life was a bit too broad. The
correctness of the nature-view was not questioned. Especially not since
one of their most renowned empirical scientists, known as Professor
HECKLER, had boldly toddled from his empirical laboratory into the
field of philosophy, and had strenuously emphasized the nature-view,
with utter neglect of the emotional side of the Martian character. But
though the nature-view was held to be perfectly in order, NEETCH-UR’S
international broadness did not coincide with the Two-Tonian national
mental tendencies. No wonder, therefore, that another author soon
arose, named TRITE-SHKUR, who adopted NEETCH-UR’S views, but applied
them exclusively to the glory of the Two-Tons. If any one nation
was to survive by its power to conquer, that one nation must be the
nation of the Two-Tonians. The Brits with their propensity toward
territorial expansion had ruled the misty planet long enough. We, the
Two-Tons, have a greater quantity of explosives than have the Brits.
Our Kooltoor is far greater than their culture. The God of NAZARRO, no
matter what precepts NAZARRO himself may have proclaimed, will take
joy in seeing us conquer. We must go for the Brits, use our explosives
indiscriminately, and thus capture all the territory we can, in order
to force the law of survival to make its decision in our favor.

And when his writings were followed by another book compiled by an
explosive-manufacturer suitably named BURN-ARDOR, and which described
in detail the method to be followed in the contemplated struggle, the
minds of the Two-Tons were fully made up concerning the futility of
Nazarrano kindness, and the superiority of nature-morality. Indeed,
when the struggle came, even the Two-Ton division of the Social-Mist
sect, advocates of international cooperation and peace, compounders of
a cure for the dreadful nationality-mania, prophets of good-will to all
nations, but among whom the nature-view nevertheless largely prevailed,
suddenly lost their idealistic enthusiasm, and joined the ranks of the
nationality-maniacs, in order to make use of the explosives under the
command of the destruction-chiefs. Had these Social-Mists suddenly gone
mad? Why no, not suddenly. They simply felt their intimate relationship
to one of the Martian nations; and these nations had been mad for
centuries, and had not yet been brought back to sanity; that’s all.

True, in other countries the Darviniano philosophy had led to
conclusions of a different type. In Brittia a contemporary of
DARVINO, answering to the name of SPENSAIRO, had elaborately traced
the development of Martian social conditions from time immemorial to
date. And he showed that as the nations had advanced in civilization,
their pursuits and mental attitude had grown more and more peaceable.
He concluded that the martial spirit of destruction is a spirit of
barbaric savagery. Hence, cooperation among the various nations for
the good of all was the ideal toward which his conclusions pointed.
It is curious that this advocate of peace arose in a country that had
arrived at a position of foremost political importance, so that by this
nation no struggle for predominance with other nations was in the least
desired. It is just as curious that in Two-Tonia, which was actually
engaged in a mental struggle for supremacy, the rising philosophers
were advocates of the sanctity of power and the primordial struggle for
survival.

Indeed, the militaristic BURN-ARDOR previously referred to,
sarcastically pointed to this influence of political conditions upon
a nation’s philosophic views. He expressed the opinion that these
philosophers purposely proclaimed their conclusions for the benefit
of their own country. Our Martian informer, however, thought that
it was simply one of the subconscious elements that unwittingly
influence the thoughts of a nation and of its authors. As BURN-ARDOR
saw in this wholly unavoidable result the effect of nefarious
deep-low-matic selfishness, he even declared that, as between nation
and nation, neither virtue, nor honor, nor fairness was ever taken in
consideration. Yet, if it is bad for the members of a family to treat
one another without fair-minded loyalty, if it is morally despicable
for any family to treat the neighboring families dishonorably and
with malice or hidden unfair purposes, it is just as contemptible
for that larger aggregate of Martians, called a nation, to treat any
other nation unfairly or unscrupulously. BURN-ARDOR probably gave his
impression of things as he thought they were, and not as he thought
they ought to be.

When the TWO-TONIAN SUPREMACY WAR had at last become a dreadful
physical fact, a number of nations were involved in the titanic
struggle. Considering the jealousy with which the Brits had long
guarded their predominance, and the Two-Ton aspiration to supplant
them, one might have expected the Two-Tons to seek some deep-low-matic
excuse for engaging the Brits in a gigantic wrestling match. And
had they done so, the Martian world would probably have looked on,
impartial, and satisfied to see the best man win. But the struggle was
brought about in a very different manner.

One nation, in reality the only one with whom the Two-Tons entertained
intimate relations, was the group of Martians usually referred to as
the Ostrich-ans or AUSTRICH-ANS. They were so named, not because
the ostrich makes their country its habitat, for this bird never had
any such intention; not because they were wont, like the ostrich, to
hide their heads in the sand under the impression that they are thus
protected from an approaching enemy, for when they are compelled to
hide, they are wise enough not to hide their heads alone and leave
the rest of their frail bodies exposed: the name Austrich-ans was
given them because, like this famous bird, they were known for a
voracious and very varied appetite. They were in the habit of nibbling,
whenever they had a chance, at the neighboring territories known as
the Bally-Khan States. They had even at one time dipped their steel
forks into the plate of the EAT-ALL-IANS, a nation whose territory
also borders theirs. Nay, so typically were they renowned for their
everlasting appetite, that one prominent part of their country actually
bears the official name HUNG’RY! As the Two-Tons are reputed to serve
five meals a day, and as the Austrich-ans moreover speak the same
language as the Two-Tons, the friendship between these two nations was
ideal, and even caused them to dream of a delicious Pan-Two-Tonianism.

The nearest neighbors of these Austrich-ans were a much smaller tribe
which subsequently was referred to as the SERVERS, because they
served the Two-Tons apparently as a welcome excuse to start the
struggle. The Austrich-ans had no end of trouble with the Servers. The
nationality-mania between them had indeed developed to a state of very
dangerous acuteness. At last, in the country of the Servers, a crime
was committed of which an Austrich-an official was the victim. Now
in the Darvinized Nazarrano countries all crimes were dealt with by
law-courts instituted for this very purpose. And in case a foreigner
was the victim, the courts were wont to act with redoubled vigor; and
the country where the deed had been done would moreover make amends to
the country of which the victim had been a citizen, amends which were
made in various forms. Law-courts, in fact, are one of the first marks
of civilization on Mars. But the Austrich-ans were not satisfied to
treat this particular case in the ordinary legal way. They sent the
Servers a message demanding such amends as no nation had ever demanded
of any other. Their message of indignation was couched in terms, and
contained stipulations, to which no self-respecting nation, not even
the smallest, could in the eyes of the rest of the Martian world
honorably have submitted.

Now the Servers were one of a group of small nations, heretofore
referred to as the Bally-Khan States, and they had a powerful friend
and protector in the politically far more important nation of the
RUSH-NOTS. The Rush-Nots were named for the slowness of their national
progress. For many centuries there had been among the Nazarrano nations
a pronounced prejudice against the Heebrons, notwithstanding the fact
that NAZARRO Himself had been a Heebron and had followed the Heebron
faith. Heebrons were unscrupulously persecuted, robbed, tortured,
murdered, their possessions frequently confiscated, and they were
permitted to dwell only in special sections set aside for them. These
criminal proceedings had long ago been abolished in all the other
Nazarrano countries, but the Rush-Nots continued to indulge in these
sordid amusements of the long-forgotten past. In all other Nazarrano
countries, moreover, the power of the ruler had been limited by giving
his subjects a share in determining the laws that govern them. Among
the Rush-Nots the ruler still had absolute power over his subjects
as the rulers in other countries had had in the long-forgotten past.
So you can easily understand that in matters of progress and social
improvement they rushed not. Nevertheless, by means of bloodshed, the
Rush-Nots had acquired a goodly proportion of the crust of Mars. So
the Rush-Nots, being friends of the Bally-Khan nations to which group
the Servers belonged, parleyed with the Austrich-ans and told them
to treat the Servers more politely, and threatened that otherwise
they would be compelled to direct their engines of destruction very
impolitely against the Austrich-ans.

We have stated before that Brittia was desirous of permanent peace. So,
indeed, were the Rush-Nots, because they, too, had obtained more than
their due proportion of Martian territory. So, too, were the previously
mentioned Frank-Aulians or Fringe, who in fact had entered into an
intimate bond of friendship with the Rush-Nots. The Brits therefore, to
all appearances, did their best by means of dip-low-macy to avoid the
threatening war. But the Austrich-ans hurriedly commenced to make war
preparations; and when the Rush-Nots saw this, they followed suit.

Whether or not the Austrich-ans had acted all this time with
the secret approval of the great WILMOSTASH, or the Two-Ton
explosive-manufacturers, may forever be a question fit for debate.
Yet so much is certain that, at this momentous stage of the
international quarrel, WILMOSTASH peremptorily told the Rush-Nots to
turn their destructive apparatus back from the Austrich-an borders,
so that Austricha might do to the Servers whatever served the
Austrich-an-Two-Tonian interests best. The Rush-Nots told the mighty
WILMOSTASH to go to Halifax, a sort of meeting-place where it is
always hot to suffocation.

Did the Two-Tons thereupon at once attack the Rush-Nots? No, they
Did-not. Aware that the Fringe were an important factor in various
anti-Two-Tonian protective alliances, they anticipated that the
Fringe would beyond question actively side with the Rush-Nots. As a
consequence, you might have expected the Two-Tons to start a vigorous
campaign against the Rush-Nots, meanwhile heavily guarding their
borders against invasion by the Fringe. And in case the Fringe would
subsequently have grown too gay, the Two-Tons might then justly have
handled them in accordance with the rules dominating such international
pastimes. As their quarrel was with the Rush-Nots, this of course would
to all appearances have been the logical plan to follow. Yet, even this
plainly outlined course the Two-Tons Did-not take. Under the impression
that the Rush-Not armies are heavy and slow, and that the Fringe are
light and quick as lightning; convinced moreover that their chances
of victory lay in offensive action, and that a defensive attitude
might imperil their cause, the Two-Tons decided, before assailing the
Rush-Nots, first to attack the Fringe.

In explanation of the odd-sounding name of the latter nation,
let me state that the Frank-Aulians or Fringe are named for the
frankness with which they own and exhibit their vices as well as
their virtues. Aulians is sometimes spelled Owlians and evidently
refers to the fact that many of their great men are known to have been
night-owls. The shorter name Fringe is applied to them on account of
their artistic inclinations. Although they have contributed a goodly
share to Martian science, philosophy and the industries, their most
pronounced characteristic is that they are so eminently fond of profuse
decoration. They decorate their homes, their theatres, their churches,
and their minds. Thus they have decorated the Nazarrano-Darviniano form
of civilization with a harmoniously colored fringe of politeness, a bit
fuzzy, quite a bit inclined toward dip-low-matic deceit, but, all in
all, rather artistic.

When the Two-Tons had decided to attack the Fringe, did they cross that
part of their border that leads directly into the Fringe territory?
No, they Did-not. By George, king of the Brits, I am almost inclined
hereafter to call the Two-Tons the Did-Nots! Instead of this, they
decided to run their destructive engines across two small and perfectly
nootril countries, one known as Luxury-burgh, and the other inhabited
by a valiant little nation whose name is fast going down in Martian
history as the BELL-GIANTS. Their country contains all sorts of
beautiful old buildings and churches renowned all over Mars for their
marvelous bells and chimes; and small as be their number, they are,
nevertheless, known as the Giants, because in case of need they are
willing to undertake gigantic tasks, from which many another small
nation would shrink in fear. Accordingly, the Bell-Giants obstructed
the passage of the Two-Tons, and undertook a struggle in which they
were bound to be defeated.

And here comes a typical instance of Brit deep-low-macy. Because the
maniacal envy of nation toward nation had become unbearable even to
the deluded Martians, the nations had signed certain agreements for
the protection of what was called the buffer-countries, territories
whose neutrality was to be respected in case the bigger nations would
ever go to war. The Two-Tons had signed this agreement, and so had the
Brits. Now after the Brits had endeavored to prevent the war, they
published the letters and telegrams which they had exchanged for that
purpose with the various foreign dip-low-mats. From this correspondence
it appears that the Two-Tons had made an inquiry to find out whether
the Brits would look on unmoved or whether they would take a hand in
the upheaval, in case the Two-Tons were to start the international
cataclasm. In reply, the Brits carefully controlled their muscles and
said, they were not at all certain what they would do. May-be they were
at first indeed undecided. But then one of the Brit dip-low-mats asked
one of the medal-bearing chesty Two-Tons whether Two-Tonia would agree
not to annex any part of the Fringe territory. The Two-Ton replied that
Two-Tonia would positively refrain from any such glaring violation
of the Nazarrano precepts. Whereupon the Brit, who in the meantime
had telegraphed to his government, returned to the weighty Two-Ton
to ask whether his promise also held good for the Fringe _colonies_.
The Two-Ton smilingly remarked that even NAZARRO Himself could not
expect the virtue of the Two-Tons to carry them so far as to stoop
to so absurd a self-abnegation. And as the Brits were not anxious to
have a colonial competitor with habits so deep-digging as those of the
Two-Tons, the Brits undoubtedly made up their minds then and there not
to look on unmoved. So when the Two-Tons started to cross the territory
of the Bell-Giants and forced them to a hopeless self-defense, the
Brits rose in ire and made a noisy hallabaloo about the violation of
the neutrality treaty, and used this as an excuse to join the opponents
of the Two-Tons. Thus once again, they hid their selfishness behind a
rather transparent veneer of noble indignation and ideals.

And now the war is on, and an insensate pandemonium reigns in the
countries which we once looked upon as civilized. An amount of
energy is being wasted that, if properly applied, could have led to
the realization of many a wonderful social ideal, many a hope long
cherished by humanity in vain. An amount of wealth is being squandered
on destruction which, applied in conjunction with this vast amount
of energy, could have built castles of education beyond our present
dreams, institutes of mind-broadening influence upon all the suffering
human race. An amount of blood and life is being sacrificed, compared
to which the human sacrifices to the gods of yore dwindle into utter
insignificance. And all this for the vain-glory that some one nation
might harvest, by wantonly destroying the pride of existence, the
happiness, the strength, the life-blood of another. What the outcome of
this blind folly will be, no one, alas, as yet can tell.

Here came once more a pause of silence, and the Martian philosopher
thereupon entrusted to Professor FANSEE some further personal
confidences. The country I live in, he said, was discovered by an
enterprising traveler for whom many statues have been erected and who
is therefore popularly referred to as COLUMN-BUST. When he discovered
our country he exclaimed “Eureka!” which means in one of the dead
Martian languages: I have found it. As a result of this exclamation, my
country was called AM-EUREKA. I may say with pride, and with a humane
lack of prejudice entirely uninfluenced by the usual nationality-mania,
that my country is one of the few on Mars in which petty jealousy and
malice against other nations is totally unknown. Although the Nazarrano
and Darviniano faiths form a mechanical mixture among us just as among
other civilized nations, yet the Heebron and Nazarrano precepts are
beyond all else dear to us; not so much for their supposedly divine
origin, but far more so for their humane and beneficent character. We
are not double-faced, either nationally or internationally. In the
conduct of business as well as in our international relations we are
broadminded. When we say we are in favor of permanent peace, we mean
what we say, without hiding any selfish motives. When we say we are,
if need be, ready to fight for a noble cause, there is nothing in our
minds except this noble cause, and we have no by-thoughts to hide.

Now I was born on that hemisphere on which the struggle is now going
on, and to which we in Am-Eureka, owing to our strictly neutral
principles, nowadays refer as YOUR-ROPE. Am-Eureka became my country
by adoption; and in Your-Rope I had frequented artistic circles from
which I imbibed exceedingly lofty ideals, such as Art for Art’s sake,
Science for the sake of Science, the preference of other aims to
money-hunting, and so on. And not finding similar ideals catered to in
my adopted country, I personally had always considered the inhabitants
of Your-Rope as on a plane of civilization far higher than that reached
in Am-Eureka.

The drama at present being played in that hemisphere of so-called high
ideals has absolutely changed this point of view. The simple precepts
of NAZARRO and of the earlier Heebron teachers are the best that the
Martians can desire for their guidance. The brotherhood of nations and
the peaceable attitude of man toward man no matter on what part of
Mars he happens to have been born, is an ideal at least as inspiring
as Art for Art’s sake. The high flying and loudly proclaimed ideals
of Your-Rope are not the ideals of humanity at large. They are fitted
for but a small class of men who by these ideals are inspired toward
producing things of wonderful beauty, highly idealistic, but utterly
superfluous to human comfort and welfare. The peace-ideal of the
Am-Eurekans, unobtrusive, subconsciously active in their heart and
every-day actions, not claiming a sky-reaching mental superiority,
is not only fit for all Martians, young and old, high and low, able
and unable, hence also for those engaged in the production of useful
things needed in every-day life, but it is moreover an ideal which
would benefit all civilized countries and aid the further development
of science, industry, and mental as well as physical civilization.

Here the Martian philosopher seemed to have been interrupted. A few
minutes elapsed before the Zee-rays continued to do their interesting
work. My assistant remarks, he subsequently said, that Am-Eureka
itself but recently might have gone to war with a neighboring country
called MAKE-SICK-O, and that the Am-Eurekans actually sent a fleet to
WE’RE-ON-A-CRUISE. And indeed, such things may sometimes be necessary.
But our behavior in We’re-on-a-Cruise is typical of the difference
between Am-Eurekan and Your-Ropean warfare. When we Am-Eurekans
entered We’re-on-a-Cruise, there were snipers there who shot at us
from windows and housetops. One must expect these things on a campaign
of invasion. The private citizens naturally are your enemies as much
as are the uniformed soldiers. So, what did we do? We shot back at
them whenever it was unavoidable. Whenever possible, we arrested them.
We further saw to it that all citizens surrendered all weapons in
their possession. This work done, we started to improve the sanitary
conditions of the town. We made the town more comfortable to live in
than it had ever been under Make-sickan rule. On the other hand, it is
said of the Two-Tons that they conquered among others a town called
Low-Vein situated in the territory of the Bell-Giants. Quite naturally
they found snipers there. Did they meet the situation as humanely as we
had done? No, they Did-not. So passionately enraged were they, on the
contrary, at this inevitable discovery, that they burned, shelled, and
destroyed the larger part of the town and its inhabitants; and a town
this in which the very buildings were treasures of mediaeval art. After
this, further sanitary improvements were almost wholly superfluous.

No, even though circumstances may have compelled us to send that fleet,
even though similar circumstances may again compel us to similar acts,
and even though we may thus find ourselves some day engaged in bloody
war with some other nation, in our minds and in our breasts we bear
no malice toward either the Make-sickans or any other nation on all
our vast planet. We might fight, but the fight having been fought, we
would gladly shake hands, and feel sincerely sorry that we had been
drawn into a nasty quarrel. And this, without dip-low-macy, without
manipulation of the facial muscles, wholeheartedly, as befits a good
sport.

Separated as we are, by an expansive ocean, from the main seat of
nationality-mania, we look on unprejudiced, pitying deeply the Martians
who are forced to suffer by its fearful consequences, and doing what we
can to stay at least the starvation that might follow in the struggle’s
dreadful wake.

Nor do we take sides in this horrible calamity. Why call one madman a
fool and jolly the other madman by telling him that he is right? We,
on this side of the rocking pond, do not care a rap whether the Brits,
the Two-Tons, or any other nation attains to world-supremacy, provided
that, this supremacy reached, they shall not assume an overbearing
attitude or dictate to us how we are to conduct our business. We
Am-Eurekans do not aspire at supremacy. Our institutions are founded
on equality; and, indeed, equality and supremacy cannot easily be
made to harmonize. All we aspire to attain is what a clean-minded and
healthful development of our resources and intelligence may bring us in
the natural course of events. All we advise other nations is to be wise
enough not maliciously to interfere with this development.

Did the Two-Tons believe the Brits were maliciously interfering
with their natural growth? Then they should have gone straight for
the Brits, without starting a campaign against the Fringe or the
Rush-Nots, and without a destructive passage through a small country
that never had been accused of malicious interference. Were the Brits
under the impression that their natural development was maliciously
interfered with by the Two-Tons? Then they should have settled their
quarrel openly and directly with the Two-Tons, without waiting
deep-low-matically for a “noble” excuse that they all along expected
to be furnished them. We Am-Eurekans believe in a fair fight when a
fight cannot be avoided; stripped and without gloves if need be; but no
hitting below the belt.

When the war broke out, we in Am-Eureka noticed that the actual
hostilities had been started by the Two-Tons. We noticed that, instead
of limiting their activities to assailing the nation they were about
to attack, they forced their way through other countries, one of these
being the land of the Bell-Giants, against the Bell-Giants’ clearly
expressed desire to the contrary. The Bell-Giants were defending
naught but their right to keep aloof from the mad struggle; and when,
owing to the narrow limits of their territory and resources, they
were defeated, their fields devastated and their towns destroyed, we
naturally sympathized with the Bell-Giants in their pitiable plight.
There are Two-Tons who migrated to my adopted country but who are
still in close sympathy with the Two-Tonian nationality-mania, and
who saw in this attitude on our part the evidence of ill-will against
Two-Tonia. Yet before these grim events no sign of any such ill-will
or hatred had ever been detected. Nor will it be possible to detect
any after the struggle for supremacy shall have come to an end. We in
Am-Eureka love justice, and justice necessarily involves a deep-seated
consideration for the rights of others, and a systematic avoidance of
any passionate violence, especially of violence in the wrong direction.
But the Two-Tons may be at ease. Our sympathies are not with the
backward Rush-Nots or with the deep-low-matic Brits, either. Were they
to indulge in unjust acts, we would detest these acts as definitely
in them as in any other Martians. Only, while we may disapprove of an
act of injustice in any nation, that does not mean that we bear malice
toward the nation as such, nor that we fail to appreciate whatever
virtue or wisdom that nation may possess.

After thus having described the attitude of his own country, the
Martian philosopher declared that this was in reality not the main
purpose of his reflections. What he wished to emphasize was, he said,
that the whole deplorable conflict could have been avoided if only
the Martian nations had taken measures to cure, at least in part, the
nationality-mania that at any time is likely blindly to arouse their
destructive passions. To you, he said, at the distance at which you
see our planet, all of our globe must make the impression of an insane
asylum, where nationality-mania and nationalized megalomania are the
two mental aberrations most prominently prevalent. But in reality,
he assured us, these people are not insane. They are simply deluded,
carried away by a wrong and intensely harmful conception of honor and
of Martian greatness.

My most intense hope is, continued the Martian philosopher, that
by proper mental training we may be enabled to re-direct their
quasi-noble impulses into better and more constructive channels. As
I contemplate the struggling armies, I see their banners raised high
above the surging regiments. But I see the national colors dimmed with
powder-smoke and the dust of the battle, so that now the banners look
all alike to me; and over the smutty surface of every one of them, I
see the word FOLLY glaring in the vivid red of warm young blood. How
much better will it be to see in the near future the same banners, the
national marks of distinction dimmed by factory smoke and the dust of
the quarries, and to see written on all of them in letters of gold:
FOR THE FEDERATION AND WELL-BEING OF HUMANITY; PEACE AND GOOD-WILL TO
ALL MEN OF ALL NATIONS.

At this moment Professor FANSEE bethought himself of a question that
he had all along intended to put to the Martian philosopher, but that
had so far been crowded out by the Martian’s interesting narrative.
“For what purpose,” he finally asked, “did you Martians construct those
straight-lined canals that cross your planet?” Came from the Martian
the counter-question: “What canals?” “Well,” replied Professor FANSEE,
somewhat taken aback, “we on earth notice straight lines across your
globe every spring, and we reached the conclusion that they are canals
used to guide the water when it rushes down from the thawing ice-fields
at the poles.” “Ah,” said the Martian, “this is extremely interesting.
Straight lines you say? Let me think a moment. Oh, yes, they are....”

Here a strange thing occurred. We heard a few clicks of a nature
to suggest that the apparatus had suddenly gone out of order. The
Professor looked over some of the details of the machinery, but found
nothing wrong. Then, of a sudden, the Martian communications were
resumed. With a speed as if our distant philosopher had suddenly
turned into a maniac, his message was now rushing in.

One of the nations involved in this miserable cataclasm, known as the
Chopper-Knees, it said, has at the last moment invented an engine of
destruction excelling all others in deadliness. It consists of an
enormous thin metal globe, to which a device is attached that causes
it to fly up in the air to a considerable height. The device is timed;
so that, when it has reached a certain height and has drifted in a
certain direction, it suddenly comes to a standstill, and by its own
dead weight falls with increasing speed toward the soil. The horror of
it is that upon reaching the surface it explodes, and spreads a thick
cloud of smoke, of such a nature that by powerful electrical action it
gathers unto itself various materials from the atmosphere and from the
soil, with the result that the cloud, instead of diminishing, grows
ever thicker and vaster. The cloud kills all life it comes in contact
with, and it is feared that it may encircle the whole planet. It is
guaranteed to kill every forest and every animal that lives in the
forest, to kill every living creature in the water whose surface it
touches. It is guaranteed to kill every flower, every grassblade, every
thistle; to kill the ass who is eating the thistle as a much desired
delicacy, as well as the flies that pester his bushy hide; and as a
minor effect, it will also kill the followers of NAZARRO who, according
to the legend, once rode through the streets of Jairoosolom on his
patient back. As I have erected my apparatus on the highest promontory
of the planet Mars, just as you probably have done at your end, I shall
be the last to be attacked by the deadly fumes. Already do I see the
cloud fill the valley below me. I see it rising, rising!...

And then, as if in the despair of his agony he were addressing a world
already laid waste, and a race already wiped out, a few additional
sentences reached us from the depth of space: Abandon your petty
jealousies, your tricky international schemes and your malice. Form a
friendly federation by which everyone of you will benefit. Establish
international courts of justice and of honor. Do away with your
national armies and navies, and use their remnants as international
guardians of the peace. Give up your futile efforts to be guided by
blind Nature in the treatment of your fellowmen. Morality, whether
considered from an international or a national point of view, is a set
of rules of wholesome living, founded on the requirements of an ever
further developing social organization. It does not refer merely to a
respectable limitation of sex-life. It embraces good-will, loyalty,
justice, fairness, the absence of all underhand thoughts and methods,
and the total lack of malicious intent. Many of these laws have been
lucidly compiled in the Nazarrano manuscripts. Enthrone ye then,
therefore, once more, if not NAZARRO’S divinity, then at least such of
His precepts as are practicable and beneficent for men of all faiths
and for men of no faith, for the human race at large!... Thus alone
shall ye thrive without unnecessary disturbances, social upheavals,
industrial calamities, wanton slaughter, and without the despicable
arousal of savage passions!

The Martian admonition ceased. And then I saw Professor FANSEE grow
deadly pale; and as he reeled as if about to swoon, he whispered: “I
feel as if my mind were giving way. That voice, that solemn message,
did it come from space, or did it come to me from the heaps of the dead
and dying that I seem to see dispersed on the battlefields of Belgium,
France, and Poland? Was this the voice of departing spirits dying on
our fair earth itself?” “Since we left for these vast fields of ice,”
he said to me with a sickly smile, “many things may have happened!”

And then he swooned indeed, and it took fully six hours to bring
him back to consciousness. From then on it was evident that he was
suffering from some mysterious disease, of which he died two weeks
later. Had the electrical cloud that enveloped Mars, entering the
communicating-apparatus, anything to do with this mysterious functional
disturbance? My own knowledge of medicine is limited, and we had no
physician with us. His remains were buried in the ice of the South
Pole. The problem may never fully be answered.

And now, while I am preparing this narrative for publication, as
yet far away from civilization and ignorant of recent events, I
wonder whether the malicious nationality-mania, that dreadful mental
aberration to which the Martian philosopher referred, could ever
have developed to the same extent among civilized humanity on earth,
arraying Christian nation against Christian nation! I wonder, in case
this malady hereafter ever threatened to become acute, whether it
could not easily be cured by a wise and systematic application of calm
commonsense.

May all good men stand together to eradicate this evil!


FINIS




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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE:


  Text in italics is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.

  Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.