Amazing Stories, Vol. 2, No. 1 — page 29: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

28 rays—only when isolated—completely © devitalized all colon-bacilli which lay in their path, without in the least affecting the integrity of any interposed organic cells. The great result, as many of you already know, was that the life of man was extended to nearly two hundred years. That, I state un- equivocally, was a great century for the human race. “But I spoke of another happening—one, perhaps, of more interest than importance. I referred to the bank account of John Jones the fortieth. It, gentle- men, had grown to such a prodigious sum that a special bank and board of directors had to be created in order to care for, and reinvest it. By scanning the following notation, you will perceive the truth of my statement: 3 2521 600 years $47,900,000 “By the year 2621 A. D., two events of stupendous importance took place. There is scarcely a man in this class who has not heard of how Professor P222D29333Male accidentally stumbled upon the scientific fact that the effect of gravity is reversed upon any body which vibrates perpendicularly to the plane of the ecliptic with a frequency which is an even multiple of the logarithm of 2 of the Naperian base ‘e.’ At once, special vibrating cars were constructed which carried mankind to all planets. That discovery of Professor P222D29333- Male did nothing less than open up seven new ter- ritories to our inhabitants; namely: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Nep- tune. In the great land rush that ensued, thousands who were previously poor became rich. “But, gentlemen, land, which so far had been constituted one of the main sources of wealth, was shortly to become valuable for individual golf links only, as it is today, on account of another scientific discovery. ' “This second discovery was in reality, not a dis- covery, but the perfection of a chemical process, the principles of which had been known for many centuries. I am alluding to the construction of the vast reducing factories, one upon each planet, to which the bodies of all persons who have died on their respective planets are at once shipped by Aerial Express. Since this process is used today, all of you understand the methods employed; how each body is reduced by heat to its component constituents: hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, - ealeium, phosphorus, and so forth; how these separated constituents are stored in special res- ervoirs together with. the components from thou- sands of other corpses; how these elements are then synthetically combined into food tablets for those of us who are yet alive—thus completing an end- less chain from the dead to the living. Naturally then, agriculture and stock-raising ceased, since the food problem, with which man had coped from time immemorial, was solved. The two direct re- sults were, first—that land lost the inflated values it had possessed when it was necessary for tillage, and second—that men were at last given enough leisure to enter the fields of science and art. “And as to the John Jones Dollar, which now embraced countless industries and vast territory on the earth, it stood, in value: 2621 700 years $912,000,000 SL ee a | AMAZING STORIES “In truth, gentlemen, it now constituted the largest private fortune on the terrestrial globe. And in that year, 2621 A. D., there were thirteen generations yet to come, before John Jones the fortieth would arrive. “To continue. portant political battle was concluded in the Solar System Senate and House of Representatives. I am referring to the great controversy as to whether the Earth’s moon was a sufficient menace to inter- planetary navigation to warrant its removal. The outcome of the wrangle was that the question was decided in the affirmative. Consequently— “But I beg your pardon, young men. I occa- sionally lose sight of the fact that you are not so well informed upon historical matters as myself. Here I am, talking to you about the moon, totally forgetful that many of you are puzzled as to my meaning. -I advise all of you who have not yet at- In the year 2721 A.:.D., an im-- tended the Solaris Museum on Jupiter, to take a trip . there some Sunday afternoon. The Interplanetary Suburban Line runs trains every half hour on that day. You will find there a complete working model of the old satellite of the Earth, which, before it was destroyed, furnished this planet light at night through the crude medium of reflection. “On account of this decision as to the inadvis- ability of allowing the moon to remain where it was, engineers commenced its removal in the year 272F. Piece by piece, it was chipped away and brought to the Earth in Interplanetary freight cars. These pieces were then propelled by Zoodolite explosive, in the direction of the Milky Way, with a velocity of 11,217 meters per second. This velocity, of course, gave each departing fragment exactly the amount of kinetic energy it required to enable it to overcome the backward pull of the Earth from here to infinity. I dare say those moon-hunks are going yet. “At the start of the removal of the moon in 2721 A. D., the accumulated wealth of John Jones the fortieth, stood: 2721 800 years $17,400,000,000 “Of course, with such a colossal sum at their command, the directors of the fund had made ex- tensive investments on Mars and Venus. By the end of the twenty-eighth century, or the year 2807 A. D., the moon had been completely hacked away and sent piecemeal into space, the job having required 86 years. I give, herewith, the re- sult of John Jones’s dollar, both at the date when the moon was completely removed and also at the close of the 900th year after its deposit: 2807 886 years $219,000,000,000 2821 900 years $332,000,000,000 “The meaning of those figures, gentlemen, as stated in simple language, was that the John Jones Dollar now comprised practically all the wealth on Earth, Mars, and Venus—with the ex- ception of one university site on each planet, which was, of course, school property. “And now I will ask you to advance with me to the year 2906 A. D. In this year the directors of the John Jones fund awoke to the fact that they were in a dreadful predicament. According to the agreement under which John Jones deposited his Eomichbooks.co -