"I have made a study of the Saurians," I said.
"No you haven't," he said. "You have read what other men have written
and that is not the same thing."
"Really," I began, but he broke in.
"I mean to say that you have never been in any new equatorial country,"
he said. "Your manner shows that. You are too quiet. Too easy. Too
sedentary. You would have been killed because of your lack of
vigilance."
That is, as nearly as I can repeat and remember, the opening of the
conversation. There was an air of challenge about the man that I found
unpleasant. Of course I admitted the fact that I was not an explorer
myself, and that mine was the humbler if more tedious task of collecting
and arranging data. At that he said that in his opinion, organized
expeditions were little more than pleasure jaunts taken at the public
expense. His viewpoint was most extraordinary.
"Such an expedition," he said, "must fail in its main purpose because
its very unwieldiness destroys or disperses the very things it was
organized to study. It cannot penetrate the wilds; it cannot get into
the dry lands. The very needs of the men and horses and dogs prevent
that. It must keep to beaten tracks and in touch with the edge of
civilization. The members of such an expedition are mere killers on a
large scale, and to kill or to hunt a thing is to not know it at all.
Pages:
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186