The Morgan City daily review. (Morgan City, La.) 1916-1920, 1917-09-11

according to the medium in which
they live"
"Well, sir, as I understand 1t, the
first organisms that came out on land
were armor plated. like the crabs and
spiny fossil fishes. Their bones were
on the outside. to protect them against
being eaten. But after while the
progressive ones turned themselves In
side out. Those that didn't. remained
like the turtles and degenerated. The
rest found that 1t was easier to escape
their enemies by using their bones as
props and developing speed.
"Now, lieutenant, suppose men had
developed that way In the depths OF
the sea. Suppose you had race OF
men who had discovered, not neces-
sarily turning themselves inside out,
like us, although they might have done
sn. but other means to avoid being
eaten--say invisibility."
There I can refute y0u," answered
Donald. Man has developed from an
extinct ape. an ancestor OF his cOus-
ins, tho four anthropoids. supposedly
a ehtmpanzee!ike creature with the
structure Of 4 gibbon. from which he
obtaileh h!s erect posture. Your sea
creatures would have had to 60
through the lemur-ape FORMS"
But let US suppose man who de-
veloped OF the Hne." persisted Mas
terman. "A manlike organism with
webbed feet-something like q man
seal. How about mermen7 Do you
believe there u anything In that
storyr
II hardly think 20. captain"
"How about the old legends Of the
Cyclopsesr
"A myth, Masterman. Besides. the
Cyclops kept cattle and lived upon
land"
But they ate men. lieutenant. How
ever. let US call our men Of the sea
imaginary. Grant that there might
be such creatures, though. You'll ad-
NIT that, with life 80 hard under the
ocean. they'd have developed more
cunning along certain lines than the
human race. And they wouldn't know
much about pity or love. or anything
except how to find their food"
"I'l grant that" answered Donald,
IF we accept the hypothesis that such
creatures exist" ...t
"Goodl Put pin there. my lad.
Now. a. we were saying, after thou
sands Of years the heat at the bottom
of the sea would disappear by its dit.
fusion through the oceans every
where. The depths would grow too
cold for them. It's bitter cold In the
water at 81 to 81 degrees Fahrenheit.
Wouldn't the time come when they,
too, would feel the impulse to migrate
into the sum-"
mo. Masterman. Their breathing"
II know what you're going to say.
lieutenant. You're going to tell me
that, even If they could breathe air,
they couldn't live when the pressure
of those miles of ocean was removed.
But suppose nature has been busy
preparing for the change during thou
sands of years, while she has been
modifying their gills into lungs, as
she worked on the brOntOsaurs. That's
how nature works-Qutetly. softly, Sc
cretly, till she's ready to launch her
thunderbolt
Suppose q second human swarm.
mans poor cousins, is getting ready
to overrun the earth. and put down
man from his throne. Suppose the
puny swarms Of monkey-men. white.
yellow and black, that crawl upon the
face Of the globe and imagine them
selves IT. owners. are going to BE- OBJ
liberated. not from Mars or Venus, but
out Of the sarth's own vitalsy"
Captain Masterman at bolt upright
- he spoke; he looked like some old
prophet spelling out the doom Of man.
The intense earnestness In bis words
shook Paget's incredullty for q mo.
ment. and left him sick with horror.
Suppose that civilization. every
thing which has gone to make up the
life we know-family love. books,
parliaments, ships-all Of
1t Is to be at the mercy Of this mer-
CHESS horde, and that we are going
to fight harder than we have fought
since the days when We held our own
against the saber-tooth! Who'd think
or care then whether he was an Eng
lishman or Dutchman who'd trouble
whether his friends were white men,
Hottentots or Chinese, so
long as they were human? Wouldn't
that make for the brotherhood Of man,
Wouldn't we set all our con-
victs free? Wouldn't kings shake
hands with anarchists and college pro-
fessors with coal beavers? Wouldn't
class and race vanish like dreams
when the nights over? And maybe
that's what Gods working fon lieu
But the impossibility, Mastermanl
Granting the incredible supposition
that these deep-sea organisms exist,
and could live under a pressure enor-
mously increased. and breathe"
"We're suppOsing that, lieutenant"