It made no difference, for he was pleased to meet Duncan and happy to chat with him. A genuine
friendship had developed, long before Duncan decided to take advantage of it.
"I sometimes feel," Warren lamented, not very seriously, "that I'm a living cliché. Did you know that there was a time when all ship's engineers were Scots and call Mac-something-or-other?"
"I didn't know it. Why not Germans or Russians? They started the whole thing."
"You're on the wrong wavelength. I'm talking about ships that float on water. The first powered ones were driven by steam — piston engines, working paddle wheels — around the beginning of the nineteenth
century. Now, the Industrial Revolution started in Britain, and the first practical steam engine was made by a Scot. So when steamships began to operate all over the world, the Macs went with them. No one
else could understand such complicated pieces of machinery."
"Steam engines? Complicated? You must be joking."
"Have you ever looked at one? More to it than you might think, though it doesn't take long to figure it out... Anyway, while the steamships lasted — that was only about a hundred years — the Scots ran them.
I've made a hobby of the period; it has some surprising parallels with our time."
"Go on — surprise me."
"Well, those old ships were incredibly slow, averaging only about ten klicks, at least for freighters.
So really long journeys, even on Earth, could take weeks. Just like space travel."
"I see. In those days, the countries on Earth were almost as far apart as the planets."
"Well, some of them. The most perfect analogy is the old British Commonwealth, the first and last world empire. For almost a hundred years, countries like Canada, India, and Australia relied entirely on steamships to link them to Britain; the one-way journey could easily take a month or more, and was often a once-in-a-lifetime affair. Only the wealthy, or people on official business, could afford it. And — just like today — people in the colonies couldn't even speak to the mother country. The psychological
isolation was almost complete."
"They had telephones, didn't they?"
"Only for local use, and only a few even then. I'm talking about the beginning of the twentieth
century, remember. Universal global communication didn't arrive until the end of it."
"I feel that the analogy is a little forced," protested Duncan. He was intrigued but unconvinced, and quite willing to listen to Mackenzie's arguments — as yet, with no ulterior motive.
"I can give you some more evidence that makes a better case. Have you heard of Rudyard Kipling?"
"Yes, though I've never read anything of his. He was a writer, wasn't he? Anglo-American —
sometime between Melville and Hemingway. English Lit's almost unknown territory to me. Life's too
short."
"True, alas. But I have read Kipling. He was the first poet of the machine age, and some people think he was also the finest short-story writer of his century. I couldn't judge that, of course, but he exactly described the period I'm talking about. ‘McAndrew's Hymn,’ for example — an old engineer musing
about the pistons and boilers and crankshafts that drive his ship round the world. Its technology — not to mention its theology! — has been extinct for three hundred years; but the spirit behind it is still as valid as ever."
"And he wrote poems and stories about the far places of the empire which make them seem quite as
remote as the planets are today — and sometimes even more exotic! There's a favorite of mine called
‘The Song of The Cities.’ I don't understand half the allusions, but he tributes to Bombay, Singapore, Rangoon, Sydney, Aukland... make me think of Luna, Mercury, Mars, Titan..."
Mackenzie paused and looked just a little embarrassed.
"I've tried to do something of the same kind myself — but don’t worry, I won't inflict my verses on you."
Duncan made the encouraging noises he knew were expected. He was quite sure that before the end
of the voyage he would be asked for his criticism — translation, praise — of Mackenzie's literary efforts.
It was a timely reminder of his own responsibilities. While the voyage was still beginning, he had
better start work.
*
*
*
*
*
Exactly ten minutes, George Washington had directed — not a second more. Even the President will
be allowed only fifteen, and all the planets must have equal time. The whole affair is scheduled to last two and a half hours, from the moment we enter the Capitol until we leave for the reception at the White House...
It still seemed faintly absurd to travel three billion kilometers to make a ten-minute speech, even for an occasion as unique as a five hundredth anniversary. Duncan was not going to waste more than the bare minimum of it on polite formalities; anyway, as Malcolm had pointed out, the sincerity of the speech of thanks is often inversely proportional to its length.
For his amusement — and, more important, because it would help to fix the other participants in his