Flatland - Edwin A. Abbott (early reader books .TXT) 📗

few sands now remained in the half-hour glass. Rousing myself from my reverie I turned the glass Northward for the last time in the old Millennium; and in the act, I exclaimed aloud, “The boy is a fool.”

Straightway I became conscious of a presence in the room, and a chilling breath thrilled through my very being. “He is no such thing,” cried my wife, “and you are breaking the Commandments in thus dishonouring your own grandson.” But I took no notice of her. Looking round in every direction I could see nothing; yet still I felt a presence, and shivered as the cold whisper came again. I started up. “What is the matter?” said my wife, “there is no draught; what are you looking for? There is nothing.” There was nothing; and I resumed my seat, again exclaiming, “The boy is a fool, I say; 33 can have no meaning in geometry.” At once there came a distinctly audible reply, “The boy is not a fool; and 33 has an obvious Geometrical meaning.”

My wife as well as myself heard the words, although she did not understand their meaning, and both of us sprang forward in the direction of the sound. What was our horror when we saw before us a Figure! At the first glance it appeared to be a woman, seen sideways; but a moment’s observation showed me that the extremities passed into dimness too rapidly to represent one of the female sex; and I should have thought it a Circle, only that it seemed to change its size in a manner impossible for a Circle or for any regular Figure of which I had had experience.

But my wife had not my experience, nor the coolness necessary to note these characteristics. With the usual hastiness and unreasoning jealousy of her sex, she flew at once to the conclusion that a woman had entered the house through some small aperture. “How comes this person here?” she exclaimed, “you promised me, my dear, that there should be no ventilators in our new house.”

“Nor are there any,” said I; “but what makes you think that the Stranger is a woman? I see by my power of Sight Recognition⁠—”

“Oh, I have no patience with your Sight Recognition,” replied she, “ ‘Feeling is believing’ and ‘A Straight Line to the touch is worth a Circle to the sight’ ”⁠—two proverbs, very common with the frailer sex in Flatland.

“Well,” said I, for I was afraid of irritating her, “if it must be so, demand an introduction.” Assuming her most gracious manner, my wife advanced towards the Stranger, “Permit me, Madam, to feel and be felt by⁠—” then, suddenly recoiling, “Oh! it is not a woman, and there are no angles either, not a trace of one. Can it be that I have so misbehaved to a perfect Circle?”

“I am indeed, in a certain sense a Circle,” replied the voice, “and a more perfect Circle than any in Flatland; but to speak more accurately, I am many Circles in one.” Then he added more mildly, “I have a message, dear Madam, to your husband, which I must not deliver in your presence; and, if you would suffer us to retire for a few minutes⁠—” But my wife would not listen to the proposal that our august visitor should so incommode himself, and assuring the Circle that the hour of her own retirement had long passed, with many reiterated apologies for her recent indiscretion, she at last retreated to her apartment.

I glanced at the half-hour glass. The last sands had fallen. The third Millennium had begun.

XVI How the Stranger Vainly Endeavoured to Reveal to Me in Words the Mysteries of Spaceland

As soon as the sound of the peace-cry of my departing wife had died away, I began to approach the Stranger with the intention of taking a nearer view and of bidding him be seated: but his appearance struck me dumb and motionless with astonishment. Without the slightest symptoms of angularity he nevertheless varied every instant with gradations of size and brightness scarcely possible for any Figure within the scope of my experience. The thought flashed across me that I might have before me a burglar or cutthroat, some monstrous Irregular Isosceles, who, by feigning the voice of a Circle, had obtained admission somehow into the house, and was now preparing to stab me with his acute angle.

In a sitting-room, the absence of fog (and the season happened to be remarkably dry), made it difficult for me to trust to Sight Recognition, especially at the short distance at which I was standing. Desperate with fear, I rushed forward with an unceremonious, “You must permit me, Sir⁠—” and felt him. My wife was right. There was not the trace of an angle, not the slightest roughness or inequality: never in my life had I met with a more perfect Circle. He remained motionless while I walked round him, beginning from his eye and returning to it again. Circular he was throughout, a perfectly satisfactory Circle; there could not be a doubt of it. Then followed a dialogue, which I will endeavour to set down as near as I can recollect it, omitting only some of my profuse apologies⁠—for I was covered with shame and humiliation that I, a Square, should have been guilty of the impertinence of feeling a Circle. It was commenced by the Stranger with some impatience at the lengthiness of my introductory process.

Stranger. Have you felt me enough by this time? Are you not introduced to me yet?

I. Most illustrious Sir, excuse my awkwardness, which arises not from ignorance of the usages of polite society, but from a little surprise and nervousness, consequent on this somewhat unexpected visit. And I beseech you to reveal my indiscretion to no one, and especially not to my wife. But before your Lordship enters into further communications, would he deign to satisfy the curiosity of one who would gladly know whence his visitor came?

Stranger.