We may conclude from what has been done in places upon our earth that the whole Utopian world will be open and accessible and as safe for the wayfarer10 as France or England is to-day. The peace of the world will be established for ever, and everywhere, except in remote and desolate11 places, there will be convenient inns, at least as convenient and trustworthy as those of Switzerland to-day; the touring clubs and hotel associations that have tariffed that country and France so effectually will have had their fine Utopian equivalents, and the whole world will be habituated to the coming and going of strangers. The greater part of the world will be as secure and cheaply and easily accessible to everyone as is Zermatt or Lucerne to a Western European of the middle-class at the present time.
On this account alone no places will be so congested as these two are now on earth. With freedom to go everywhere, with easy access everywhere, with no dread12 of difficulties about language, coinage, custom, or law, why should everyone continue to go to just a few special places? Such congestions are merely the measure of the general inaccessibility14 and insecurity and costliness15 of contemporary life, an awkward transitory phase in the first beginnings of the travel age of mankind.
No doubt the Utopian will travel in many ways. It is unlikely there will be any smoke-disgorging steam railway trains in Utopia, they are already doomed16 on earth, already threatened with that obsolescence17 that will endear them to the Ruskins of to-morrow, but a thin spider’s web of inconspicuous special routes will cover the land of the world, pierce the mountain masses and tunnel under the seas. These may be double railways or monorails or what not — we are no engineers to judge between such devices — but by means of them the Utopian will travel about the earth from one chief point to another at a speed of two or three hundred miles or more an hour. That will abolish the greater distances. . . . One figures these main communications as something after the manner of corridor trains, smooth-running and roomy, open from end to end, with cars in which one may sit and read, cars in which one may take refreshment18, cars into which the news of the day comes printing itself from the wires beside the track; cars in which one may have privacy and sleep if one is so disposed, bath-room cars, library cars; a train as comfortable as a good club. There will be no distinctions of class in such a train, because in a civilised world there would be no offence between one kind of man and another, and for the good of the whole world such travelling will be as cheap as it can be, and well within the reach of any but the almost criminally poor.
Such great tramways as this will be used when the Utopians wish to travel fast and far; thereby19 you will glide20 all over the land surface of the planet; and feeding them and distributing from them, innumerable minor21 systems, clean little electric tramways I picture them, will spread out over the land in finer reticulations, growing close and dense22 in the urban regions and thinning as the population thins. And running beside these lighter23 railways, and spreading beyond their range, will be the smooth minor high roads such as this one we now approach, upon which independent vehicles, motor cars, cycles, and what not, will go. I doubt if we shall see any horses upon this fine, smooth, clean road; I doubt if there will be many horses on the high roads of Utopia, and, indeed, if they will use draught24 horses at all upon that planet. Why should they? Where the world gives turf or sand, or along special tracts25, the horse will perhaps be ridden for exercise and pleasure, but that will be all the use for him; and as for the other beasts of burthen, on the remoter mountain tracks the mule26 will no doubt still be a picturesque27 survival, in the desert men will still find a use for the camel, and the elephant may linger to play a part in the pageant28 of the East. But the burthen of the minor traffic, if not the whole of it, will certainly be mechanical. This is what we shall see even while the road is still remote, swift and shapely motor-cars going past, cyclists, and in these agreeable mountain regions there will also be pedestrians29 upon their way. Cycle tracks will abound30 in Utopia, sometimes following beside the great high roads, but oftener taking their own more agreeable line amidst woods and crops and pastures; and there will be a rich variety of footpaths31 and minor ways. There will be many footpaths in Utopia. There will be pleasant ways over the scented33 needles of the mountain pinewoods, primrose-strewn tracks amidst the budding thickets34 of the lower country, paths running beside rushing streams, paths across the wide spaces of the corn land, and, above all, paths through the flowery garden spaces amidst which the houses in the towns will stand. And everywhere about the world, on road and path, by sea and land, the happy holiday Utopians will go.
The population of Utopia will be a migratory population beyond any earthly precedent35, not simply a travelling population, but migratory. The old Utopias were all localised, as localised as a parish councillor; but it is manifest that nowadays even quite ordinary people live over areas that would have made a kingdom in those former days, would have filled the Athenian of the Laws with incredulous astonishment37. Except for the habits of the very rich during the Roman Empire, there was never the slightest precedent for this modern detachment from place. It is nothing to us that we go eighty or ninety miles from home to place of business, or take an hour’s spin of fifty miles to our week-end golf; every summer it has become a fixed38 custom to travel wide and far. Only the clumsiness of communications limit us now, and every facilitation of locomotion39 widens not only our potential, but our habitual1 range. Not only this, but we change our habitations with a growing frequency and facility; to Sir Thomas More we should seem a breed of nomads40. That old fixity was of necessity and not of choice, it was a mere13 phase in the development of civilisation41, a trick of rooting man learnt for a time from his new-found friends, the corn and the vine and the hearth42; the untamed spirit of the young has turned for ever to wandering and the sea. The soul of man has never yet in any land been willingly adscript to the glebe. Even Mr. Belloc, who preaches the happiness of a peasant proprietary43, is so much wiser than his thoughts that he sails about the seas in a little yacht or goes afoot from Belgium to Rome. We are winning our freedom again once more, a freedom renewed and enlarged, and there is now neither necessity nor advantage in a permanent life servitude to this place or that. Men may settle down in our Modern Utopia for love and the family at last, but first and most abundantly they will see the world.
And with this loosening of the fetters44 of locality from the feet of men, necessarily there will be all sorts of fresh distributions of the factors of life. On our own poor haphazard45 earth, wherever men work, wherever there are things to be grown, minerals to be won, power to be used, there, regardless of all the joys and decencies of life, the households needs must cluster. But in Utopia there will be wide stretches of cheerless or unhealthy or toilsome or dangerous land with never a household; there will be regions of mining and smelting46, black with the smoke of furnaces and gashed47 and desolated48 by mines, with a sort of weird49 inhospitable grandeur50 of industrial desolation, and the men will come thither51 and work for a spell and return to civilisation again, washing and changing their attire52 in the swift gliding53 train. And by way of compensation there will be beautiful regions of the earth specially54 set apart and favoured for children; in them the presence of children will remit55 taxation56, while in other less wholesome57 places the presence of children will be taxed; the lower passes and fore8 hills of these very Alps, for example, will be populous58 with homes, serving the vast arable59 levels of Upper Italy.
So we shall see, as we come down by our little lake in the lap of Lucendro, and even before we reach the road, the first scattered60 chalets and households in which these migrant people live, the upper summer homes. With the coming of summer, as the snows on the high Alps recede36, a tide of households and schools, teachers and doctors, and all such attendant services will flow up the mountain masses, and ebb61 again when the September snows return. It is essential to the modern ideal of life that the period of education and growth should be prolonged to as late a period as possible and puberty correspondingly retarded62, and by wise regulation the statesmen of Utopia will constantly adjust and readjust regulations and taxation to diminish the proportion of children reared in hot and stimulating63 conditions. These high mountains will, in the bright sweet summer, be populous with youth. Even up towards this high place where the snow is scarce gone until July, these households will extend, and below, the whole long valley of Urseren will be a scattered summer town.
One figures one of the more urban highways, one of those along which the light railways of the second order run, such as that in the valley of Urseren, into which we should presently come. I figure it as one would see it at night, a band a hundred yards perhaps in width, the footpath32 on either side shaded with high trees and lit softly with orange glowlights; while down the centre the tramway of the road will go, with sometimes a nocturnal tram-car gliding, lit and gay but almost noiselessly, past. Lantern-lit cyclists will flit along the track like fireflies, and ever and again some humming motor-car will hurry by, to or from the Rhoneland or the Rhineland or Switzerland or Italy. Away on either side the lights of the little country homes up the mountain slopes will glow.
I figure it at night, because so it is we should see it first.
We should come out from our mountain valley into the minor road that runs down the lonely rock wilderness64 of the San Gotthard Pass, we should descend65 that nine miles of winding66 route, and so arrive towards twilight67 among the clustering homes and upland unenclosed gardens of Realp and Hospenthal and Andermatt. Between Realp and Andermatt, and down the Schoellenen gorge68, the greater road would run. By the time we reached it, we should be in the way of understanding our adventure a little better. We should know already, when we saw those two familiar clusters of chalets and hotels replaced by a great dispersed69 multitude of houses — we should see their window lights, but little else — that we were the victims of some strange transition in space or time, and we should come down by dimly-seen buildings into the part that would answer to Hospenthal, wondering and perhaps a little afraid. We should come out into this great main roadway — this roadway like an urban avenue — and look up it and down, hesitating whether to go along the valley Furka-ward, or down by Andermatt through the gorge that leads to Goschenen. . . .
People would pass us in the twilight, and then more people; we should see they walked well and wore a graceful70, unfamiliar dress, but more we should not distinguish.
“Good-night!” they would say to us in clear, fine voices. Their dim faces would turn with a passing scrutiny71 towards us.
We should answer out of our perplexity: “Good-night!”— for by the conventions established in the beginning of this book, we are given the freedom of their tongue.
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1
habitual
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| adj.习惯性的；通常的，惯常的 | |
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habitually
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| ad.习惯地，通常地 | |
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migratory
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| n.候鸟，迁移 | |
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texture
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| n.(织物)质地；(材料)构造；结构；肌理 | |
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complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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apparatus
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| n.装置，器械；器具，设备 | |
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unfamiliar
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| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
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fore
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| adv.在前面；adj.先前的；在前部的；n.前部 | |
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predecessors
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| n.前任( predecessor的名词复数 )；前辈；（被取代的）原有事物；前身 | |
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wayfarer
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| n.旅人 | |
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desolate
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| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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inaccessibility
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| n. 难接近, 难达到, 难达成 | |
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costliness
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| 昂贵的 | |
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doomed
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| 命定的 | |
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obsolescence
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| n.过时，陈旧，废弃 | |
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refreshment
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| n.恢复，精神爽快，提神之事物；（复数）refreshments:点心，茶点 | |
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thereby
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| adv.因此，从而 | |
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glide
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| n./v.溜，滑行；(时间)消逝 | |
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minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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lighter
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| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
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draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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tracts
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| 大片土地( tract的名词复数 )； 地带； （体内的）道； （尤指宣扬宗教、伦理或政治的）短文 | |
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mule
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| n.骡子，杂种，执拗的人 | |
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picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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pageant
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| n.壮观的游行；露天历史剧 | |
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pedestrians
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| n.步行者( pedestrian的名词复数 ) | |
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abound
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| vi.大量存在；(in，with)充满，富于 | |
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footpaths
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| 人行小径，人行道( footpath的名词复数 ) | |
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footpath
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| n.小路，人行道 | |
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scented
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| adj.有香味的；洒香水的；有气味的v.嗅到(scent的过去分词) | |
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thickets
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| n.灌木丛( thicket的名词复数 )；丛状物 | |
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precedent
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| n.先例，前例；惯例；adj.在前的，在先的 | |
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recede
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| vi.退(去)，渐渐远去；向后倾斜，缩进 | |
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astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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locomotion
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| n.运动，移动 | |
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nomads
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| n.游牧部落的一员( nomad的名词复数 )；流浪者；游牧生活；流浪生活 | |
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civilisation
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| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
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42
hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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proprietary
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| n.所有权，所有的；独占的；业主 | |
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fetters
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| n.脚镣( fetter的名词复数 )；束缚v.给…上脚镣，束缚( fetter的第三人称单数 ) | |
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45
haphazard
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| adj.无计划的，随意的，杂乱无章的 | |
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smelting
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| n.熔炼v.熔炼，提炼（矿石）( smelt的现在分词 ) | |
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gashed
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| v.划伤，割破( gash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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desolated
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| adj.荒凉的，荒废的 | |
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weird
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| adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的 | |
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50
grandeur
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| n.伟大，崇高，宏伟，庄严，豪华 | |
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thither
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| adv.向那里；adj.在那边的，对岸的 | |
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attire
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| v.穿衣，装扮[同]array；n.衣着；盛装 | |
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53
gliding
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| v. 滑翔 adj. 滑动的 | |
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54
specially
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| adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地 | |
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55
remit
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| v.汇款，汇寄；豁免（债务），免除（处罚等） | |
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56
taxation
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| n.征税，税收，税金 | |
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wholesome
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| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
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populous
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| adj.人口稠密的，人口众多的 | |
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arable
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| adj.可耕的，适合种植的 | |
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scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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61
ebb
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| vi.衰退，减退；n.处于低潮，处于衰退状态 | |
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retarded
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| a.智力迟钝的，智力发育迟缓的 | |
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stimulating
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| adj.有启发性的，能激发人思考的 | |
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64
wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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68
gorge
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| n.咽喉，胃，暴食，山峡；v.塞饱，狼吞虎咽地吃 | |
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69
dispersed
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| adj. 被驱散的, 被分散的, 散布的 | |
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graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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scrutiny
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| n.详细检查，仔细观察 | |
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