Classic Audiobook Collection - The Master-Knot of Human Fate by Ellis Meredith ~ Full Audiobook [fantasy]

Starting point is 00:00:00 the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter i up from earth center through the seventh gate i rose and on the throne of saturn sate and many a knot unraveled by the road but not the master not of human fate ah love could you and i with him conspire to grasp this sorry scheme of things entire would not we shatter it to bits and then-and-one and i with him conspire to grasp this sorry scheme of things entire would not we shatter it to bits and then remolded nearer to the heart's desire. Omar Kayam. Tonight God knows what things shall tide. The earth is racked and faint. Expectant, sleepless, open-eyed, and we, who from earth were made,

Starting point is 00:00:48 thrill with our mother's pain. Kipling. Along one of the most precipitous of the many rocky mountain trails, a man and a woman climbed slowly one spring morning. the air was cold and farther up the mountains little patches of snow lay here and there in the hollows two or three miles below them nestled one of the most famous pleasure resorts of the entire region three or four times as distant lay the nearest town of any importance over the plain and through the clear atmosphere it looked like a bird's-eye view map rather than an actual town far away to the left gorgeous in coloring and grotesque in outline could be seen the odd figures of many strangely piled rocks the two pedestrians stopped now and then to rest and look away over the matchless scene and take in its wonderful beauty the woman was tall and slender with a superb carriage even on that steep ascent she moved with the grace and freedom of one who has entire command of her body

Starting point is 00:01:59 she was well-gowned also for such an excursion her short green-cloth skirt did not impede her movements and high stout shoes gave her firm footing she had removed her jacket and in her bright pink silk blouse and abbreviated petticoat with the glow of the morning on her usually pale face she looked almost girlish but her face was not that of girlhood it was without lines and the heavy masses of her golden-brown hair were quite unstreaked with silver but her white forehead was serene with the calmness that follows overcoming and her dark gray eyes saw the world shorn of its illusions in her there were or had been unrealized capacities for life in all its height and depth and breadth in studying her one became vaguely aware that having missed these things, she had found a fourth dimension which supplied the loss. Her companion was younger by several years, and so much taller that she seemed almost small in comparison. In his eyes there danced and shone the light of truth and courage and hope, and he walked with the buoyancy of joy and youth. Israfil, Antenou, Apollo, he might have

Starting point is 00:03:24 stood as the model for any of them, or, for for a fit representation of the words of the wise man rejoice o young man in thy youth and let thine heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth and walk in the ways of thine heart the relation between the two was problematic certainly there was no question of love on either side equally certainly there existed between them a rare and exquisite camaraderie a perfect comprehension that often made word superfluous. A look sufficed. They toiled up the steep, narrow path, until they reached a wide trail, a carriage road that had been laid out and abandoned. It swept around the mountainside, miles above the little city on the plain, and terminated suddenly at an immense gateway of stone. Here the mountain had been torn asunder, and two palisades of gray-green rock rose grim and terrible for hundreds of feet while between them dashing over boulders and trees and the impediments of ages a little stream rushed along in the eternal night at their base

Starting point is 00:04:40 far away to the west range upon range piled themselves against the intense blue sky beyond a rustic gate standing across the path that narrowed to a few feet before the wall of stone a park sparkling and green in the sunlight was visible they stopped and regarded the two gateways one the work of nature the other the feeble counterfeit of man and then swinging open the creaking wooden affair passed into the peaceful valley a few yards away stood a small log cabin but the chimney was smokeless and though the chickens clucked in the yard and a collie lay on the doorstep it seemed desolate and deserted passing along an almost invisible trail they found themselves in the wildest and most remote part of that wild and remote region they saw a few stray animals but no human beings this was one of the few places where mining was not a universal pursuit and it was too early to do much in the few mines that did exist there are entire sections in the rockies that are deserted for more than half the year and this was one of them that day there was no one at the signal station the keeper had gone down to the valley for fresh stores and to learn something of the terrific disturbances that were said to be through the keeper had gone down to the valley for fresh stores and to learn something of the terrific disturbances that were said to be threatening the entire eastern coast with annihilation. Perhaps the owners of the log cabin had made a similar pilgrimage.

Starting point is 00:06:21 The scene was flooded with moonlight when the travelers passed the gate on their homeward way and sat down in a boulder a few yards without the frowning portal. The night was cold and the woman had put on her jacket and sunk her numbed fingers in its pockets. In spite of her weariness, she was troubled and wrestling. and turning looked first at the beetling crag's back of them, then away over the plain at the twinkling lights of the town below. They heard indistinctly the sounds of bells ringing wildly, and overhead flocks of birds circled and called with shrill, uncanny voices.

Starting point is 00:07:03 Yet the moonlight was so bright that they saw each other as plainly as if it were day, and its placid radiance seemed strangely at variance with them. the disturbed wildfowl and certain weird and fitful sounds that seem to be sighed forth from the bosom of the earth it is a pity she said that we cannot pass through this gateway into paradise without descending to earth again i don't believe you are half as tired of life as you say he answered with an impatient movement of his head you may not shrink from death as i do or enjoy life so keenly but isn't it a good thing to be alive to-night isn't it fine to be a mile or so above the rest of humanity and the deadly conventionalities aren't you glad you came she did not answer but presently said dreamily suppose that plain was the sea it isn't hard to suppose he answered i have seen the pacific when it looked just so oh no she said quickly nothing is like the sea but itself you will never persuade me that i love the mountains so well and the plains just imagine if all that gray-green silver were gray-blue with here and there a gathering crest of foam racing to break in spray about these mountains

Starting point is 00:08:35 why look he said drawing her a little to one side there is your liquid blue with its white crest moving toward us could the real sea look more wonderful than that it is blotting out everything now it recedes was it not real she started to her feet this is a very strange night she said irrelevantly in a rather strange voice listen and see how many birds are flying about us i never saw them fly so at night what does it mean they stood together looking at each other with startled faces the whole mountain all the mountains seemed to be alive and trembling under them overhead thousands of birds wheeled and screamed with terror in their mingled outcries the little creeping things scuttled away up the mountain the silver-blue wave widened and spread over the plain from north to south and the air was full of a dull terrible roar as if the fountains of the great deep had broken up and a thousand white-crested waves rushed toward the hapless city before them they covered it and with a wild jangle of bells faintly audible over the tumult it sank out of sight all the gleaming dancing lights disappearing in an instant the white crests came on and broke about the mountains and receded and came on again with a deafening roar then the crust of the earth between the mountain range and the spot where the city had been seemed to crack like a bit of dried orange peel and the flood rushed over the abyss and there arose a blinding steam that hid the whole scene below

Starting point is 00:10:33 low and ascending circled the mountain peaks in mist all about them on the mountain side rose the cries of terrified wild things and along the narrow pathway into the park a herd of cattle and horses rushed and disappeared among the aspens that trembled as never before the collie scenting their presence came and crouched whining at their feet and a bird fell exhausted into the woman's arms. She closed her hands over it, unconsciously giving it the protection none could give them, and in the fog moved toward the figure of her companion. His arm closed about her convulsively. Shall we go farther up the mountain? he asked. If it be now, tis not to come. If it be not to come, it will be now, she answered, insensibly, finding it easier to use another's words than to coin phrases while holding death watch over a continent. They sat down on the boulder. After what seemed like countless hours, she said,

Starting point is 00:11:47 I wonder how long we have been here. Perhaps it is years. He looked at his watch. I do not know whether we are in time or eternity, he answered simply. It is nearly four o'clock by this watch through the dense vapor they saw the sun rise red and sullen but the mist was so impenetrable that they dared not move about the day and night passed almost without their knowledge and the second morning found them as the first by the great boulder the wind rose with the sun and when it blew aside the veil of mist far as the eye could reach there rolled a sea white-capped turbulent fretful as if unwilling to leave a single peak to tower above its lordly dominion the man and woman followed the collie to the cabin and there found some food then they retraced their way until they could look down over the valley where the town had slept nothing was left there was not even a prospector's cabin the shock which had succeeded the first wild dash had been volcanic the very canyons looked strange and though they called again and again there came no answer come the man said imperiously let us go to the peak there must be some one there they reached the signal station late in the afternoon no one was there

Starting point is 00:13:28 looking down from that awful eminence they saw on the other side of the range the same desolation the same watery waste they seemed to be on an island alone on a wide wide sea nowhere curled a friendly wreath of smoke nowhere was their sound of any human thing they went wearily back there was nowhere else to go if the gateway had been awful in its solitude the peak was still more desolate there was nothing living there except themselves and the dog that followed closely at their heels making no excursions of its own the hour was wearing toward midnight when they sank down by the boulder once more to watch the darkness disappear and wait for they knew not what the man built a huge fire so that if any other waifs had been left by this wreck of a world they might see the beacon and reply in some fashion they did not talk except now and then in a half whisper they gave monosyllabic queries and replied and replied the shock that had obliterated a continent seemed to deprive them of all active use of their senses they moved only in circles returning always to the place from which they had watched the cataclysm it was almost sundown when with a superhuman effort they again entered the sunny beautiful park the air was balmy and there all remained quite as before in front of the cabin stood in alderney as they approached her she loed uneasily the woman looked up and then spoke aloud with the quick sympathy that had always been her greatest attraction

Starting point is 00:15:24 she seemed to understand so readily whether it was a man's head a woman's heart or an animal's wants she needs to be milked she said and pushing open the door she entered the cabin there were two rooms the farther of which was evidently a bedroom there was a large fireplace at one end of the main room at one side of it was a primitive dresser with such utensils and china as the place afforded on the other were some miners implements and a shovel there was a small table and beside it were placed two chairs there was a rocker by the one window and a pot of geraniums on the sill forming a kind of window-seat was a long seaman's chest at the other end of the room there was a desk covered with green oilcloth and above it was a shelf containing some books and a clock the woman took off her hat and jacket and brushed back her hair then turning back her sleeves went outdoors again under the rude porch on a slab table stood a number of buckets and there was a stool by the door she took a bucket and the stool and walked away a few paces the alderney following as she began milking she looked over her shoulder at the man watching her and said won't you build a fire he gathered some wood and went into the cabin she threw out the first pint or so of milk then finished milking and strained the foaming contents of her pail into some crocks left sunning by the door and went into the house she found some corn meal and salt and deftly mixed the dough and arranging the shovel in the hot ashes set her hoe cake to bake

Starting point is 00:17:25 in the meantime the man had brought water from the brook and as the woman swung the crane over the blaze he filled the iron kettle hanging there from there was some sour milk and by a mysterious process she converted it into dutch cheese there was some butter and a few eggs and she found a white cloth and spread the table with a few poor dishes placing the geranium in the center as the water steamed and boiled she caught up a tin canister see she said with forced gaiety let us eat drink and be merry for there's just enough tea in the world for two people to drink once she made the beverage and poured it into the thick cups and breaking the yellow pone and piling it on the platter they sat down to the strangest meal they had ever known the man watched her with fascinated eyes he had never before seen her do anything for herself yet she presided over the simple meal she had prepared as graciously as over the coarse dinners of her chef how should she know how to make hoe cake all through the singular feast the sparkle and play of her fancy kept them in hysterical laughter afterwards as she cleared away the same wild mood possessed her the man wondered if her mind was going with all else but as she hung up the towel her humor changed and she ran out of the cabin into the dusk as if she could not bear the simple homely tasks in a homeless world the firelight and the bounds of a dwelling when doom must be at hand

Starting point is 00:19:13 the man put a fresh log on the fire and covered the coals with ashes he would have preferred to remain there but he knew why she was hurrying back to the mountain side and he took her coat and followed her she was standing by the boulder looking out over the waters with a despair on her face that made him groan it was so like what he felt in his heart she pointed weakly toward the water but her lips formed no words yes he answered it was not a dream dawn found them still sitting by the boulder the man shook her half roughly come he said let us go back to the cabin no she answered i cannot believe it we are both mad we are dreaming the same mad dream let us go down let us go down and when we feel the spray on our faces and taste the brine it will be time enough to believe she began the descent with reckless rapidity and he followed checking and holding her back the roar of the surf grew momentarily louder but though she looked at him with wild grieved eyes she went on a monster wave dashed up over the rocks and wet them to the skin she flushed it was out her arms and would have fallen headlong into the greedy crawling water, but he caught her and made his way back.

Starting point is 00:20:52 The hut bitter tears on her face brought her to herself, and with one great sob she broke down, clinging to him and crying, till, from sheer exhaustion she fell asleep. He carried her back to the cottage and laid her gently on the bed in the tiny room. her hair was falling about her and he removed her dusty shoes and covered her over as if she had been a child then he went out into the sunlight and sat down in the doorstep and tried to grasp the situation he had been a very ambitious man and she had been as ambitious for him as he was for himself that had been the main bond of union he was to have made a great place in the world the applause of listening sentence was to have been his wealth fame position all the possibilities of life were gone nothing but barely life itself remained a living might be wrung from nature but for ambition what surely somewhere on earth there were other human beings the destruction if irreparable was not universal sooner or later some hearty sailor would find the surviving peaks of this new Atlantis. At least, if the woman within was

Starting point is 00:22:19 not his world, he was thankful that no one else was. And having looked the grim truth in the face, he too slept. It was long past noon when the dog wakened him, and he started to his feet, determined that, having lost all else, they should keep their sound, clear brains. He walked about the park which contained perhaps 500 acres. There were half a dozen cows, as many horses, some burrows, and a few chickens. There was a rude stable and a few farm implements. There was a large tunnel in the mountainside and some mining machinery lying about its entrance. The dog, seeming to realize some of the responsibilities of life, herded the cattle and drove them toward the cabin. When they reached it, she was standing in the doorway. She had made

Starting point is 00:23:19 her toilet and looked fresh and calm. "'These are our flocks and our herds,' he said in greeting. "'What shall we call them?' She smiled rather wanly. "'Wasn't it Adam who named the animals? You shall have that honor.' "'Very well,' he answered, but if this is the garden there is an angel with a flaming sword at the gateway do not pass it again our life is here here do you understand we must give ourselves time to get used to it time to realize that we are alive we must be very patient for whatever has befallen us whether we are in the body or out of it this through which we have passed is is a miracle, and only time can tell if it is more. Do not look upon the change again, at least not now. You will stay here, and we will work together and be content for a while?

Starting point is 00:24:27 Content? she said. Content? We will be happy. End of Chapter 1. Recording by Roger Maline. fate this libervox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter two there is always work and tools to work with all for those who will and blessed are the horny hands of toil lowell do you remember gabriel bederidge asked adam a day or so later as he he watched her set the house in order after their breakfast. You know, in times of great mental

Starting point is 00:25:24 perturbation, he always sought comfort and counsel from the pages of Robinson Crusoe. When in doubt, he waited until tomorrow, as Robinson advised. And no matter what his perplexities, he always found just what he wanted in that infallible book. If I remember correctly, but it's years since I read it, Robinson goes on a voyage of discovery. the first thing. He built a raft to get away from the wreck first, I think, she said reflectively. Or did he build the raft to get to the wreck? I can't remember.

Starting point is 00:26:01 And then he built a house. Somewhere along there he wrote down his situation in a deadly parallel. I have sometimes wondered if he was the inventor of that style. But he offset the debit of being cast away with gratitude for having escaped with his life. We're not, at least I'm not, sure that belongs on the credit side. We don't want to do much exploring yet, he answered. If we have no wreck to supply us with all sorts of things, we have a house ready to hand.

Starting point is 00:26:37 Not exactly as we would either of us have ordered it, I fancy, but better than we could build. Do you know what there is in it? We might begin our investigation here. with lamp in hand we will explore she hummed but two rooms in a cellar do not promise much there is nothing to see in this room except what we do see and the contents of that chest which is locked adam tried the lock then shook the chest there's nothing in it anyhow he said as to the other room she went on there is a bedroom set a better one than i should have expected to find in a place like this and a closet with some clothes in it the man was about your size but the feminine garments well they are all about the length of my bicycle skirt and on the shelf there is a shelf there is a small of my bicycle skirt and on the shelf there is a small size but the feminine garments well-well they are all about the length of my bicycle skirt and on the shelf there is a pile of bedding there is no trap-door leading into either subterranean or overhead apartments in fact there is nothing else except a chair it's very uninteresting adam had been moving about the room and stopped before the bookshelf he wound the clock mechanically and read the titles of the books aloud a chemistry a book and a book on electricity a bible a worn copy of tennyson the yankee at king arthur's court and a patent medicine almanac made up the list there is one mysterious thing he said and that is the packing-cases out under the shed

Starting point is 00:28:18 i can't make up my mind what they contain and i don't quite feel that we ought to open them i should like to they look as if they might hold canned goods she said interrogatively i was going to say books but i suppose we need canned lobster more he assented if you are sure they contain oats peas beans or barley or anything that the farmer knows that would justify me in opening them he took up a hatchet and they went out and inspected the boxes which were very large and strong let's not open them yet she said there is one other treasure in one of the bureau drawers it is a box with seeds of almost every kind they ought to have known most of those things wouldn't grow up this close to timber line probably they were sent by the congressman from this district adam said dryling but I'm not so sure they won't grow. Have you noticed how warm it is, how very unlike what it has always been? Let us go to the stables and see what we can find there. They went up a path, past a garden, fenced with woven wire, through which the chickens looked longingly. Under some sashes forming a primitive greenhouse, lettuce and radishes were making good headway.

Starting point is 00:29:47 nothing else had come up though there were many beds with small slips of board like miniature tombstones showing what had been planted the stables and cow-barn were all under one roof and would accommodate several horses and a few cows there was hay and fodder in a lot adjoining and a few ordinary farm implements a plough a harrow and a cultivator in a shed addition do you know what it is for she asked mischievously as he pulled out the plough do you think i never remembered the granger vote in my ambitions he answered i can plow and i have planted and snapped corn and cut fodder and dug potatoes i wonder if there are any here yes she answered in the cellar at least a bushel mostly gone to eyes but i forget how thick to cut them if we were only the swiss family robinson she went on we should find yams and pineapples and oranges and sugar cane and bananas coming up between the rocks as it is i am thankful to the congressman who sent the peas and morning glories There is only about enough wheat and corn to plant 15 acres, Adam said, making a rough calculation in his mind. I will plow a little over that so as to have a patch for the potatoes and get it ready as soon as possible. I know how to plant corn and potatoes, she said eagerly.

Starting point is 00:31:28 Just as soon as you get part of the land ready, I will begin. You didn't know I was brought up on a ranch, did you? i never was very fond of recalling it it is a perpetual round of conditions unlike any theory ever heard of she shrugged her shoulders and stopped at the rude table under the porch to crumb some slices of what looked like a kind of corn bread what is it he asked curiously that is to enable us to make light of our troubles she replied solemnly or for thy more sweet understanding it is or-for-thigh-the more sweet understanding it is or or at least I hope it will be, yeast. I found a twin brother's yeast cake, and from it, behold, the brethren. I know that raised bread is unhealthy,

Starting point is 00:32:19 and that to get the worth of your money, you ought to eat the bran also, and that the best bread, from the hygienic standpoint, is made from wheat paste, and is about the consistency of sole leather. But even if yeast does shorten our lives, I don't know that I shall give it up,

Starting point is 00:32:37 on that account the planting of their crops took several weeks and was very hard work for neither of them was an expert farmer when the corn and wheat came up there were almost no weeds and the stand was better than usual for sod land but they were kept busy warding off the horses and cattle that preferred the fresh young corn and wheat to the indifferent natural grass i thought she said wearily after driving away the intruders for the third time i thought fences were a sign of civilization but they seemed to be the first necessity of the wilderness she was sitting on a rock fanning her flushed face with her sombrero when adam came to her assistance you should have waited he said i was coming but i had to hitch the team he turned and looked at her and laughed boyishly the run hasn't hurt you he said you look like a wild rose i believe i shall call you so may i i can't call you by the old name she colored hotly then turned quite pale and there was a touch of reserve in her voice as she answered rather too indifferently if you choose still i think oh adam crusoe that friday or robinson would be a better name we'll compromise on robin he said a rose by any other name is just as sweet i wish we had a fence she said turning the subject hastily we have he answered if we were to build one ourselves it would have to be of rocks but nature has provided a magnificent stone barrier

Starting point is 00:34:34 we have only to drive the animals we are not using through the gateway and fasten that little wooden concern after them there is good pasture outside and if we need them we can go after them. Lassie will look after Daisy and Lily, won't you little dog? I will go and open the gate and drive them through. You help Lassie keep those two back. She stood undecidedly, and he turned and said gently, I will come back without passing through the gateway. I will never pass it without you. I wouldn't dare. Now see how nicely Lassie will conduct this round-up. as he went toward the gateway her eyes followed him with the look he would hardly have comprehended it was so full of relief and gratitude he understood and reassured her without noticing her fears or smiling at her weakness every day and many times she thanked god that of all the men who might have been left by this modern deluge it was adam who had been with her and was with her in this terrible experience end of chapter two recording by roger maline chapter three of the master not of human fate this librivox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter three it might be months or years or days i kept no count i took no note i took no note Byron. They had been on the island nearly four months. The corn was waving in the soft breeze,

Starting point is 00:36:33 and the sun shone down hotly. Indoors sweet corn was boiling in the same pot with new potatoes, while in an improvised milk boiler on coals, at one side of the fireplace, peas were simmering. The table was spread, and there was white bread and jersey butter and raspberry, Adam, with lassie's puppies crawling over him, sat in the doorway, and watched Robin put the finishing touches on their Sunday dinner. His apparel was somewhat picturesque, and he had a brown and thoroughly healthy look. Robin was dressed in a costume of blue denim's. The skirt was rather short, and the waist was a blouse, finished at the throat, with a broad collar that turned away from a neck, still white in spite of much sunlight their months of roughing it had not harmed them and only the intense sadness in adam's eyes the pathetic droop of robin's mouth when they thought themselves unobserved told a story different from that of pastoral content

Starting point is 00:37:42 their meal was unusually silent sometimes they fell into long lapses of silence there was so much not to say in all the weeks of the past they had worked almost feverishly allowing as little time as possible for thought and never speaking of what was oftenest in their minds much of the time adam seemed to be in a dream only half realizing the flight of time that made hope more and more hopeless robin said nothing one would not seek to console the sky with phrases if all the stars were wiped out She half reproached herself at times for the peace, the something akin to happiness that had crept into her life. She had long before grown very weary of the world and all it had to offer. She was stung at the side of Adam's quiet face, with the repressed suffering that had somehow touched it, with the beauty it had not possessed, and she said impetuously, let us go out, Adam.

Starting point is 00:38:51 Let us go quite away somewhere and talk. There is so much I want to ask you, but I have not dared. He looked up with such a hurt expression that she went on quickly. Not that. I mean I couldn't. I have been afraid to put things in words. They grow so much more real, then. But now I am afraid to keep my thoughts longer.

Starting point is 00:39:18 They went past the way. wheat and cornfields, through a narrow canyon that led them to a valley they had never seen before. It was very beautiful, and the play of the sunlight on the high walls of rock, the murmur of the stream below them, the trembling aspens, the white peaks in the distance, made a scene worthy their attention, but they were blind to it. They sat down on a broad stone seat. Presently, Adam said, now tell me tell me how it seems to you no she answered you must tell me what has happened to us adam where are we and why were we left

Starting point is 00:40:04 god knows he said reverently do you think it possible she said slowly that we are dead oh i don't know he broke out with a return to something of his old childlike impatience sometimes i think it is all a dream and directly i shall wake up and find myself in my dingy old law office but you are not a dream these mountains are not a dream lassie barking down below there is not a dream and these callous spots in my hands are real enough in all conscience and no dream could last so long sometimes i think we have been hypnotized and carried off and left on an island somewhere sometimes do you remember the man who computed the vast number of mysterious disappearances and formed a theory that the earth was being sorted out before the opening of the last vial or some such stuff do you think we can be simply another disappearance i don't know she said it seems easier to believe that easier to believe anything than that the whole world has disappeared then i think sometimes he went on that there are evil powers i know this sounds as if i had lost my mind and maybe i have i'm not sure of anything but it seems as if there might be an explanation if we believed in jenny i who have power over us perhaps you and i who so often found fault with the poor old earth are being punished by banishment from it perhaps we are being prepared for some great work

Starting point is 00:41:58 i haven't very much religion and yet i suppose i do believe in a divine purpose back of things a directing power that wastes nothing i have tried to think why this thing should come upon us you and me of all the world and while it seems an evil thing a terrible and overwhelming disaster when i realized that it might have be fallen me alone then just the fact that you are here makes it seem almost good do you understand yes she said quickly i have felt just so when at first i felt as if i should curse god and die i had only to remember you to fall on my knees for thankfulness even if a dozen other people had been left instead no one would have understood as you have oh i would infinitely rather be alone with you than in the utter loneliness of the society of a lot of men and women who would drive me mad with their complaints and inefficiency i don't know whether it is a dream or heaven or hell or the work of some black magic i only know that if it is a punishment it has been commuted and that you share it and yet how selfish that sounds as selfish as love itself i ought to wish you were in a better happier place where you could carry out your ambitions she stopped and her eyes filled don't mind he said grimly if that is selfishness i am selfish to the core i have gone over the whole list and i don't know any one i would rather sacrifice to companionship with me in this exile than you my parents were old they could never have borne the shock my sisters would be unhappy without their families my women friends could none of them have met the exigencies of such an existence

Starting point is 00:44:05 as you have, and as for men, by this we would all have been barbarians together. You have kept me sane and alive, for that matter. But are we sane, she said slowly. I think I could stand it if I only knew we were sane and alive. It is the feeling that I don't know anything, that this valley, these mountains, may fade like the baseless fabric of a dream. And sometimes I think that it may be real, all real, but you, and that I shall find myself here all alone, dead or alive, sane, or mad.

Starting point is 00:44:48 God, how horrible it is! That thought has never troubled me, he said. Whatever has put us in this dream together will keep us together to the end. You have not wanted me to go far away. away from you, so we have worked together. I have even let you do work that was unfit for you because I knew you would prefer it. You were more frank about it, but you didn't feel any more strongly than I did. I couldn't, I can't bear to have you out of my sight. Have you ever thought that it may be so? she asked hesitatingly. What? That it isn't a dream, and that we are sane and alive?

Starting point is 00:45:34 Yes, I have thought of that, too. If it be true, how universal is the destruction? We know now pretty well from the time that has passed. By the way, how long is it? He stopped with a sudden dazed look and turned to her. It was the first of May, she said softly. Now it is nearly the last of August. Four months!

Starting point is 00:46:04 he said in a shocked tone i did not realize it i must have been worse stunned than i thought in that case it seems as if there can't be anything left of this continent unless it be detached peaks here and there where other mountain ranges have been there may be other men and women waiting as we wait for a sail a sign a message and they do not know any more than we do whence it is to come The alteration in the climate has convinced me that the waters, on our west, are those of the Pacific. It has been so warm and pleasant. I have tried to imagine what kind of a winter we may expect, or will the winter of our discontent be made glorious summer. By three crops of strawberries like California? she interrupted. Perhaps, he said smiling. As to the east, that may be the Atlantic.

Starting point is 00:47:04 or the gulf it seems more probable that it is the latter the st lawrence district was said to be the oldest section of this continent and it is reasonable to suppose the earth's crust thickest there and along the mountain ranges i suppose the continent has gone to make another layer a stratum on top of the pliocene and after a while the waters will subside or some volcanic action will raise up a new continent. If there are any ships anywhere, on any seas, they will search every degree of latitude and longitude. Our flag floats, did float, all over this globe. If it still flies anywhere, we shall see it again. If I did, she said irreverently, I should feel sure we were in heaven. It was beautiful before, but what wouldn't it mean now, Adder. but have you any one left on earth if this continent is all gone who would look for you there are people of my blood or there were but they did not even know of my existence there is not a soul he answered indeed in this country it would have been one chance in ten million you might have done it he said half jestingly but you are here

Starting point is 00:48:34 yes she echoed i am here adam how long will it be before you are satisfied that no one is left no one in the sense of any civilized people with a country and means of circumnavigation a year he answered perhaps more but a year anyhow i shall not give up hope until then end of chapter three recording by roger maline chapter four of the master not of human fate this librivox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter four how gladly would i meet mortality my sentence and be earth insensible how glad would lay me down as in my mother's lap. Milton The corn hardened and the wheat ripened and was harvested in truly primeval fashion. Adam cut the wheat with a scythe, and Robin followed him, binding it as best she could.

Starting point is 00:49:57 They shocked it together, and then began hauling it to the barn with the horses and bobsleds, their only vehicle. The stacking was weary work and progressed slowly. adam watched his co-worker toil over the sheaves and then took them from her and pitched them on the stack haphazard you shall not bother over it any more he said not if we live on hominy all winter have you ever been in mexico well hawaii was called the land of poco tempo but mexico was the land of manana there isn't any work there for the work's sake i mean there was there wasn't, and we can take a lesson from them. We need not hurry. The legislature will not meet this winter, and there will be no grand opera before spring. Daisy and Lily shall do our work for us. We will find a bit of hard, smooth ground, and then we will not muzzle the cows that tread out the grain.

Starting point is 00:51:02 Willingly, gasped Robin, climbing down from her slippery eminence on top of the load of grain, but do you think we are going to have any winter that is pre-eminently one of the things that no fellow can find out he answered in a dream you are likely to have any kind of weather and on a submerged planet we have no precedents at hand to tell us what to expect by replanting the vegetables right along we have had a perpetual crop as long as we have this kind of weather things will grow and i suppose we would better let them shut in as we are it doesn't seem likely that any very fearful winds are apt to trouble us and if there is a wet season on this slope we shall have good drainage if the worst comes to the worst there's the tunnel could you make that cheerful and home-like robin smiled rather sadly it will do to put the grain in she said and they walked on silently the spot finally selected for the threshing floor was brushed as clean as twig brumes would make it and the wheat spread out upon it adam and lassie drove the cows over it leisurely and between times adam experimented on a flail when he finally had one that answered the purpose and found he could use it without fracturing his skull the cows were released and he went on with the work seated on a boulder close by her sombrero tipped well over her eyes robin fanned the grain and converted it into a coarse cracked wheat with a venerable coffee mill

Starting point is 00:52:54 i will make you a mexican mill when i get through with this said adam but you cannot use it because it is too hard work i shall have to be the miller it is a rather simple affair and dates from before the days of noah it is made with two stones sandstone preferred the lower of which is hollowed out bowl fashion with a hole in the centre the upper stone is rounding and fits in the bowl and has a hole in it about four inches from the edge in which a stout wooden handle is inserted with which to turn it the two stones are ground together until they become smooth then they are placed on four other stones as rests and a blanket or cloth is spread underneath to catch the meal the grain is poured around the edge of the upper stone and works down it makes a very tolerable flour how handy you are she said isn't it a good thing we hadn't civilized the whole world to such a degree that only patent high-grade flour was used where should we be now without the simple devices of the good people of the stone age and their survivors on whom we looked down with so much scorn the snapping of the corn was an easier matter and it was piled in the tunnel till they should be ready to shell it then adam did what he calls his fall ploughing and left the bare brown sod to lie fallow so far as possible they had retained the manners and cuffed so far as possible they had retained the manners and customs of the world that had left them there was a tolerable supply of clothing and a good deal more household linen than could have been expected

Starting point is 00:54:47 robin concluded that the owners of the cabin had not been long married and the bride knowing to what kind of a place she was coming had thought more of her house than of herself all the feminine garments had to be refashioned robin made her skirts short enough for mountain climbing and dreading the time when her one pair of shoes should give out she wore sandals fashioned from yucca leaves by adam's clever fingers as the hairpins lost themselves she braided her hair in a long cue the curling ends of which fell far below her waist the little house was kept as neat and cool the little house was kept as neat and clean as if it were headquarters for all the labor-saving inventions in the world and their meals were as well served as if a corps of servants had been in attendance they were simple and often a little monotonous as meals must be where there is nothing save what grows on one's own plantation they had no tea coffee sugar spices or foreign fruits however the hardship of manual labor and plain food would cure most cases of dyspepsia and they did not suffer one day early in december robin woke to the consciousness of a steady drip drip of rain accompanied by an indescribably mournful wind in the other room she heard adam piling on the logs and shivered perhaps the winter had come it had been hard enough when there was plenty of work and the free outdoor life if they should become prisoners how should they how would he endure it

Starting point is 00:56:38 she dressed quickly and met his cheery good-morning in kind and over their breakfast they discussed the possibility of this storm being the first of many they decided that they must get the corn into such shape that the tunnel would be available for the hapless cattle, or even for themselves, if need be. We will go up there and shell corn all day, said Adam. It isn't really cold, and you can wrap up a bit. I wish I had thought to take a lot of stone into the tunnel, to build a bin at the end to put the corn in. I don't know how we are to manage it. She disappeared into the bedroom and came back presently

Starting point is 00:57:24 with a few grain sacks. when adam opened the door he was nearly ready to abandon his plan you will be wet through he said i cannot let you go then you cannot go either she answered but i must he said she was standing by him hardly reaching his shoulder the sacks over her head catching her up in his arms he banged the door behind them and ran up the slope to the tunnel where he deposited her laughing and shaking the water from her curly hair as he had said it was not cold and they sat down near the mouth of the tunnel, turned the tops of their sacks back over corn cobs, and shelled the corn in silence. At last a little sigh from Robin made Adam look up quickly. Her hands were bleeding. "'Robin!' he cried angrily. "'How can you be so cruel? I don't want you to do this work. There is no need. I forgot to watch you. Besides, I know you are tired.

Starting point is 00:58:38 you did not sleep last night i heard you moving about then you did not sleep either she responded quickly he flushed through the tan and scooping some dry leaves together into a bed took off his coat and folded it for a pillow lie down and rest a little now he said while i go down to the house and see what i can find for lunch then you can have a good sleep this afternoon he was gone several minutes and when he came back with some sandwiches in a tin bucket and a dozen scarlet radishes dripping in his hand he stopped appalled robin was at the extreme end of the tunnel sitting on the ground laughing and crying and crying and talking extravagant nonsense. Had she really gone mad at last? Adam put down the bucket and walked toward her unsteadily. She did not stir, but went on chattering in the same absurd way, until she saw him. Then she cried excitedly,

Starting point is 00:59:49 "'Oh, look, it's kittens, real little tame kittens, though their mother won't come near me yet. she is over in that corner adam saw her green eyes and though distrustful she was not unfriendly emptying the bucket he ran down to the sheds and came back with some milk which he poured into the top of the pail and set down before the kittens they lapped it eagerly and as the two human beings withdrew discreetly the cat crept out of her corner and joined in the feast when it was over robin took possession of one tiny ball of fur and adam of another while they made their own meal then robin curled up among the dead leaves and slept like a child it was growing dusk when adam awoke from his day-dreams the tunnel looked like a small grain elevator on one side robin still slept but the old cat was nestled contentedly at her feet and the kittens were playing sleepily over her what is she dreaming adam asked wearily all day i have sat here and dreamed dreams that can never come true i know it i feel it i told her a year but i am as sure now as i shall be in six years that there is no hope the watch-fire is out to-night the first night in eight months

Starting point is 01:01:26 i shall relight it for her sake not that she is any more deceived than i but she will be happier to believe me still hopeful what will be the end of it all how can it end the same old way came a sleepy voice from the leaves with the gut married and lived happily ever after formula she sat up and rubbed her eyes and stretched lazily to the discomfort of the kittens who retreated hastily as she struggled to her feet and a knowledge of her surroundings her face changed pitifully and she sat down again and cried miserably oh it was so real she sobbed i can see it now we were back in the old house in the library don't you remember it and walter was at the piano and louis had just asked me how to finish his last story. Did I answer out loud? Oh, which is the dream, for that was as real as this? Adam stood and watched her. He tried not to think of that, apropos answer. He heard the beating, steady patter of the rain and the lowing of the cows, and there was not even a star in heaven to look at him from its accustomed place, with a friendly,

Starting point is 01:02:56 quinkling promise for the future. There was nothing left. So far as he was concerned, the earth was without form and void. There was nothing to wait or hope for. There was nothing to live for, neither cheerful yesterdays nor confident to-morrows. What was the use in living? He looked down at the slender creature, lying outstretched almost at his feet, shaken with the agony of long-repressed grief, and then at his long, muscular hands. How little it would take to end it all for both of them? A mist came over his eyes, and he stooped, his hands outstretched toward her white throat. They fell on the rounded curve of her shoulder.

Starting point is 01:03:49 He checked the caress as he checked the other impulse, and shook her instead. Let us go home! he said. They went into the storm. End of Chapter 4. Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 5 of the Master Not of Human Fate. This Libervox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 01:04:21 Recording by Roger Maline. The Master Not of Human Fate by Ellis Meredith. Chapter 5. Why wilt thou take a castle on thy back when god gave but a pack with gown of honest wear why wilt thou tease for braid and fripperies learn thou with flowers to dress with birds to feed and pinch thy large want to thy little need frederick langbridge the next morning dawned clear and warm and adam coming in with his milk pails held out his hand to robin there were three ripe strawberries see he said they are the harbingers of spring or a california climate and either way makes our gain california without fogs and fleas is heavenly enough for most people nevertheless they completed the shelling of the corn and made a bin for it at the end of the tunnel removing the cat family to the house where lassie viewed their advent with jealous eyes

Starting point is 01:05:36 one day when they had been hauling corn for nearly a week adam sat down and began laughing do you know how much corn it takes to plant an acre he asked no said robin blankly i know something about the number of kernels to the hill one for the cut-worm and one for the crow and one for something or other else i forget what and one to grow why it takes eight quarts to plant an acre we have raised about thirty bushels to the acre which is pretty well for sod that will make over fifteen thousand pounds of meal and hominy and will feed us for seven years, even if we eat six pounds daily. Unless there is a winter season, when we must do something for the animals, there is not the slightest use in planting more than an acre. As to the wheat, even with a light yield, there would be fifteen hundred pounds to the acre. We have fresh vegetables all the time, and there will be any quantity of potatoes and cabbage and beans. And yet people starved everywhere, and it seemed to me that the farmers were the

Starting point is 01:06:58 worst off of all. They farmed to make money, not to live, and they had no control over the markets. They had to sell or build barns. It is only dives who can afford to tear down the old ones and build greater. It was easier for them to sell cheap to a man who took their wheat and held it until it could be sold back to them as deer flower. They were eaten up with mortgages and pests and interest. Have you noticed that there are almost no insects here, not even flies and mosquitoes? They were never so bad in the mountains, and apparently they have been wiped out with the rest. Truly, Adam, she said, speaking just of the physical part of it, would you regret this year? he stood up and stretched out his arms a splendid type of manhood smooth-shaven with clear-cut features bronzed square-shouldered and powerful

Starting point is 01:08:03 oh you are magnificent she cried involuntarily it has done you good great good you are twice the man you were in strength and health and resource and if only we had been cast away on an island knowing we were sure to be rescued some day soon i should not be sorry at all he colored and answered frankly without the mental strain i should not regret this year sometimes when i am sure it is a dream and that presently we shall waken i can't help wondering whether we shall not wish we had fretted less and enjoyed it more when i come to think of it i believe it is the first time since i was a child that ways and means have not troubled me it was a good thing to work as we have to keep our minds employed but now that we are sure that starvation is five six years away, we might as well drop the old headlong rush to get more than we need. That has been the trouble ever since men began to make history. It was the same thing, power, conquest, riches, everything. Too much to eat, too much to drink, too much to wear. Well, you can't say that of us, said Robin ruefully, looking down at her

Starting point is 01:09:32 made over gown well perhaps not and i don't mean that there ever was a time when there was a general surfeit but i mean that was the tendency there would have been plenty for all if part had not taken more than their share as for the other part who had not enough they only longed for the opportunity to simulate their unwise betters when they could they took too much too if it was only to drink and forget their misery we could have lived so well and so easily if we had lived more simply coming more directly in contact with nature as we have this year she shook her head doubtfully this has not been real life at all we have only kept alive we haven't read anything or done anything or helped anyone except each other and the animals dependent on us on the whole i don't know but what that we have accomplished about as much as when we were devoting most of our attention to paying board and rent bills we have helped each other more than we can measure we should have died had we been left alone with our thoughts all of life is not in cities nor even in books she did not answer for some moments and then said slowly. If it were a dream, and we were going back to the old life,

Starting point is 01:11:09 what would you regret most? If we were going back to the world we knew, I should regret a good many things. First, I suppose, that I did not realize sooner that we must be going back, instead of letting myself be utterly overwhelmed. Then I think I should be sorry that I didn't practice, a la demosthenes when i had a whole coast to myself and most of all i should regret that we have not kept a record of our lives from day to day there is other writing i should want to do but there is no paper and i don't know how to make any

Starting point is 01:11:50 there is plenty of time to do all that yet she said what else would you wish you had done he looked at her for there was something in her voice he did not understand, but her eyes were turned from him. I should regret that we had not talked more. Do you know, we have been very silent, and we used to have so many things to talk over in the old days. I should have twinges of remorse that I did not make more of your companionship when I had it, instead of raising more corn than we can eat in half a dozen years, and letting you tear your hand shelling it.

Starting point is 01:12:32 He stooped and kissed one of her slender hands. She withdrew it quickly. There had never been even a touch of the sentimental between them. What would you regret? he asked suddenly. She shrank a little, and her eyes looked far away, past the gateway. Some of the things you mention, very much that I had not encouraged you more to go on with your work. but mainly well mainly she jumped down from the rock where she had been sitting and answered evasively i don't think there is any mainly unless it is that when i had such a good chance to be a hermit i couldn't remember all those wonderful mahotma practices that make one so good and so wise

Starting point is 01:13:28 the only formulas i have really tried hard to recall are for cooking without sugar or spice or fruit end of chapter five recording by roger maline chapter six of the master not of human fate this libervox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter six six heap on more wood the wind is chill but let it whistle as it will we'll keep our christmas merry still scott it was christmas eve and the night being in a reminiscent mood was chillier than usual adam piled up the logs till the whole room was full of the warm glow let us hang up our stockings he said with an attempted gaiety robin spread out her hands with a gesture of comic distress if only i had a pair to hang she said but they gave boxes in england didn't they i noticed that the rain the other day seemed to have come through the shed roof and i fear the contents of those packing cases may be the worse for it especially if they happen to be sugar do you think it would do to make ourselves presents of them if you do please give me the smaller box i am sure it has hairpins and needles and darning cotton in it adam laughed we will give them to each other he said and perhaps you'll find some stockings in your box if there is no box in your stockings we can dream of their contents all night and who knows

Starting point is 01:15:33 we may have a merry christmas after all robin hardly knew the place next morning adam had risen early and decked every available spot with kinikinick until the room fairly glistened i wish i knew how to thank him she said do you like it he said as he came in i was afraid i should waken you putting it up like it she answered why adam it is beautiful you are just an ideal santa claus when they had finished their breakfast they went out and looked at the boxes you must open yours first she said it's so big i know it doesn't contain anything nice so we would better save mine till the last and then i can divide with you what do you think it is you shall have three guesses it might be a piano from its size he ventured no she said decidedly it's not the right shape or perhaps it's a feather bed i don't know of anything i want less it's too large for that now guess really as a matter of fact i expect it is mining machinery which will be about as much use as another chimney but here goes to find out he brought his hatchet down vigorously between the boards at one end where a slight crevice promised some leeway oh do be careful she cried even if there's nothing in it but stove polish and excelsior the nails and the boards are absolute treasures

Starting point is 01:17:26 he proceeded more gently there was any amount of hoop-iron which he removed carefully and the nails were drawn with as much caution as if they had been teeth as they well might be considering there were no more on earth to draw when the top of the box was finally off and a quantity of papers removed they gave a simultaneous cry of delight the box was full of books they took them out one at a time with little exclamations of pleasure as an old friend came to light sitting down on the ground they piled the books about them on the papers and opening favorites here and there read to each other and themselves till long afternoon. It was really a fine library, well-chosen, covering a wide range of subjects, and including an encyclopedia and an unusually fine edition of Shakespeare.

Starting point is 01:18:30 Isn't it the most beautiful Christmas present you can imagine, Adam? she said. If you are not suited with this, it must be because, in the old slang, you want the earth. But we haven't even opened your box, he said. I don't want to, she answered slowly. Somehow, I feel as if we would better stop now and let well enough alone. Let us enjoy this a while. Perhaps the other box may spoil this one, or at least the day.

Starting point is 01:19:06 Adam laughed with good-natured tolerance. How absurd, he said. let us see what there is. You know you said yours would be the nicest. Besides, if it contains sawdust and last year's almanacs, I shall have to divide with you, and we may quarrel over the Shakespeare. He opened the box while she stood watching him with a strange unwillingness. It had been labeled this side up, and on the very top there was a wooden case. He put it in Robin's. arms and she opened it with trembling fingers she replaced the broken strings adjusted the bridge tucked the violin under her chin tuned it and straightway escaped from every sorry care of earth adam went on unpacking the box it contained chiefly materials for writing all the paraphernalia that the fastidious student requires there were many notebooks and at the bottom a large handsomely inlaid writing-desk the name on the cover made him start and call her she put down the violin reluctantly and then stooped and kissed the vibrating wood with sudden feeling it is a steiner she said you know the story of steiner's violins do you not no

Starting point is 01:20:40 some day perhaps i may tell you can you open the desk he found the key and unlocked it there were some letters a few papers and memoranda and a journal adam turned to the last page written and read have just completed arrangements for transportation of my effects to the mountains close study of various phenomena convinces me that i have just completed arrangements for transportation of my effects to the mountains close study of various phenomena convinces me that i have just completed arrangements for transportation of my effects to the mountains close study of various phenomena convinces me that i may have been in error and that the cataclysm is much closer at hand than i have thought within a few months i shall burn this book and confess that i should be written down an ass or turn to it to prove myself a prophet from the area i have chosen i expect to be able to write the story of the coming deluge it will be of great value to posterity to have a calm scientific account quite free from any tinge of superstition or religion i have to-day written my boston sceptics forwarding copies of my calculations with references to former inundations and reasons for believing the rocky mountain region the safest at this time all geologists agree that here the journal terminated abruptly robin hardly seemed to comprehend its full significance or possibly she was not surprised she touched the book as gently as if it were the napkin over the face of the dead it is not to the wise that god has revealed himself she said softly where is the hand that wrote this you must finish it is not to the wise that god has revealed himself she said softly

Starting point is 01:22:28 where is the hand that wrote this you must finish it adam hear of the blank pages waiting for such a chapter as was never written on earth but adam only looked at the half-written page unseeingly it is all true then he muttered to himself it is all true he walked away with the painful precision of motion almost as if he were drunk he neither heard nor saw anything yet was conscious of everything and while he thought he had been hopeless before he knew now that he had never given up hope never until that moment ceased to expect a rescue robin took her violin and went indoors presently he heard its liquid note stealing out to him like a power unknown and divine brushing its fingers across his heart, the harp of a thousand strings. She played for a long time, and when she ceased, in some strange way, he felt that he was comforted. End of Chapter 6.

Starting point is 01:23:44 Recording by Roger Malene Chapter 7 of The Master Not of Human Fate This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline THE MASTAR NOT OF Human Fate by Ellis Meredith Chapter 7 The world is too much with us. Late and soon getting and spending, we lay waste our powers.

Starting point is 01:24:19 Little we see in nature that is ours. We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon. Great God! I'd rather be a pagan, suckled in a creed outworn. So might I, stand down. on this pleasant lee have glimpses that would make me less forlorn have sight of proteus rising from the sea or hear old triton blow his wreathed horn wordsworth they had been sitting by the fire in silence for a long time robin had been sewing but the blaze had sunk too low to see by it and her hands were folded idly upon her mending she put it by and went to the window it was a very dark night and the stars shone brilliantly the stars had come to mean a great deal to them both howbeit neither had ever said so the stars only were unchanged the thoughts of god and the heavens were the same whatever might be his thoughts on earth she sighed so heavily that adam asked quickly

Starting point is 01:25:31 what is it and she answered with a nervous laugh i was thinking of the old legend that the souls on other planets call ours the sorrowful world what made it so sorrowful adam ignorance would cover at all he answered but to be specific intemperance sensuality avarice and poverty i don't mean drunkenness only when i say intemperance i have known a few prohibitionists in my time who were as intemperate in their eating as any one could be in the matter of drink i think intemperance in its widest sense was the great curse of our time anyway drink and tobacco and tea and coffee and as to our eating there was too much of almost everything on earth that was not food but which could be over-salted and overpeppered and treated with tobasco sauce we overstimulated every activity of the body and spent our lives doing all kinds of things in which there was no sense think of reading one or two morning and evening papers every day to be sure we said there was nothing in them but we used up our eyesight over them and let a stream of stillness and scandal dribble through our minds as to the things we wore robin laughed i know she said the sewing-machine didn't save work it only made ruffles a dressmaker once said to me it's a good thing for me that these women haven't sense enough to spend their time and money on themselves in making their bodies free and strong and beautiful.

Starting point is 01:27:21 But no, they would rather have a stylish dress than a graceful body. They don't care to be beautiful themselves. All they want is a handsome gown to cover their ugliness. Isn't it strange that we never seemed able to realize that the Greek fashions were immortal because they were beautiful? Still, I don't think the dress of the Greek. women would be very convenient for housework, ventured Adam. Robin shook her head. You only say that because some woman has said it to you. The Diana of the stag wore the first

Starting point is 01:28:01 rainy-day gown. The Greek dress was capable of ever so many modifications. If I were making a handbook of proverbs for women, I should say, a good complexion is rather to be chosen than many fine dresses, and glossy and abundant hair turneth away wrath. I believe in the simplification of life. I understand just how Thoreau felt when he threw out that specimen because it had to be dusted daily. There are very few things beautiful enough to pay for that amount of trouble. But perhaps that is because I don't care for specimens, and I loathe dusting.

Starting point is 01:28:44 you ought to have been a jap said adam there was one in college in my class and one day when i was fretting over something i could not afford he said in that immensely polite way of theirs you i cannot understand with all american people it so is even as by ruskin said was it whatever you have of it you more would get and where you are you would go go from. You happy are only when something you get, and never that you yourself are. But I think the celestial was wrong there. When a man is self-conscious of illy-made garments, a mean domicile, a poor kind of half-education, he is uncomfortable. He hasn't accomplished his evolution from the conscious, the self-conscious, to the unconscious. It was this very discomfort and inequality that used so to enrage me, for it need not have been. I wish, said Robin, we knew how to make paper. Of all the fascinating things in Bellamy's equality,

Starting point is 01:30:00 there was nothing I liked so well as the idea of paper garments, to be burned when one got through with them. Think of never having any washing and ironing and always having new clothes. i wonder whether we could invent some of those things over again said adam reflectively i couldn't spare you any of my precious rags if you could said robin most of the paper was made out of wood anyhow answered adam and the ash that grows here in any quantity was considered particularly fine for that purpose god made man upright but he hath sought out many inventions quoted robin and now we are going to seek them over again i can't imagine how anyone could ever make a lineotype but the type and the hand press are easy enough and if you can make paper we may yet live to read our published works you probably do not know that i used to have a wegg-like facility for dropping into poetry did you that is another of the things you never told me but your speaking of thoreau answered adam recalls what he said of the amount of work necessary to sustain life beside walden pond it took six weeks out of the year and that was in a most forbidding country in such a valley as this two months ought to be sufficient to more than feed and clothe us but then he didn't have to make his own clothing

Starting point is 01:31:43 and out of nothing particular interrupted robin adam laughed and went on did you ever hear of a man called he was an eminent austrian sociologist and he figured it out that if five million men should work a little less than an hour and three-quarters a day they could produce all the necessities of life for the twenty-two million people of austria by working two hours and twelve minutes daily for two months beside they could have all the luxuries also and that not for a few not for the court and the nobility but for all there could have been music and pictures and books and theatres and sufficient food and clothing isn't it strange that when we might have been so happy we preferred to be so wretched for even if we had all we wanted ourselves we could not escape the sights and sounds that told of abject misery it was always so robin answered moodily the poor we had always with us history always repeated itself still it didn't exactly repeat itself adam said our dark age would have been done for a golden age in the past greece was glorious for a little while but her literature tells us of her ideals the isles of greece where byron contracted his last illness would have left him to die among the rocks twenty-five hundred years earlier because he had a lame foot we at least were kinder to animals and that means a great deal

Starting point is 01:33:37 i don't know she answered perhaps it seems to me i have read of a hospital for sick animals on the island of ceylon a long sometime b c lady mary warley montague or was it lady hester stanhope said she had travelled all over the world and had never found but two kinds of people men and women i fancy the same thing is true of all the ages as well as all the countries no adam said shaking his head our ideals change the scheme of life laid down by christ was to the greeks foolishness and to the jews a stumbling-block and there were plenty of greeks and jews in our day by greeks i mean people whose ideals were purely intellectual and by jews those who saw no good save a material good no god but the god of mammon they would not hear either moses or the prophets and the statute of limitations was as near as they could come to the sabbatic year the greek and the jew have stood ready with their cup of hemlock their crown of thorns for every christ's spirit that has ever come to earth yet more people read socrates and believed on the nazarene every year i don't mean in the church the working-man did not go to church but he uncovered his head at the name of christ the first lawgiver who confounded the scribes and pharisees and ate with publicans and sinners but moses was the first lawgiver to forbid taking the nether millstone as a pledge objected robin

Starting point is 01:35:35 True, he admitted, and the laws of Moses would have made the world over. He was the greatest writer on political economy this earth has ever seen. His absolute fiat against the alienation of the land would have done more for the common people than all Adam Smith's theories of free competition and Fourier's dream of a perfected communism. But who would have known of Moses, save for Christ? the old testament would have been merely the sacred book of the hebrews and save as a literary and historic work a very uncertain historic value would have been unread as the koran and other books of a similar nature were unread

Starting point is 01:36:24 and yet you do not believe in the divinity of christ she said slowly no he answered is that necessary before one can believe in his teachings the truth is always divine what difference does it make whether the one who utters it be human or divine bond or slave isop or marcus aurelius the truth remains the same a fable is only another name of a parable we have the story of the lost sheep that's a parable and that of the lamb that muddied the stream and that's a fable one is sacred the other profane but both are fables both parables when you take them away from the context it is as easy to feel for the lamb eaten by the wolf as for the one that was rescued and has been immortalized in picture and song. Probably you are right, she said. I never thought of it in just that way before. And saying good night, she went to her room.

Starting point is 01:37:39 Adam thought he heard her humming, Away on the mountains, cold and bare. End of Chapter 7. Recording by Roger Malene. Chapter 8 of the Master Not of Human fate. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline. The Master Not of Human Fate by Ellis Meredith. Chapter 8 When we mean to build, we first survey the plot, then draw the model, and then we see the

Starting point is 01:38:24 figure of the house. Then must we rate the cost of the erection. Shakespeare the discovery of the incomplete journal made a subtle change in adam he had been silent and self-absorbed from the first but he had never quite given up hope even now robin sought to keep up the pretense and dreading the despair which she saw creeping over adam she began artfully to seek some means of interesting him in something else the question of a proper place for the books gave her an opportunity and adam suggested that he built an addition to the house they planned it as eagerly as if it were to be a castle and spent days in looking for adobe but finally decided that logs would be better and adam's axe could have been heard ringing from morning till night a log house is not exactly a work of art but it requires no little skill to build one and takes a good deal of time when the logs for the floor must be planed and squared so as to make a matched board floor sometimes robin went with adam and worked or read sometimes she took him his luncheon at noon for the trees were at some little distance from the house the logs had to be snaked across the rough ground and down the mountain and when the floor had been laid and the location of the window decided upon,

Starting point is 01:39:59 Robin planted morning glory seeds where it was to be. By dint of much pushing and hauling, the logs were finally put in place, and the roof battened down. The window was truly worthy of a medieval castle, for it was simply an oblong hole, boxed in with a casement made from some scraps of boards, while a slab shutter, swung on leather hinges,

Starting point is 01:40:26 shut out the elements the chinking was a simple matter and when it was all done including a doorway into the main room robin was unfainly delighted they made rows of shelves with the packing-cases and arranged the books thereon it was not an extensive library but it occupied one side of the room and was a godsend to them under the window robin placed the green-covered desk and placed on it adam's writing materials along the inside wall adam built a bunk after the fashion in miners cabins and with a mattress stuffed with the soft inner corn husk and a pillow from the other room and blankets from the one tiny closet the couch looked sufficiently inviting on the floor robin spread mats made from plated corn husk and in the doorway hung a portiere woven from the same material on a loom that a navajo might not have utterly despised adams scanty wardrobe was transferred to pegs in one corner of the room one or two stools were set first here then there until robin was sure the best effect had been secured and when all was done that they could accomplish with the means at hand and the morning-glory blossoms came peeping in at the window the room was by no means unattractive then robin's housewively soul took refuge in house-clothesons and house-clotheseses cleaning and she scrubbed and arranged and rearranged while adam repaired or invented furniture until inside and out their little domain was as perfect as they could make it

Starting point is 01:42:20 between them there had again fallen one of those long silences they dreaded but seemed powerless to prevent as the voice of the turtle dove was lifted in the plaintive notes of nesting time adam harrowed the three acres of the plowed land and planted in it wheat and corn the perennial garden was flourishing and there was nothing to do adam said so one day with an air of calm finality robin regarded him uneasily the time had not yet come when he could sit down and write though she had brewed an excellent ink and the paper waited on the desk in his room she considered for a moment then said brightly don't you remember what myron used to say how when his friends got rich they first built a beautiful house and then went abroad for three years let us go traveling wouldn't you like it the alacrity with which he acquiesced proved how well he liked it and he started out at once to get the burrows and make ready for the expedition robin baked and prepared as well as she could it's a good thing i had a southern grandmother she soliloquized as she put her beaten biscuit in the dutch oven and pulled the coals over it and it's a good thing my mother crossed the plains and learned how to make biscuit in the mouth of her flour sack and as she rolled out some crackers it is a blessed good thing i went to cooking school but i wish that that instead of being so particular about the knobs on the candlesticks the pentateuch had given sarah's recipe for making cakes with honey not that i have any honey but i am sure we shall find some on this trip

Starting point is 01:44:19 when they were all ready and the burrows stood waiting at the door with lassie jumping wildly about them adam wrote a placard which he stuck in the framework of the door the stock had been turned loose on the mountain side and the house and stables secured as well as possible against any storms that might arise the kittens had possession of one of the sheds the puppies were to accompany them robin had put on her long unused shoes and a new gown that she had made out of a dark blue surge found hanging in her room adam looked at her approvingly from under her adam looked at her approvingly from under his wide sombrero she turned back after going a few paces and read the card wait april fifth back in two weeks look for smoke as she passed into the canyon that hid their home from sight adam saw her brush her hand across her eyes end of chapter eight recording by roger maline chapter nine of the master not of human fate this libervox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter nine i pity the man who can travel from dan to bersheba and cry tis all baron stern they travelled a due west course crossing the two ranges wending their way through dim defiles and along precipitous canyons until they saw the sea

Starting point is 01:46:20 here its mood was summer-like even in the short time that had elapsed it had worn itself a broad smooth beach and wide tracks of land between the sand and the base of the mountains proved that the earth had been thrown up or that the water had receded they had not looked upon the ocean before for many months they picketed the burrows on the rank salt grass and built their camp-fire early and while Robin set the potatoes baking and began her supper preparations, Adam went scouting along the coast. In less than half an hour he came back with a quantity of clams, which he threw down before her, as proudly as if they had been foreign battle flags. She gave a little feminine shriek of delight.

Starting point is 01:47:14 Now I know why we brought that inconvenient iron pot, she said. bring it here please adam brought it and watched her slice up onions and potatoes and stir in the various ingredients it is going to be the best chowder you ever tasted she said even if we haven't any bacon when you write the voracious tale of our adventures adam don't put in how many things we ate they might think it a voracious tale if i did he answered dropping some more butter into his mealy potato do you remember how the swiss family were always worrying for fear they wouldn't have enough to eat yes and how they went out and killed an elephant for breakfast and a herd of wild pigs for dinner and had a buffalo apiece for supper and don't you remember how when the boa constrictor killed one of their zebras little fritz asked pathetically if boas were good to eat they laughed over their supper and then having made sure that they were out of reach of the tide and the fire would keep and the rifle was close at adam's elbow they spread their blankets and said good-night it had been an exciting day it was past midnight and the moon was waning when adam was wakened by lassie's cold muzzle against his face he sat up and called to robin there was no answer and her blankets lay tossed on the other side of the fire he started up and listened at first he heard only the sound of the sea then there came mingled with it the clear notes of her glorious voice

Starting point is 01:49:07 holding lassie in check he went down to the beach robin stood well out on the shimmering sand the waves lapping softly almost at her feet and he heard the plaintive music and caught the words oh for the wings for the wings of a dove far away far away would i fly and be and be at rest her voice quivered when she came to the words in the wilderness build me a nest but she sang on and adam recalled the words of him after him anthem after anthem for she sang nothing else he heard the bitter cry of the de profundis hendell's triumphant i know that my redeemer liveth and then she began he watching over israel slumbers not nor sleeps his eyes filled and he saw the tents of his regiment she had written by every mail and across her letters at the top or bottom she had put those five bars from elijah although he did not believe it for he had not the early hebrew ability to see israel in his own race and the to be spoiled philistine in every filipino it had comforted him in that sickening campaign surely surely if he an american non-com had spared a filipino now and then he watching over israel had not been less merciful her voice died away it was the first time she had sung that year though she was a very perfectly trained musician indeed in the old days adam had first sought her acquaintance because of her music

Starting point is 01:51:00 adam returned to the camp he knew instinctively that she preferred to keep this to herself he was lying quite still when she came back and controlled every muscle when she bent over him she regarded him intently for a moment then went to her blankets with a heavy sigh that adam knew was for him she had sung out her own sorrows their vigils seemed to do them both good for they shook off their melancholy tendencies and before the end of the first week their torre was beginning to be thoroughly enjoyable they did not find cocoanuts and bananas but they did find plenty of strawberries and long prickly vines that would be covered with raspberries and wild grapes and choke cherries and currants which they planned to transplant for though the western coast was more beautiful and in some respects more convenient than their hedged-in valley they preferred the valley already it had come to mean home they traveled about fifty miles southward to the end of the island making desultory trips up into the mountains to see if anywhere on land or sea there was a friendly wreath of smoke and every night their watch-fire glowed from the highest peak in their vicinity the island narrowed to a single range detached peaks rising here and there from the sea as they rounded the southernmost point adam said we ought to name it that remarkable swiss family always named places robin looked at the bare stone walls rising sheer above the waves three hundred feet and her

Starting point is 01:52:54 her lip curled let us call it the cape of good hope she said in the name of wonder why asked adam and she answered because we are past it and then would have given anything to have recalled the bitter words the eastern coast was wilder and more picturesque but the traveling was correspondingly slower something in the formation of the coast caused a terrific surf and at many places there was scarcely any beach and they found themselves compelled to climb along trails that made even the burrows dizzy when they had been absent ten days robin said i begin to feel like a grandmother no i don't mean that i feel so old but that i begin to long to see the chicken and cat children and the new calf and every everything adam laughed i have been thinking we ought to hurry that place of ours is growing so entrancingly lovely in memory that last night i dreamt that i dwelt in marble halls they were not to reach home without at least one adventure however a day or so later as they toiled up a painfully steep ascent lassie sounded the note of alarm and he sounded the note of alarm and he was a little bit of alarm and he, catching up the rifle, Adam ran ahead. As he rounded a point in the rocks, he came upon a rocky mountain goat engaged in combat with a cinnamon bear. The bear was hardly more than a cub,

Starting point is 01:54:39 and was carrying off one of the kids. The goat, horns down, was fighting viciously, though weak from loss of blood. It would be interesting to know what one wild animal thinks. when another wild animal from its point of view comes to the rescue adam carried a lariat over one arm in an instant it flew through the air dropping over bruin's shoulders he released the kid and tumbled backward over the cliff as much with surprise as by the force of the jerk on the rope taking that treasured article with him it took some time to capture the wounded animals bind up their hurts and get them down the pathway leading to the beach for there was a beach the best one they had found on the eastern coast and as they put the goat and her kids down in the grass adam said tentatively if you are not afraid i can go home and get the horses and the sleds it isn't a great way and i believe i can be back in three hours. I'm sure I can, if the beach goes as close to our park as I think. Robin acquiesced, and as soon as he was gone, began gathering driftwood.

Starting point is 01:56:04 When she had quite a little heap, she made a fire with the coals they carried in the pot. It is doubtless more romantic to build a fire by striking flint rocks together, but a pot of coals has its uses in a matchless. universe. Then she found a long, stout club, and put one end in the fire, where it smoldered sullenly. "'There now,' she said conclusively, "'if my bear acquaintance calls, I will present him with the red flower. I didn't learn the jungle books by heart for nothing.' Meanwhile, Adam was striding over the beach at a rate that brought him to the little Cove and the high wall of rocks that shut them in on the south in a little over an hour.

Starting point is 01:56:54 Two of the pups had gone with him, and they raced on ahead as he came in sight of the house. Everything seemed to have an air of welcome, and the horses whinny joyfully when he called them from the gateway. The pathetic placard was still there, and he crumpled it in his hand and went in and opened the windows. he milked one of the cows and gathering some green stuff in the garden started back with the team and the sleds once down the steep decline and over the rocks at the south they went on rapidly although he had wasted no time it was past one o'clock when he saw her familiar figure afar off she hurried to meet him they had not been separated so long before that year and realized the unconscious strain in the sudden revulsion they said nothing of this however though they clasped hands for a moment then robin spoke to the horses and stroked their necks as they bent their heads and rubbed against her affectionately she had spread their table on a broad flat rock but before they had their own meal she warmed some of the milk and they gave the kids their

Starting point is 01:58:17 first lesson in drinking out of a bucket. Afterward, it took but a few moments to strike camp. The burrows were already packed, and the goat with her kids, all hobbled, were placed in the sled, and the cavalcade started on its way. End of Chapter 9. Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 10 of the Master Not of Human Fate. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter ten cling to thy home if there the meanest shed yield thee a hearth and a shelter for thy head and some poor plot with vegetable stored be all that heaven allots thee for thy board unsavoury bread and herbs that scattered grow wild on the river brink or mountain brow. Yet even this cheerful mansion shall provide more hearts repose than all the world beside. Leonidas. Do you know, Adam, said Robin, when they had walked a mile in silence.

Starting point is 01:59:43 Do you know that you're a fraud? Well, yes, he responded. But I didn't know you knew it. Is the discovery recent? never mind about dates but tell me why you didn't use the rifle instead of the lariat what did you take it for i took it for your peace of mind i didn't use it for several good and substantial and sentimental reasons to reverse them this last year i have grown to understand your horror of killing things we have done very well without sacrificing any of our dependents in fact it would seem like murder to slaughter the animals about us and in such a little world it seems a pity to kill off any of its inhabitants to tell the truth i hope the bear got away all right this is maudlin i know but i don't want my hand first to bring death on all there is left on earth incidentally there are no cartridges he stopped the horses while robin readjusted the kids to make them more comfortable and took the lame one in her arms and they moved on presently she said i am so glad of these kids there was so much enthusiasm in her voice that adam laughed and asked why and she answered like you i have sound and sentimental reasons

Starting point is 02:01:21 the sound one is that we shall need their fleece unless why goodness gracious adam there is a baking-powder can of flax in the dresser and i never thought till this moment that we can plant it true answered adam but given flax or fleece what would you do with it spin it she answered sententiously of course you think i can't but it happens that i once lived when i was a little girl very near to an old woman i don't refer to her age but her ideas she carded and spun and wove and dyed all the family clothing she made her own soap and wouldn't have a stove in the house she had eight children too and they all of them turned out badly i used to go there off and on i think she looked on me as a kind of sinful amusement anyhow she told me the world was going to ruin and the women were poor dooless creatures who couldn't spin a hank of yarn or gin a pound of cotton or heel a sock. She shook her head over me when she found I couldn't knit, but she set a garter for me at once,

Starting point is 02:02:46 and during the seven or eight years that I went by her door on my way to school, she taught me all those marvelous accomplishments. I dare say I have forgotten them. What are the sentimental reasons? asked Adam. She looked at the kid as it nestled against her shoulder, shoulder. I have a fancy, she said, that Nanette and her children are going to minister to a mind diseased and help pluck a rooted sorrow from the brain. The world was getting too healthy. Has it ever struck you that we have neither of us been sick for a day this year? I have had to

Starting point is 02:03:31 mother the chickens, but there has been no suffering. I'm not glad to have pain come back into the world, but it is good to be able to alleviate it. We will put Nanette in a sling till her leg has a chance to set, and by the time it is well she won't want to leave us. As for the kids, I expect they will be like the plague of frogs, and we shall find them in our beds and our ovens and our kneading troughs. Oh, Adam, there is the house. Doesn't it look dear and home? me?" She put the kid back on the sled and ran on, pointing out this and that, the growth of the corn, the afternoon radiance, till they reached their doorway. Then there were a thousand things to do. First, Nanette was made comfortable in the stable, then the chickens were summoned to a meal of yellow corn, and when Lassie drove the cows into the barnyard, each was congratulated in turn upon her calf and those interesting if wobbly bovine infants were carefully inspected after supper they sat down before the fire very tired but the nearest happy they had been in a year

Starting point is 02:04:53 the dogs were lying about them and the thump-thump of first one tail and then another told the story of canine content while the kittens walked over them impartially what a strange thing human nature is adam said the only thing needed to make our life perfect is that it shall not last the moment if that moment ever comes when it is real no more it will become ideal i know she said dreamily things in the world used to be too good to be true this must cease to be to be good at all End of Chapter 10. Recording by Roger Maline. is it therefore the less gone all that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream poe it is the first of may said adam it is a year ago to-day shall we pass the gateway not now answered robin wait till afternoon i'm so busy this morning she was sitting at the table teaching half a dozen little chickens to appreciate hard-boiled egg the wounded kid was lying in her lap one arm was about it and an adventurous kitten looked over her shoulder as she tapped on the board with one slender forefinger the chickens hearing their mother's bill

Starting point is 02:07:04 began picking up the fragments of egg. She had rounded out wonderfully in a year, and Adam realized for the first time that she was a very beautiful woman. Suppose, she went on, you begin your book today. Write your description of a year ago. It will never be so plain again.

Starting point is 02:07:28 There is plenty of time before we go. Besides, if it is a dream, we shall want the written record to show what dreams may come. Adam hesitated a moment, then went to his desk. She had said truly the events of that day would never again be so clear, and as he began to record them, they marshalled themselves before him, until he found himself writing with a dramatic power that fascinated and amazed him. It must have been some time afterward,

Starting point is 02:08:03 that Robin stole in and set a glass of milk, some biscuit and strawberries, down on the desk beside him, and then went out, taking the dogs with her. He did not notice another sound until she called him to supper. While he did the evening work, Robin dressed herself in the garments

Starting point is 02:08:23 she had worn the year before. As soon as she could make others, she had put them aside, awaiting the awakening or the rescue. the heavy cloth skirt and the silk waist were put on with a strange reluctance years ago the old doctor in the guardian angel said our china became our tombstones but surely our garments may become the graveyards of our emotions and hold sharp or sweet remembrances long after they are past wearing in spite of some tan robin found the face that looked back at her from her mirror infinitely more attractive than it had been the year before adam started a little when he saw her then he drew her hand through his arm and they went to the gateway as he opened the gate she turned and looked back the sun was behind the mountains and the shadows were long and dark they heard the sounds of the various creatures settling into quiet for the night

Starting point is 02:09:31 and adam sent back all the dogs but lassie they went slowly and wistfully robin stooped and kissed prince on his white forehead as adam closed the gate she said half fearfully shall we ever see them again but he did not answer he took her hand and led her to the boulder far as the eye could reach they saw what they expected to the boulder far as the eye could reach they saw what they expected to see half a mile away the sea rolled in on a tolerably level beach here it thundered and roared against a sheer cliff among the rocks they could see the nests of many wild fowl and gulls flew by them they sat down on the rock and waited until midnight then they went home the dogs received them obstreperously and the kid from its corner bleated faintly robin bent over it anxiously then warmed some milk and fed it when adam came in with some fresh water she was swinging slowly to and fro in the rocker singing softly an absurd nursery song sleep baby sleep the stars they are the sheep the big moon is the shepherdess the little stars are the lambs i guess sleep baby sleep it needed to be cuddled she said in as matter-of-fact a voice as if all lambs were sunk to sleep regularly you know dear old professor carter said there would have been no wild animals if we hadn't made them so but now if you will you can put her with nanny

Starting point is 02:11:27 when he came back she had gone into her room there was nothing more for either of them to say there was nothing to do except to hope for a sail since they no longer hoped for an awakening end of chapter eleven recording by roger maline chapter twelve of the master not of human fate this librovoc's recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter twelve speech is but broken light upon the depth of the unspoken george elliot the work on the book progressed rather slowly often adam had to refer to robin when his memory was at fault at first she had gone away to leave him alone with his work but as he referred to her more frequently she sat with him sewing while he wrote a frame of morning glory's back of her or reading with the keen enjoyment of one who renews a pleasure long foregone When he seemed to be going on smoothly, she sometimes stole away and gave herself up to long hours with her violin. One afternoon she tapped on his casement. His work was lagging, and he rose gladly and went out with her.

Starting point is 02:13:09 They walked up the path and threw the gateway to their boulder and sat down. Talk to me, said Adam. She shook her head. head about what most worshipful signor for i am but a warm of the dust before thee and all my tails are of the homely tasks of baking and brewing not is there worthy to be set down in thy book then with a sudden change of manner oh adam there are eighteen new chickens to-day the plymouth rock hen stole a nest and they came off this morning and there is some news too the flax is in bloom it is so pretty when do you expect to weave your first linen asked adam oh i don't know but it is good to know there will be some to weave do you remember anderson's story of the flax i was thinking of it this morning as i pulled out some weeds and how when it was pulled up and cut and hackled it said one cannot always have good times.

Starting point is 02:14:23 One must make one's experience, and so one comes to know something. And when it is woven and cut up and made into garments, it still says, If I have suffered something, I have been made into something. I am happiest of all. That is a real blessing. Now I shall be of some use in the world, and that is right.

Starting point is 02:14:47 That is a true pleasure. if one only knew he was to be of some use adam said wearily if we could see the justification of our suffering then we should be as gods answered robin i like the song of the flax content content and when the linen is worn out it is again tortured and beaten until it becomes paper whereon an eternal word is written i used to wonder why anderson was given to children not that i wouldn't have them read him but he is one of the profound thinkers of the world no one had anderson clubs or professed to find deep and wonderful esoteric truths in his stories but they are there do you remember my girls club down on i don't think there were any streets but the inhabitants called the place carry patch why no said adam i didn't know you had one why didn't you tell me that was ever so long ago ages and ages when you came to see she paused a little and then spoke the personal pronoun that tells the whole story for a woman can say him in such a way as to betray unspeakable heights of adoration or abysses of loathing she went on slowly you were not one of my friends then how could you be if there existed anything in common between you two that sounds dreadful but you know all about it so well that subterfuges are useless

Starting point is 02:16:38 to tell the truth i never cared anything about him at all adam answered quickly like a good many others i was enthusiastic over your voice he asked me to the house to hear you sing and i went and was glad of the chance and you have never sung for me once this year you never asked me she answered a dumb priest loses his benefice but i was speaking of my club we studied anderson all winter and got enough more out of him than a lot of us who poured over ibsen guided by a literary expert anderson has a more beautiful a more inspiring philosophy every nation has its story of psyche the lost soul of things but none is more beautiful than the tale of gerda and k they were children in that club who were cruel horribly cruel and one day when we gave an entertainment for them one of the older girls recited the story of the daisy and the lark they cried as i had cried over it years before i remember he said it broke my heart when i was a little shaver i couldn't give so sad a story as that to a child oh yes you could she said if the child needed it the world was cruel cruel adam i used to wonder sometimes why god did not blot it all out as he has blot it all out as he has blot it out now. Once, in another club, a big swell affair, there was a humane society program.

Starting point is 02:18:31 One woman, in a Persian lamb jacket, spoke on the evils of the overcheck. You know how they get that wool? And women nodded the egrets in their bonnets, torn from old birds, while the little one starved to death, to show their approval, and patted their hand. hands gloved in the skins of kids sewed in cloth soon after their birth so they couldn't grow a fleece and tortured all their short lives and went home to eat patte de foie gras and broil live lobsters thanking god they were not as the rest of men if only they let out their check reins a hole or so it was horrible the cruelties men practised to gratify appetite and the that women were guilty of for vanity. I suppose I am a monomaniac on the subject, but we never seemed far removed from barbarians, when we went clothed in the skins of wild animals, and decorated with their heads and tails and feathers, like so many Sioux chiefs.

Starting point is 02:19:41 The varnish of civilization isn't dry on us yet. Why, if a ship should come here now, do you know what they would do first, unless they happen to be East Indians? They would say they wanted some fresh meat and offer to buy Lily. She is the fattest of the cows. If we wouldn't sell her, they would probably take her anyway. Kill Lily, cried Adam angrily. They'd have to kill me first. Nothing on this place is going to be slaughtered while I can protect.

Starting point is 02:20:18 it. He went on more slowly, a little ashamed of his heat. I feel a sense of kinship with all these creatures that would make it impossible to kill them. It's like the woman whose Newfoundland died, and a friend asked if she was going to have him stuffed. Stuffed, she said. I'd as soon think of stuffing my husband. Robin laughed, and leaning over, tweaked last. his ear if we are to be stuffed we prefer to have it an anti-mortem performance don't we little dog the sun dropped behind the tall peaks but its dying light still covered sea and shore they rose as if for the benediction and looked out at the waters before them then they looked at each other and grew white to the lips and robin knelt down and flinging her arms around lassie sobbed and laughed adam never took his eyes from the coming ship end of chapter twelve recording by roger maline chapter thirteen of the master not of human

Starting point is 02:21:42 human fate this libervox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter thirteen every ship brings a word well for those who have no fear looking seaward well assured that the word the vessel brings is the word they wish to hear emerson the ship bore steadily toward them but night was coming on so rapidly that her lines were obscured they could not even tell whether it was a sailing vessel or propelled by steam there's one thing certain said adam excitedly it was coming this way but very slowly i suppose that is to be expected of a ship sailing unknown waters they have nothing to go by though they know of course just what part of the round globe they are on she answered almost apathetically as if she found it difficult to talk it seems as if good sailors would lay by at night when they do not know their course and there is land in sight land that has never been explored it does seem strange she should come right in he assented for surely no ship has ever sailed these seas before perhaps perhaps what perhaps she has been clear around perhaps this is the only bit of land left above a world ocean robin shivered a little and adam turned toward the beacon that had glowed in vain for a year it had been built on a high altar-shaped rock across the gorge where it could be kept up without leaving the park robin went with him and they gathered a pile of timber that ensured the brilliancy of their signal until morning

Starting point is 02:23:56 adam piled on the logs till the blaze leaped far up in the darkness then they went back to the boulder and sat down to think and wait see how the wind is rising said robin breaking a silence of an hour during which even lassie had been motionless but it is toward land answered adam but the same wind that brings us the ship may dash it to pieces on this awful coast true but she is far enough out to make herself secure oh robin suppose she sails around us and goes on that is impossible answered robin the people on that ship are as anxious to find us as we can be to see them if they are civilized at all noah and mount ararat are not to be named in the same day with us adam crossed the gorge and added fuel to the fire for a time the wind increased in velocity until a stiff gale was blowing then as the small hours came on, it waned, and the beacon flared straight up once more. "'I wonder where she's from,' said Adam. "'I wonder where she is now,' answered Robin.

Starting point is 02:25:24 "'I feel sure,' he said. "'When morning comes, we shall see her riding the waves out there. And think of it, Robin. We can go.' robin made no reply and her very silence made adam repeat but as a self-addressed question go where yes he went on quickly go where robin suppose the ship is all right and that she stops and the crew are not pirates and are willing to take us aboard where are we to go is there any place on earth that can mean as much to us as this island suppose asia or africa or europe are still in existence we should not regain our friends and relatives and life would be harder with strange people under a strange government far more so than we have found it here even without so many of its luxuries robin shook her head sadly at first adam we should learn their language and their customs new friends are speedily acquired and as for relatives well in the scheme of life relatives don't count for much

Starting point is 02:26:47 there always comes a time when they step out of our lives anyway but as to happiness her face paled a little have you been happy here she asked without raising her eyes to his and then went on not waiting for a reply if you have been it has been in the care of our little family of dependents who do not need you half so much as the great family of human dependents rest assured if there is a continent over there across the darkness it is peopled with beings who need the devoted and unselfish labors of such a man as you you would find your work easily enough the work you have been saved for the work you must do but if there is no continent left he queried in that case there must be islands there were many mountains higher than these and they are peopled, no doubt. Shall we not go to these other orphans, deserted by Mother Earth, our brothers and sisters,

Starting point is 02:27:59 through our common calamity? Both were silent and grossed in their own thoughts. A return to the world meant going back to the uncivilized rush of civilization. It meant the eternal question of, what shall we eat, and what shall we drink, and wherewithal shall we be clothed. It meant the old competition,

Starting point is 02:28:24 the stern old law of the survival of the brainiest. Above all, to Robin, it meant separation from Adam, for once more in Rome, the customs of Rome must be followed. To do Adam justice, this was a contingency which did not enter his mind. As he had said before,

Starting point is 02:28:47 whatever had put them in this dream together would keep them there, so that when he thought of relinquishing all the comfort and ease and quiet of his present life, all the loving animals, the cozy little house, the tiny fields, the blooming garden, it never occurred to him that he must relinquish more than all these things, more than the peace and harmony, that which, unconsciously, had come to be the very guiding star of his life i wonder if whoever is left cares for grand opera said robin rather grimly why asked adam in so startled a voice that she laughed hysterically it's the only thing i know well enough to make a living at it she said laconically i think the fire needs some more wood adam as he replenished it her words burned themselves upon his brain and he realized in an instant that a return to the old world meant giving up this supreme friend all that he had left in the world all there was for him in any world

Starting point is 02:30:03 the thing was impossible he turned to go back to her some kind of an impetuous avowal on his lips but she had left the boulder and walked down almost to the edge of a precipitous cliff which they had called lover's leap in a spirit of baddenage she stood there quietly watching the gray dawn and his heart impelled him to go to her and take her in his arms as his love revealed itself to him in all its power it seemed impossible that he should know it now for the first time why why had he been so blind if the ship took them away he walked unsteadily down to her resolved to say nothing if she wanted to go her wish should be sufficient the dawn came slowly but it came at last as the darkness lifted a slight fog settled over the face of the waters instinctively they recalled that other night when they had watched through the mist and his hand closed over hers. The sun was well up before the east wind dissipated it, and left only the dancing waves, brilliantly blue, stretching away into the dawn. On all that broad expanse, there was not so much as a cockle-shell afloat. Robin turned and looked to right and left in

Starting point is 02:31:39 bewilderment, and then at Adam. His chest was heaving, and as his eyes searched her face, he cried, Thank God, and gathered her up in his arms. She nestled there without a word. They crossed the gorge and scattered the brands of their watchfire, and walked on down to the cove. Suddenly, Lassie came bounding toward them uttering short, excited barks. they quickened their pace and as they came in sight of the beach discovered the object of her alarm against a small promontory lying on one side was the ship they had sighted the evening before it was a hopeless wreck and had borne to them no living thing yet it had served its purpose it had revealed their love for each other and told them that they had been to them that they had served its purpose it had revealed their love for each other and told them that they had hoped against a second deluge in vain end of chapter thirteen recording by roger maline chapter fourteen of the master not of human fate this librovoc's recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith

Starting point is 02:33:12 chapter fourteen the truth of truths is love bailey as adam went about his morning's work he was filled with a sense of gladness an exultation of life he had never known before he stretched out his arms as if to let all the glory of the earth meet the profounder splendor of his soul as he walked down the garden path he looked with affection at the flowers they had planted together but for the absurdity of it he could have woven a chaplet of them and worn it but the world had reached that height of civilization where the symbol of the glad and living thing was too emotional always and everywhere we preferred the dead thing the skin of the seal the shroud of the silkworm the straw that was left after the flowers were gone an atom was still civilized he accepted his happiness without a question it was too real too keen too great a revelation for him to stop to analyze it he knew it in every pulsation of his heart in every imagination of his mind and with the quickened senses of the lover he perceived that robin's feelings differed from his own for a year he had been lost in introspection now they seem to have changed places and she grew silent and almost reserved what is it dear he said no don't try to evade an answer we must not stop being frank with each other now she did not reply at once and when she did her voice was so low that he had to stoop to catch the words do you think you do love me as fully as you might have loved some one else younger and happier than i better fitted to you

Starting point is 02:35:20 it doesn't seem as if you could you never did in the old days you never even thought of it adam laughed lightly i beg of you to spare me for this isn't so sudden at all then seeing that her mood forbade jest he went on seriously really i mean it it's true i never made you pretty speeches in the old days nor stop to consider whether i might have done so had things been different but then i never made pretty speeches to any one from the very beginning i have taken you as a matter of course it always seemed as if we had known each other from the very first you entered into my plans as if you had known them as you might if we had gone to the same little red schoolhouse i wish we had i'm jealous of the years when i didn't know you but a whole year she said doubtfully are you sure it isn't a year she said doubtfully are you sure it isn't just loneliness and propinquity? Adam kissed her fingers one at a time. You are going to beg my pardon for that some day, he said.

Starting point is 02:36:40 You are not very vain, my sweetheart. How could I help loving you? That's just what I am finding fault with, she said with a sudden twinkle of fun in her eyes. You have managed to keep from it so long. but seriously i am not the kind of a woman i should have fancied you would care for i am at least i was very weary of life i knew too much about it and i am older than you he looked at her critically you were a year ago he answered i don't know how much two or three years five she said well five but this last year you have been growing young the very fact that you were tired of the old life made it less of a strain for you to give it up

Starting point is 02:37:38 the tired look is all gone even from your eyes whereas lots of gray has come into my hair you had learned to live in yourself and your music my whole scheme of life was wrapped up in the social existence of our time in a way i lost more than you did i have learned a good deal this past year five years ago if i had loved you there would have been many inequalities between us that do not exist to-day now it seems to me we are as absolutely mated as much parts of one whole as the two halves of the brain or the right and left ventricles of our hearts it is no disparage of our hearts it is no disparage of you or of myself to say that no boy could appreciate you the measure of a man's manhood is his ability to understand the highest types of womanhood as to your being worldly that's all nonsense he stroked her hair a few minutes in silence and then said half quizzically you might question me if i said it but this is what balzac said of women like you a woman who has received a man's education possesses a faculty which is the most fertile in happiness for herself and her husband but that woman is as rare as happiness itself she looked pleased but she did not reply and he went on do you still doubt me well then know that i have loved you from the very beginning for love when it come is a retroactive law of our being.

Starting point is 02:39:29 If I had loved you less, if you had seemed less a part of me, I might have realized it sooner. She shook her head. I have known that I loved you for a long time, months, she said. Then you ought to have known I loved you, he answered quickly. Don't you think it is possible to love with our souls, our subconsciousness, and realize with our slow brains, after months and years, what our hearts

Starting point is 02:40:01 new at once? Even love has become more or less of a mental process. We reason about things instead of feeling them, and yet when we come to our last analyses, we don't know anything. We simply feel. When the scientist says, the amoeba moves out of the the shade into the sunlight because it wants the sunlight, he bases his postulate upon what he feels, and believes that the atom feels. This is all that he knows. We do not seek warmth because we have calculated its effects upon us, but because we feel cold. Oh, we have starved our feelings to feed our brains, until the mind believes it is the immortal part of us. instead of realizing that what we know we are merely rediscovering while what we feel is our apperception of the infinite if we had the courage to be true to our feelings instead of our thoughts i believe it would be a better as it would certainly be a truer world

Starting point is 02:41:14 do you really think more people are guided by thought than by feeling she asked with a good deal of surprise perhaps not in one sense he answered a great many people are carried along by their impulses their transitory emotions which are not properly speaking feelings at all they make what some one calls the fatal error of mistaking the eddy for the current but among educated people it seems to me that we think too much especially of our own thoughts and feel too little all this year i have not said that i loved you i don't know that i have thought it but i have felt and lived it sometimes i have not been thoughtful you have always been too thoughtful she interrupted no but when i have been inconsiderate it was because you were myself the best self that we overlook sometimes but return to with unfailing loyalty you were not bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh that is a very low and material view of what you have been and are to me heart of my heart and soul of my soul i cannot think of a life apart from you for you are my life marriage is not a matter of a license and a ceremony and mendelssohn and gaping crowds and a tour we do not need any one to tell us that what god has joined cannot be sundered by man all this year has been a long wedding of every thought and feeling and desire until i have looked into your eyes to see my own wish we have thought and my own wish we have thought and

Starting point is 02:43:11 and thought but that way madness lies now i feel that all the world we have lost lives for us in every glorious possibility in each other for i know that you love me yes she said i think i have loved you all along but it never entered my dreams that you could love me even now when you tell me it does not seem as if it could be so either by the mental process or by that of feeling he caught her in his arms and kissed her a kiss so long and tender that it left her clinging to him breathless and half awakened don't think he said feel feel my heart and know that every beat is for you that every atom of me calls for you and every drop of blood obeys as it would command you i have tried to reach the ideal of the love that says not thou must be mine but i must be thine but i have failed if you can doubt me she flung her arms around his neck with sudden passion this is the greatest the most perfect dream of all she said i think it must be heaven a new heaven and a new earth he answered gently end of chapter fourteen recording by roger maline chapter fifteen of the master not of human fate this librovoc's recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter fifteen women alone know how much attraction there is in the respect which a master shows them

Starting point is 02:45:26 balzac the derelict did not afford them much amusement or information the waves soon beat her to pieces on the savage rocks apparently she had been a ship plying between western ports probably san francisco and honolulu in the wreckage washed up there were a few pounds of rice and some brooms of what they believed to be sugar-cane there was nothing else not even a lemon robin said disconsolately think of living all one's natural life not only ten but ten thousand miles from a lemon adam laughed sympathetically it's like a yachting party i remember we found that the boat we had engaged had been taken by somebody else and our set had to be divided later in the evening we discovered that we had all the sugar and the other crowd all the lemons twas ever thus from childhood's hour i've seen my fondest hopes decay i never wanted something sour but what molasses came my way never mind dear we will go and plant our sugar and by the time it is ready to sweeten anything a whole cargo of lemons may have floated into harbor right at our day we will go and plant our sugar and by the time it is ready to sweeten anything a whole cargo of lemons may have floated into harbor right at our day door. They crossed the ranges to the western coast, where there was lower ground, better fitted to the supposed requirements of rice and cane, and had a good deal of amusement out of their

Starting point is 02:47:08 ignorance, neither of them having more than a misty idea about either rice or sugar before they reach the stage to be served together. It was quite late when they were through and camped for supper. Remembering their trip of a few weeks previous, that now seemed so long ago, Adam said, Are you too tired to sing, dear? It is so long since I have heard you. She stood up and thought for a moment, and then, putting back her loosened hair, began with Bourillon's The Night Has a Thousand Eyes, and sang on and on. at last turning to adam with a little fond gesture and altering the word slightly she sang like a leverlock in the lift sing o bonny bride all the world was adam once with eve by his side what's the world my lad my love what can it do i am thine and thou art mine life is sweet and new if the world have missed the mark let it stand by for we two have gotten leave and once more will try

Starting point is 02:48:27 once more adam repeated once more my darling oh life is sweet and new for us we can afford to lose the world when will you come to me love when she shook her head with a little willful laugh and all the glistening glory of her hair fell about her like a wedding veil wait she said wait a little the flax is not nearly ready for spinning yet can a bride forget her attire besides how can we be she paused and let her silence fill the gap when i know we neither of us know any ceremony more dignified than hopping over a broomstick they started homeward walking slowly through the dimly lighted mountain gorges talking the ineffable nonsense that lovers never weary of. As they came to a brook that rushed noisily down the ravine, Adam stepped across and held out his hand to her. Wait a moment, he said, just where you are, dear, and say this with me. Over running water, my love I give to you, my life I pledge to you, my heart I take not back from you while this

Starting point is 02:49:56 water runs. Over running water every seventh year at this time of the year, at this hour of the night, I will meet you here to renew my troth, death alone to relieve me of this vow. Is that all? she asked wonderingly. Overrunning water while this water runs, while there is any snow in the mountains, or rivers upon land, or waters in the sea, or waters in the sea, or clouds in the skies when the world is old and the sun burned out and time grows weary i shall love you still always and forever what is it all about love he clasped her close and did not answer at once don't you know the old irish troth he said which would have been enough even in that hard unromantic world of ours to have made you know the old irish troth he said which would have been enough even in that hard unromantic world of ours to have made you legally my wife if said over any scottish stream i thought you knew you are sure i would not trick you you know i could not he put her head back on his shoulder and looked into her shining eyes it seemed to him he could not bear even a look of reproach she raised her hands almost as if she were placing an invisible crown upon his head and let her arms fall about

Starting point is 02:51:26 his shoulders then i am your wife while living water runs forever and forever he replied oh wait wait just a little she answered end of chapter fifteen recording by roger maline chapter sixteen of the master not of human fate this librivox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter sixteen all persons possessing any portion of power ought to be strongly and awfully impressed with an idea that they act in trust and that they are to account for their conduct in that trust to the one great master author and founder of society burke adam found a note beside his plate in the morning i will be back before five o'clock it said i must think he did not sit down to the table she had spread for him but called the dogs prince was missing and this was a relief to him nothing could happen to her when prince was with her his first impulse was to follow her but he repelled it and he too sat down to think lassie whined uneasily and he stroked her head absent-mindedly and finally went out and tried to work the hours dragged away and by four o'clock he could stand it no longer he went to the gateway as he unfastened it he saw her coming toward him but she stopped and he stopped and he could stand it no longer he went to the gateway as he unfastened it he saw her coming toward him but she stopped and he joined her and together they turned back to the boulder he noticed that she was very white and that her eyes looked as if she had not slept but he only said

Starting point is 02:53:43 have you thought yes she answered i have thought and decided and decided no she said wearily we must decide together we are not children adam nor are we in any way the prototypes of those first parents of ours i think sometimes that ever since their day their children have been walking in a blind circle eating not the fruit of knowledge but of the knowledge of good and evil and what do we know you and i after all these years are you sure what we ought to do we do It is as if God had taken us into a conspiracy to renew the old or create a new scheme of existence. Possibly we are being tried, tested, to prove whether or not we have learned our lesson. We must be brave enough to think, not what is our will, but what is our duty. Think of the awful responsibility, whichever way we choose. "'I can't,' said Adam.

Starting point is 02:54:58 "'I can't think of anything but you.' "'Nor I of aught but you,' she said, moving away, "'when you hold me so. "'But we must think.' "'I have,' answered Adam, gravely. "'All my life, I have thought. "'I have wanted the perfect companionship "'of the one woman in all the world who could give it.'

Starting point is 02:55:23 i have always known she would come i have wanted a home i have wanted to see my sons and daughters grow up about me i wanted to be a power for good in this world of which we are a part and where we live for some good purpose if there be any purpose in life i have so conducted myself that i can look a good woman in the face and offer her my life for whatever it is worth without damning recollecting recollections to come between us. My children will have a clean heritage of blood and name. The family tree was scoffed at in America, but, thank God, mine was an oak that had weathered many a gale. Not very great folk, but honest, upright, fearless men and women, true to their king or their country and their faiths.

Starting point is 02:56:20 True to their ideals, too, when their fellows. were content with realities only. Any man who gives his children such a heritage as that can say with more truth than Napoleon said to his soldiers, Fifty centuries look down upon you. I wanted to make the world a little better for my life, and I wanted my children brought up to feel that their lives belonged first to their country,

Starting point is 02:56:48 to live and die for her. I know. said Robin, softly. I used to think I would drape the flag over my baby's cradle and embroider it on his pinning blanket. We are probably a pair of sentimental fools, he went on, but I believe in sentiment. A man could not say this out loud

Starting point is 02:57:12 because sentiment was supposed to be essentially womanish. How those old distinctions weary one, with their scientific data to prove that men's surpass women in the senses of feeling and taste, while women have better sight and hearing, and so on through every conceivable mondering of the human brain, forever harping on differences and accentuating them, forever dwelling on sex distinctions, and never on a common humanity. It was a dreadfully scientific age, she assented, a generation fearfully and wonderfully given

Starting point is 02:57:54 over to statistics. And yet how many dreamers there were? Yes, but in the 20th century, a young man dreamed dreams and saw visions at his own risk. While he dreamed of the brotherhood of man, his classmate with a corporation practice distanced him in the pursuit of position. While he led himself through the valley of the shadow of temptation, and feared no evil because of the Madonna vision in his soul, even the Madonna's preferred Lancelot and Tristram to Galahad. It wasn't an easy world for a man who wanted to keep faith with himself. It was a pinch-back world of pretense and pull,

Starting point is 02:58:41 that world that lies drowned out there. And yet I believe it was infinitely better than the Lost Atlantis, better than the deluged planet of Noah, nobler and finer than the best civilization of which we have any trace i never despaired of it and yet as i grew older i wondered if i was not foolish and mistaken in daring to hope and to dream i know she said again i think i did despair for it seemed to me a dreadful a terrible world i used to wonder how conscientious men and women could bring other human beings into it, to be and to suffer and to faint in the frantic struggle for the unrealities that made us miserable or happy. Consider how paltry they were. If we built a new house, we were infinitely more concerned to see that the contractor used pressed brick than we

Starting point is 02:59:46 were to see that the construction of our own characters was true. When we grew wealthy, we more moved into houses of more stories. But how often did we say, Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul? I had as clean and strong a heritage as you, but a different one. It is no use to comfort oneself with nice little aphorisms about the needle's eye, and saws about filthy lucre, and telling God's estimate of money from the kind of people he gives it to. I tell you, biting poverty is a terrible thing, an unspeakable thing. It is a misfortune for a child to grow up under a sense of injustice. I used to have times of revolt against it all, when I hated with the blind,

Starting point is 03:00:40 ferocious hate of a child, and I saw what David never saw, the righteous forsaken, and his seed begging, not bread, but a chance to earn his bread and begging for it without being able to make just terms i saw my home sold under the sheriff's hammer and my parents struggle all their lives because of the lack of money when they had everything else nobility character truth and education my girlhood was a long series of going withouts finally i had everything else-nobility character truth and education my girlhood was a long series of going withouts finally i married a man who promised me everything ah well when has the atom of sodom failed to deceive the eye and undeceive the tongue at least he did care for my voice and through that i learned that all those years i had carried in my own throat the golden notes to have altered everything and i sang a little gladness into my parents lives before they ended thank god how did you come to sing an opera do not tell me if the recollection is unpleasant i wondered then because after after things went wrong i could not take his money i knew how to sing and i loved it but even there it was the same story of suspicion and jealousy till it seemed to me that hate and fear ruled the world

Starting point is 03:02:17 i went to so many many cities but there was no city beautiful and in all the country i found no arcady i had money then it is true but the jingle of the guinea doesn't help the artist who sings or paints or writes or plays because god has put it into his soul to do this thing at least not after the very first when it stands as a tangible assurance of success the cities were cities of dreadful night and awful days there were places that were not hives but sties of human beings fighting for what they called life to die never having lived sometimes i went into those jungles of civilization and sang to them it was the only thing i could give them all it was there i got my lesson i had been singing all tears when an old woman said in her feeble trembling voice ye mon lois young lady to come to suck a place and singin him what's a load the world that he sent his only begotten son to it for it's only great love that casts out fear and this is a fearsome spot since then i haven't hated anything except wanton cruelty and i know love rules when it is fearless but that is very seldom we were afraid to say i love you to anything more sensitive than a stray kitten though the world has hungered and thirsted after the love we have feared to give even to our own children and yet just the love a man and woman may bear each other unconsciously is enough to transform the earth we have not been crossed to each other i do not believe we have spoken unkindly to anything this year

Starting point is 03:04:22 he drew her into his arms is it enough to regenerate the earth and keep it regenerated she echoed do you know do you remember telling me long ago of a story in which the woman said she had never seen but one man whose mother she would be willing to be and you said you felt so about me i was very proud of it then but i was very proud of it then but i was very proud of it then but i was very proud of it then but i was very very very very am prouder of it now since feeling so you cannot be unwilling to be the mother of my children you are not are you she nestled a little closer to him and put her hand about his neck he stooped and kissed it and repeated his question unwilling no how could i be i never dreaded maternity except when and that lasted such a little while i do not dread it now it seems to me it would be a blessed thing for us but adam tell me for i have sat here all day asking myself whether it is a blessed thing to be born or a penalty that others pay i think it would be a blessing to be your son he said steadily and i think it would be a benediction to be yours she answered but he would not be yours nor mine but ours plus everything in the past verily heir of all the ages and the ages were full of pain and sorrow oh she said passionately could you and i who love him so this son who is only our wish could you and i who know the weight of this weary world bind it upon the shoulders of our baby boy and send him staggering down the centuries the new atlas of this old earth

Starting point is 03:06:29 they sat in silence for a long time then adam said slowly i don't know dearest but i do know that you are tired and hungry and i am going to take you home they rose and disappeared through the gateway together end of chapter sixteen recording by roger malin chapter seventeen of the master not of human fate This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline The Master Not of Human Fate by Ellis Meredith Chapter 17 Love gives us a sort of religion of our own. We respect another life in ourselves.

Starting point is 03:07:29 Balzac Robin was shelling peas. Adam was reading her the story of their deluge. He paused, dissatisfied, and said impatiently, I have not described it at all. I have said all I had to say in less than a thousand words. One would think such a scene deserved a hundred thousand. Robin smiled her little inscrutable smile.

Starting point is 03:07:59 I think you have done it very well. It isn't intended to be scientific. You haven't told all the strata that were turned skyward for a moment. moment when that crevasse opened between us and the town. You will find, if you turn to the first chapter of Genesis, that there is very little detail, but I am sure that the one line he made the stars also is as eloquent as a treatise on the nebular theory. If you were learned in geology and astronomy and so on, you would load it down with an avalanche of scientific hypotheses, about which you would really know nothing except by deduction and over which future scientists would wrangle part of them making you a god and the rest proving you a fool

Starting point is 03:08:49 be content to climb where moses stood and produce literature why should an author fret about the judgment of posterity it is not and it never was and it perhaps may never be quoted adam cynically I wonder what they will call us, Robin, and who will lecture on my mistakes in seven or eight thousand years, and show how it never could have happened. Do you suppose there is anyone else on Earth? Did the Atlantis people leave any literature behind them? Robin shook her head. Who really knows? God has not left himself without a witness at any time.

Starting point is 03:09:34 In some way, the story of creation has been. has gone on and on. Every nation has its Eden and flood and Savior. Esther was the first, I think, to have her wish granted, even to the half of my kingdom, and all the fairy stories since have borrowed the phrase. Cinderella is almost as old as Job, and the Irish, the Fenians, claimed that Cadmus, the Phoenician, was one of their forebears. Wide as race distinctions were there were strange and almost unaccountable similarities she went indoors to see to her baking and coming back went on with her work adam watched her silently for a while and then said curiously i wonder what you have missed most this year pins and needles and until christmas books and shoes and stockings and sugar and a cook stove and a piano, answered Robin promptly.

Starting point is 03:10:39 I can live without the opera and a telephone, but if you only knew how I cherish my stock of pins, and with what dread I look forward to the day when, like a poor white trash family I used to know, I shall refer to the needle. I used to think you could do anything with a pair of pliers and a bit of wire, but I tremble lest you may not be able to compass a needle. she looked up and seeing adam's troubled face said quickly forgive me for being frivolous i am so happy i can't help it what were you thinking of adam he got up and walked away a few yards and cut one of the long thick yuckel leaves and stripped it down to the central spine while he went on speaking to her i was thinking he said of what mill said about inventive and how they hadn't helped the laboring man, that they had neither decreased his number

Starting point is 03:11:42 of working hours nor increased his comforts, and wondering whether it would be better for a new race to find an electric light plant alongside their other plants, or whether they would better work out their own salvation, a little at a time, by main strength and awkwardness. I was thinking how strange our books would seem to men and women who knew nothing of the late earth. He held out to her what looked something like a needle threaded with coarse white linen thread. Will your majesty deign to look at this?

Starting point is 03:12:20 She took it and looked at it wonderingly, and then ran in and brought back a torn towel and began mending it. Why, it soes very well, she said. Who taught you that? The mother of inventions, generally, he answered. If you ever had gone on the round-up, you might have had occasion for a needle and thread when there wasn't any nearer than a hundred miles. But you haven't

Starting point is 03:12:48 answered my question. About inventions and so on? It seems to me you have to consider the raison d'etre of a people before you can tell the answer. What is the use of labor-saving inventions if the time saved isn't of some great value. What is to be the chief end of man in a dispensation that has no catechism as a guidepost? A very different end from the old one, answered Adam, half sternly. Work should not come to him as a curse, nor as his greatest boon, at least not hard manual labor. There should be work enough to ensure ease, and comfort, and everyone should work freely and gladly. I should educate the individual. He should be strong of body and keen of mind, and should feel that his talents were given him

Starting point is 03:13:46 for use, not for concealment. He should use his hands, both of them, and find delight in their work. It is a beautiful world. It always was. But I don't know that the steam engine brought men's souls closer together, or that the electric light led in any more radiance upon our minds, or that the great telescopes made heaven any nearer. It should be a happier and a healthier world, if it was no more. "'Adam,' she said abruptly, "'if we had children, in what religious faith would you bring them up?' "'I don't know. I never thought about it very much,' he answered, honestly. i have an idea in my mind but i can't explain it i believe in one source of life and therefore a common divinity robin laughed quietly that is like the hindu proverb that which exists is one sages call it variously that has been called pantheism and for that belief the jews expelled baruch benedict spinoza from their synagogue

Starting point is 03:15:00 in our time there was a very learned magazine published in its behalf and i heard david star jordan say no man could tell whether it was a mere jargon of words meaningless and empty or whether monism was the profoundest philosophy the world has ever known i don't care what you call it said adam stoutly i am not afraid of names and i don't know anything about any of those religions pantheism Spinozaism, or Monism. But I do know I would rather a child of mine saw God in everything than that he saw God in nothing save his own narrow creed. I would rather he was a pantheist than a Calvinist. Spinoza never burned anyone, did he,

Starting point is 03:15:52 nor preached that hell was paved with infant skulls. Robin clapped her hands and laughed again. I beg your pardon for laughing, she said, but the idea of Spinoza, the God-intoxicated man, presiding over an Otto de Fay, is too absurd. If you only remembered anything about his gentle, retiring spirit and melancholy life, I think he was better known in our time than in his own, but his philosophy does not satisfy me.

Starting point is 03:16:27 I am willing to grant the identity of love, and its divine possibilities, but I cannot worship it as life itself, a mere manifestation of nature. I know that there is such a thing as living rock, and that it may be killed by a bolt of lightning as readily as a tree. But this does not make it any more worthy of worship than I am, and that is terribly unworthy. The rock and I are types of life, stages in the development of life. but for my child there must be something better for the child i must lay hold on the everlasting life i must find the rock that is higher than i i do not know of any manifestation of that life so great so godlike and so lovable as his who said i am the way the truth and the life but surely you do not believe in the immaculate conception asked adam incredulously i don't care anything about it one way or the other it's the immaculate life that concerns me

Starting point is 03:17:40 as you said yourself a few minutes ago words cannot frighten me am i going to stand carping can any good come out of nazareth what do i care if it comes out of sodomen gamorah if it is good but you surely don't believe in the miracles he asked surely i do in some of them at least i have seen a miracle or so myself besides if you remember the greatest proof he gave was that the gospel was preached to the poor buddha was a prince he whom the jews expected was to reign as a king what a fall was this there the gospel of hope and joy was brought to the children of gibbon the hewers of wood and drawers of water the love of christ was wrought greater miracles than he did look at the arena in rome look at the whole countless army of martyrs when mrs booth died the eighty thousand women that nightly walked the streets of london rebelled and for once the long aisles of brick and stone were swept clean of that awful arraignment of civilization that was more of a miracle than satisfying three thousand souls with food at least it's enough of a miracle for me the tears came into her eyes and she gathered up her pans and went into the house end of chapter seventeen recording by roger maline chapter eighteen of the master not of human fate this librovoc's recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter eighteen

Starting point is 03:19:46 are god and nature then at strife that nature lends such evil dreams so careful of the type she seems so careless of the single life so careful of the type but no from scarped cliff and quarried stone, she cries, A thousand types are gone. I care for nothing. All shall go. Tennyson. They were sitting in the doorway together. Robin rested her chin in her hands and looked down the valley, the lines of perplexity deepening in her forehead. If only we had an angel with a sword, or without one, to tell us what to do, she said.

Starting point is 03:20:32 if only we were deeply religious with the old-fashioned orthodox religion that would enable us to believe we were predestined not to be drowned or if we believed in a personal god without whom not a sparrow falleth though the waters cover the face of the earth and blot out millions of his creatures answered adam after all can we do better than follow the dictates of nature do you mean to look through nature up to nature's god answered robin how can we worship any god as pitiless as nature nature is strong but is it our place to help her and her care for the single type perhaps we're the trilobites of a new celerian period well trilobites were painfully common but we need not be nature's laws are immutable so we have been told with wearying insistence but suppose you and I have wills as strong as nature herself suppose we ask what she has done for the humanity of which we are apart that she should demand fresh victims from us

Starting point is 03:21:47 oh i know you will tell me what a piece of work is a man how noble in reason how infinite in faculty in form and moving how express and admirable in action how express and admirable in action how like an angel. In apprehension, how like a God? And I should answer, What is man that thou art mindful of him? And the son of man that thou visitest him, for thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor? David or Hamlet, it comes to the same thing. Where are the crowns now? And how can we say Solomon was not right when he said the end of it all was vanity. What is nature, and on what compulsion must we obey her? The imperative mandates of our own hearts?

Starting point is 03:22:44 But what if our hearts are at war with our heads? Are we to follow no higher law than the blind instinct that moves the housefly? Or will we aspire to the indomitable soul of the mockingbirds that feed their young in captivity until they see they are prisoners for life and then bring them poisonous spiders that they may die rather than live under such conditions shall we give hostages to nature when she has given nothing to us she was standing now and speaking with more vehemence than was her want adam caught her hands as she flung them out with a gesture full of scorn do you really think we have nothing how many million lovers have envied adam and eve their paradise this nature against which you bring so railing an accusation has she taken away more than she has given us we had ambitions you and i but the way of ambition is full of weariness and disappointment and bitterness of spirit we did not expect peace and comfort and joy but work and turmoil our slates were set with a sum yes a sum in vulgar fractions answered robin perhaps it was a sum in which the unknown and unknowable quantity determined the result

Starting point is 03:24:16 we had seen a good deal of what is called life it is a good name to distinguish it from the death that so much resembles and i am half inclined to think nature has been merciful but if she was merciful to them said robin quickly why were we omitted she gave them oblivion the hereafter whatever comes hereafter she gave us each other we were going to miss one another in the career as we had mapped out we might have lost each other forever or for eons of years nothing but a general breaking up of everything would ever have flung us into each other's arms we were too much interested in my career my vast influence on the political situation to consider any existence apart from the setting we had chosen for the play and after all what was it that career from which we hoped so much i stood waiting my cue ready to act my part in the farce or tragedy whichever it turned out to be i think it was more like a circus said robin very like a circus he admitted with grim appreciation a circus in which no one knew whether he was to be a ringmaster or a clown there were the financial tight-rope walkers and the social lion tamers and snake charmers and the political acrobats whose falls were unsoftened by any kind of network there were heat and dust and discomfort and weary wretched animals looking out of cages at other weary tortured animals that were sometimes scarcely less pachydermatious than themselves

Starting point is 03:26:10 i know the program we had mapped out the triumphal entry the daring leaps the cheers but was it worth while after all does one care to be the champion bareback rider in life's hippodrome nature swept away my sawdust ring but she gave me heaven for a canopy earth for an arena you for a queen at times i am disposed to take a fatalist view of the case and think that god or nature knew there was no more to be done with the earth not so much because of its wickedness as on account of its stupidity and cruelty all my plans had centered in a political career and yet how could a man touch politics and remain undefiled yes i know there were honorable men in politics but they were lonely and they hated with an unspeakable hatred all the means that were used to keep them there. And there were any number of men who had been honorable once. When a man becomes possessed by the desire of place, his backbone becomes elastic, and he stoops to things of which he had believed himself incapable. I don't know what it is, but it weakens a man's moral fiber and breaks down the tissues of his will and gives him

Starting point is 03:27:39 mental astigmatism. How dare I say I should have been any better than the rest? Do you remember your address a year ago Flag Day, and the old man with the little bronze button of the Civil War veteran who stood in front and shook hands with you afterwards, with tears running down his face? And the applause? Can you honestly say that you find to utter love more sweet than praise you have told me of your dream of a home but emerson said not even a home in the heart of one we love can satisfy the awful soul that dwells in clay can it satisfy you who hoped and expected so much he hesitated and did not reply at once are you sure you are not making a virtue of necessity she asked a little bitterly i think as much as anything he said slowly i was excusing myself for not having known all along that the real life and the most useful one is the one one we could have made together.

Starting point is 03:28:53 Principalities and powers and empires and republics have fallen. When God wants to regenerate the world, he begins with the family. Now I, with unspeakable scorn, I intended to begin with a different primary law. I could have made a good home, but I was intent on making an indifferent, honest congressman or senator or perhaps president in a way your home always meant a good deal of what i am trying to say you always had someone on hand you were trying to make capable of great things by believing in them you made us welcome and were ready to listen to our troubles our literary curiosities our musical gems and our aspirations suppose i had had sense enough to refuse the husks and choose don't say it she answered don't say it even if you mean it for i should have sent you away and have felt like reviling you for putting your hand to the plough and turning back your ambitions were the most attractive thing about you then i hadn't pinned my faith on a primary law i think it was government ownership that i regarded as the great regenerator

Starting point is 03:30:16 i am glad if my home seemed home-like to any one it never reached my ideal and when a woman's home isn't the hub of her universe well she takes to china painting or gossip or philanthropy a man takes to poker or politics i took to politics second-hand personally and concretely i abhorred the whole miserable farce but abstractly and as a means to an end which i greatly desired i found it interesting i admired you infinitely more than i liked you in those days but i wouldn't have married you under any circumstances why why Why? First, because I didn't want to marry anyone. I didn't want to care that much. And secondly, because I wanted you to devote yourself to your country. And had you possessed a family, your devotion would have been divided. I don't see, she went on reflectively, how you, who knows so well how empty it all was, and how hopeless the endeavor to lift it an inch, I don't see how you can think,

Starting point is 03:31:34 anything would justify us in making it go on. But, on the other hand, he said, we are justified in snuffing it all out. There was so much that was beautiful, and the possibilities were so glorious. Sweetheart, I shall not believe you love me if you think the world all cold and dark. I believe now the one law it needs, or has ever needed, is love, the fulfilling of the law. Robin shook her head, and there was a pathetic quiver about her sensitive mouth. Is it so?

Starting point is 03:32:14 We have sung, Tis love, it makes the world turn round. But is it so? Would you give your world that one great principle as the whole of its code of laws? Yes, I would, he answered sturdily. I should not revive a single law. not even the ten commandments nor any of their variations you have to read the statutes provided for unnameable crimes to understand just how bad mankind could be i should not bother my world with drako or sallone or justinian or coke or blackstone i should give it the code of christ whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you do ye even so unto them to love one's neighbor as one's self isn't that code enough for any world and i should make the neighbor include every dumb creature

Starting point is 03:33:15 she turned to him her face radiant with love and trust there is no difference between us in reality she said you would found you would found you your political economy on the teachings of Christ, and I, my religion. If we realize the unity of life, we must make our religion our law, and our law our religion. Sometimes I think the hand of the Lord is in it, for surely, surely, there never was a nobler man on earth than you. End of Chapter 18. Recording by Roger Maline. master not of human fate this libervox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter nineteen for the race is run by one and one and never by two and two kipling do you remember the name of that man we knew said adam one day who wrote a book to prove the immortality of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of the body of body. He did prove that various people had lived well on to two hundred years. If we were sure of that, we might get the earth very fairly started. Robin laughed. We are not apparently growing any

Starting point is 03:34:55 older, she said, but we can hardly count on more than a hundred years each. There is one thing you haven't taken into consideration, said Adam. Our children would be several thousand years, ahead of the original children of the garden, they would be further along than you and I in a good many ways. No, she said, I haven't forgotten, but I do not know how much of a load they would bring with them into the world. We called it heredity, the Hindus called it karma, and, though that is different, educators called it the recapitulation theory. Adam shook his head. I understand heredity, he said, but karma and recapitulation are too much for me.

Starting point is 03:35:47 Karma is our heritage from former existences, she answered, that may have been lived here or elsewhere. It is the sum of our past, good and bad. It is based on a belief in reincarnation, and it is the law that whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. it is the justice untempered by mercy and it is at variance with the doctrine of vicarious atonement though one may believe it and worship christ at the highest type of love the world is ever known naturally it does not appeal to the people who are willing to let some one bear the cross for them and yet i have wondered whether if we were sure we should not gather figs from thistles we should sow the thistles so freely the recapitulation theory makes the child pass through the evolutionary stages of the nation or nations he represents it has a kind of seven ages of man of its own and brings him down through all phases the savage the hunter the explorer the conqueror the builder i don't pretend fully to understand it i heard one of its ablest exponents say once

Starting point is 03:37:07 the soul of the german nation is in the german boy heredity curses or blesses sometimes both before any of these theories prospective parents might well hesitate which do you believe asked adam curiously she reflected a moment a little of all three not all of any of them one would have to be a profound student to understand fully what their adherents claim for them heredity plays strange freaks now and then it is easier to account for abraham lincoln by the second theory than by either of the others his shiftless untidy mother and commonplace father do not explain such a soul as his nor was there any reversion in his childhood to the original savage instincts that make children dismember grasshoppers rather the reverse i like better to think that like that other deliverer who was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief he came to do the will of his and our father which art in heaven came gladly freely knowing the end from the beginning adam sat up suddenly and looked at her with startled eyes then you think you mean you don't believe surely you don't believe we have anything to do with our coming here she smiled surely i do our coming is sad enough when we do it voluntarily it would be quite intolerable to have existence thrust upon us besides it seems blasphemous to me to believe that God has given to every human being the power to bestow an eternal existence.

Starting point is 03:39:02 The responsibility is great enough when it is simply a matter of so living that noble souls may seek to be born of us, and undertaking to give them sound minds and bodies. Adam looked unconvinced and troubled. Where on earth did you get all that? he asked. Well, it is to my mind. mind only an elaboration of Descartes, I think, therefore I am. I am, presupposes that I have been and will be. If you can't destroy one drop of water, you can't destroy me. If you drop the water on red-hot iron, it instantly becomes an imperceptible mist, the mere ghost of itself,

Starting point is 03:39:49 but it will ultimately become fluid again. It seems to me that the scientist, fact gives a sound basis for the psychological probability. But think of all the miserable human beings born daily. Do you think anyone would choose such surroundings? You and I never wanted to go anywhere badly enough to crowd ourselves under the cowcatcher or upon the trucks, but there were those who did. We didn't want to see the parade badly enough to stand on the street corner for hours. but you worked your way through college and we have both sat in the top gallery to hear tonhauser we were willing to put up with the whips and scorns which is another way of seeing the garlic and tobacco for the sake of the music

Starting point is 03:40:42 in any event the experiment was of brief duration no one gets more than a fragment in an ordinary lifetime if you think that said adam i can't see that there's a moment that there's a moment that is any responsibility about it we should not thrust life on anyone true she assented your position is unassailable but still it seems to me the responsibility remains in the first place granting that my hypothesis is true how can we tell whether to live is gain how do we know that the next generation would be better and stronger than we are moreover i only give this to you as my idea i do not say it is true i believe it to be so but i do not know anything whatsoever about it i can't prove it and it may be transcendental rubbish i rather imagine you think it is not exactly that he said coloring and laughing but certainly it is rather amazing when one hears it for the first time i dare say i shall come to believe it too so far as i can see you're about as unorthodox as i am i have times of relapse she said then i think we are being tempted like the first adam and eve they were commanded to multiply and reign you and i wouldn't ask anything better but as a rule one's duty is not attractive it seems to me just as likely that we are to prove that the lesson is learned and a man and woman may love each other unselfishly and nobly foregoing their own desires to save others under the old dispensation it was said greater love hath no man than this

Starting point is 03:42:40 is it not possible now that the greatest love is that which lays down its life untransmitted if christ could pray that the cup of suffering and death might pass from him dare we press the bitter draught of being to other lips dare we dash the full goblet of joy and opportunity from them asked adam gravely i wish i knew she said i wish i knew have you ever thought what it will mean he said if we adopt the other alternative have you thought of the desolation and loneliness of growing old and helpless and finally he stopped and she threw out her hands as if to ward off the thoughts he called before her oh yes yes i have thought and it is terrible i keep remembering a picture i saw in the french exhibit it was of a man and a woman the woman was dead and he had dug her grave his broken sword lay at his side and he had wrapped her in his coat and begun to cover her over he could not go on and knelt looking at her with a despair on his face that has haunted me ever since the name manon lascoe meant nothing to me then but the story of the picture was enough by itself all last year i kept seeing that terrible picture sometimes it was you sometimes it was i that dug the grave and went mad looking into it i should not bury you said adam grimly i should carry you to the cliff and take you in my arms and jump the sea is deep and cruel there

Starting point is 03:44:34 sometimes she hesitated a moment then went on sometimes i think that would be the best way for us now i mean if we decide we have no right to be happy in the old way for i should be afraid we could not always be strong very well he answered when we decide it shall be literally life or death end of chapter nineteen recording by roger maline chapter twenty of the master not of human fate this librivox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter twenty The ant and the moth have cells for each of their young, but our little ones lie in festering heaps in homes that consume them like graves. And night by night, from the corners of our streets, rises up the cry of the homeless. I was a stranger, and ye took me not in.

Starting point is 03:45:54 Ruskin. For a time they busied themselves with different things about their little home, worked in the garden, and held a round-up of their little. stock that they might know the extent of their wealth. And because, in a life quite apart from human beings, animals come to take their place to a greater extent than might seem possible. It was a very pleasant time. Everything seemed so gentle, so willing to be friends, and so certain of their goodwill. You used to be a kipling fiend, said Adam one morning, when they had been assaulting the cattle and were resting before going home.

Starting point is 03:46:36 Didn't he write a jungle tale about how fear came? He ought to be here now to write another to show how fear might go. It seems to me he did, Robin answered, running her fingers through the short, curly forelock of a colt that stood placidly licking her hand. I wonder that they don't remember longer, or perhaps they know that we think they are full, folks. Really, I think we ought to hold a reception, a kind of salon, once a week, so as to keep acquainted with our neighbors.

Starting point is 03:47:13 You are an absurd child, he said laughing. But does that mean that you have really decided to go on living? I don't know, she said. What did we determine? By the way, which side of this question are you on? both he said decidedly oh then we can't do like those men cooper told about in the pioneers wasn't it who argued and argued every night until at last they convinced each other and then started in to argue it out again no he answered i rather think we are answering ourselves rather than each other anyhow robin was there the land of not that is one of the questions that i was sent to bed for asking a preacher who was visiting at our house when i was about seven years old they hurried me hence before he had a chance to answer so i never found out but i know what you are thinking of and i have thought of it too perhaps there isn't any land of nod or any land at all and i have thought also how it would be if one of us died and left the other with little children you might take my body and jump off the rock but you couldn't take them too and still less could you leave them

Starting point is 03:48:42 i have thought of the risk to you he said and felt that not even for the sake of a child would i let you come so near death she laughed a little that is really funny she said said. You must have been reading Michelet. I never thought of that at all. I am very well and strong, and my habits and my clothes are not much as to hamper my life, nor endanger that of another. There is next to no risk, so far as that is concerned. Certainly none I would not gladly take. But I have dreaded afterwards when the child might fall ill and need help that we could not give it. because there are no doctors in the world said adam with a touch of cynicism i don't know that we are not better off without them the greatest of them confessed that it was guesswork the best doctors i ever knew were always trying to make their patients live more simply take more exercise and give nature a chance they never resorted to medicine until there was nothing else to do if all the germs and microbes have gone with them the earth can stand the loss the main thing is to be well born and when the body is healthy and leads a natural life while it may no pain it need not be a prey to disease

Starting point is 03:50:14 very few children had a heritage worth having it had been bartered away no wonder we were taught to say there is no health in us do you remember gannett's not all there she asked soberly i am not sure i can recall it but it began this way something short in the making something lost on the way as the little soul was taking its path to the break of day only his mood or passion but it twitched an atom back and she for her gods of fashion filched from the pilgrim's pack the father did not mean it the mother did not know no human eye had seen it but the little soul needed it so through the street there passed a cripple maimed from before its birth oh the strange face gleamed a ripple like a half-dawn on the earth it passed and it awed the city as one not alive nor dead eyes looked and burned with pity he is not all there they said not all for part is behind it lying dropped on the way that part could too but find it how welcome the end of day for a long while neither spoke then robin went on the colt had wandered back to its mother and she sat with her hands clasped and her eyes looking far out to sea i don't blame people for dreading the responsibility nor even for shirking it when i think of all the conditions we had to face men who thought they had hedged their trades about with so much skis

Starting point is 03:52:07 that they had banished competition found that they had only succeeded in bringing into the field the machine that banished them and everywhere there was such ghastly poverty poverty of body and brain and soul we had gone back to patrons and patronesses men or women did not do anything of themselves any more they did not sing or play or give a reading or exhibit a painting they starved or they performed or exhibited under the auspices of it has always been the same given a pure democracy and demos reigns sooner or later the shiflis go to the bottom the thrifty to the top and then like the upper and nether millstones they grind everything between them that which is below cries alms and that which is above responds largesse and the voice that cries justice is stifled between the stone that crushed from above and the rock that ground from below were very near and men dreaded them for when the grist is ground and flint strikes upon flint the conflagration is at hand do you think i am talking like a populist campaign book i only know what i saw-and and what the poets have said i wouldn't dare to be as radical as lowell nor as bitter as tennyson nor as savage as carlyle or ruskin or hugo we had overcome the sharpness of death but whence could we hope for deliverance from the sharpness of living we have been delivered said adam slowly but you don't seem disposed to be the miriam of this israel limited

Starting point is 03:54:08 well no answered robin i should like to believe that you and i were rewarded for our superhuman excellence by being saved when pharaoh and his multitudes went under but a somewhat wide acquaintance with other people forbids on the other hand we can't have been left on account of our superlative badness truly adam don't you feel sometimes as if you would rather have died with the rest he hesitated the question was so unexpected and so fraught with possibilities she watched the struggle in his face and honoured him for it he put back a stray lock of hair and kissed her forehead before he ended answered. The streak of cowardice that we all of us have in us, he said finally, the distrust of myself and the doubt of all systems of life of which I know anything, prompts me to answer yes, for I think even if we had died, you and I would still be together. I think sometimes we have been in the past, but whether we have or not, I know we shall be in the future. So while the mental part of me, which it seems to me is the weakest and most

Starting point is 03:55:33 contemptible part of man, because it is always reasoning him out of what his soul tells him is true, while the mental part of me might find it easier to be dead than to know what we ought to do, everything else in me rejoices. I know that in the great plan we have a part. It seems to me a very happy and beautiful part. In all our world there is no cause for anger or hatred or sin. There is friendliness and content and gentleness and love all around us. Look up, dear, and see how near heaven seems. But though she looked up, she saw only the light in his eyes. End of Chapter 20.

Starting point is 03:56:25 Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 21 of the Master Not of Human Fate This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline. The Master Not of Human Fate by Ellis Meredith. Chapter 21 We're all for love, the violin said. Sidney Lanier

Starting point is 03:56:58 Robin's music was a source of great delight to both of them. There was such a sense of time. time, infinite and unlimited, that they ceased to be the hurrying mortals of Earth. The joy of life crept into their hearts, and they grew young with the new world. One evening they watched the full moon come up over the mountains. She had been playing a few desultory airs, and looking up, asked, Who is it, says music is love in search of a word? If you don't know, I'm sure I don't.

Starting point is 03:57:37 answered Adam, laughing. Do you know that you quote entirely too much? Oh, yes, she said lightly. I always knew that if I ever should break into print, the critics, supposing they ever deigned to notice me, would say, as they said of Lubbock's beauties of life, that it wasn't a book, but a compendium of useful quotations. But do you really dislike quoting?

Starting point is 03:58:05 I think it takes as much or nearly as much originality to quote well as to invent. Oh, no, he interposed. No? Well, it seems so to me. I think the thing first myself, that is original, so far as I am concerned, though it may be old as the hills, and then it comes to me afterward, in a dozen ways, perhaps, as other people have said it. i realized that in the kaleidoscope of life the pattern before my mind's eye approximates that which others have seen we don't say a man knows too many synonyms or antonyms and i don't see much difference i have a misty memory that quotation is said to be a confession of inferiority answered adam that's emerson she said laughing

Starting point is 03:59:04 but he also says genius borrows nobly and i am willing to confess inferiority to a great many people all that implies is that one should only quote well if it wasn't that i'm not sure of the words and that i can't verify them i should confound you with a citation from disraeli go on said adam lazily i don't mind being crushed it is to the effect that people think that where there is no quotation there must be great originality then he says the greater part of our writers in consequence have become so original that no one cares to imitate them and those who never quote are seldom quoted that's about it now are you answered she laughed gleefully it is delicious to disagree with you i had almost forgotten that it was possible he echoed her laugh with the carefree heartiness of a boy i am going to make a riddle he said prepare yourself this is the first conundrum of the new world Why is it better to disagree than to differ?" She made a little grimace. It's a wonder the Sphinx does not rise from the other side of the world and eat you," she said with derision.

Starting point is 04:00:36 Anybody who loved anybody could answer such a fool little excuse for a riddle as that. Besides, it sounds like an extract from somebody's first easy lessons in rhetoric. don't you see that i can disagree with you while i must differ from you that is too disgracefully easy indeed adam that riddle of yours brings back every doubt for they say scientists and ologists and learned people you know that there is hope for delinquents and defectives but none for degenerates and that is an awfully degenerate joke "'Play for me,' he said, "'and don't call names.' She lifted the bow and drew it across the strings in a series of cadences so wildly mournful

Starting point is 04:01:31 that he shuddered. She put the bow down and laid her hand upon the strings to still them. In the old days she had been given to sudden changes of mood, but of late she had been almost serene. what is it he asked gently oh nothing everything i was thinking of another thing which those wise ones said she answered with more bitterness than she had shown for many months it was that word degenerate brought it back you know birds are a very low order of being a branch of the reptile family in truth and i have heard people say that musicians are generally lacking in something. They either have no moral or financial sense and cannot be bound by ordinary

Starting point is 04:02:26 rules, and I am musical to the very tips of my fingers. It is as if I could hear the song of the silence. I feel its vibrations like those of a great organ. She walked up and down, her hands back of her head, and the moonlight shining on her upturned, troubled face. face there is another scientific fact you forget he said she stopped to listen and he went on when a race has run its course nature cries habay and nothing can alter its fate it was not alone the merciless onslaughts of the white man that exterminated the buffalo they died and none came to take their places they vanished less on account of man's cruelty than by reason of their own sterility degenerates or regenerates can't we leave the decision with a power that forever builds or destroys in accordance with a law we do not understand a higher law that comes from the source of all law whatever that source may be don't think any more but play for me in spite of my lecture i will quote too my mother used to sing a hymn that went like this i'd soar and touch the heavenly strings and vie with gabriel while he sings do you know it

Starting point is 04:04:02 she began the old tune arielle and then wandered on playing many airs that brought back forgotten days adam threw himself down on the grass to listen half jealously for she seemed to first get everything she had seated herself on a great boulder and leaning back against it her eyes looking into the blue depths above her she played on and on the old tunes were merged in new ones and the high-sustained notes of the cavalier the subtle miner of wagner the exquisite sweetness of beethoven and schubert filled the moonlit canyon and still she played on melodies new to adam intoxicating full of a wild ecstasy that filled his very soul and thrilled through him till he felt all power of resistance swept away every other desire in the world was lost in the supreme and overwhelming longing to gather her to his heart and hold her there forever the very air was steeped in melody the full majestic chords rose and melted in unison with the high exquisitely sweet notes and throbbed their life away she held the bow suspended a moment then very softly half unconsciously played a dreamy lullaby and laid the violin down in her lap adam took her and it into his arms be careful put it down gently she said faintly it is your soul and mine do you not know the secret of antonio stradivari of all the great makers of violins

Starting point is 04:05:59 ah they solved our riddle love ages ago do you not remember the story of jacob steiner and how he spent days and days in the woods selecting the trees for his violins and how the spirits of the trees revenge themselves by telling him of their ruined lives till he went mad but there was no madness in this music adam answered except except the supreme sublime madness of love do you not know surely you do that every perfect violin is as much man and woman as you and i the back of the violin is made from the timber of the female tree the belly of the male tree the harmony depends on their vibrations as they clasp each other in an embrace as real as this he cried drawing her closer and bending his handsome head until their lips met sweet must i envy that violin he felt her heart beating wildly against his own their arms closed around each other convulsively the sweetness of the music-laden flower-scented air filled his senses god how i love you he said a frightened look came into her eyes and she struggled for a moment futilely let me go she whispered let me go do you want me to he answered studying her face in the moonlight no she said no never again but oh adam end of chapter twenty one

Starting point is 04:07:58 recording by roger maline chapter twenty two of the master not of human fate this librivox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the master not of human fate by ellis meredith chapter twenty two i'm weary of conjectures this must end them addison adam had to go to the cane-fields across the range and one of the calves needed robin's ministrations so she could not go with him he started before the stars were set that he might be back before night and returned twice to kiss her before he finally got away. Left with the long day ahead of her, restless and lonely, she gave the small house a thorough sweeping and cleaning. She had finished her dusting and was rearranging the furniture when she shoved back the long chest

Starting point is 04:09:09 and struck the framework of the window with some little violence. It was enough to jar a rusty key from its place above the casement and it dropped upon the chest with a kind of ominous. clink as it struck the lock and fell upon the floor she took it up and looked at it curiously and then kneeling fitted it in the lock i wonder she mused what i shall set free if i open this box is it pandora's but there was nothing left in hers but hope and that is all we need how happy we could be if we dared to hope she turned the key with a wrench and the hasp shot from its place the chest was nearly empty there being but one parcel in it this was done up carefully in a square of linen pinned here and there on the bottom of the chest were several folds of white paper very slowly she lifted out the parcel and opened it the treasure was a gown it was of a heavy satiny weave of light paper very slowly she lifted out the parcel and opened it the treasure was a gown it was of a heavy satinny weave of linen, very yellow, and creased. The bodice was made without sleeves or neck, and the skirt was

Starting point is 04:10:29 kind of a kilt-plated affair. The whole effect was Greek, and simple as it was, it seemed beautiful to Robin after her year of dark, utilitarian clothing. There was white underwear, and even white stockings, and a pair of slippers. Robin drew a long breath of delight, and laying all her finery upon the table placed the irons over the tripod that she might smooth the wrinkles out and set about making the necessary alterations at once she worked rapidly in spite of her excitement but the hours slipped away i must try it on she said before adam comes there will be plenty of time and then i will put it away until shroud or wedding-gown she did not finish the sentence she dressed slowly but when she had finished she was startled to see that the image in the glass was so much fairer than she had ever thought herself suddenly she discovered with something like a pang that there was no belt and hurried back to the chest to look again as she twitched out the remaining layer of paper in her eagerness a long white satin ribbon dropped from it, and a little heap of fine muslin lay on the floor of the chest.

Starting point is 04:11:57 She caught up the ribbon with an exclamation of delight, and adjusted it with trembling fingers. Her flushed cheeks and radiant eyes, the long heavy braid of hair, her round, white arms and shoulders, made her a vision of delight indeed. When she had quite completed her toilet, she sat down by the chest to inspect its last secret. As she took up the pile of lace and muslin, her heart seemed to stop beating for a moment. She had forgotten. Only the hands of the prospective mother could have fashioned such dainty garments as these. Everywhere the eternal question. All her perplexities had fallen from her in the joy of dressing herself, as Adam's bride should be decked, howbeit Adam saw her not,

Starting point is 04:12:51 but the great problem of life confronted her still she put the tiny garments down on the chest closed now having given up its mystery its hope of the world and knelt by it touching them with loving reverent fingers till the tears blinded her and she gathered up the clothes and kissed them as she had never kissed adam as she had never kissed anything in her life after a while the tears ceased to flow and there stole over her a gracious calmness and then the slumber of a child she did not hear adam nor see him until he passed the window and stood in the doorway all the sunset glow back of him then she started to her feet her arms closing instinctively over the tiny garments she had gathered to her breast as she stepped back her face flushing and pearsing her arms closing instinctively over the tiny garments she had gathered to her breast as she stepped back her face flushing and all in a moment. He stood as if he dared not move lest the vision vanish, but heart and soul looked out of his eyes. Eve, he said, Eve! She turned, and he sprang toward her with an eager cry of joy. Eve, he repeated, Eve, my love, my soul! You have decided, you are going to be my wife, my wife! life oh do not torture yourself or me any longer with doubts that did not enter the mind of god almighty when he made us what we are you are my world dearer than life more necessary than the air we breathe

Starting point is 04:14:37 we are only one being separated god knows how long but united now forever nothing can part us again he stopped and held out his arms to her. He had taken her into their shelter very often, but now he wanted her to come to him and nestle against his heart of her own will. She took a single step, stretching out her arms to him with a gesture of infinite trust and abandon. The long, sheer dress fluttered down to the floor and lay between them. They stood as still as if frozen. "'Dare you cross it?' she said. and hid her face in her hands. He stooped and picked it up,

Starting point is 04:15:26 and looked at it as a man might look at the soul of something of which he had never seen the body. He had a sense of his own strength, the glory of his manhood, and a vision of his weakness. She watched him breathlessly. He put the garment down on the table and smoothed it out gently.

Starting point is 04:15:47 There was, in his face, the combined look of a man who sees, the cradle and the coffin of his first born. She went and stood beside him, touching the dress timidly. He covered her hand with his own. My wife, he said. We know all there is to say, all there is to risk. We must do what is right. I am going now to set everything at liberty. It is nearly sundown. You will meet me at the rock in half an hour. if we give each other our right hands we will fear no evil not though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death for the love in our hearts is deathless and though the sun sets it is to rise upon another shore death is only an incident but life is eternal we could not choose differently and though she spoke with the upward inflection it was not a question

Starting point is 04:16:50 no it would be quite impossible for either of us to desire what the other did not and much as we love each other we know we have loved our race and honored god first in our decision to live if we live not for ourselves alone but for the good of our kind to renounce love the unspeakable gift if need be for the sake of what seems to us right and if i give you my left hand the sudden flash of light in his eyes half blinded her he took both her hands in his and looked deep in her beautiful unfathomable eyes then the morning stars will sing together and all the sons of god shall shout for joy the sun dropped lower and lower over the high sharp peaks at the west covering their white summits with a flood of golden glory the sullen roar of the ocean seemed hushed and across its wide expanse the last beams of the setting sun made radiant pathways of crimson and gold a lark far up in the heavens sang its few clear notes as it hastened homeward far away in the mountain-side the cattle lay placidly and a mare whinnied to her colt the air was soft and warm and drowsy with the scent of many flowers the sounds of nestling birds the drone of an insect here and there the cheerful call of the crickets adam stood by the rock and waited for her she came toward him all the light of the world seeming to fall upon her and circle her in a halo that transformed her white draperies and glistened like a million gems in the sparse grass about her feet

Starting point is 04:18:53 they made each other no greeting but stood and looked into each other's eyes grave and sweet with the exultation of their purpose and standing so they clasped hands and the word they spoke was the same for they by searching had found out god end of chapter twenty two end of the master not of human fate by ellis meredith

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