III
Well, my dear Dorothea, the hearing before the Assembly is over, and ithas left us just where it found us, as far as the departure of our traderis concerned.
How I wish you could have been there! The hearing lasted three days, andI would not have missed a minute of it. As it was, I did not miss asyllable, and it was so deeply printed on my mind that I believe Icould repeat it word for word if I had to. But, in the first place, Imust try and realize the scene to you. I was once summoned as a witnessin one of our courts, you remember, and I have never forgotten the horrorof it: the hot, dirty room, with its foul air, the brutal spectators, thepolicemen stationed among them to keep them in order, the lawyers withthe plaintiff and defendant seated all at one table, the uncouthabruptness of the clerks and janitors, or whatever, the undignifiedmagistrate, who looked as if his lunch had made him drowsy, and whoseemed half asleep, as he slouched in his arm-chair behind his desk.Instead of such a setting as this, you must imagine a vast marbleamphitheatre, larger than the Metropolitan Opera, by three or four times,all the gradines overflowing (that is the word for the "liquefaction ofthe clothes" which poured over them), and looking like those Bermudanwaters where the colors of the rainbow seem dropped around the coast. Onthe platform, or stage, sat the Presidents of the Assembly, and on a tierof seats behind and above them, the national Magistrates, who, as this isthe capital of the republic for the time being, had decided to be presentat the hearing, because they thought the case so very important. In thehollow space, just below (like that where you remember the Chorus stoodin that Greek play which we saw at Harvard ages ago), were the captainand the first-mate on one hand, and the seamen on the other; thesecond-mate, our particular friend, was not there because he never goesashore anywhere, and had chosen to remain with the black cook in chargeof the ship. The captain's wife would rather have stayed with them, but Ipersuaded her to come to us for the days of the hearing, because thecaptain had somehow thought we were opposed to him, and because I thoughtshe ought to be there to encourage him by her presence. She sat next tome, in a hat which I wish you could have seen, Dolly, and a dress whichwould have set your teeth on edge; but inside of them I knew she was oneof the best souls in the world, and I loved her the more for being thesight she was among those wonderful Altrurian women.
The weather was perfect, as it nearly always is at this time ofyear--warm, yet fresh, with a sky of that "bleu impossible" of theRiviera on the clearest day. Some people had parasols, but they put themdown as soon as the hearing began, and everybody could see perfectly. Youwould have thought they could not hear so well, but a sort of immensesounding-plane was curved behind the stage, so that not a word of thetestimony on either side was lost to me in English. The Altruriantranslation was given the second day of the hearing through a megaphone,as different in tone from the thing that the man in the Grand CentralStation bellows the trains through as the _vox-humana_ stop of an organis different from the fog-horn of a light-house. The captain's wife wasbashful, in her odd American dress, but we had got seats near thetribune, rather out of sight, and there was nothing to hinder ourhearing, like the _frou-frou_ of stiff silks or starched skirts (whichI am afraid we poor things in America like to make when we move) from thesoft, filmy tissues that the Altrurian women wear; but I must confessthat there was a good deal of whispering while the captain and the menwere telling their stories. But, no one except the interpreters, who weretaking their testimony down in short-hand, to be translated intoAltrurian and read at the subsequent hearing, could understand what theywere saying, and so nobody was disturbed by the murmurs. The whisperingwas mostly near me, where I sat with the captain's wife, for everybody Iknew got as close as they could and studied my face when they thoughtanything important or significant had been said. They are very quick atreading faces here; in fact, a great deal of the conversation is carriedon in that way, or with the visible speech; and my Altrurian friends knewalmost as well as I did when the speakers came to an interesting point.It was rather embarrassing for me, though, with the poor captain's wifeat my side, to tell them, in my broken Altrurian, what the men wereaccusing the captain of.
I talk of the men, but it was really only one of them who at first, bytheir common consent, spoke for the rest. He was a middle-aged Yankee,and almost the only born American among them, for you know that oursailors, nowadays, are of every nationality under the sun--Portuguese,Norwegians, Greeks, Italians, Kanucks, and Kanakas, and even Cape CodIndians. He said he guessed his story was the story of most sailors, andhe had followed the sea his whole life. His story was dreadful, and Itried to persuade the captain's wife not to come to the hearing the nextday, when it was to be read in Altrurian; but she would come. I wasafraid she would be overwhelmed by the public compassion, and would notknow what to do; for when something awful that the sailor had saidagainst the captain was translated the women, all about us cooed theirsympathy with her, and pressed her hand if they could, or patted her onthe shoulder, to show how much they pitied her. In Altruria they pity thefriends of those who have done wrong, and sometimes even the wrong-doersthemselves; and it is quite a luxury, for there is so little wrong-doinghere: I tell them that in America they would have as much pitying to doas they could possibly ask. After the hearing that day my friends, whowere of a good many different Refectories, as we call them here, wantedher to go and lunch with them; but I got her quietly home with me, andafter she had had something to eat I made her lie down awhile.
You won't care to have me go fully into the affair. The sailors'spokesman told how he had been born on a farm, where he had shared thefamily drudgery and poverty till he grew old enough to run away. Hemeant to go to sea, but he went first to a factory town and worked threeor four years in the mills. He never went back to the farm, but he sent alittle money now and then to his mother; and he stayed on till he gotinto trouble. He did not say just what kind of trouble, but I fancied itwas some sort of love-trouble; he blamed himself for it; and when he leftthat town to get away from the thought of it, as much as anything, andwent to work in another town, he took to drink; then, once, in a drunkenspree, he found himself in New York without knowing how. But it was inwhat he called a sailors' boarding-house, and one morning, after he hadbeen drinking overnight "with a very pleasant gentleman," he foundhimself in the forecastle of a ship bound for Holland, and when the matecame and cursed him up and cursed him out he found himself in theforetop. I give it partly in his own language, because I cannot help it;and I only wish I could give it wholly in his language; it was so graphicand so full of queer Yankee humor. From that time on, he said, he hadfollowed the sea; and at sea he was always a good temperance man, butAltruria was the only place he had ever kept sober ashore. He guessedthat was partly because there was nothing to drink but unfermentedgrape-juice, and partly because there was nobody to drink with; anyhow,he had not had a drop here. Everywhere else, as soon as he left his ship,he made for a sailors' boarding-house, and then he did not know much tillhe found himself aboard ship and bound for somewhere that he did not knowof. He was always, he said, a stolen man, as much as a negro captured onthe west coast of Africa and sold to a slaver; and, he said, it was aslave's life he led between drinks, whether it was a long time or short.He said he would ask his mates if it was very different with them, andwhen he turned to them they all shouted back, in their various kinds offoreign accents, No, it was just the same with them, every one. Then hesaid that was how he came to ship on our captain's vessel, and thoughthey could not all say the same, they nodded confirmation as far as hewas concerned.
The captain looked sheepish enough at this, but he looked sorrowful, too,as if he could have wished it had been different, and he asked the man ifhe had been abused since he came on board. Well, the man said, not unlessyou called tainted salt-horse and weevilly biscuit abuse; and then thecaptain sat down again, and I could feel his poor wife shrinking besideme. The man said that he was comparatively well off on the captain'sship, and the life was not half such a dog's life as he had led on ot
hervessels; but it was such that when he got ashore here in Altruria, andsaw how _white_ people lived, people that _used_ each other white, hemade up his mind that he would never go hack to any ship alive. He hateda ship so much that if he could go home to America as a first-classpassenger on a Cunard liner, John D. Rockefeller would not have moneyenough to hire him to do it. He was going to stay in Altruria till hedied, if they would let him, and he guessed they would, if what he hadheard about them was true. He just wanted, he said, while we were aboutit, to have a few of his mates tell their experience, not so much onboard the _Little Sally_, but on shore, and since they could remember;and one after another did get up and tell their miserable stories. Theywere like the stories you sometimes read in your paper over your coffee,or that you can hear any time you go into the congested districts in NewYork; but I assure you, my dear, they seemed to me perfectly incrediblehere, though I had known hundreds of such stories at home. As I realizedtheir facts I forgot where I was; I felt that I was back again in thathorror, where it sometimes seemed to me I had no right to be fed orclothed or warm or clean in the midst of the hunger and cold andnakedness and dirt, and where I could only reconcile myself to my comfortbecause I knew my discomfort would not help others' misery.
I can hardly tell how, but even the first day a sense of somethingterrible spread through that multitude of people, to whom the wordsthemselves were mere empty sounds. The captain sat through it, with hishead drooping, till his face was out of sight, and the tears ran silentlydown his wife's cheeks; and the women round me were somehow awed intosilence. When the men ended, and there seemed to be no one else to sayanything on that side, the captain jumped to his feet, with a sort offerocious energy, and shouted out, "Are you all through, men?" and theirspokesman answered, "Ay, ay, sir!" and then the captain flung back hisgrizzled hair and shook his fist towards the sailors. "And do you think I_wanted_ to do it? Do you think I _liked_ to do it? Do you think that ifI hadn't been _afraid_ my whole life long I would have had the _heart_ tolead you the dog's life I know I've led you? I've been as poor as thepoorest of you, and as low down as the lowest; I was born in the townpoor-house, and I've been so afraid of the poor-house all my days that Ihain't had, as you may say, a minute's peace. Ask my wife, there, whatsort of a man I _am_, and whether I'm the man, _really_ the man that'sbeen hard and mean to you the way I know I been. It was because I was_afraid_, and because a coward is always hard and mean. I been afraid,ever since I could remember anything, of coming to want, and I waswilling to see other men suffer so I could make sure that me and mineshouldn't suffer. That's the way we do at home, ain't it? That's in theday's work, ain't it? That's playing the game, ain't it, for everybody?You can't say it ain't." He stopped, and the men's spokesman called back,"Ay, ay, sir," as he had done before, and as I had often heard the men dowhen given an order on the ship.
The captain gave a kind of sobbing laugh, and went on in a lower tone."Well, I know you ain't going back. I guess I didn't expect it much fromthe start, and I guess I'm not surprised." Then he lifted his head andshouted, "And do you suppose _I_ want to go back? Don't you suppose _I_would like to spend the rest of my days, too, among _white_ people,people that _use_ each other white, as you say, and where there ain'tany want or, what's worse, _fear_ of want? Men! There ain't a day, or anhour, or a minute, when I don't think how awful it is over there, where Igot to be either some man's slave or some man's master, as much so as ifit was down in the ship's articles. My wife ain't so, because she ain'tbeen ashore here. I wouldn't let her; I was afraid to let her see what awhite man's country really was, because I felt so weak about it myself,and I didn't want to put the trial on her, too. And do you know _why_we're going back, or want to go? I guess some of you know, but I want totell these folks here so they'll understand, and I want you, Mr. Homos,"he called to my husband, "to get it down straight. It's because we've gottwo little children over there, that we left with their grandmother whenmy wife come with me this voyage because she had lung difficulty andwanted to see whether she could get her health back. Nothing else onGod's green earth could take me back to America, and I guess it couldn'tmy wife if she knew what Altruria was as well as I do. But when I wentaround here and saw how everything was, and remembered how it was athome, I just said, 'She'll stay on the ship.' Now, that's all I got tosay, though I thought I had a lot more. I guess it'll be enough for thesefolks, and they can judge between us." Then the captain sat down, and tomake a long story short, the facts of the hearing were repeated inAltrurian the next day by megaphone, and when the translation wasfinished there was a general rush for the captain. He plainly expected tobe lynched, and his wife screamed out, "Oh, don't hurt him! He isn't abad man!" But it was only the Altrurian way with a guilty person: theywanted to let him know how sorry they were for him, and since his sin hadfound him out how hopeful they were for his redemption. I had to explainit to the sailors as well as to the captain and his wife, but I don'tbelieve any of them quite accepted the fact.
The third day of the hearing was for the rendering of the decision, firstin Altrurian, and then in English. The verdict of the magistrates had tobe confirmed by a standing vote of the people, and of course the womenvoted as well as the men. The decision was that the sailors should beabsolutely free to go or stay, but they took into account the fact thatit would be cruel to keep the captain and his wife away from their littleones, and the sailors might wish to consider this. If they still remainedtrue to their love of Altruria they could find some means of returning.
When the translator came to this point their spokesman jumped to his feetand called out to the captain, "Will you _do_ it?" "Do what?" he asked,getting slowly to his own feet. "Come back with us after you have seenthe kids?" The captain shook his fist at the sailors; it seemed to be theonly gesture he had with them. "Give me the _chance!_ All I want is tosee the children and bring them out with me to Altruria, and the oldfolks with them." "Will you _swear_ it? Will you say, 'I hope I may findthe kids dead and buried when I get home if I don't do it'?" "I'll takethat oath, or any oath you want me to." "Shake hands on it, then."
The two men met in front of the tribunal and clasped hands there, andtheir reconciliation did not need translation. Such a roar of cheers wentup! And then the whole assembly burst out in the national Altruriananthem, "Brothers All." I wish you could have heard it! But when theterms of the agreement were explained, the cheering that had gone beforewas a mere whisper to what followed. One orator after another rose andpraised the self-sacrifice of the sailors. I was the proudest when thelast of them referred to Aristides and the reports which he had sent homefrom America, and said that without some such study as he had made ofthe American character they never could have understood such an act asthey were now witnessing. Illogical and insensate as their system was,their character sometimes had a beauty, a sublimity which was notpossible to Altrurians even, for it was performed in the face of risksand chances which their happy conditions relieved them from. At the sametime, the orator wished his hearers to consider the essential immoralityof the act. He said that civilized men had no right to take these risksand chances. The sailors were perhaps justified, in so far as they werehomeless, wifeless, and childless men; but it must not be forgotten thattheir heroism was like the reckless generosity of savages.
The men have gone back to the ship, and she sails this afternoon. I havepersuaded the captain to let his wife stay to lunch with me at ourRefectory, where the ladies wish to bid her good-bye, and I am hurryingforward this letter so that she can take it on board with her thisafternoon. She has promised to post it on the first Pacific steamer theymeet, or if they do not meet any to send it forward to you with aspecial-delivery stamp as soon as they reach Boston. She will alsoforward by express an Altrurian costume, such as I am now wearing,sandals and all! Do put it on, Dolly, dear, for my sake, and realize whatit is for once in your life to be a _free_ woman.
Heaven knows when I shall have another chance of getting letters to you.But I shall live in hopes, and I shall set do
wn my experiences here foryour benefit, not perhaps as I meet them, but as I think of them, andyou must not mind having a rather cluttered narrative. To-morrow we aresetting off on our round of the capitals, where Aristides is to make asort of public report to the people of the different Regions on theworking of the capitalistic conditions as he observed them among us. ButI don't expect to send you a continuous narrative of our adventures.Good-bye, dearest, with my mother's love, and my husband's as well as myown, to both of you; think of me as needing nothing but a glimpse of youto complete my happiness. How I should like to tell you fully about it!You _must_ come to Altruria!
I came near letting this go without telling you of one curious incidentof the affair between the captain and his men. Before the men returned tothe ship they came with their spokesman to say good-bye to Aristides andme, and he remarked casually that it was just as well, maybe, to be goingback, because, for one thing, they would know then whether it was real ornot. I asked him what he meant, and he said, "Well, you know, some of themates think it's a dream here, or it's too good to be true. As far forthas I go, I'd be willing to have it a dream that I didn't ever have towake up from. It ain't any too good to be true for me. Anyway, I'm goingto get back somehow, and give it another chance to be a fact." Wasn'tthat charming? It had a real touch of poetry in it, but it was prose thatfollowed. I couldn't help asking him whether there had been nothing tomar the pleasure of their stay in Altruria, and he answered: "Well, Idon't know as you could rightly say _mar;_ it hadn't ought to have. Yousee, it was like this. You see, some of the mates wanted to lay off andhave a regular bange, but that don't seem to be the idea here. After wehad been ashore a day or two they set us to work at different jobs, orwanted to. The mates didn't take hold very lively, and some of 'em didn'ttake hold a bit. But after that went on a couple of days, there wa'n'tany breakfast one morning, and come noontime there wa'n't any dinner, andas far forth as they could make out they had to go to bed without supper.Then they called a halt, and tackled one of your head men here that couldspeak some English. He didn't answer them right off the reel, but hegot out his English Testament and he read 'em a verse that said, 'Foreven when we were with you this we commanded you, that if any one wouldnot work neither should he eat.' That kind of fetched 'em, and afterthat there wa'n't any sojerin', well not to speak of. They saw he meantbusiness. I guess it did more than any one thing to make 'em think theywa'n't dreamin'."
Through the Eye of the Needle: A Romance Page 31
