Philip Van Doren Stern (ed) (30 page)

"Here
was
the
new
view.
Plainly,
this
second
species
of
Man
was subterranean.
There
were
three
circumstances
in
particular
which made
me
think
that
its
rare
emergence
above
ground
was
the
outcome of
a
long-continued
underground
habit.
In
the
first
place,
there
was the
bleached
look
common
in
most
animals
that
live
largely
in
the dark—the
white
fish
of
the
Kentucky
caves,
for
instance.
Then,
those large
eyes,
with
that
capacity
for
reflecting
light,
are
common
features of
nocturnal
things—witness
the
owl
and
the
cat.
And
last
of
all,
that evident
confusion
in
the
sunshine,
that
hasty
yet
fumbling
and
awkward
flight
towards
dark
shadow,
and
that
peculiar
carriage
of
the head
while
in
the
light—all
reinforced
the
theory
of
an
extreme sensitiveness
of
the
retina.

"Beneath
my
feet,
then,
the
earth
must
be
tunnelled
enormously, and
these
tunnellings
were
the
habitat
of
the
new
race.
The
presence of
ventilating-shafts
and
wells
along
the
hill
slopes—everywhere,
in fact,
except
along
the
river
valley—showed
how
universal
were
its ramifications.
What
so
natural,
then,
as
to
assume
that
it
was
in
this artificial
under-world
that
such
work
as
was
necessary
to
the
comfort of
the
daylight
race
was
done?
The
notion
was
so
plausible
that
I
at once
accepted
it,
and
went
on
to
assume
the
how
of
this
splitting
of the
human
species.
I
dare
say
you
will
anticipate
the
shape
of
my theory;
though,
for
myself,
I
very
soon
felt
that
it
fell
far
short
of the
truth.

"At
first,
proceeding
from
the
problems
of
our
own
age,
it
seemed clear
as
daylight
to
me
that
the
gradual
widening
of
the
present merely
temporary
and
social
difference
between
the
Capitalist
and the
Labourer
was
the
key
to
the
whole
position.
No
doubt
it
will seem
grotesque
enough
to
you—and
wildly
incredible!—and
yet
even now
there
are
existing
circumstances
to
point
that
way.
There
is
a tendency
to
utilise
underground
space
for
the
less
ornamental
purposes of
civilisation;
there
is
the
Metropolitan
Railway
in
London,
for instance,
there
are
new
electric
railways,
there
are
subways,
there are
underground
workrooms
and
restaurants,
and
they
increase
and multiply.
Evidently,
I
thought,
this
tendency
had
increased
till Industry
had
gradually
lost
its
birthright
in
the
sky.
I
mean
that
it had
gone
deeper
and
deeper
into
larger
and
ever
larger
underground factories,
spending
a
still-increasing
amount
of
its
time
therein,
till,

in
the
end
-----
!
Even
now,
does
not
an
East-end
worker
live
in
such

artificial
conditions
as
practically
to
be
cut
off
from
the
natural
surface
of
the
earth?

"Again,
the
exclusive
tendency
of
richer
people—due,
no
doubt, to
the
increasing
refinement
of
their
education,
and
the
widening gulf
between
them
and
the
rude
violence
of
the
poor—is
already leading
to
the
closing,
in
their
interest,
of
considerable
portions of
the
surface
of
the
land.
About
London,
for
instance,
perhaps
half the
prettier
country
is
shut
in
against
intrusion.
And
this
same
widening
gulf—which
is
due
to
the
length
and
expense
of
the
higher educational
process
and
the
increased
facilities
for
and
temptations towards
refined
habits
on
the
part
of
the
rich—will
make
that
ex
change
between
class
and
class,
that
promotion
by
intermarriage which
at
present
retards
the
splitting
of
our
species
along
lines
of social
stratification,
less
and
less
frequent.
So,
in
the
end,
above ground
you
must
have
the
Haves,
pursuing
pleasure
and
comfort,
and beauty,
and
below
ground
the
Have-nots,
the
Workers
getting
continually
adapted
to
the
conditions
of
their
labour.
Once
they
were
there, they
would
no
doubt
have
to
pay
rent,
and
not
a
little
of
it,
for
the ventilation
of
their
caverns;
and
if
they
refused,
they
would
starve or
be
suffocated
for
arrears.
Such
of
them
as
were
so
constituted
as to
be
miserable
and
rebellious
would
die;
and,
in
the
end,
the
balance being
permanent,
the
survivors
would
become
as
well
adapted
to
the conditions
of
underground
life,
and
as
happy
in
their
way,
as
the Upper-world
people
were
to
theirs.
As
it
seemed
to
me,
the
refined beauty
and
the
etiolated
pallor
followed
naturally
enough.