200 ESSAYS OF A BIOLOGIST 



and dead of senile decay — grey-haired, shrivelled, 

 atrophic. 



Then of course the machine is smashed up; and 

 Mr. Wells begins to write another book. 



******* 



I have spent so much time in frivolous discussion 

 of rhythm and size and commonplaces that 1 have 

 not pointed out another fundamental fact of biolog- 

 ical relativity — to wit, that we are but parochial 

 creatures endowed only with sense-organs giving in- 

 formation about the agencies normally found in our 

 own little environment. Mind without the objects of 

 mind is the very Chimaera bombinating in vacuo. 



Out of all the ether waves we are sensitive to an 

 octave as light, and some few others as heat. X-rays 

 and ultra-violet destroy us, but we know nothing 

 about them until they begin to give us pain; while 

 the low swell of Hertzian waves passes by and 

 through us harmless and unheeded. Electrical sense 

 again we have none. 



Imagine what it would be for inhabitants of an- 

 other planet where changes in Hertzian waves were 

 the central, pivotal changes in environment, where 

 accordingly life had become sensitive to "wireless" 

 and to nought else save perhaps touch — imagine such 

 beings broadcast upon the face of the Earth. With 

 a little practice and ingenuity they would no doubt 

 be able to decipher the messages floating through our 

 atmosphere, would feel the rhythms of the Black 

 Hamitic Band transmitting Jazz to a million homes, 



