“Now, I do not wish to be understood that I am ridiculing your social and industrial institutions, or that I blame any one for these poor, pitiable conditions we find existing here on earth. We passed through the same woful stages. Every well-informed person knows that your world, as a whole, is better to-day than it ever was before. You enjoy more security, more kindness, more intelligence and more freedom than you ever did in any preceding age. The conditions which we find on earth are, as a whole, undoubtedly nearly in tune with your social and industrial culture; and the only known power in the universe that can substitute a higher and nobler order of things is additional intelligence. Acts, as we have seen, are always in harmony with the intelligence of the actor.

“We can not hope to find much good work done in a world where the division of labor is so imperfect as it is here with you. Your so-called farmer is, as a rule, at the same time agriculturist, horticulturist, stockbreeder, butcher, dairyman, shepherd, carpenter and poultry raiser. On the other hand, your city laborer must frequently be idle, or accept any kind of labor he can get, whether he is proficient in it or whether he is a bungler at it.”

“There must be a great difference between our institutions and yours,” said Mrs. Uwins.

“In some respects there is,” replied Mr. Midith. “Just compare the appearance and conditions of our social and industrial world with that of yours. Think of our magnificent residences—grand edifices, furnished on the interior with all the domestic conveniences that human ingenuity can contrive. The outer appearance is very imposing; numerous large windows through which are seen the rich curtains and through which the blitheful laugh of the inmates can be heard, and the healthy countenances of free, rich men, women, and children can be seen. Think how all these fine dwellings are located in the grandest parks that nature and art can produce; how all varieties of flowers and ornamental trees may be seen in all directions. Think of the green, closely-mowed lawn; the cool, refreshing fountain playing on the bosom of the artificial lakes in which men, women and children are sportively swimming and bathing. Think how the odoriferous, life-giving breeze enters every apartment of our palatial homes, which are neither crowded in populous cities nor isolated in a lonely country. Think of the smooth, shady boulevard on which numerous men, women and children are seeking healthful, sportive exercise. Think of the spacious conservatory and green-house, surrounded by glass, and containing luxuriant tropical plants, whose foliage is as green, even when the snow is two feet deep, as it is in its native climate. Think of the productive garden, bearing the choicest vegetables that evolution through the hand of the horticulturist has been able to produce; of the enticing orchard with its endless variety of fruit trees and shrubbery, its green lawns, and clean walks. Think of the ease with which our farming is done, and the immense amount of agricultural work we can do in a short time. Think how all our labor has turned almost into play, and how much leisure time we enjoy. And lastly, think of the intelligent free, rich, healthy inhabitants who have all learned that the happiness of self includes the happiness of others. Such, upon a brief, superficial contemplation, are a few of the more conspicuous differences existing between our system and yours. Yet you should always bear in mind that we have nothing on Mars but what you can have right here on earth with a little additional intelligence, a little more knowledge of yourselves and your fellowman. A little more kindness and a little less cruelty. A little more peace and a little less discord. A little more freedom and a little less jealousy. A little wider and more voluntary co-operation and a little less single-handed effort. A little more individualism and a little less paternalism and co-operative coercion. A little more confidence in the operations and uniformity of the so-called laws of nature, and a little less trust in the pretended virtue of superstition. I, therefore, repeat again that thousands of your foremost cultivated men and women here on earth are already prepared to live a Marsian life, if they were not prevented by your existing institutions and by the masses who are not yet ready for such a harmonious life.”

“You have not told us anything about your mining,” said Mr. Uwins. “I presume you do that with as much skill and facility as you do your other work.”

“Yes; we mine on the same large plan as we do our other work,” replied Mr. Midith, “Our mining machinery is very much improved, and we need but little muscular power in the occupation of mining. We are continually sinking more and deeper shafts, whereby we increase the quantity and quality of our mining products. Every few communities fit out a ‘prospecting’ gang, who are constantly employed in ‘prospecting’ for better mines in those communities which they represent; and wherever we find the most productive ones, we work. In this manner we find the most productive mines, and the best iron and other useful minerals. We have also discovered how to manufacture aluminium successfully and cheaply. This metal, on account of its cheapness and advantageous properties, is now very largely used for mechanical, architectural and other purposes.

“Much of our mining is done in the winter. Many of those who work on the farm during the summer, work in the factory and mine during the winter. Some of the agriculturists also work in the green-house during the winter. In this manner, you see, our work of the whole year is divided nearly uniformly. That is, we have as much work to do one season of the year as another; and whenever we are in need of more help in one occupation, for instance, such as harvesting, we can get all the help we need from the factory and the mine. By this change, we are never crowded in any work, nor are we ever out of work. These conditions are highly conducive to human well-being. The body is not burdened with overwork at one period of the year and stupefied on account of inactivity at another.”

“Do you have many accidents in your mines?” asked Rev. Dudley, who became more and more interested in Mr. Midith’s narrative.

“Very rarely one loses his life by accident in our mine. We value life so highly that, if things are not very secure, no one will go into the mine. We are not driven by a ‘boss’ and by poverty, like many of your miners are, who have to go or lose their position. We go when and where we like. No one has the power to throw us out of employment nor to make us poor.

“There is still another important mining feature which I have not explained to you, and that is this: The more we prospect the more evenly do we find the mining products distributed on our world. Nearly every community can now work a mine of some kind with advantage.

“From what I have said, you no doubt understand by this time that we have long ago abandoned the use of coal for heating and lighting purposes, and also for the generating of motive power. We use electricity and compressed air for all this. We employ wonderfully simple and powerful storage battery cells, which we charge either with wind power, water power or with compressed air engines. Is it not strange that the people of earth are already imitating us in these fields? Your Paris, in France, is already using the storage battery cells for lighting purposes. I notice in your Scientific American of Jan. 30, 1892, that Niagara Falls and Buffalo, N. Y., are about to utilize the waterfall power at that place for generating electricity and compressing air. This is what the Scientific American says:

“‘After the completion of the great tunnel works now in progress at Niagara Falls, there will be nothing to hinder the rapid rise and growth of that interesting town into a great and wonderful city. Its dwellings and factories will be supplied with light, heat and motive power at an extremely low cost, and useful industries of every kind ought there to flourish with unwonted vigor. Domestic life will be attended with many comforts and conveniences. The cook will only need to touch a button, and presto! her electric stove be in full operation, the pot will boil, the oven bake, the turkey roast, the pump move, the washing machine turn; while the electric refrigerator will freeze the water, preserve meat, vegetables, milk, butter, eggs and other supplies. No coal, no wood, no dust, no dirt, no oil, no gas. The lady of the house will be relieved of care. She presses a button, and every nook and corner of her dwelling glow with cheerful light. Touch another, and the electric fire glimmers in every room, diffusing genial warmth. The electric lift takes her up or down stairs in a jiffy. The telephone conveys her orders to market and distributes her social commands among friends and neighbors. Niagara is in a fair way to become famous as the great electrical city of the world. At any rate, it will possess in a great degree the means for economic electric generation and supply.

“‘Near to Niagara, only twenty-five miles distant, is Buffalo, already a large and prosperous city, the head center of lake navigation. The simple extension of conductors over the short distance above mentioned will bring to the people of Buffalo a direct share in the economic and other advantages of the new and great enterprise. Light, heat and motive power for streets, vehicles, work-shops, factories, stores, churches, dwellings can be supplied from the dynamos at Niagara, more economically, probably, than by any other means. Local steam engines may be dismissed; their occupation for Buffalo will be gone. Even the steam fire engine may retire. The electric pump will beat them out of sight.

“‘We look toward Niagara and Buffalo with hopeful interest, expecting soon to witness these many novel applications of electricity for industrial, domestic and municipal purposes. In the latter category the promotion of the public health and the expulsion of disease by electrical agencies seem to be among the reasonable possibilities of the near future.’

“The Scientific American of Jan. 9, 1892, also shows a cut of an electric carriage propelled by storage battery cells,” said Mr. Midith, as he showed the cut of it and began to read as follows:

“‘The graceful vehicle illustrated in the accompanying picture is interesting, as being undoubtedly the first carriage propelled by electricity built in the West. It is the invention of William Morrison, of Des Moines, Ia., and was built by Morrison and Schmidt, of that city. It is intended for operation on ordinary city and country roads and will carry twelve people comfortably.

“‘The power is furnished by 24 storage battery cells placed beneath the seats.... This motor is of four horse power.... The steering is attached to the forward axle and is controlled by a hand wheel in front of the carriage. Mr. Morrison claims that his carriage has been exhaustively and successfully tested in Des Moines, and that it has been run continuously 13 hours, attaining a speed of 14 miles an hour. He thinks that a much higher velocity can be attained if desirable.’”

Mr. Midith continued: “I noticed in the Western Electrician of Sept. 17, 1892, that J. B. McDonald, president of the American Battery Company, Chicago, purchased this electric carriage and is creating quite an excitement with it on the streets of Chicago.

“From the foregoing articles appearing in your Scientific American, we clearly see that the earthites (people living on earth) are closely following the Marsites in their mechanical, as well as in their other lines of progress. Of course all your electric apparatus and work is, as yet, but the rude beginnings. All it needs is improvement. There is an inexhaustible amount of electricity, and all you need do is to store it up for use. Formerly we, like you now, used coal, wood and gas for lighting, heating and motive purposes. But all of these were slowly supplanted by compressed-air engines and electricity.

“Our large warehouses, factories, and mills built along the motor-lines at short intervals, have on their large flat roofs, powerful windmills which continually pour a strong current of electricity into a capacious electric reservoir, or they are charging storage battery cells.

“In some localities on Mars, we still use compressed air. The powerful windmills are always compressing air for the compressed-air engines. Our compressed-air engines are almost similar to yours, but with you the compressed-air engine is not a success on account of your limited storage room for the compressed air, and also on account of occasional local calms, during which time your supply of compressed air becomes exhausted.

“We have overcome these difficulties. The communities of a large area of country are all connected by large air-tubes, into which the windmills are compressing air. At certain intervals along these air-tubes are capacious air chambers for the reception of air. These air-tubes are all around the communities the same as the motor-lines, passing through all the ‘big-houses,’ warehouses, factories and mills, where they drive compressed-air engines, which furnish all the motive power for generating electricity and do all the other motor work. Thus you see by this arrangement, we have a vast supply of air on hand, and there is always a local wind somewhere over this extensive district of communities which are connected by these air tubes.

“Where electricity is generated and stored directly by wind power, which it is most places, the electric currents are led through all the buildings, ‘big-houses,’ warehouse, factories, mills and barns. Here it is used for heating, lighting, and motive power for loading and unloading and for running machinery. Waterpower is also largely used for the generation of electricity. Our carriages, farming machinery, and all other movable vehicles and machinery, are propelled by the electric storage battery cell. These cells are with us now very simple, powerful and lasting. Every community has a large supply of them stored for reserve, the same as you have a supply of coal on hand, and our model windmills and waterfalls are charging them faster than we need them. The force which manifests itself in the current of air which drives the windmills is stored for future use, and this storing is being done just the same, whether it is winter or summer, whether we work or sleep. The irregular motion of the wind is thus changed into a perfectly uniform motion of electricity and then applied to machinery.

“Thus you see, we do not, like you, need water and fuel to run our engines, nor do we need draft-animals to draw our plows and other vehicles. Some communities, in order to charge their storage battery cells, ship them to great waterfalls. Electricity is also led by wires for long distances, and everywhere you are following us step by step. It is true that your mechanical appliances are still very rude, but you are improving them very rapidly, and, no doubt, you will before long make wonderful achievements in the electric and other lines of discoveries. In order to show your progress in the field of electric science, let me read to you another article from the Scientific American of March 12, 1892.” Then Mr. Midith read as follows:

“‘One Hundred Miles an Hour by Electricity!

“‘The latest electrical scheme is for an electric railway between Chicago and St. Louis. The following is from the prospectus of the Chicago & St. Louis Electric Railroad Co., working under the patents of Dr. Wellington Adams:

“‘The proposed road will be operated from one central station, located at the mouth of a coal mine somewhere near the center of the road. The railway company will operate this mine by means of electric mining locomotives, electric drills, electric cutters, and electric lights, which will greatly cheapen the present cost of the ordinary system of mining coal. The possibility and economy of this method of mining has already been established beyond dispute. The company will sell the good coal that is mined at a handsome profit, and use only the waste, dust and slack to run the engines which develop the power for operating the mine and road, in connection with its distributing system of light and power for consumers along the line of road. At the present time such dust and slack is not only valueless, but has to be hauled away at the expense of the mining company. The road will be divided up into twenty-five sections of ten miles each, which will constitute a complete block system, making it impossible for any two cars to run at a high speed upon any single section at the same time, thus making collisions impossible. There will be a complete block signaling system by means of incandescent electric lights, with telephonic communication between cars upon the same section, whether running or standing still. The road will be illuminated by incandescent electric lamps for one mile ahead and one mile behind every car while running. It will be built in a practically straight line, and as far as possible will avoid grade crossings of other roads. At all grade crossings, whether wagon or railroad, a red electric light will be displayed and an electric bell rung for two minutes before it is time for the train to pass. It is intended to ultimately construct four tracks—two outside tracks for local traffic and high class freight, while the two inner tracks will be used exclusively for through passenger traffic, mail and high class express. The through cars will not stop anywhere between the two terminal cities between which they run. Spurs or branches will be run, connecting the large cities along the line of the road with the main through tracks, and from these cities to St. Louis and Chicago without stop. Ultimately a street will be run along the sides of these tracks, along which dwelling houses and stores will be built. On both sides of these avenues the land will, ultimately, be laid out in building lots one hundred feet front by two hundred feet deep, giving an area of half an acre to each lot. These lots will be bought by people from town seeking the healthy air of the country and pleasant homes within quick and cleanly access of the city. Back of them they will have the open farm lands, and in front of them the boulevard with the electric railway, telephone and electric light; practically uniting Washington avenue, St. Louis, with Michigan avenue, Chicago, by one grand electric highway or boulevard, along which the farmer may secure electric light and power for pumping, plowing, thrashing, chopping and mixing fodder, shelling and grinding corn, and harvesting at night in case of emergency; and the rural resident may secure electric lights for the illumination of his dwelling, and electricity for heating and cooking, and electric power for domestic purposes. Along this road there will ultimately be a constant stream of travel. The population will be scattered out into the country, and the centers of trade and business relieved of their surplus, leaving more room for business establishments near the great centers of trade, taking out of the great bustle and crowd of the city those who are not immediately engaged in trade, and leaving room for those who are. The result will be of incalculable benefit to the whole population and land holders throughout the district through which the proposed road will traverse. It will bring into use and market a large amount of real estate hitherto of but little value.

“‘Either of the three routes which this road proposes to take between St. Louis and Chicago will be at least thirty-three miles shorter than the shortest of the existing steam routes. The standard schedule time of all through cars will be one hundred miles per hour. The trip from St. Louis to Chicago can, therefore, be made in from two and a half to three hours. It will be unnecessary to travel at night, therefore no through passenger cars will be run after nine o’clock P. M., the tracks being reserved at night for high-class freight, express and mail. This does away with the necessity of running Pullman cars, and the expense to the company attendant thereon, as well as to the traveling public. No man will care about traveling at night when he can travel in the daytime over a cleanly road which will land him so quickly at his destination. Farmers along the line can build cheap side switches with light rails, which will enable cars to be run directly to the doors of their barns and granaries, to facilitate the transportation of the produce of their land, thus rendering them largely independent of the condition of the ordinary wagon roads, which, by the way, have become very poor through neglect since the inauguration of the railroad system. Thus will the large markets of St. Louis and Chicago be practically at the door of every farmer throughout this district, for the sale of his perishable produce. The moment the proposed road is completed and put in operation, all lands throughout the district traversed by the road will be increased in value from one to two hundred per cent. and ultimately, and that at a day not very far distant, the land immediately contiguous to the road will be selling by the front foot instead of, as at present, by the acre, with very little demand for even this.

“‘It will, of course, be to the highest interest of this company to build this road and get it in operation in time for the World’s Fair, so as to secure the immense traffic incident thereto. It is entirely practicable, says the prospectus, to build such a road within the time allotted. Steam roads of a much more difficult character have been built much more rapidly; for instance, the Texas & Pacific extension was built a distance of 615 miles in twenty-two months, four hundred miles of which was through a region entirely destitute of railroads and even of population, the cattle men at that time having failed even to penetrate the greater portion with their herds. The country was of a rough and hilly character, many summits being as high as three and four thousand feet, with such modifications of climate as to make a trip across the country a series of continual surprises. For a great portion of the road a rate of two miles for every working day was maintained for several months. Ties, fuel, and bridge timber had to be transported from East Texas, a distance of from four to six hundred miles; rails from Pennsylvania, seventeen hundred miles; and water from wherever it could be gotten along the line. The present proposed road will have none of these difficulties to contend with. It will have a practically level country over which to build its road, which will be crossed at intervals by steam roads, which can be utilized for the transportation of its materials. An interesting fact may be stated in this connection, that contracts can be made for the delivery of rails for the entire road within six weeks from the day of giving the order.

“‘The electric carriage or car that will be run upon this proposed electric road is a long, low, compact, light but strong car, having two pairs of driving wheels, each of which are driven by a separate and distinct electric motor. The whole weight of the car, with its passengers, and of the two electric motors, comes upon these two pairs of driving wheels, and is, therefore, all available for traction, or adhesion between the rails and the wheels, through the agency of which the car is propelled. The top of the car stands only nine feet from the rail, which is three feet lower than the ordinary street car. This brings the center of gravity very low and near to the track, which decreases immensely the danger of jumping the track. It has a wedge-shaped nose or front for cutting the air, which has the effect of decreasing the air resistance and of helping to keep the car down upon the track. The motor man stands immediately back of this wedge-shaped front, and between his department and the rear wheels is the compartment for the accommodation of passengers. In the rear of this is a separate compartment for mail and high express. The driving wheels are six feet in diameter, and are capable of making 500 revolutions in a minute. The weight of the entire car, with its motors, is but ten tons. It maybe interesting in this connection to state that a steam locomotive, to make the same speed, if it were practicable, would have to weigh in the neighborhood of one hundred tons, and the present locomotive weighs from sixty to ninety tons. These electric carriages or cars will be illuminated and heated by electricity, and will contain all the modern appointments for the comfort of passengers. There will be no conductors and no brakemen. It will be possible to stop the car within half a mile by means of the motors themselves and auxiliary electric brakes.’

“This is a grand scheme for the people of earth. I have read this article to show that you are not so far behind the Marsites in the science of mechanics as the masses of the common people seem to believe. This article clearly shows that what I have told you concerning our mechanical science is not a dream, but can by a little improvement, by a little more genius, and by a little wider voluntary co-operation, be applied equally well right here on earth. You need nothing new, but only improve on what you already have. I believe that the proposed enterprise is the grandest lesson in transportation and intercommunication that the people of the earth have so far conceived. There are still many monopolistic features in it as far as the social and economic principles are concerned, but this proposed railway with its lines of boulevards is a kind of a rude, primitive community, which will no doubt grow in regularity, freedom and equitable prosperity.”

“How, Mr. Midith, do you conduct your manufacturing industry?” asked Mrs. Uwins after Mr. Midith had finished speaking. “I suppose you manufacture a great many nice things.”

“Our manufacturing is, of course, done on a large scale, and mostly in those localities where the natural resources are best adapted for it. The advantages of manufacturing on a large scale are many and important. Let us exemplify this more fully. When every individual had to make his own garments and his own house, like primitive people do, both clothes and houses were scarce and poor, for several reasons which you undoubtedly understand. It is necessary, in order to manufacture a good article with little labor, first, to be a skillful workman, and, second, to have good tools and machinery to work with. The same person cannot be skilled in all trades, and, even if he could, he should still manufacture on a large scale; for it would require far too much needless labor for every person to own as good machinery and tools as many men can afford to own together, and the better the tools and machinery, the more and the better goods can be manufactured with the same amount of labor. Every individual can not own a good tailor shop, a convenient shoe factory and a large watchmaking establishment. ‘Division of labor’ should be as complete as possible, not only among individuals, but among communities as well.

“For instance, we have very large flouring mills, which have all the latest improved milling machinery in them. This machinery is very costly, and it would not be wise to have such a mill in each community. Therefore, one community manufactures one article and another community manufactures another, and some do not manufacture much at all.”

“Do you manufacture extraordinary fine cloth, jewelry, dress goods, etc.?” asked Viola somewhat inquiringly, as she glanced at Mr. Midith.

Mr. Midith smiled with apparent satisfaction and replied: “Indeed, we make fine cloths, some elegant jewelry, but we manufacture no dress goods. You see we have no use for dress goods, because our ladies do not wear dresses like you do.”

“Do your ladies honestly wear no dresses!” exclaimed Viola astonishingly. “What a strange world! a world without a dress in it!”

“Yes; our ladies wear no dresses,” responded Mr. Midith; “but we are digressing from our subject. Some other evening I shall fully describe our costume of both ladies and gentlemen.”

“Does not, then, manufacture and mining give a denser population to a community than a community has which is engaged almost exclusively in agriculture?” asked Mr. Uwins.

“Yes; they have a tendency to increase the density of population in a community above the average. But a mine or factory which employs 10,000 hands is quite large; and an increase of ten thousand in a community having in an average a population of 120,000 is not a large increase.”

“There is one feature in your system, Mr. Midith, I can not yet see into, and I should like to have you make that a little plainer if you can,” said Rev. Dudley, “and that feature is about the density of population. I may be dull in comprehension, but it does not, in my opinion, figure out well. You say that a square mile of land can, under the same conditions, support as many, and no more, human beings on Mars than it can on earth. You further say that your communities contain about four townships; have, in an average, about 120,000 inhabitants. Four townships contain 144 square miles. This gives a population of over 800 to the square mile, while Belgium, the most densely populated country on earth, has only a little over 500 to the square mile; and political economists, I think, unanimously agree that, without importation, the land of Belgium can not raise sufficient products to support its own population.”

“Rev. Dudley, I think that I fully agree with your political economists on the Belgium question of population. It is very likely true that the land of Belgium can, under your social and industrial system, not support, without importation, its own inhabitants; but that does not argue in favor of the fact that the Marsites, under a different social and industrial system, can sustain, in superfluity, a population nearly twice as dense as that of Belgium. I said under the same conditions the earth can sustain as dense a population as Mars can, but the conditions are not the same. With a little patience and close attention, I think I shall be able to clear up this question for you satisfactorily.

“Let us take an illustration. If the American Indians, who formerly lived a hunter’s life on the present area of the United States, had been questioned before the discovery of America about the density of population of their country, they would, no doubt, have said that their country was more densely populated at that time than it had ever been before, and that it would be utterly impossible for the land area comprising the present limits of the United States to support a population of over sixty millions of people who eat and waste so much, who wear so many good clothes, and who live in such good wigwams as the people of the United States actually do at the present time. Those Indians would undoubtedly have further argued that they had better weapons and tools, better wigwams, better clothes and better food than any of their ancestors had enjoyed, and that therefore the earth would be unable to do much better than it is already doing. But you, the white man, actually showed the Indians differently, when you settled among them. You changed the system of making a livelihood, to something of which the Indians had never thought; and very likely if one could have propounded a system similar to your present one, he would have been branded a traitor to his country, and a heretic to his religion. Instead of leading a hunter’s life, which requires a large territory and a sparse population, you partially live on agricultural products, and partially on domestic, instead of wild, animals. The Indian lived almost exclusively on a flesh diet—game, while you cultivate the soil and raised stock. Your industrial system is able to support a population vastly more dense than the Indian’s system was capable of supporting. So you see, the error was not that the earth is unable to sustain a denser population than the Indian’s, but that the Indian was not living under that social and industrial system which is capable of sustaining a dense population. The Indians’ mistake was, that they measured the possible maximum density of population by the standard of their social and industrial system. They knew that thousands of their companions were in want, and that they were frequently pressing on subsistence in all directions.

“Just so it is with you at the present time. You are apparently always figuring on what can be done under your present system. You, by adopting a social and industrial system which is capable of sustaining a denser population, showed the Indians that they had not reached the maximum density of population. Now I want to show you that you are as mistaken on your present density of population as the Indians were on theirs.

“We have seen that the Indians subsisted almost exclusively on animal food—game, while you gradually became more and more a vegetarian, and lived on the flesh of domestic animals, instead of wild game. Your system is capable of sustaining a denser population than the Indian system is, but the Marsites have continued to change the system which you began still further; therefore we are capable of supporting a population of over 800 to the square mile, in superfluity, while you are sometimes pressing on subsistence with a population of much less that 100 to the square mile.

“Now let me briefly enumerate a few of the most conspicuous differences existing between your system and ours, which enable us to sustain a population so much denser than you can. A vegetarian requires much less land area than a flesh eater, and we are almost exclusively vegetarians, while you are partly vegetarians but largely carnivorous (flesh eaters). We are wasting no land for the production of tea, coffee, tobacco, intoxicating liquor, opium, etc., which we claim contain very little if any nutriment. Much of your crops is spoiled and damaged by curing it out doors; we do all our drying and curing artificially, and not a particle is lost, spoiled or damaged. Our clothing is not made and worn so wastefully, and our fashions are not so changeable as yours. Our manner of cooking and eating is not half so wasteful as yours. We save an immense amount of land by not fencing it off into little lots and farms like you do. In this manner you, first, waste the land occupied by the fences; secondly, you require an immense amount of additional land on which to produce the fencing material—posts and lumber; and thirdly, fencing requires labor which involves a physiological waste that must be repaired by additional food raised on land. We get our building material nearly all out of the earth, while you use largely lumber, etc., which are grown on the land surface of the earth. Many of us live together in one house, and it requires much less labor and material to build and maintain one large residence than it does to build and maintain many smaller ones. By extensive voluntary co-operation, we are enabled to do much work with machinery which you have to do by hand; for instance, such as digging potatoes, unloading corn and other grain, heating and lighting the apartments, etc. We, who work on a large scale, have also much work for each machine, while you, under your single-handed system, require many machines, and have but little work for each; for example, a self-binder owned by a farmer, who has perhaps no more than 50 acres of grain to cut with it, while the machine is idle and decaying all the rest of the year.

“You have a vast amount of wealth employed in an army and a navy. The cavalry horses require feed; the man-of-war requires timber for its construction; your fortifications, your arsenals, your guns, your navy, etc., all require material which is largely produced by the land surface. Their construction requires a vast amount of unproductive labor—a physiological waste which must be repaired by food. Then, again, you often destroy by war countless millions of wealth; in fact you sometimes devastate whole countries. We have no war, no armies and navies to support, no destruction of wealth by war. You have to raise food for the reparation of the waste caused by your immense amount of unproductive and destructive labor. You, as well as we, require an immense amount of power to do the work: to build the houses, to plow, sow, and harvest, to heat the apartments, to run the train and factory. You raise and feed thousands and millions of draft-animals, horses, oxen, and mules, which draw the plow, wagon, etc., for you; they all have to be fed with feed which is raised on the surface of the earth, and which requires land area for its production. We have no draft-animals to feed—no hay and corn to raise for them. We receive all our motive power from the atmospheric current and water power. Thus man, during his different stages of physical and intellectual advancement, employs different motive power. Let us illustrate.

“In his primitive beginning, man carries his few burdens for transportation on his back. Then he makes his slaves do it. Further on, he uses the back of his domestic animals, which have to live from the vegetable products of the earth; this, as I have said, requires land area, and man by his labor must also aid in the successful production of this feed. A little further on he uses the direct wind power for propelling his clumsy ship and for running his primitive mill. Now he had power when the wind blew and none when it was calm; it was all uncertainty and irregularity. To overcome these, he invents a powerful steam engine which runs his ships, trains, factories, etc. But these engines require an immense quantity of water and fuel. This water is often difficult to get, and the fuel has to be raised on the land surface in the form of timber, or it has to be mined out of the earth; either method requires millions of days of labor. Still a little later on, man learns how to store up electricity and successfully compress air by the action of the atmospheric currents and water power. He lays up a large supply of this motive power for future use, and for unforeseen emergencies. This laid up motive power in the form of stored electricity and compressed air, he can, at his pleasure, convert into uniform mechanical motion. He applies it to his ships, trains, factories, land engines, vehicles, and all other machinery. He uses it for heating and lighting purposes, for drying and curing his grain and hay, and for countless other things too numerous to mention.

“All this vast motive power which he now stores up by the aid of evaporation and the atmospheric circulation involves scarcely any waste. There is an inexhaustible quantity of it. Millions of horse-powers are daily going to waste on every square mile of land and sea. Thus the burdenless man begins to walk more erect and with an increased elasticity in his step. His slave is emancipated. His draught animal, which required feed and care, is extinct. The pride of his mechanical genius, the steam engine for which he had to mine the coal in the damp mine, has also disappeared from the stage of action. And now the Marsites receive all their motive power from the present sunbeam without being first organized into a vegetable or animal, or without extracting it from the coal which was buried millions of ages ago.

“Is it not marvelous how the human mind, with its limited experience, has discovered such complex relations existing between certain phenomena? For examples, how a tiny sunbeam, after having traversed the abyss of space intervening the sun and our planets, warms the atmosphere in certain localities; how this produces atmospheric currents; how the windmills, driven by these currents, charge the storage battery cells, and fill other electric reservoirs; and how these cells and reservoirs of stored power furnish the motive power for train, ship, aerial projectile, factory, carriage, plow, elevator, etc., etc.; how they heat and light the factories, houses, stables, cars, vehicles, roads, etc. What a grand accomplishment when one contemplates this! What a display of human ingenuity; and yet we think that with all these marvelous achievements, even the Marsites are only living in the dawn of an approaching day whose effulgent brilliancy no human intellect has thus far contemplated.

“The foregoing, as you no doubt comprehend, are a few of the many reasons why we can support a denser population than you can.”