Nothing in all my strange experiences astonished me so much as the lack of ceremony in this matter of fatherhood. It was approached with a brutal disinterestedness, a cynical disregard of feeling equalled only by men of pleasure in other countries. I was filled with rage when I was introduced to the committee of middle-aged and elderly women and exposed to their cold scrutiny. First of all I was told to stand at the end of the hall and repeat the poem of William Christmas. I had been made to get it by heart, but in my distress I substituted the word Ram for the word Stallion. The chairwoman rapped angrily on the table. “Why do you say Ram for Stallion?” I replied: “Because it more aptly describes my condition. There is nobility in the stallion, but the ram is a foolish beast.” There was a consultation, after which the chairwoman bade me approach and said: “Your medical report is excellent but we are afraid you lack mental simplicity. You are an educated man.” “I am an American citizen,” I replied proudly, “and I protest against the treatment to which I have been subjected.” “We know nothing of that,” retorted the chairwoman. “You are before us as L.D. 8150, recommended for paternal duties and, if passed, to be entered in the stud-book. Your record since you have been in the country is a bad one, but points to the possession of a spirit which for our purposes may be valuable.” I said: “You may call me what you like; you may register me in any book you please, send me where you choose, but I am a married man and will not oblige you.” Then a fury seized me and I shouted: “Can you not see that you are driving your people into madness or disaster, that you will soon be plunged again into barbarism, that your science is destroying the very spirit of civilisation? I tell you that even now, as you work and plan and arrange, there is growing a revolt against you, a revolt so strong that it will ignore you, as life in the end ignores those who would measure it with a silver rod.” The chairwoman smiled as she rejoined: “Those are almost identically the words I addressed to the late Prime Minister of Fatland when, after thirty years of prevarication, he was persuaded to receive a deputation. I am afraid we must reject you as a candidate for the duties for which you have been trained. In the ordinary course you would be put upon your trial and committed to a severe cross-examination, an art which has been raised by us to the pitch of perfection. As it is, we are satisfied that you are labouring under the disadvantage of contamination from a man-governed society and are probably not guilty of the usual offences which render candidates unfit. We therefore condemn you as a man of genius, and order you to be interned in the suburb set apart for that class.”