|
flann.txt |
Pipelines v2.1 |
.....|...+....1....+....2....+....3....+....4....+....5....+....6....+....7....+....8....+....9....+....10...**** Top of file ****
1 THE LONG and unprecedented conversation I had with Policeman MacCruiskeen after I
2 went in to him on my mission with the cigarette brought to my mind afterwards several
3 of the more delicate speculations of de Selby, notably his investigation of the nature
4 of time and eternity by a system of mirrors. His theory as I understand it is
5 as follows;
67 If a man stands before a mirror and sees in it his reflection, what he sees is not a
8 true reproduction of himself but a picture of himself when he was a younger man.
9 de Selby's explanation of this phenomenon is quite simple. Light, as he points out
10 truly enough, has an ascertained and finite rate of travel. Hence before the reflection
11 of any object in a mirror can be said to be accomplished, it is necessary that rays of
12 light should first strike the object and subsequently impinge on the glass, to be
13 thrown back again to the object — to the eyes of a man, for instance. There is
14 therefore an appreciable and calculable interval of time between the throwing by a man
15 of a glance at his own face in a mirror and the registration of the reflected image in
16 his eye.
1718 So far, one may say, so good. Whether this idea is right or wrong, the amount of time
19 involved is so negligible that few reasonable people would argue the point. But de Selby
20 ever loath to leave well enough alone, insists on reflecting the first reflection in a
21 further mirror and professing to detect minute changes in this second image. Ultimately
22 he constructed the familiar arrangement of parallel mirrors, each reflecting diminishing
23 images of an interposed object indefinitely. The interposed object in this case was
24 de Selby's own face and this he claims to have studied backwards through an infinity of
25 reflections by means of ' a powerful glass'. What he states to have seen through his
26 glass is astonishing. He claims to have noticed a growing youthfulness in the reflections
27 of his face according as they receded, the most distant of them — too tiny to be visible
28 to the naked eye—being the face of a beardless boy of twelve, and, to use his own words,
29 ' a countenance of singular beauty and nobility '. He did not succeed in pursuing the
30 matter back to the cradle ' owing to the curvature of the earth and the limitations
31 of the telescope.'
3233 So much for de Selby. I found MacCruiskeen with a red face at the kitchen table panting
34 quietly from all the food he had hidden in his belly. In exchange for the cigarette he
35 gave me searching looks. ' Well, now,' he said.
36 He lit the cigarette and sucked at it and smiled covertly at me.
37 Well, now,' he said again. He had his little lamp beside him on the table and he played
38 his fingers on it.
39 ' That is a fine day,' I said. ' What are you doing with a lamp in the white morning?'
40 ' I can give you a question as good as that,' he responded.
41 ' Can you notify me of the meaning of a bulbul?'
42 'A bulbul?'
43 ' What would you say a bulbul is?'
44 This conundrum did not interest me but I pretended to rack my brains and screwed my
45 face in perplexity until I felt it half the size it should be.
46 ' Not one of those ladies who take money?' I said.
47 'No.'
48 ' Not the brass knobs on a German steam organ?'
49 ' Not the knobs.'
50 ' Nothing to do with the independence of America or such-like?'
51 'No.'
52 ' A mechanical engine for winding clocks?'
53 'No.'
54 ' A tumour, or the lather in a cow's mouth, or those elastic articles that ladies
55 wear?'
56 ' Not them by a long chalk.'
57 ' Not an eastern musical instrument played by Arabs?'
58 He clapped his hands.
59 ' Not that but very near it,' he smiled, ' something next door to it. You are a cordial
60 intelligible man. A bulbul is a Persian nightingale. What do you think of that now?'
61 ' It is seldom I am far out,' I said dryly.
**** End of file ****
|
|