Nequa; or, The Problem of the Ages

by Alcanoan O. Grigsby; Mary P. Lowe

I carefully studied the economy of the home in which we lived, being assured that this was a sample of a multitude of others. The same thing was true of the district. So in a general way, we were making a study of the entire concave by having a sample submitted to our inspection. At least, I could get a very clear idea of agriculture, the great basic industry that sustains the race, and hence, I am condensing into this chapter the results of a long and careful investigation under exceptionally favorable conditions.

During our attendance at school Iola and MacNair frequently took us for a sail in their airship. This gave us an opportunity to study its mechanism, and at the same time obtain a bird's eye view of the country, and if anything especially attracted our attention, all we had to do was to ask for an explanation. As we had first approached the continent we were struck by the large residences, storage buildings, and the long rectilinear fields, but now that we examined the scene at leisure we began to take in the details, and were impressed by the general sameness of the picture.

These magnificent buildings were strikingly similar to each other and the same thing was true of the long rectilinear fields and the arrangement of the crops. The residence buildings were apparently situated at alternate section corners and hence about two miles apart each way. Midway between these were large warehouses, elevators, mills, factories, etc.

To the east and west these long rows of buildings were connected by surface, electric roads, and north and south by elevated roads. These roads, both passenger and freight, all passed through these buildings. This general arrangement of everything into squares, gave the entire district, from the cabin of the airships, the appearance of an immense checkerboard.

This district which may be taken as a sample of many others, had a complete system of waterworks, a continuous pressure being secured by a series of stand-pipes, from three to five hundred feet in height, which forced the water to every point where it was needed. This system also provided water for irrigation purposes as the season seemed to require. This with a complete system of drainage, constituted a method of keeping the most perfect condition for producing the greatest abundance. In addition to this, all the waste products were converted into fertilizer and returned to the soil. These wise, economic, scientific methods and intense cultivation, explain how this small district, sustained a population of 200,000 and yet gave up fully one-half of its lands to boulevards, lawns, parks, driveways and ornamented grounds.

Electricity was the universal motor power, as well as a stimulant to the growth of crops. The soil was pulverized, seeded and rolled by vast machines. The grain was harvested, threshed and placed in sacks by huge combined reapers and threshers, and dried by passing through evaporators on an endless belt which conveyed it to elevators, from which it reached the mills by force of gravity, if that is the right word to apply to the centrifugal force which in this moral world held everything to the surface.

The standard day's labor was but two hours; and yet with the aid of machinery, ten persons harvested a strip of grain one hundred feet wide and thirty miles in length, delivering the same at the elevators in sacks, while another ten prepared the soil and put in another crop. All the other work was carried on in the same labor saving manner, and this two hours of labor was deprived of every feature of drudgery and became only agreeable exercise.

One thing I noticed particularly; domestic animals seemed to be raised more as pets than for use. The only animal diet ordinarily used consisted of eggs, milk, butter and cheese. Sheep and goats were raised for the fleece which was manufactured into the finest fabrics. Fruits and nuts were produced in the greatest abundance and constituted a very large part of the diet of the people.

The district was in fact a stupendous farm and in its original design the prime object had evidently been utility rather than ornament. The work of the landscape gardener had been utilized to the largest extent, but it had not been permitted to encroach upon the useful. The economy in the uniformity in which the lands were laid out, the houses constructed and the work of production carried on, gave to the whole country such an artificial appearance, especially from the airships which we need most generally in our observations, that Captain Ganoe could no longer refrain from commenting upon it. One day as we were soaring above this magnificent farming district, he asked MacNair if the entire inner world had been cut out according to the same pattern.

"Not at all," replied MacNair. "You will find plenty of variety. Every person has an opportunity to gratify his or her tastes, provided that by so doing they do not deprive others of the same privilege. There is nothing compulsory about it. People who do not desire to dwell together can find plenty of opportunities to be by themselves. The rule here is freedom. People live together in communities because it secures so many advantages, but they often take an outing and find variety, and solitude if they want it, in comparatively wild and uninhabited parts of the country."