He will not be thinking of himself.  He will not be wishing the way to the lethal chamber was longer.  He will be filled with joy at the thought that he is about to die for the good of the race—­to ‘make way’ for the beautiful young breed of men and women who, in simple, artistic, antiseptic garments, are disporting themselves so gladly on this day of days.  They pause to salute him as he passes.  And presently he sees, radiant in the sunlight, the pleasant white-tiled dome of the lethal chamber.  You figure him at the gate, shaking hands all round, and speaking perhaps a few well-chosen words about the Future....”

Sec.5.

It was enough.  The old broom hadn’t lost its snap.  It had swept clean the chambers of Perkins’ soul—­swished away the whole accumulation of nasty little cobwebs and malignant germs.  Gone were the mean doubts that had formed in him, the lethargy, the cheap cynicism.  Perkins was himself again.

He saw now how very stupid it was of him to have despaired just because his own particular panacea wasn’t given a chance.  That Provisional Government plan of his had been good, but it was only one of an infinite number of possible paths to the Dawn.  He would try others—­scores of others....

He must get right away out of here—­to-night.  He must have his car brought round from the garage—­now—­to a side door....

But first he sat down to the writing-table, and wrote quickly: 

    Dear Duchess,

    I regret I am called away on urgent political business....

          Yours faithfully J.  Perkins....

He took the morocco leather case out of his pocket and enclosed it, with the note, in a large envelope.

Then he pressed the electric button by his bedside, almost feeling that this was a signal for the Dawn to rise without more ado....

SOME DAMNABLE ERRORS ABOUT CHRISTMAS

By

G.K.  CH*ST*RT*N

That it is human to err is admitted by even the most positive of our thinkers.  Here we have the great difference between latter-day thought and the thought of the past.  If Euclid were alive to-day (and I dare say he is) he would not say, “The angles at the base of an isosceles triangle are equal to one another.”  He would say, “To me (a very frail and fallible being, remember) it does somehow seem that these two angles have a mysterious and awful equality to one another.”  The dislike of schoolboys for Euclid is unreasonable in many ways; but fundamentally it is entirely reasonable.  Fundamentally it is the revolt from a man who was either fallible and therefore (in pretending to infallibility) an impostor, or infallible and therefore not human.