And the oddest of the institutes was the Bare Chance Transmission Society. In spite of all derision and mockery, it persevered in its peculiar aim: to find some viable creature that could be educated or adapted or mutated to absorb human knowledge and carry on once more the human tradition.
What creature? What possible strain could it be from? What creature on Earth was unaffected?
Well, the largest of them was the giant squid. But it was not promising. It had shown no development in many millions of years; it did not seem capable of development or of education. And, moreover, there are difficulties of rapport with a creature that only can live in the deep sea.
There were the insects. Bees and ants were capable of organization, though intelligence has been denied them. Spiders showed certain rugged abilities, and fruit flies. Special committees were appointed to study each. And then there were the fleas. Old flea-circus grifters were brought out of retirement and given positions of responsibility and power. If fleas could really be taught, then these men could teach them. But though fleas can be taught to wear microscopic spectacles, they cannot be taught to read. It all seemed pretty futile.
And there were the crayfish, the snails the starfish, the sea cucumber. There were the fresh-water flat worm and the liver fluke. There were the polyp, the sponge, the cephalopod. But, after all, none of them was of the main line. They were of the ancestry that had failed. And what of the noble genealogy that had succeeded, that which had risen above all and given civilization, the chordata? Of that noble line, was there nothing left? What was the highest form still reproducing?
McGonigal's Worm.
It was discouraging.
But for the careful study of M.W., as it was now known, a great new institute was now created. And to the M.W. Institute was channeled all the talent that seemed expedient.
And one of the first to go to work for the Institute in a common capacity was a young lady of thirty-odd named Georgina Hickle. Young lady? Yes. Georgina was within months of being the youngest woman in the world. She was a scatterbrained wife and disliked worms. But one must work and there were at that time no other jobs open.