CHAPTER X.

Mr. Lister paused a moment in the narration of a story to which I had listened with absorbing interest, and then said:

“Ah me, that was eight years ago.”

“Eight years ago?” I exclaimed, “what a long courtship!”

“It did not seem long to us. We had both discovered from much observation of our married friends that courtship was the true elysium in every one’s life, and a far happier state than marriage. Noting this we asked each other why we should not prolong this happy season. In it we realised that each was to the other a delightful and never-ending mystery. We saw that in courtship we had a feeling of deep reverence for each other which was almost wholly wanting among married people. In courtship we each felt that love was generous condescension in the other. I did not feel that I was at all worthy of her, and she did not feel that she was worthy of me. We were inexpressibly sacred objects in each other’s eyes, and above all things we desired to remain so.

“Besides, to tell the truth, we saw some terribly dark spots in marriage from which we shrank as from the contemplation of the slimy things in a pool. It seemed ‘filled with the habitations of cruelty!’ She confided to me that she had a schoolmate, a dear friend, who had been married a few years before. She was a radiant, fragrant being, fitted by every gift of Nature to shed light and perfume, joy and laughter wherever she went. But alas, she was not physically adapted to the fearful treadmill of enforced maternity. After twice becoming a mother and barely escaping the ordeal with her life, she was warned that another risk of that kind would undoubtedly have a fatal termination. And this innocent, helpless being, with a sword hanging over her bright young life, went on her way scattering gentle words and loving deeds along her blackly shadowed path. But O, the pity of it! the sword fell. Within a year she was a martyr to the fearful Moloch which yawns continually over woman’s life. She escaped by death from a life so fraught with cruel suffering, so filled with unutterable indignities, that the wonder is that woman did not strike long ago!

“In the ecstasy of our love Allegra Alliston and I vowed that we would never take part in a system that permitted such unspeakable cruelty. We chose rather to enjoy the quiet pleasures of courtship and be satisfied with them.”

“And yet,” said I, “you had decided to get married. You said that Miss Alliston was preparing her wedding-dress at the time of the commencement of the Strike.”

“Oh,” said Mr. Lister, “the great discovery of Zugassent opened up a manner of life by which married people could preserve their sacred reverence for each other, and make the state of courtship a perpetual one. When we saw that we could enter into the joys of marriage without ravaging each other like wild beasts, we had no longer any reason for not doing so. We decided to get married at once.”

“But,” said I, as soon as I could speak, “you talk as though I knew all about Zugassent and his discovery, when in fact I never heard of either.”

“Why,” said Mr. Lister, “it was the wonderful discovery of Zugassent that emboldened the women to strike, and gave a logical basis for their movement. Before that discovery was made, much as they desired the Magna Charta which they are now asking, they were reasonable, and scarcely saw how man could give it. The problem seemed too deep and intricate for any possible solution. But when Zugassent’s discovery was made, they saw that it took away from man all excuse for withholding this right. They demanded it at once.”

At this fresh promise of an utterly unlooked-for revelation, I felt a despairing kind of anger. Could this be the same world in which I had for thirty-five years lived a sober and commonplace life? Mr. Lister had already, in the few days which I had spent with him, dazed me and amazed me with the stunning character of the intelligence which he had conveyed to me. Did he wish to craze me also? Unconsciously I put my hand to my head and stared at him in helpless, pathetic reproach. But he did not appear to be conscious of my feelings. At last when I had mastered myself enough to speak calmly, I said:

“I wish that you would tell me all about Zugassent and his discovery. I have been trying to find out the causes of this singular Strike, and now I hear for the first time that it was assisted by a great discovery about which I am entirely ignorant. I entreat you to tell me who Zugassent was and what was his discovery?”

“Zugassent,” said Mr. Lister, and his lip quivered, and a sudden moisture sprang into his eyes as he spoke, “was a pure and noble soul who believed that everything that was of human interest was worthy of conscientious, painstaking study, and that everything which involved human happiness or misery was a legitimate field for honest effort for improvement. The appalling sum of misery resulting to woman from the present system of marriage, and indirectly to men and children as well through the too great division of the means of subsistence, filled his heart with a divine compassion. It is said that his attention was first called to this subject by observing the suffering of his own wife. That he should be the cause of producing such unavailing suffering became a source of deep disquietude to him. He resolved rather than to pursue a course so fraught with evil to woman, to return to the simple relations of courtship. He fondly loved his wife, but he had firmly decided to content himself with the purely Platonic and spiritual pleasures of her society. Being, however, a natural thinker and a man of studious tastes and habits, he could not help revolving the problem in his thoughts, much wondering at its mind-baffling character. The more he pondered the matter the more was he struck with the astounding anomaly presented by this scientific age. He saw that the explorer, the discoverer and the pioneer were pushing their caravans and wagon-trains into every unmapped land on the globe, and steering their barks into every unknown sea. Applauded by the world, they were daring the burning fevers of Central Africa, and leaving their bones for others as determined discoverers to find in the frozen regions of the North Pole. He saw that in the domain of Science, and Art, and Invention an innumerable host of patient, earnest workers and thinkers, lured on by the highest rewards which Earth could offer, were burning midnight oil in an agonizing search after improvement. Consuming brain and nerve with unremitting and profligate energy, these toilers after newer and better ways were fast robbing the earth of all its material secrets. Even in Religion the rock-bound creeds of hoary churches were being diligently revised and unscrupulously altered to adapt them to the new light of a refulgent present. Everywhere there was light, change, improvement, discarding the old and adopting the newer and better, except in the social relation of man and woman. This alone remained, not, indeed, unquestioned, but unexplored and unimproved, the one stationary fixture of an obsolete and decrepit past. Zugassent saw with absolute and increasing wonder that none of the new light which was flooding the world was allowed to penetrate this dark Continent. A superstition as black, as unreasoning, as utterly inconsistent as that which compelled Galileo to retract his affirmation about the earth’s motion, shrouded this dark Continent and forbade any student to set foot therein. No matter how pure the motive, no matter what misery it was sought to alleviate, the leperous cry, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ was ready to be raised at any one who should seek to direct some of the unstinted light of a marvellous age into this dark domain of ignorance and injustice. To be sure, every one freely acknowledged that black and mephitic vapours were continually arising from this great uncleared land. Every one marvelled that it could be so enveloped in darkness, when there was life and light, change and improvement continually going on about it. The wailing which came from this dark Continent was a source of continual commiseration on the part of every one, and the recitals of the heartrending cruelties, the pestilential scandals, and the shameful deeds that were enacted in this dark country, and which far exceeded those of Siberia, constituted a large and staple part of the intelligence of the newspapers. An age which boasted that it could foretell its weather, and measure the stars, and girdle the earth, was supinely and superstitiously content to let the relation between man and woman remain an unstudied and unimproved part and parcel of a benighted and slave-driving past! As if beyond anything else that concerned mankind, his relations to woman, next to his relation to his Creator, were not the most important, the most deserving of free scientific and conscientious research, and the one supreme improvement for which the world’s highest premiums should be offered.”

There was a choking sound in Mr. Lister’s throat. He seemed like one about to weep. But he continued,

“Zugassent saw all this. He fully realized that the man who conscientiously gave his mind to the study of these problems, who honestly sought to illumine this great department of human life with some of the light which was being prodigally shed elsewhere, would be reviled and misunderstood. He knew that the impure would call him impure, and that the thoughtless would jeer at him. He knew that many good people, still somewhat bound by the fast-failing chains of superstition, would suspect his motives, and would deem any investigation of this subject unlawful. Nevertheless, Zugassent determined that in no other field of human interest was discovery and improvement so wofully and pitifully lacking, and that though for the present his name might be covered with obloquy, future generations would respect his effort if this did not. He therefore resolved, with all the desperate earnestness of a man who is preparing to take leave of his home and friends forever, to light his humble torch and go alone into the murky caverns of this dark Continent. He would, if possible, open some part of it to the light of day. He did so, and his beneficent discovery, but just beginning to be made known, has placed him at the very head of those who have honestly and successfully toiled for the betterment of the human race.”

“And Zugassent’s discovery?” said I, eagerly. But the rays of the morning sun were bursting in at the window. It was broad daylight.

Mr. Lister arose. His face was wet with tears. “My dear Mr. Carford,” said he, “have you forgotten that to-day is Sunday, and that we are to witness the woman’s parade this afternoon? It is absolutely necessary that we should take some rest before that. I will give you Zugassent’s book and let him speak for himself.”

I went to my room and lay down upon the rug. As I passed along the hall I heard Mr. Lister singing the snatches of a song as he prepared himself to rest; and as I drifted into sleep, it was with the words of his song running in my mind:

Love lingers not where sorrow dwells, She cannot bide the downcast face; Where laughter rings like golden bells Is Love’s abiding place.

Love follows those, though seeming vain, Who gild life’s path with faith and hope; She smiles on those who smile again, Not on the misanthrope.

Love smiles on those who smile again, Not on the misanthrope.

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