Major Barbara, George Bernard Shaw [bookstand for reading txt] 📗

me to the factory of death, and let me learn something more. There must be some truth or other behind all this frightful irony. Come, Dolly. She goes out. Cusins My guardian angel! To Undershaft. Avaunt! He follows Barbara. Stephen Quietly, at the writing table. You must not mind Cusins, father. He is a very amiable good fellow; but he is a Greek scholar and naturally a little eccentric. Undershaft Ah, quite so. Thank you, Stephen. Thank you. He goes out. Stephen smiles patronizingly; buttons his coat responsibly; and crosses the room to the door. Lady Britomart, dressed for out-of-doors, opens it before he reaches it. She looks round for the others; looks at Stephen; and turns to go without a word. Stephen Embarrassed. Mother⁠— Lady Britomart Don’t be apologetic, Stephen. And don’t forget that you have outgrown your mother. She goes out.

Perivale St. Andrews lies between two Middlesex hills, half climbing the northern one. It is an almost smokeless town of white walls, roofs of narrow green slates or red tiles, tall trees, domes, campaniles, and slender chimney shafts, beautifully situated and beautiful in itself. The best view of it is obtained from the crest of a slope about half a mile to the east, where the high explosives are dealt with. The foundry lies hidden in the depths between, the tops of its chimneys sprouting like huge skittles into the middle distance. Across the crest runs a platform of concrete, with a parapet which suggests a fortification, because there is a huge cannon of the obsolete Woolwich Infant pattern peering across it at the town. The cannon is mounted on an experimental gun carriage: possibly the original model of the Undershaft disappearing rampart gun alluded to by Stephen. The parapet has a high step inside which serves as a seat.

Barbara is leaning over the parapet, looking towards the town. On her right is the cannon; on her left the end of a shed raised on piles, with a ladder of three or four steps up to the door, which opens outwards and has a little wooden landing at the threshold, with a fire bucket in the corner of the landing. The parapet stops short of the shed, leaving a gap which is the beginning of the path down the hill through the foundry to the town. Behind the cannon is a trolley carrying a huge conical bombshell, with a red band painted on it. Further from the parapet, on the same side, is a deck chair, near the door of an office, which, like the sheds, is of the lightest possible construction. Cusins arrives by the path from the town. Barbara Well? Cusins Not a ray of hope. Everything perfect, wonderful, real. It only needs a cathedral to be a heavenly city instead of a hellish one. Barbara Have you found out whether they have done anything for old Peter Shirley. Cusins They have found him a job as gatekeeper and timekeeper. He’s frightfully miserable. He calls the timekeeping brainwork, and says he isn’t used to it; and his gate lodge is so splendid that he’s ashamed to use the rooms, and skulks in the scullery. Barbara Poor Peter! Stephen arrives from the town. He carries a field-glass. Stephen Enthusiastically. Have you two seen the place? Why did you leave us? Cusins I wanted to see everything I was not intended to see; and Barbara wanted to make the men talk. Stephen Have you found anything discreditable? Cusins No. They call him Dandy Andy and are proud of his being a cunning old rascal; but it’s all horribly, frightfully, immorally, unanswerably perfect. Sarah arrives. Sarah Heavens! what a place! She crosses to the trolley. Did you see the nursing home!? She sits down on the shell. Stephen Did you see the libraries and schools!? Sarah Did you see the ballroom and the banqueting chamber in the Town Hall!? Stephen Have you gone into the insurance fund, the pension fund, the building society, the various applications of cooperation!? Undershaft comes from the office, with a sheaf of telegrams in his hands. Undershaft Well, have you seen everything? I’m sorry I was called away. Indicating the telegrams. News from Manchuria. Stephen Good news, I hope. Undershaft Very. Stephen Another Japanese victory? Undershaft Oh, I don’t know. Which side wins does not concern us here. No: the good news is that the aerial battleship is a tremendous success. At the first trial it has wiped out a fort with three hundred soldiers in it. Cusins From the platform. Dummy soldiers? Undershaft No: the real thing. Cusins and Barbara exchange glances. Then Cusins sits on the step and buries his face in his hands. Barbara gravely lays her hand on his shoulder, and he looks up at her in a sort of whimsical desperation. Well, Stephen, what do you think of the place? Stephen Oh, magnificent. A perfect triumph of organization. Frankly, my dear father, I have been a fool: I had no idea of what it all meant⁠—of the wonderful forethought, the power of organization, the administrative capacity, the financial genius, the colossal capital it represents. I have been repeating to myself as I came through your streets “Peace hath her victories no less renowned than War.” I have only one misgiving about it all. Undershaft Out with it. Stephen Well, I cannot help thinking that all this provision for every want of your workmen may sap their independence and weaken their sense of responsibility. And greatly as we enjoyed our tea at that splendid restaurant⁠—how they gave us all that luxury and cake and jam and cream for threepence I really cannot imagine!⁠—still you must remember that restaurants break up home life. Look at the continent, for instance! Are you sure so much pampering is really good for the men’s characters? Undershaft Well you see, my dear boy, when you are organizing civilization you have to make up your mind whether trouble and anxiety are good things