278 



The REvmw of Reviews. 



IN THE TWENTY-SECOND CENTURY. 



Mr. Kii'ling's Vision of the Hell to Come. 

 Mr. Rudyard Kipling begins, in the London 

 Magazine for March, a prophetical romance entitled 

 " As Easy as A B C," the date of which is 2150 a.d. 

 Readers will rejoice that there is no chance of any of 

 them living to witness the state of things which 

 Mr. Kipling professes to foresee. The most salient 

 feature of the world which he describes in his vision 

 is that its population has been cut down to 450 

 millions. The Planet, which has passed under the 

 despotic government of the Aerial Board of Control, 

 has sickened of popular government. 



The board sitting in London was informed that the 

 district of Northern Illinois had cut itself out of all 

 systems, and would remain disconnected till the 

 board should take it over and administer it direct. The 

 Mayor of Chicago in the district had complained of 

 crowd-making and invasion of privacy. The planet 

 had had her days of popular government. She suffered 

 from " inherited agoraphobia." The planet had, 

 moreover, taken all precautions against crowds for the 

 past hundred years. The total population was drop- 

 ping, it was expected, to 450 millions. But men lived 

 a century apiece, on the average. They were all rich 

 and happv. because they were so few and they lived so 

 long. 'I'lie country at the foot of Lake Michigan, like 

 most flat countries, was heavily guarded against 

 invasion of privacy by forced timber, fifty feet oak and 

 tamarack grown in five years. No news sheet had 

 been printed in Illinois for twenty-seven years, as 

 Chicago argued that engines for printing news sooner 

 or later developed into engines lor invasion of privacy, 

 which might in turn bring the old terror of crowds and 

 blackmail back to the planet. The carefully guarded 

 privacy of the individual home was secured by belts 

 of quicksand permeated with electric current that 

 suspended the motion of any persons attempting to 

 pass it. When the aerial fleet assembled over Chicago, 

 the road-surfacing machines w-ere working on each side 

 of a square of ruins. The brick and stone wre( kage 

 crumbled, slid forward, spread out into white-hot 

 pools of sticky slag, which the levelling-rods smoothed 

 out more or less flat. The people were singing the old 

 forbidden song, to an infernal tunc that had carried 

 riot, pestilence and lunacy round the planet a few- 

 generations ago. One stanza only is given of this 

 anthem of Hell : — 



Once there was The People— Terror g.ive it birth ; 



Once there was The People, ami it made a hell of earth ! 



Earth arose and crushed it. Listen, oh, ye slain I 



Once there was The People— it shall never be again ! 

 To suppress this insurrection of song the 250 ships of 

 the aerial navy turn on terrible streams of light ; the 

 firmament as far as the eye could reach seemed to 

 stand on pillars of white fire. The light was with- 

 drawn, and in the awful darkness the forbidden song 

 rose again from undefeated Chicago. Then the fleet 

 turns on terrific sounds that touch the raw fibre of 

 the brain, and again pour down the beams of light. 



'i"he notes cut through one's marrow, and after three 

 minutes thought and emotion passed in indescribable 

 agony. All Illinois asked them to stop. The deeper 

 note — the lower C — '' could lift street paving." On 

 the Admiral's ship arriving at the Chicago north 

 landing tower a grovelling crowd gathered around, 

 some crying they were blind, others pleading that no 

 more noises should be made. Next day they were 

 told their eyesight would return. 



GROWTH OF SOCIALISM. 



In the American Review of Revieu's for T.Iarch 

 Mr. Thomas Seltzer describes the growth of Sociali.sm. 

 He says that : — 



Germany always led in the .Socialist movement 01 the 

 world, and until recently none of the Socialist p.irties of the 

 other "countries dared even to aspire to rival it. But of late 

 the remarkable spread of .Socialist sentiment in the United States, 

 the steady and rapid growth of the .Socialist organisation, its 

 many municipal victories piling one upon the other in the brief 

 space of two years, the incrc.T^ing number of Socialist repre- 

 sentatives in the State legislatures, and finally the appearance 

 of the Red .Spectre in Congress itself seemed to augur such a 

 phenomenal landslide that for a moment it was thought American 

 Socialism would outstrip the German Social Democracy. 



He gives the following valuable summary of the posi- 

 tion of Socialism at the latest general elections : — 



^ . .. ,, , Seats in Percentage 



Country. Vear. Note. Lower House. ofSe.-.ts 



Germany 1912 ... 4,250,000 (ir)... I lo [li) ... 27-71 



France 1910 ... 1,106,047 ... 76 ((■) ... 13-01 



Austria 1911 ... 1,000,000 ... 82 ... IS'jI 



Australia 1910 ... 669,681 ... 44 (</) ... 58-66 



United States ... 1910 ... 641,789 (<■)... i(J)... 25 



Belgium 1910 ... 4^3,241 ... ZS ig) ... 21-08 



Great Britain ... 1910 ... 373,645 (/<)... 42 ... 6-27 



Italy 1909 ... 33^,885 ... 43 ... 8-46 



Sweden 191 1 ... 170,299 ... 64 ... 38' 79 



Finland 1911 ... 3:!i,cxx) ... 87 ... 43-50 



SwilzeiLind ... 1911 ... 100,000 ... 9 ... 5-29 



Denmark 1910... 98,721 ... 24 ... 2I-o6 



Norway 1907 ... yo,cX)o ... 11 ... 8-94 



Holland 1909 ... 82,494 ••• 7 ••• "'oo 



Spain 1910 ... 40,000 ... I ... 25 



Bulgaria 19H ... 13.000 ... 1 ... 52 



Argentina 190S ... 5,000 ... — ... — 



Servia 1908 ... 3.056 ... I ... 62 



Russia 1906... '(') ... 17 ... 3'82 



Greece 1910 .. (.=) ... 4 ... 1-93 



Luxendmurg ..^'.)C9 • (?) ... 10 ... 20-89 



Turkey „. ...^9)8.. (.') ... ... 3-06 



[o) 35 per cent, of total electorate. 



(/() In addition, 194 Socialist representatives in the State 

 Legislatures. 



(r) The French Chamber has also 21 Independent Socialists. 



(1/) Laliouritcs not Socialists. The Labour Party in .\ustralia 

 leans strongly toward Socialism. It also has a majority in the 

 Senate, 23 out of 36. 



(c) Socialist Parly 607,674, Socialist Labour Party 34,115- 



(/) .\lso 23 representatives in 5 legislatures. 



{g) .-MsvJ 7 senators, 



(//) Independent Labour Party 370,802, Social Democratic 

 Federation 2,843. 



Mr. Seltzer repents that the French syndicalist 

 Herve has been converted by the success of the German 

 Social Democracy to admit that its method of opening 

 the road to the social revolution is more effective than 

 the French labour nioNenient. Even in the Far East 

 Socialism is raising its head threateningly. 



