登陆注册
20057100000088

第88章 Chapter 28(4)

I had learned that it had a use in the world around me only because the work of producing the nation's livelihood, instead of being regarded as the most strictly public and common of all concerns, and as such conducted by the nation, was abandoned to the hap-hazard efforts of individuals. This original mistake necessitated endless exchanges to bring about any sort of general distribution of products. These exchanges money effected--how equitably, might be seen in a walk from the tenement house districts to the Back Bay--at the cost of an army of men taken from productive labor to manage it, with constant ruinous breakdowns of its machinery, and a generally debauching influence on mankind which had justified its description, from ancient time, as the "root of all evil."Alas for the poor old bank director with his poem! He had mistaken the throbbing of an abscess for the beating of the heart. What he called "a wonderful piece of mechanism" was an imperfect device to remedy an unnecessary defect, the clumsy crutch of a self-made cripple.

After the banks had closed I wandered aimlessly about the business quarter for an hour or two, and later sat a while on one of the benches of the Common, finding an interest merely in watching the throngs that passed, such as one has in studying the populace of a foreign city, so strange since yesterday had my fellow citizens and their ways become to me. For thirty years Ihad lived among them, and yet I seemed to have never noted before how drawn and anxious were their faces, of the rich as of the poor, the refined, acute faces of the educated as well as the dull masks of the ignorant. And well it might be so, for I saw now, as never before I had seen so plainly, that each as he walked constantly turned to catch the whispers of a spectre at his ear, the spectre of Uncertainty. "Do your work never so well,"the spectre was whispering--"rise early and toil till late, rob cunningly or serve faithfully, you shall never know security. Rich you may be now and still come to poverty at last. Leave never so much wealth to your children, you cannot buy the assurance that your son may not be the servant of your servant, or that your daughter will not have to sell herself for bread."A man passing by thrust an advertising card in my hand, which set forth the merits of some new scheme of life insurance.

The incident reminded me of the only device, pathetic in its admission of the universal need it so poorly supplied, which offered these tired and hunted men and women even a partial protection from uncertainty. By this means, those already well-to-do, I remembered, might purchase a precarious confi-dence that after their death their loved ones would not, for a while at least, be trampled under the feet of men. But this was all, and this was only for those who could pay well for it. What idea was possible to these wretched dwellers in the land of Ishmael, where every man's hand was against each and the hand of each against every other, of true life insurance as I had seen it among the people of that dream land, each of whom, by virtue merely of his membership in the national family, was guaranteed against need of any sort, by a policy underwritten by one hundred million fellow countrymen.

Some time after this it was that I recall a glimpse of myself standing on the steps of a building on Tremont Street, looking at a military parade. A regiment was passing. It was the first sight in that dreary day which had inspired me with any other emotions than wondering pity and amazement. Here at last were order and reason, an exhibition of what intelligent cooperation can accomplish. The people who stood looking on with kindling faces,--could it be that the sight had for them no more than but a spectacular interest? Could they fail to see that it was their perfect concert of action, their organization under one control, which made these men the tremendous engine they were, able to vanquish a mob ten times as numerous? Seeing this so plainly, could they fail to compare the scientific manner in which the nation went to war with the unscientific manner in which it went to work? Would they not query since what time the killing of men had been a task so much more important than feeding and clothing them, that a trained army should be deemed alone adequate to the former, while the latter was left to a mob?

It was now toward nightfall, and the streets were thronged with the workers from the stores, the shops, and mills. Carried along with the stronger part of the current, I found myself, as it began to grow dark, in the midst of a scene of squalor and human degradation such as only the South Cove tenement district could present. I had seen the mad wasting of human labor; here I saw in direst shape the want that waste had bred.

From the black doorways and windows of the rookeries on every side came gusts of fetid air. The streets and alleys reeked with the effluvia of a slave ship's between-decks. As I passed Ihad glimpses within of pale babies gasping out their lives amid sultry stenches, of hopeless-faced women deformed by hardship, retaining of womanhood no trait save weakness, while from the windows leered girls with brows of brass. Like the starving bands of mongrel curs that infest the streets of Moslem towns, swarms of half-clad brutalized children filled the air with shrieks and curses as they fought and tumbled among the garbage that littered the court-yards.

同类推荐
热门推荐
  • 星眸如水

    星眸如水

    宿敌,抑或双生子?相似的样貌,相似的自信与张扬……如此巧合,抑或命运?相似之人必相吸。月下的追逐,宿命的对手,相爱相杀,却不知彼此命运缠绕交错。似敌似友地行走于如墨的黑暗之中,前行……那么,追逐,开始!Ladiesandgentlemen,it'sshowtime!
  • 探险家伊泽瑞尔传记

    探险家伊泽瑞尔传记

    本书重度中二,非逗比青年,屌丝宅男,慎点!(请勿催更,医院看的比较紧)
  • 没有海的城

    没有海的城

    你因为我失去了父亲,那就让我以海的名义,以兄长的身份,继续爱你。
  • tfboys感谢有你

    tfboys感谢有你

    六位都是有着明星梦的少男少女,这为他们开启了生活的道路。
  • 正室天下:小三儿,靠边站!

    正室天下:小三儿,靠边站!

    这是正室的天下了,她安宁不会如她的名字一样的安宁,她会让这个小三猖狂的时代早早结束,在嫁给他的那天就已经暗暗地发誓。她是安家的长女,是安家唯一名正言顺的嫡女,也只有她才能嫁入豪门,且看我们平时不露声色的安宁少奶奶如何美人心计,推翻小三王朝!
  • 别殇聚欢

    别殇聚欢

    有一天,你会无端想起这样一个人,他让你对明天有所期待,却从未出现在你的明天里。也有那么一天,你会与这样一个人携手今生,他装点了你油盐酱醋的平淡,却从未出现在你的青春里。每每想起那段高中时光,叶铭寒总会闯入夏熈儿的回忆,那时的他孤高清冷,而她骄傲倔强,明明彼此在乎,却无人承认。直到看过了身边的朋友在感情里挣扎,相爱,又分离,直到做够了旁观者,他们才在重逢之后彼此敞开胸怀。那么,再次重逢的他们又将面临怎杨的波折?
  • 穿越火影之沉寂

    穿越火影之沉寂

    本文主要写女主穿越到火影,逐渐变强并爱上我爱罗的故事文案还没想好,最后再写吧更文有点龟速的说PS:目前只在晋江,潇湘和我爱罗吧发过,每个地方都有个不一样的笔名。==
  • 施仲衡自传

    施仲衡自传

    《中国工程院院士传记·施仲衡自传:六十年工作回顾》作者施仲衡院士是中国地铁的开拓者之一,是历史的见证人,阅读此书,如同阅读中国地铁的发展简史,对从事和关注中国地铁发展的人员具有深刻的启迪意义。
  • 科学疯才

    科学疯才

    一个身体羸弱被人不断欺负的少年,为了强壮而当兵,却命运的被帝国第一科学怪才相中,从而成了一代科学怪人。在强者如林,神族、魔族、兽族、精族、妖族等各种传说当中才有的种族肆虐的时代,在仙术、魔法、斗技、奇门异术横行的年代,这样一个羸弱到了极点的少年,究竟保住自己微弱如蝼蚁的小生命?又如何创造出一个又一个的奇迹?情节虚构,切勿模仿
  • 冰系火法

    冰系火法

    如果再给洛云飞一次机会,那么他一定会说:网购需谨慎,中奖有风险。别人穿越是美女为何我是金刚芭比?初到异世界,就差点被人强娶了,还好学过两手,要不然后果不堪设想。