The Bacillus of Beauty Part 13

"I teach t'ose vomen, yes; but I despise t'em," he added.

"If you do, you ought to be ashamed of it," I retorted hotly. "But I don't believe you really despise them. Such a bright lot of girls--why, some of them are bound to be heard from in science some day!"

"In science? Bah!"

"Why not? There was Mary Somerville and--and--and Caroline Herschel and-- well, I can't think of their names all in a minute, but I'm proud to be one of the girls here anyway."

"You are not one of t'em," he cried angrily. "T'ey are life failures. You fancy t'ey are selected examples, but t'ey are not; t'ey are t'e rejected.

T'ey stood in t'e market place and no man vanted t'em; or else t'ey are fools as vell as failures and sent t'e men avay. You know me. I am biologist, not true? I hate t'e vord. I am physiologist, student of t'e nature of life--all kinds of life, t'e ocean of life of v'ich man is but a petty incident."

"You were speaking about--"

"Ach, so! Almost t'ou has t'e scientific mind t'at reasons and remembers.

I said, I am physiologist. I study v'at Nature is, v'at she means to do.

V'en Nature--Gott, if you vant a shorter name--makes a mistake, Gott says: 'Poor material; spoiled in shaping, wrong in t'e vorks; all failures; t'row t'em avay. Ve haf plenty more to go on vit'. You know. You study Nature, also, a little. You know she is law, she is power. To t'e indifidual pitiless, she mofes vit' blind, discompa.s.sionate majesty ofer millions of mangled organisms to t'e greater glory of Pan, of Kosmos, of t'e Universe. She vastes life. And how not? Her best vork lives a little v'ile and produces its kind, and t'e vorst does not, and t'ey go down t'e dark vay toget'er and Nature neit'er veeps nor relents Kosmos is greater t'an t'e indifidual and a million years are short.

"T'ose young vomen--Nature meant t'em to desire beauty and dream of lofe.

Vat is lofe? It is Nature's machinery. T'ose vomen are old enough for lofe, but t'ey haf it not. So t'ey die. T'ey do not reproduce t'eir kind, not'ing lifing comes from t'em, to go on lifing, on and on, better and better--or vorse, as Nature planned--vit' efery generation. If a voman haf t'e desire of lofe and of beauty, and lofe and beauty come not to her, t'en I pity her, because I am less vise and resolute to vit'hold pity t'an Nature is. Efen if she haf not lofe, but only t'e ambition of power or learning or vealt', I might pity her vit' equal injustice, but I cannot.

She vill not let me. She does not know t'at she is a failure. She prides herself upon being so mis-made. She cannot help t'at; neit'er can I help despising her. Such vomen are abnormal, monstrous, in a vord, failures.

Let t'em die! You, I t'ink, are not so. You study to bide t'e time. You haf a fine carriage. You comb t'e hair, you haf pretty ribbons, you make t'e body strong and supple, you look in t'e gla.s.s and vish for more beauty. Not so?"

"Of course I do," I cried angrily, wondering for the moment if he had lost his senses. It seemed as if he knew little about women for a man who professed to make all life his study. If there were one of his despised girls who lacked the desire of beauty and the dream of love, I am much mistaken. But I came to see afterward that he understood them as well as myself.

"I t'ought so," he mused, his eyes still upon my face. "And you are not too beautiful now; t'ey could not doubt. Yes; I vatch you, I study you.

Seldom I make t'e mistake; but it is fery important. So I vatch you a little v'ile longer yet. T'en I say to myelf: 'Here is t'e voman; yes, she is found.'"

And he chuckled and rubbed his lean hands together as I had so often seen him do.

The thought flashed across my mind that this extraordinary man meditated a proposal of marriage, but I dismissed the notion as ridiculous.

The Professor leaned forward and, fixing me with his eye, spoke in a hoa.r.s.e whisper, tense with excitement:--

"Mees Veens.h.i.+p, I am a biologist; you are a voman, creature of Nature, yearning for perfection after your kind. I--I can gife it you. You can trust me; I am ready. I can gif you your vish, t'e vish of efery normal voman. Science--t'at is I--can make you t'e most beautiful being in t'e vorld!"

Another Sunday school lesson! Miss Coleman and her unforgotten lecture upon beauty flashed upon my mind. But this man was promising me more than she had done, and his every word was measured. What was the mystery? What had he to say to me?

"T'e most beautiful--voman--in t'e vorld," he went on in a slow, cadenced whisper. "Do you vish it?"

His glittering eyes held mine again. No, he was not jesting at my expense; rather he seemed waiting with anxiety for me to make some decision upon which much depended. He was in very serious earnest.

But was ever a question more absurd? Who of women would not wish it? But to get the wish--ah, there's a different matter! I thought he must be crazed by over-study, and I could only sit and stare at him, open-mouthed.

"Listen!" he went on more rapidly, as if to forestall objection. "You are scholar, too, a little. You know how Nature vorks, how men aid her in her business. Man puts t'e mot'er of vinegar into sweet cider and it is vinegar. T'e fermenting germs of t'e brewery chemist go in vit' vater and hops and malt, and t'ere is beer. T'e bacilli of bread, t'e yeast, svarming vit millions of millions of little spores, go into t'e housevife's dough, and it is bad bread; but t'at is not t'e fault of t'e bacilli--mein Gott, no!--for vit' t'e bacilli t'e baker makes goot bread.

T'e bacilli of b.u.t.ter, of cheese--you haf studied t'em. T'e experimenter puts t'e germs of good b.u.t.ter into bad cream and it becomes goot. It ripens. It is educated, led in t'e right vay. Tradition vaits for years to ripen vine and make it perfect. Science finds t'e bacillus of t'e perfect vine and puts it in t'e cask of fresh grape juice, and soon t'e vine drinkers of t'e vorld svear it is t'e rare old vintage. T'e bacillus, inconceivably tiny, svarming vit' life, reproducing itself a billion from one, t'at is Nature's tool. And t'e physiologist helps Nature.

"See now," continued Prof. Darmstetter. "I haf a vonderful discofery made.

I must experiment vit' it--_experimentum in corpore vili!_ Impossible, for the subject is mankind. I must haf a voman--a voman like you, healt'y, strong, young--all t'e conditions most favourable. She must haf intelligence--t'at is you. She should know somet'ing of biology, and be fery brave, so t'at she may not be frightened, but may understand how t'e vonderful gift is to come to her; and t'at is you. She should not be already beautiful, lest t'e change be less convincing. Yes, you are t'e voman for t'e test. You may become more famous in history fan Cleopatra or Ninon, and outs.h.i.+ne t'em and all t'e ot'er beauties t'at efer lifed. Do you vant triumphs? Here t'ey are. Riches? You shall command t'em. Fame?

Power? I haf t'em for you. You shall be t'e first. Aftervard, v'en beauty is common as ugliness is now--ah, I do not know. Efen t'en it vill be a blessing. But to be t'e first is fame and all t'e ot'er t'ings I promise you. Now do you trust me? Now do you beliefe me? Vill you make t'e experiment? I haf--let me tell you!--I haf discofered--"

Cautiously Prof. Darmstetter looked about the room. Then he leaned toward me again and added in a hoa.r.s.e whisper:--

"I haf discofered t'e Bacillus of Beauty."

CHAPTER VI.

THE GREAT CHANGE.

The Bacillus of Beauty! Was the poor man insane? Had much study made of him a monomaniac babbling in a dream of absurdities? Do you wonder that I doubted?

And yet--the thought flashed through my mind that things almost as strange have become the commonplace. I had seen the bones of my own hand through the veiling flesh. I had listened to a voice a thousand miles away. I had seen insects cut in two, grafted together, head of one and tail of another, and living. I had seen many, many marvels which science has wrought along the lines of evolution. And yet--

My dream; my desire always! If it could be!

As I stared open-mouthed at the Professor, he began once more:--

"T'e danger, t'e risk--t'ere is none. You shall see. It is as harmless as--"

"Never mind about that!" I interrupted. "How would I look? Would it change me totally? Would I really be the most beautiful?--"

I stopped, blus.h.i.+ng at my own eagerness.

"Absolutely; I svear it. T'e most perfectly beautiful voman in t'e vorld.

Mein Gott, yes. How not? Never vas t'ere yet a perfectly beautiful voman.

Not von. All have defects; none fulfills t'e ideal. You? You vill look like yourself. I do not miracles. T'e same soul vill look out of your eyes. You vill be perfect, but of your type. T'e same eyes, more bright; t'e same hair, more l.u.s.trous and abundant; t'e same complexion clear and pure; t'e same voman as she might have been if t'e race had gone on defeloping a hundred t'ousand years. Look you. Some admire blondes; some brunettes. You are not a Svede to be white, an Italian to be black. You are a brown American. You shall be t'e most beautiful brown American t'at efer lifed. And you shall be first. Vit' you as an example we shall convince t'e vorld. Ve shall accomplish in t'ree generations t'e vork of a hundred t'ousand years of defelopment. How vill humanity bless us if we can raise, out of t'e slums and squalor, out of t'e crooked and blind and degraded, out of t'e hospitals and prisons, t'e sp.a.w.ning dregs of humanity and make t'em perfect! T'ey shall valk t'e eart' like G.o.ds, rejoicing in t'eir strengt'. No more failures, no more abnormalities. Nature's vork hastened by science, aeons of veary vaiting and slow efolution forestalled by--by me!"

The little Professor stood erect, his eye fixed on mine, his mien commanding. I had never looked on man so transfigured.

The thought was intoxicating me, driving me wild. I tried to think, to struggle against the tide that was sweeping me away. He seemed to be hypnotizing me with his grave, uncanny eye. I could not move, I could not speak.

"You may ask," Darmstetter went on--though I had not thought of asking-- "if t'e beauty vould be hereditable; if as an acquired characteristic, it vould pa.s.s to descendants, or, if each child vill not haf to be treated anew. I believe no. It is true t'at acquired traits are not hereditable.

T'ere Weissmann is right, v'atefer doubters may say. You know t'e t'eory.

T'e blacksmit's muscles are not transmitted to his son t'e clerk; but t'e black hair t'at he got from his fat'er. Only after fery many generations of blacksmit's could a boy be born who vould grow up as a clerk vit'

blacksmit' muscles. Efolution shapes t'e vorld, yes; but t'e process is so slow, so slow! So education, modification, must begin afresh vit' each generation and continue forefer. But t'is bacillus does not add ornament to t'e outside. It is not like t'e ma.s.seuse, vit' her unguents and kneading. It changes all t'e nature. It is like compressing a million years of education by natural selection into von lifetime. T'at is my t'eory. I do not know--it is not yet tried--but how ot'ervise? Ve but hasten t'e process, as t'e chemist hastens fermentation; Nature constructs, she does not adapt or alter or modify. Ve produce beauty by Nature's own met'od. V'y not hereditary?"

I had made up my mind.

"I'll do it," I cried, no longer able to resist, for the fever of it was in my blood. "You shall make your attempt on me! It can do no harm. I do not see how it can accomplish all you claim, but if you think--it's an experiment full of possibilities--in the interests of science--"

"Interest of humbug!" snapped Prof. Darmstetter, his own sarcastic self again. "You consent because you vant to be beautiful. You care not'ing for science. I can trust you vit' my secret. You need svear no oat's not to reveal it. You vant to be t'e only perfect voman in t'e vorld, and so you shall be, for some time. T'at is right. T'at is your revard."

My cheeks flushed at his injustice. I do care for others. I am not selfish--not more than everybody. And yet--at that moment I feared him and his knowledge; I shuddered at nameless terrors.

Really, I often wonder that I ever had the courage to try. And oh, I am so glad!

Now there is no more fear. Darmstetter is my servant, if I will it. As for his marvellous power, I shall bless it and reverence it all my life. I thank G.o.d for letting me know this man. It is too wonderful--too wonderful for words!