leaves us in much the same state of bewilderment as
The Sea Lady. Opening as an irresponsible and apparently jocular exercise of the scientific imagination, Mr. Wells is led by his severely circumstantial method to situations of such gravity that extravaganza gives place to something like tragedy, and the story ends on a note of prophetic exaltation which reminds us of Mr. Chesterton in The Napoleon of Notting Hill. It is not that the serious note is wanting even in the
earlier pages, but it is tempered by so much whimsicality and incidental satire that it never becomes oppressive. The portraits of the two blameless arch-conspirators, buried in "eminent but studious obscurity" until their independent researches converged in the manufacture of the new food, are drawn with humour as well as persuasiveness. Mr. Bensington and Professor Redwood were undistinguished-looking, unim- pressive, almost grotesquely insignificant, "quite ordinary
persons, or, if anything, on the unpractical side of ordinary." And then Mr. Wells continues in ironic strain:— "No race of men have such obvious littlenesses. They live in a narrow world so far as their human intercourse goes; their researches involve infinite attention and an almost monastic seclusion; and what is left over is not very much. To witness some queer, shy, misshapen, grey-headed, self-important, little discoverer of great discoveries, ridiculously adorned with the wide ribbon of some order of chivalry and holding a reception of his fellow-men, or to read the anguish of Nature at the neglect of science' when the angel of the birthday honours passes the Royal Society by, or to listen to one indefatigable lichenologist commenting on the work of another indefatigable lichenologist, such things force one to realise the unfaltering littleness of men. And withal the reef of Science that these little 'scientists' built and are yet building is so wonderful, so portentous, so full of mysterious half-shapen promises for the mighty future of man ! They do not seem to realise the things they are doing ! No doubt long ago, even Mr. Bensington, when he chose this calling, when he consecrated his life to the alkaloids and their kindred com- pounds, had some inkling of the vision,—more than an inkling. Without some such inspiration, for such glories and positions only as a 'scientist' may expect, what young man would have given his life to such work, as young men do? No, they must have seen the glory, they must have had the vision, but so near that it has blinded them. The splendour has blinded them, mercifully, so that for the rest of their lives they can hold the lights of knowledge in comfort—that we may see ! And perhaps it accounts for Redwood's touch of preoccupation, that—there can be no doubt of it now—he among his fellows was different, he was different inasmuch as something of the vision still lingered in his eyes."
The great discovery was, as we have said, the result of inde- pendent research,—Redwood's theory of intermittent growth being supplemented by Bensington's isolation of a substance which rendered growth continuous. Hence the manufacture of Herakleophorbia, and the experimental poultry farm at Hickleybrow under the supervision of the Skinners, who are introduced to the reader in an entirely characteristic " The eligible couple who were destined under Mr. Bensington to be the first almoners on earth of the Food of the Gods, were not only very perceptibly aged, but also extremely dirty. This latter point Mr. Bensington did not observe, because nothing destroys the powers of general observation quite so much as a life of experimental science. They were named Skinner, Mr. and Mrs. Skinner, and Mr. Bensington interviewed them in a small room with hermetically sealed windows, a spotted overmantel-glass, and some ailing calceolarias."
After some preliminary failures, the Herakleophorbia in its final form begins to act on the chickens, but the carelessness of the Skinners precipitates disaster. The food is scattered about, and a plague of gigantic wasps and rats spreads havoc throughout the countryside. The timid Professors are unable to cope with the emergency, but an energetic engineer friend named Cossar takes command, organises an expedition to Hickleybrow, and after a gruesome conflict, extirpates the monstrous vermin and insects, and burns down the farm- house. Skinner has already disappeared, but Mrs. Skinner escapes and spreads the plague in another village by giving the food to a grandchild ; Redwood has already administered it to his own ailing infant ; and subsequent leakages of the substance are responsible for the rearing of other gigantic brats all over the country.
* The Foodof the; Gedsand How it Cane to Earth. By E.G. Wells. London : Macmillan and Co. [Goa With the result of the diet on the human race, and the social and political cleavage brought about by the emergence of this giant brood, the story assumes a new, a more serious, and a semi-allegorical complexion. The advent of the gigantic Princess seems to make for comedy, but such frivolous expectations—for we can never banish grateful recollections of the Mr. Wells who gave us The Wheels of Chance—are doomed to disappointment, and we have to resign ourselves to a new Gigantomachia on serious lines, in which the whimsical and bizarre temper of the opening chapter is exchanged for a somewhat ponderous didacticism, culminating in the ultimatum of the sons of Anak put into the mouth of young Cossar :—
" ' It is not that we would oust the little people from the world,' he said, in order that we, who are no more than one step upwards from their littleness, may hold their world for ever. It is the step we fight for and not ourselves. . . . We are here, Brothers, to what end? To serve the spirit and the purpose that has been breathed into our lives. We fight not for ourselves— for we are but the momentary hands and eyes of the Life of the World. So you, Father Redwood, taught us. Through us and through the little folk the Spirit looks and learns. From us by word and birth and act it must pass—to still greater lives. This earth is no resting place ; this earth is no playing place, else indeed we might put our throats to the little people's knife, having no greater right to live than they. And they in their- turn might yield to the ants and vermin. We fight not for ourselves but for growth—growth that goes on for ever. To- morrow, whether we live or die, growth will conquer through us. That is the law of the spirit for ever more. To grow according to the will of God ! To grow out of these cracks and crannies, out of these shadows and darknesses, into greatness and the ! Greater,' be said, speaking with slow deliberation, greater, my Brothers ! And then—still greater. To grow and again—to grow. To grow at last into the fellowship and under- standing of God. Growing. . . . Till the earth is no more than a footstool. . . . Till the spirit shall have driven fear into
nothingness, and spread. . . He swung his arm heavenward There ! ' His voice ceased. The white glare of one of the wheeled about, and for a moment fell upon him, standing out gigantic with hand upraised against the sky. For one instant he shone, looking up fearlessly into the starry deeps, mail-clad, young and strong, resolute and still. Then the light had passed and he was no more than a great black outline against the starry sky,—a great black outline that threatened with one mighty gesture the firmament of heaven and all its multitude of stars."
Wiser and subtler minds than that of the present reviewer may possibly derive all manner of suggestive and stimulating lessons from the second half of Mr. Wells's romance. Speak- ing for ourselves, we cannot resist the conviction that he has spoiled a promising semi-sqientific extravaganza by tacking on- to it a somewhat cryptic allegory of a serious cast.
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