The Flooding Machine

7/27/2019 The Flooding Machine

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THE FLOODING MACHINE

CACILDO MARQUES

With illustrations of the author

Some centuries after the last world war, theinhabitants of a distant island had a calm life,

but they were facing a serious preoccupation:

they were a people in extinction.



The flooding machine

Cacildo Marques

1.

ISLAND

Once upon a time there was a principality, which was a distant island, inhabited for twenty

people, being fourteen adults and six children. The territory was not so small, as the number of

inhabitants can seem to suggest, but, to the opposite, it was almost of the size of the Elba Island.

That country was very rich, with a very high per capita income, given that there were a lot of gold, silver and diamond mines. Periodically, the men went to the searches, where they passed two

or three days, practicing the mining. Even without financial needs, all of the adult inhabitants had a

profession and they worked with vitality, certain that the idleness is unhealthy, so much physics as

emotionally. The prince and the princess took care of the diplomatic works and of the defense,

which counted with a general as only effective member of the armed forces. He frequently gave the

turn around the island with his boat to certify that no invasion had happened in the last times,

although that went a peace time in the world, centuries ahead of the years in that invaders of less

powerful countries and pirates' vessels existed.

All the twenty inhabitants, including the eight children, went by military training, disposing

to be, for the Constitution of the country, occasionally summoned for the service of the defense,

under the command of the general and of the prince. The adults of the island, except the prince andthe princess, occupied in rota basis the prime minister's position, with four-year mandate, the one

that was done following the alphabetical order of their first names. During the mandate, the prime



minister continued to exercise his occupation always, with reduction in his daily schedule of

dedication, in way to take care of government's subjects, that, by the number of inhabitants and by

the good education level of the same ones, never brought headache.

Occupations

Here we have the names and the professions of the fourteen adult island's inhabitants.Stephen, prince and diplomat, and his wife Lucy, princess; John, agronomist and farmer, and his

wife Julianne, teacher; Manuel, joiner, and his wife Marina, dressmaker; Mark, confectioner, and

his wife Lydia, merchant; Victor, doctor-dentist and general, and his wife Claudia, pharmaceutical;

Luke, architect and bricklayer, and his wife Ludmila, smith; Albert, general caretaker, and his wife

Cecilia, musicologist and notary public. For those times, Luke exercised the prime minister's

position. It is important to notice that all the adults had superior formation, with diplomas obtained

at foreign countries, since in the island there were not universities, as it would be of waiting of a

country with only twenty inhabitants. With that, there was not hierarchy among the types of works,

if manuals, if intellectuals. All of the occupations were respected equally, although some paid more

than others. That, in fact, was not reason for any disagreement, because all of the families were

owners of mines and all of them were rich.Differently of the principalities of other times, there the prince position was not for life nor

hereditary. After ten years in the power, the prince and the princess gave up place to a new couple of

monarchs, elect by the Parliament, which was composed of all the adult inhabitants of the country,

less the prince and the princess. In the phase in that this report is made, the number of

parliamentarians in exercise was, therefore, ten, since there were twelve adults. When an adolescent

completed 21 year-old, automatically he became member of the Parliament. Before taking office as

prince, Stephen was confectioner and baker, that occupation being now with Mark, who before

divided with Lydia the direction of the grocery store of dry and wet.

In the island there were not factories, except those of the agribusiness, as the one that

produced olive oil and another of pasta, all of property of John, and more some other, and the

garments were made by Marina using imported woven, always of high quality. There also were not

automobiles and all of they moved on bicycles, on horses or on carts, when they didn't prefer to do

their itineraries on foot. There were not obese people, maybe because there was not the habit there

of having dinner. At night they drank tea, with cheese, cookies, sweet potato or some other

accompaniments. There also was not baldness and the wrinkles were only for larger of 75 year-old.

Someone can wonder why the island would need an architect-bricklayer if there were so

many empty houses and a lot of city-ghost. Luke's work, unlike the one that one could think, was

very necessary, because he was the responsible for the reforms of the residences and of the public

and commercial buildings. The general caretaker's work, exercised by Albert, was one of the most

arduous of the island, because he took care of the public cleaning, of the recycling of the garbage, of

the electric power and water supply, besides taking care also of the sewer.

Neighboring

John and his son Lucretius were certain day in the farm of his property when they needed to

enter in the contiguous forest to cut some lianas to tie faggots sheaves.

While John cut the lianas, Lucretius became distracted, running behind some birds that lived

on the ground, scratching the earth, and they didn't get to fly for more than five meters. Suddenly,

one of the birds flew back of a tree and he lost it of view. When he went to seek them he saw an

unusual thing: a couple of adults made faces for him, while two trees that before were to his front

no more were seen. Lucretius closed the eyes and scrubbed them. When he opened them, the trees

were there, as before, and the bird was not more seen. Later, he told his father about this.- When I was playing, running behind the birds, I have seen a very strange thing.

- What have you seen?



- As we have learned at the school, the current population of the country completes twenty

people, is it right?

- With certainty.

- Because no longer I am so much sure.

- How so?

- I know all of the adult inhabitants of the city.

- And then?- Then that I have seen in the forest a couple I never saw before.

- Are you right of that, son?

- As well as I am seeing that cloud -, he pointed for a cloud in the horizon.

- How was that?

- A bird that I pursued has hidden behind a tree. When I went to try to see where it was, I

have seen a couple of persons making faces to me, as if they were protecting the bird. I closed my

eyes for some seconds and when I opened then I only saw the trees. Nor bird neither people were in

front of me.

- Do you know that it is possible to dream during the day, even in foot?

- But I was very awoke, and agitated.

- Even so. Sometimes the person sleeps a little bit, for a fraction of second, and on thatmoment he can dream.

- Very strange that. I am sure I was not dreaming.

- Just in case, I am with my hypothesis.



2.

OVERPOPULATION

The homeland history registers the period when the inverting point in that the country came

to have such a reduced number of inhabitants happened. As it is counted in books and in videos, the

island had the largest population density of the world, what has taken that people to an

unprecedented crisis. Conflicts of neighborhood against neighborhood and city against city,everyday violence even inside the families, all this went growing until the government decided to

imitate the Chinese politics and to impose a maximum of one son for couple, also increasing for 28

year-old the minimum age for the marriage and the cohabitation.

It was foreseen that after about twenty years the situation would begin to calm down,

because in that time the population reduction would take to the density of the beginning of the

crisis. It was during that phase that a great geneticist of the country, Dr. Linero, discovered a method

to alter the physiology of the feminine reproduction, so that women would start to become pregnant

once, at the most. After that first time, the biological alteration of Dr. Linero impeded a second

pregnancy, because the mechanism created by him eliminated the possibility of a new ovulation. It

was treated of a composition that women ingested and they made it willingly, because, in the

previous situation, case they came to become pregnant a second time they would have to pay a fineof considerable value to the government. The mechanism of Dr. Linero, however, had action on the

chromosomes, influencing the following generations, not only the women of his time. This only

came to get evident after the geneticist's death, when all of the families of the island had already

been submitted to the process of limitation of the ovulation. The method of Dr. Linero had not been

published in the international medical literature and their pairs, same that of the island, ignored the

foundations of his discovery. They just knew that the process worked, and that scientist's authority

was enough to do with that the islanders entrusted their future to him.

For more than one century, after that time, the life in the island became very comfortable.

Houses to live were of surplus, so that the man-woman cohabitation stopped existing. The people

got married and then went each one to a house. Case a child came, he was with the mother until the

adult age if a girl, and he started to live with the father to the thirteen year-old if he went a boy.

Even in the palatial complex, there was a house for the prince and other one for the princess.

Besides, it occurred in that time the discovery of the great diamond mines and the income of the



population started to grow quickly.

Religiosity

A luxury life, in spite of the whole material comfort that the island reached, was not enough

to avoid a great tragedy. The prince, who came of aristocratic lineage and had for life position,

professed the religion codified by prophet Auro, who, in fact, had foreseen a period of great tumultin the island due to the overpopulation that was for coming. The events that confirmed the prophet's

voice gave to him a unique recognition in the history of the prophets of the several nations. When

young, Auro had studied in Syria, among the priests of Maronite rite and, when returning to the

island, he got, with their preaching, to change their compatriots' religious practices, which he

adapted to precepts that he had learned abroad and also to decisions that appeared of his own

creativity. He was had at the island as a demigod. The problem is that, although the prince and his

family followed the rituals and the teachings bequeathed directly by the prophet, the population was

divided among rituals developed by the son and by the daughter of Auro, called, respectively,

Maruz and Arana. The followers of Maruz concentrated more on the western side of the island,

while that of Arana were almost all of them on the oriental side.

Inflamed announcers in the radio and in the TV prodded the population, some in favor of Maruz, other in favor of Arana. For one of those sides, he who followed the rituals of Maruz would

go for the paradise, going to the hell the followers of the teachings that Arana has legated. The

followers of Arana affirmed the opposite exactly.

The religious fanaticism began to invade the island and, after more than a century of peace,

no matter how much the monarch in several speeches tried to convince their subjects that the one

that imported were the teachings of Auro, the division continued growing and the animosity was

intensified.

Moonlight

In the court, a counselor of the monarch has had an idea that, at the beginning, seemed

brilliant. The court would be transferred of the city of Fringe, at the coast, for the center of the

country, settling in the small Moonlight City. In this way the prince could circulate with more

easiness for east and for west of the island, at the same time in that he showed to the subjects that he

was in their middle, irradiating the prophet's teachings, without hanging for Maruz or for Arana.

Somebody objected that Moonlight was a city with deceiving name, given that the light that comes

from the Moon is reflex of the Sun and, therefore, the moonlight doesn't exist, being a falsehood.

The prince, however, didn't give ears to that sort of conversation.

A great palace was built then in Moonlight, but the prince didn't wait for the conclusion of

the works, given the urgency of a measure to look for to suffocate the growing quarrel among the

subjects, and he moved to the small city, starting to live, provisionally, in the local seat of the National Bank, transferring that seat to a more modest big house.

Little by little Moonlight won new avenues, new squares, luminous fountains, museums,

stadiums and new buildings destined to the administration.

The life elapsed in climate of apparent normality, but the per capita income of the Moonlight

population became the double of that of the old capital, Fringe. It seemed that the whole wealth of

the country converged for the new capital.

Devastation

But, with his transfer for Moonlight, besides not having gotten to contain the frictions

between east and west due to the religious differences, the prince watched a preoccupying anddangerous escalation of financial crisis. It was waited that, with the expenses in the remodeling of

the new capital, the country would pass by an outbreak of economical growth, but the one that one



saw was the opposite. The interests arose slowly until a grievous height and the scarceness took

place at the country. Now the east side blamed the west side for the economical crisis and vice-

versa. Religious quarrel and financial crisis led the country to the civil war, having the army been

divided in orange-yellow movement, of the east, and lemon-green movement, of the west. And the

prophet had informed that the most difficult moment would come when in the middle of the sky a

great color of blood red cloud was seen. A lot of people swear to have seen that cloud one week

before the beginning of the war, but most of the inhabitants didn't have that vision. Even withouthaving seen, all of them believed that it really should have past in the skies of the island, being just

shown to some privileged.

After many battles among the military ones, the lemons, of the west, and the oranges, of the

east, dragged with themselves the civil youth, first the reservists of the army, later the non-

reservists. Finally, women were summoned in the two sides of the country.

When, finally, the population, that no longer was big, gave displays that it could disappear,

so many the low ones were in the civil war, the monarch, after eight months of conflict, got to

gather the orange and lemon military leaderships and to do them to sign the armistice.

Those leaderships signed the armistice in the end of a November seven and in the morning

of the eight, now united, they were to palace accompanied of a olive-green platoon, that joined

former enemies orange and lemon, with the purpose of dethroning the prince. They took withthemselves the president of the Parliament and drew of him the oath that inside of some hours of

that same day a new prince would be chosen and, henceforth, no more chief of State for life nor

hereditary there would be. The military ones accompanied the president of the Parliament to his

cabinet and, with the olive-green platoon, they sat down in the galleries of the plenary session, to

accompany the entire legislative section of that day.

With the new prince elected, was voted by the restoration of the residence of the chief of

State in the old capital, Fringe, what should already happen the following day. The new prince, who

agreed with the measure, took office there same and, as first action in the position, he named as

commander of the armed forces the general of the west side, who before had struggled in the

movement lemon-green. He had argued that, as test of the east side, having a commander of the

west side showed that the division of the country was contained. The general of the east side

consented and signed a declaration of support and obedience to the leadership of the new

commander, who two days before was his mortal enemy in the battlefield.

Diaspora

The peace has reigned in definitive later of those events. But the country suffered irreparable

losses with the war, being maybe the most significant the disappearance of the two universities, the

one of Fringe and the one of Moonlight. As the war had religious background, the two groups were

attacked, accused of laicism and atheism. All of the academic constructions were dropped, so much

in the campus of the old capital as in the one of the new. The teachers, when feeling the first threatsign to their occupation, took ships and emigrated for distant countries. Anyone never returned.

Ever since, the youths that concluded the medium teaching were sent to study universities

abroad. It happened that few went back to the island.

In a given government administration, the prime minister made to approve a law

determining that no emigrant of the island would be entitled to usufruct of any wealth originated

from the mines of the country, in an attempt of convincing the youths students to return to the

homeland, to continue to do right over the wealth so abundant there. That Law of the Remittance of

Wealth, however, didn't have the wanted effect, and few of the youths that studied abroad returned

to the island after having formed.

Ghost

It was like this that the country arrived to that situation of counting just with twenty



inhabitants, surrounded by a great number of ghost-cities, including the formerly new powerful

capital, Moonlight. All of the inhabitants now lived in Fringe.

The residents of the island felt happy, although the memory of the war saddened them. It

was subject studied at the school, always in silence, because nobody dared to discuss it aloud.

Teacher Julianne informed the students, in advance, on the day in that the theme would be studied,

and she already prevented them that all would read the texts, without doing questions and without

pulling any sort of conversation. Yes, the world wars and the wars of the other people were studiedand discussed, but no the civil war of the oranges and lemons. There was a type of homeland shame,

because the war of the oranges and lemons were the last war occurred in the world, a lot of decades

after the wars among all the other people had been extinguished. The names of Maruz and Arana

were had now as names of two foolish, because the rituals that one and another created were

completely abolished of the habits of the island. Children learned that a great prophet didn't have

obligation of having mentally healthy children.

The John's son, Lucretius, wanted to know from his father about that war, after having

studied it in class, with his mother. As he knew that he could not lift discussion with the teacher, he

tried later to pull more information of John.

- Father, I know that we cannot discuss the subject in the school, but with the parents will be

that are we not able to?- To what do refer you, son?

- To the war between oranges and lemons.

- We are not able to. It is not only in the classroom that the subject is taboo. We cannot

discuss it in any hypothesis, and we have to respect that decision of our ancestors.



3.

POLITICS

With the reduction of the number of children and adolescents, the school of the island had to

return to the schoolmaster system, of the 19th century, in that all of the series were joined at the

same room and a single teacher assisted them. When there was just a student in a given series, he

moved forward in his own rhythm, but when there was more than one, the progress was seasoned

accordingly the group, so that the themes were studied in the group, in cooperation, according to the

practice that came since the 20th century.

One of the disciplines studied at the island was Politics and it was offered to the students of

the ninth series. In that phase there were only two adolescents in this series and then only they were

studying that subject. There was who questioned the maintenance of that theme in the studies of the

youths of the island, given that there were so few people there and the political problems that thecities and the provinces face around the world didn't exist for those inhabitants.

Julianne, however, insisted on maintaining that study, because she wanted their students to

have knowledge of as the political systems worked at the several countries in that they could

continue their studies.

It made part of the development of the content the study of government's systems, of the

electoral models, of the systems of parties and so on. The youths started to know the difference

between the proportional vote and the old model of the district majority vote, for instance. They

discussed on the advantages and disadvantages of the many parties systems and of the only party

ones. They studied on authoritarian regimes and democratic regimes and they learned on the vital

importance of the parliament in the government of a city, of a province or of a federation.



Agriculture

John supplied Fringe with the product of his farm without great setbacks. Certainly, most of

his production had to be exported, because the twenty inhabitants of the island didn't propitiate scale

so that he cultivated and manufactured the goods that he could sell. Olive oil, rice and cheese were

some of their products exported. The agricultural production was obtained in a very craft way,

without use of machines, what afflicted John, because he noticed that he could export much more if he modernized their methods. The other islanders had small farms and small ranches, but farm, with

some production scale, there was only the one of John.

In the days of crop, as well as in the planting phase, John worked in mutual assistance

system, in that all the adult people - except the prince and the princess, by constitutional device -

and more some children went to the farm to contribute with their arms in that task and to participate

of the traditional roast fish that was offered by the host.

The environmental laws banned the use of machines with use of imported fuel, so that the

almost totality of the existent machinery in the island was served as human, animal or electric

traction. The old hydroelectric of the Rushes River supplied with some leisure the energy demand of

that society, but John would like to count with oil agricultural machines, as the ones that he saw in

the times of the university. He discussed that with Julianne certain time.- I am thinking about proposing in the Parliament the repeal of the law that forbids using

imported fuel.

- Why, John?

- Because I think I could produce much more in the field If I was had permission to use

some machines that here are prohibited.

- You have my vote, but I doubt that you obtain majority. The feeling of environmental

preservation is very strong in our population.

In fact, days after that conversation John presented his bill. The Commission of Constitution

and Pertinence approved it and it followed going through the procedure, but when it was submitted

to plenary session got only three favorable votes.

Geometric

On that week, the first Tuesday class, that was class of Geometry, was dedicated to the

introduction to the Pythagorean Theorem for the ninth series, series that Lucretius studied. He had

already studied the four metric relationships in the right triangle previous to the theorem, which

would be the fifth relationship. The classes of Geometry were the more appreciated of the week and

Lucretius had liked especially the third metric relationship, that says that the square of the height

relative to the right angle of the right triangle is equal to the product of the measures of the two

segments in the hypotenuse resulting of the intersection with the height. He had also learned that

this height, that is the square root of that product of two segments, is called proportional average, or geometric average. In fact, in the study of the proportions he had seen those terms, because they are

the name of the middle that is common in a continuous proportion, when, for instance, 3 is for 6 as

well as 6 is for 12. He had understood the reason of the name proportional average, and now it was

explained for him the reason of it also be called geometric average. Those four relationships,

previous to the Pythagorean Theorem, Lucretius learned that they were all consequences of the

relationships of similarity of triangles when applied to the right triangle.

The Pythagorean Theorem, in spite of being one of the five metric relationships of the right

triangle, was not, like Lucretius could see, a relationship emerged directly of the similarity of

triangles. It is consequence of the two first of the four relationships, those that don't involve the

measure of the height. For better understanding, Lucretius has drawn a non-isosceles right triangle

with the hypotenuse in the horizontal. Hypotenuse in Greek means extended line in the base, andthen he understood that was like this that old Greeks drew that triangle, with the hypotenuse below,

in the horizontal. As the triangle that he drew was non-isosceles, the segments in the hypotenuse



produced by the height relative to the right angle had different sizes. Then he observed that the first

two relationships were expressed like this: (a) being taken the triangle complete, original, with the

hypotenuse below, the square of the smaller cathetus, to the right in the drawing, was equal to the

product of the hypotenuse by the smaller segment, that was under the cathetus in subject; (b) the

square of the larger cathetus, to the left, was equal to the product of the hypotenuse for the larger

segment, that was under that larger cathetus. Those relationships didn't fall of the sky. The first, for

instance, comes from the similarity among the smallest triangle produced by the height and the bigtriangle, since the small segment is for the smaller cathetus as well as the smaller cathetus is for the

larger cathetus. In the second relationship, similarly, the big segment is for the larger cathetus as

well as the larger cathetus is for the hypotenuse. The first two relationships were those.

In that moment of the class, Lucretius and his friend of the ninth series, Renata, daughter of

Dr. Victor and Claudia, went to the sports block of the school, with tape measure, to do measures

that would show in practice the working of the Pythagorean Theorem. Julianne accompanied them

there and she left instructions about the measurements that should be done and logged. In the

shortest and closer side of the classroom, Lucretius and Renata measured 3 m, starting from the

right corner, and they did in that point a chalk mark, writing the number 3 there. Starting from the

same right corner, they measured 4 m in the direction of the more length side of the border of the

block, also marking that point with chalk and writing the number 4. Then, Lucretius held the tapemeasure in that point with the mark 4 and Renata stretched out the ribbon until the point with the

mark 3, on the shortest side. She wrote down in the drawing board the measure in meters indicated

in the tape measure.

The three measurements above were called series A. Soon afterwards the couple proceeded

to a new group of three measurements, that they called series B. This time, leaving of the same

corner of the block and in the same direction on the shortest side, they made the measure of 6 m,

marking the point with chalk and writing the number 6. Then, going in the direction on the longest

side, they measured 8 m, and Renata once again pulled the tape measure until the point of mark 6

and she wrote down in the drawing board how many meters were suitable in the tape measure. With

that task accomplished, they returned to the classroom.

Julianne said:

- Now we will apply in those measured the Pythagorean Theorem.

- As will we make this? -, Lucretius asked, looking at Renata.

- I don't know, but in the Theorem the values are elevated to the square; will be this?

- Bravo, Renata! -, Julianne agreed. Make the squares of the three measures in the two

series.

- Do we have to do of the six numbers? - Lucretius asked.

- For dividing the 'hardness' of the task, Renata makes the squares for the series A and you

do for the series B.

Renata then has calculated the squares of the three numbers of her series and Lucretius did

the same with his numbers. They exchanged glances and, as they didn't have a lot of idea of what todo since then, they looked both at the eyes of Julianne. She challenged:

- Now the citizens should read the Theorem, while I will assist the students of the other

series.

- Leave it with us, Renata consented.

- Here it says: The square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the cathetus

-, Lucretius said.

- And your mother has said that the hypotenuse is always the largest on the three sides, do

you remember?

- Yes, then hands to the work.

As both had written down the squares of the six measures in their drawing boards, they saw

that the following step would be to add the squares of the cathetus, the two sides with smaller measures than the hypotenuse, so much in the series A as in the series B. Then they observed that in

the series A that sum was 25, while in the series B, 100.



Both had made the sums correctly and they could verify that the sum of the squares of the

cathetus in the series A, that was 25, coincided with the square of the hypotenuse, and the sum in

the series B, 100, coincided with the square of the hypotenuse of that series, because in the series A

the hypotenuse had measured 5 m, and in the series B, 10 m. Now the working of the Pythagorean

Theorem was very clear. At this time, Julianne informed that they would pass for the class of

History, being the literal demonstration of the Pythagorean Theorem for the next class of Geometry,

which would be on Friday.

Pythagoras

In the following class of Geometry of the week, the first Friday class, the task to complete

the demonstration of the Pythagorean Theorem was short and simple. Opening their notebooks in

the drawing of the right triangle with the four metric relationships already studied, Lucretius and

Renata were guided to add member to member the first two relationships, writing the squares in the

first member of each one of the two equalities.

They wrote the square of the smaller cathetus as being equal to the product of the

hypotenuse for the small segment. In the second line, under the first relationship, they wrote the

square of the larger cathetus as being equal to the product of the hypotenuse for the big segment.Adding member to member they observed that the squares of the minor and the larger cathetus,

added in the first member, gave a value equal to the hypotenuse multiplied by the smaller segment

added to the hypotenuse multiplied by the larger segment.

- And now? If none of both reminds what to do in a situation of those, we will open the book

and take a blow of fresh air -, Julianne said.

- Oh, yes, I think it is the way -, Lucretius agreed.

The complete demonstration was in the book. After that line that Lucretius and Renata had

already written in their notebooks, it was in the following line the expression with the second

member bringing the factored hypotenuse. Then the sum of the squares of the cathetus was equal to

the hypotenuse multiplied by the sum, between parentheses, of the big and small segments. But that

sum is equal to the hypotenuse. Then, in the following line, it was the sum of the squares of the

cathetus equaled to the product of the hypotenuse by it same. And, finally, in one more line it was

the sum of the squares of the cathetus equaled to the square of the hypotenuse.

What was demonstrated, Julianne stressed, it was that, if a triangle is right, the sum of the

squares of the cathetus is equal to the square of the hypotenuse. The hypothesis was that one had a

right triangle. Now it would be necessary to prove the reverse of the theorem, being guaranteed that

if the square on the larger side of the triangle is equal to the sum of the squares on the two other

sides, then that triangle is right.

The two pupils made face of fright, and then Julianne informed that they could study that

demonstration in the book and to pass it for the notebook.

- This teacher is a mother -, Lucretius mocked.- Your mother, without a doubt -, Renata said.

In the demonstration of the reverse they studied in the book that the hypothesis is that in a

given triangle the square of the larger side is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides,

and the thesis is that such a figure has to be a right triangle. They should draw a triangle with two

smaller sides, leaving of a common vertex, and soon afterwards draw a third side, whose square

would be the sum of the squares of those two smaller sides, more or less as they did in the block. It

is immediately evident that given the two smaller sides of any triangle, a right triangle exists whose

cathetus are congruent to those sides - it is enough to open or to close the angle among those sides

until that a right angle is had. By hypothesis, the third side of the triangle originally drawn has

square equal to the sum of the squares of the two initial sides. As those two sides are congruent to

the cathetus of the right triangle taken as comparison, the square on the third side is equal to thesquare of the hypotenuse. As that larger side and that hypotenuse are necessarily positive, what

comes as result is that those two sides in the two triangles have to be congruent. By the side-side-



side case of congruence, the built triangle and the right triangle are congruent, and then, the

opposite angle to the hypotenuse is right, one having a right rectangle.

When after the task ended, Juliana talked about the theorem of Napoleon Bonaparte,

warning that it would be demonstrated only in the end of the school year, because of using the law

of sines for areas and the law of cosines. The theorem says that, if an any triangle is given, when

each side is overcome like side of an equilateral triangle, drawn externally to the given triangle, the

three gravity centers of these equilateral triangles are vertexes of a new equilateral triangle.For house lesson Julianne has left a series of a lot of equations in that Lucretius and Renata

should have to estimate the measure of the hypotenuse or of the cathetus of right triangles. In the

most advanced problems, there were cases in that the value of any side was not had, but just

relationships among them, and, however, the value of the three sides was asked. In those cases the

students had to use notable products, to expand the sides in that the expression was a binomial, and,

after organizing the equation, to apply the resolutive formula of the equation of the second degree,

because the resolution took to a complete equation.



4.

MUSIC

The following class of the day, the second class, was of Music. Always the beginning of

each class of that matter had as activity the interpretation of the National Anthem. Julianne did in

the sweet flute the first note of the Hymn, D, that was also the tonic, since the Hymn was in D

major, and she began the solfeggio of the martial rhythm. The students knew in that time and in that

beat of this time they had to begin to sing. They sang the lyrics twice, because that was the norm for

the execution of the anthem, and only then they sat down and opened their study aids and notebooks

for the tasks of the day. In that class Renata wanted to remove a doubt that came bestirring her there

was some time.

- Teacher, we know that the Music uses many calculations, is it right?

- Without a doubt. Pythagoras included the Music in the school as one of the topics of the

Mathematics. Like I already told, that was the quadrivium, composed of Geometry, Arithmetic,

Astronomy and Music. The trivium, formed by Grammar, Rhetoric and Logic, was introduced later

in Rome, by Boetius.

- But I see that the one most advanced that is used today of Mathematics in the Music are the

operations with fractions. Is the thing thereabout?

- No. Topics that you didn't learn are also used. For instance, theory of the groups, thing that

one learns at the university.

- In the university we will continue to have the matter Music? -, Lucretius wanted to know.

- Only if you want to study baccalaureate in Music, Julianne answered.- Of the one what did we learn here, what do other topics enter in the Music? -, Renata

asked.

- Logarithms, for instance. When we were in the chapter of exponent and radicals of real

numbers, I give you a quick notion of logarithms, are you reminded?

- I remember, Lucretius said.

- Can you remember for us? I don't get to remind right -, Renata diverged.

- As you already know, the extraction of roots is the inverse operation of the exponent. When

we changed the base, maintaining the exponent, we changed the root writing the new base, but

maintaining the exponent now as index. For instance, cube root of 1 is 1 because 1 high to the cube

gives 1. And cube root of 8 is 2 because 2 high to the cube give 8.

- Of that I remember, Renata agreed.- And when did we change the exponent, maintaining the base, which is the inverse

operation? -, Juliana asked.



- Oh, that is the logarithm, Renata answered.

- Yes. When we are calculating the logarithm then we discover the exponent that was used to

arrive to the presented potency, for a given base. These things we will study next year.

- But how the logarithm is used in the Music? -, Lucretius investigated.

- When I was at the university I had a friend that composed songs in the computer. One day

he told me that he was surprised when trying to complete the times that the machine generated. The

calculation to be used was the logarithm, in inverted binary base, it is to say, base half.- How so? -, Renata asked.

- Let us suppose that the machine has filled out fifteen sixteenth of a time. My friend wanted

to complete that time, but he didn't know how much the machine had generated. If we could see

what the machine is doing, would we know that it would be enough to increase one sixteenth, right?

- Yes, Renata and Lucretius said in unison.

- As we cannot see it, the way was to do the machine to calculate the discount and to

discover the exponent of the base half and, to arrive to a sixteenth, to see that this exponent has to

be four, because the logarithm of one sixteenth in the base half is that value.

- And did the machine discover that exponent? -, Renata investigated.

- Yes, with logarithms, and with that exponent in its hands, it is to say, in its bits, the

machine calculated the duration of the note that lacked to fill out the compass.- Ingenious, Lucretius affirmed.

- You never doubt of the composers' ingeniousness, Julianne completed.

After that conversation Julianne has gone to other tables, to take care of the doubts of the

students of the other series, and Lucretius and Renata accomplished the task of the study aid of that

class, which was very easy.

In the final minutes of the class, all of the students, governed by Julianne, sang the Ode to

joy, of Beethoven, with the well-known Friedrich Schiller's lyrics, in the German language.

Contents

Julianne explained to the students, no once, but a lot of times, that the school contents just

were not for the person to build the basic knowledge for the life. They were, in many cases, learning

of practices that should be used by the life out. That was the education vision that the island

cultivated.

The clearest example for the students was the one of the class of Gymnastics. As they saw

their parents daily practicing physical exercises, they knew that what was learned at the school was

a group of knowledge that they should not abandon. The same understanding happened in relation

to the Maternal Language, to the Music, to the Algebra and the Foreign Languages, cultivated there

with learning of English and French.

In relation to the History and to the History of the Religion, which one waited was that the

student used the knowledge of those disciplines in their future writings, in their reasoning and intheir discussions. In the three years of the medium course the students studied Psychology, as a

discipline, and the knowledge of History and of History of the Religion were fundamental to move

forward in that matter.

Icons

The adults' religious practice social limited to an encounter in the first day of every year,

with the children's presence, what happened in front of the palace, in the main square of Fringe,

outdoors, because there were not temples in the country. The ceremony was driven by the baptizer

reverend, an adult that was chosen at the square, in an of those encounters, among the ones that had

a son, or a daughter, already baptized, and he exercised the position for six years, not havinghimself as a successor. In that encounter, Cecilia, the musicologist, always accompanied with the

piano the religious songs of the tradition of the island. The baptism was accomplished at the own



house of the baptizing, when he commemorated the party of two year-old birthday, and in the

thirteen year-old birthday the party of the confirmation was made. In the occasion of the baptism,

the reverend blessed the union of the child's parents.

Besides the social event in the first day of the year, the adults were reminded, in the

reverend's sermon, on that day, to pronounce his daily prayer. When child, every citizen repeated

Our Father daily, without the final sentence 'don't lead us to fall in temptation, but you liberate us of

the evil', because, according to the teachings of Auro, that sentence doesn't consist of the originalversion of the prayer. The explanation is that Jesus of Nazareth would not teach his disciples to

repeat every day a sentence with three ideas so negatives as 'to fall', 'temptation' and 'evil'. In the

adolescence, each citizen was able to, if he wanted, to compose his own prayer, to be repeated daily,

but that composition would have to be built once in a lifetime. Who didn't want to create his prayer,

he continued to repeat Our Father, which should not be forgotten, because it was with this prayer

that they finished the annual encounters in the square.

The understanding in the country, after the war of the oranges and lemons, was that adults

had to avoid the practice of the religion in public, other than to instruct the children. That encounter

of the first day of the year was an exception, and in it the reverend always called attention for that

habit, that he affirmed to be psychologically very healthy, informing that the next united religious

ceremony would happen in one year. Unlike the one that one could think, the respect for the sacredthings increased, after such a convention to have been instituted in the island. The portraits of the

pious people of the past were worshipped, in pictures called icons, but the statues, sacred or laic,

were forbidden completely. Each family worshipped their ancestors as saints, and they maintained

icons of them beside the saints of the religion. There were not icons of saints or ancestors out of the

family houses.

Horses

Certain day, Lucretius and John rode in the surroundings of the farm just for pastime.

Suddenly, an accompanied uproar of a lot of dust was seen by the front. They were free horses, of

very long, shining and robust manes, but with many marks in the leather. Lucretius got scared, but

John said that it was everything well and of that time it was not a mere vision, they were horses

even. With the disappearance of the families in the several areas of the country, the animals were

abandoned and the equines became wild horses. The marks in their pile were resulted of the life in

the forests, where they were sucked by vampire bats and also for they run among the bushes of the

closed forest, suffering scratches.

- Fortunately Lightning is well treaty, huh, father! -, Lucretius said.

- Yes, he never got without a mane or a hoof cut and whenever he needed a medicine he was

assisted.

Lightning was the horse of Lucretius, white and, as the name indicates, very fast. John's

horse was sorrel and he was called Rust.- Were Lightning and Rust never wild, certain, father?

- Never. Rust is son of a mare that I had, and Lightning I bought of Mark's father, that had a

farm.

- Father, what do make those birds pecking the loin of that horse? -, Lucretius asked when he

saw some horses that had stopped close to a fence.

- They are eating ticks and then they are making a cleaning in the horses' pile.

- Dr. Victor well could give horsemanship as part of the classes of Gymnastics, huh?

- The students have rhythmic gymnastics, military march, fanfare, swimming, basketball,

volleyball, saloon football, baseball, walk and marathon. I don't think so there is need to include

horsemanship.

- But it is important to learn to mount a horse...- Yes, I know. Therefore your friends are always welcome when they want to learn here in

the farm. It is not suitable one to learn to balance in the horse after the thirty year-old. He will fall of



the horse, literally.

Gymnastic

No that the students of Fringe found boring some school matter, but the most entertaining,

they said, was the class of Gymnastics. It was the only that was not supplied by Teacher Julianne,

being under the responsibility of Dr. Victor, because of his military training, acquired in course of the armed forces of the United States. As the prince, commander-in-chief, the princess and him, Dr.

Victor, were full members of the armed forces, in all of the moments, it remained to the other 17

citizens the position of military of the reservation, from the birth. Like this, the martial training,

including, in the third year of the medium teaching, the practice of the target practice, with pressure

rifle was part of their classes of Gymnastics in the official school of Fringe. There were not short

guns in the island, but, just in case, the arsenal of the army had its collection of long weapons,

which were always well taken care by Dr. Victor.

In the days of marathon, it was part of the circuit not only the inhabited part of Fringe, but

also the old town, a line in the south of the city where nobody didn't live more, once all of the

inhabitants were fastening in the north line whereas the population of the area decreased.

Victor explained to the students that the itinerary involving the old town was strategicaction, because all of them had to prepare to protect the patrimony of Fringe and of the whole island

and, same having been abandoned as homes, the constructions of that line had to be preserved and

respected by its historical value.

Victor ran with the students, and he took advantage to go explaining what had been each

mansion and each public building that went seeing in the course.

- What will happen, Dr. Victor, if all of the inhabitants of Fringe disappear? -, Lucretius

asked in one of those races while they traveled the streets of the old town and they changed the step

for walk on that moment.

- Good question, Lucretius - Dr. Victor answered -. The most probable is that this whole

country becomes a new Easter Island.

- That will be very sad, Renata commented.

- Yes - Dr. Victor said -, because in the Easter Island the old inhabitants only left there the

Moai statues, but we will leave our history in paper and in video, be at the central library of the

island, be in cloud.

- At least they will know how we are today, Lucretius consoled himself.

- It is, at least this, Dr. Victor agreed. But the maintenance of the population of Fringe

depends more on strategic action than of dictates of the nature now. The youth needs to have

conscience that cannot abandon the island.

- The teacher said that does many years nobody emigrates, Renata intervened.

- Truth, Dr. Victor agreed. The reduced number of inhabitants increased the union feeling.

When we have known that John dated a girl in London we got very concerned. It was then thatJulianne, who already had a little attraction for him, decided go study in the same university.

- This means - Lucretius deduced - that I am son of the affection not only of my mother for

my father, but also of my mother for the island.

- Well thought, Dr. Victor agreed. Your mother made a strategic decision when she decided

to study in London. I think she until thought about studying at another country, but when she saw

John's risk return not, she ran near him.

- And she found my father in a miserable situation, because he had lost the girlfriend for an

old boyfriend of her, Lucretius completed.

- Yes - Dr. Victor said -, and with that your mother didn't need any battle to take John of that

other girl.

- Fortunately, huh, Dr. Victor? -, Renata, his daughter and student, said.- Is it not true? - Dr. Victor agreed.

On that moment the smaller children, who came behind, had already reached the three that



talked ahead, and then they restarted the race step already in the direction of the turn to the north

line of Fringe.



5.

MACHINE

On that Saturday morning John arrived early to the farm, because he wanted soon to try the

tractor that he has won of the Japanese government.

The bill presented by John to obtain authorization of use of imported fuels was not

approved, but the fact arrived, somehow, to the knowledge of the authorities of Japan. There were

not embassies in Fringe, but the prince was always in contact with State departments of the most

influential countries. What mattered for John is that the machine arrived to the island and it solvedthe problem of the use of fuel, because, second they informed him, it worked with olive oil, article

that John produced there was a long time.

That tractor was a multifunctional machine, which could be used in the planting, in the

treatment of the plantation and in the crop.

Before arriving to the farm, John tried some buttons of the control panel. When passing for

the great sand dune he pressed the button about the registration 'gush'. The result was that great

amount of water was flowed of the part of the bottom of the vehicle, so that he had to increase the

speed for not having any problem of sulkiness of the machine, exactly in the first experience almost

well succeeded. He went straight ahead and, already in the farm, before using his new present in the

plantation, for precaution, he went to the forest contiguous to the area of the farming and there he

pressed the button 'gush', this time with more care, for not provoking a flood again.He didn't take advantage of being more careful. The flood came again of under the tractor,

but then something unexpected and completely unusual jumped before John's stared eyes.

Many of the trees that went receiving the water gushed by the machine went becoming

people. The largest ones, in adult people. The smallest ones, which would be trees in growth

process, in children and adolescents. In the end of the transformation process, the dry trees, the trees

of very fine trunk and the bushes continued there, intact.

That had been the vision of Lucretius. But while his son had observed a vision, certainly a

premonition, as John noticed now, John saw, in fact, trees transformed in people. All those people

were dressed, but dressed of green, the foliage of the tree from which each one appeared. They

seemed peaceful people and they talked in a very strange language, which seemed it was done of

grunts. The ones that looked towards John, they pretended that they didn't see him. For the size of the flooded area, John evaluated in the moment that more than 300 people were to his front,

gathering adults and children.



John drove the tractor until a higher area, which had not been flooded by the machine, and

he parked there. He walked until approaching of a man of robust gait, that John imagined to have

come from a very grown tree, and he tried something that he practiced when he lived in London. As

that people's language was very strange and he saw that would there be advantage in to talk with

them in the language of the island, he decided to try a telepathic communication.

- I am your friend and I propose that we sit down for a conversation, John said,

telepathically.- Demon! Go out from my front! -, the robust man screamed, running into John and cuffing

him with great aggressiveness.

With cost, John got to escape of the attack, running for the tractor. Already on the machine,

he switched it and he departed hurriedly, going back home.

In the way back John went thinking, reconstituting the last events. He noticed that the man

whom he talked got offended and he came to attack him. However, no one among the others seemed

to take knowledge of what was happening.

Tentative

At home, he asked for Lucretius to sit down with him for to have a different conversation.Lucretius could not imagine, but he noticed by the father's look that there was something out of the

common.

- Son, I think you were not dreaming when you said to have seen people there in the farm.

- How so, father? Did you also see those people?

- I had wanted it only this, John said. They were there, in the forest beside the farm, and the

worst is that I needed to leave fled.

- Were you threatened?

- I was attacked, cuffed, and I didn't react, because they were more than 300 people, and then

I feared that they joined to the one that attacked me, and there the thing could be very worse. I

climbed the tractor and to leave in the highest speed than I got.

- How many of them did attack you?

- Only one, but a very strong individual, and tall.

- Fortunately. And from nothing did those people appear?

- Not at all. They appeared from the trees. Trees are what became people. As you saw people

there, then you had a premonition. Therefore I know that I can tell you what happened there today.

- Even so, I don't think it is a thing easy to swallow, Lucretius said. Did the man that

attacked him make that for anything, without any reason?

- No. Seemingly they are very peaceful. And as they speak a very strange language, I went to

one among them and I tried a telepathic communication.

- And then the aggression has come?

- Yes. I only said that I was friend and that I wanted to talk...- And then did he cuff you?

- Yes, but he was swearing at me, calling me demon.

- Father, can we go there tomorrow? I want to see that people.

- I think we can take a risk. We can be on the tractor, without trying any telepathic

communication.

- You never have spoken to me about that ability.

- Once in London I has seen a book on the subject. I bought it. At that time I dated Karen

and I lent it to her, who also read. Using the techniques taught in the book, we got eminent in

talking without opening the mouth.

- But it was strange the man to have interacted when you spoke to him. How was possible to

him to understand you?- In telepathic conversation we can communicate independently of the language. It is an

experience that Karen and I did. Each receiver understands the message as if he was talking in his



own maternal language.

- Father, if those people were not trees again, our population grows in a spectacular way, in

just one day.

- We will see that tomorrow.

Walk

In Sunday, John and Lucretius woke up early and soon they went to the farm, anxious to

know if those people continued there.

While they proceeded, John told Lucretius that the 'arboreal' - they stipulated to call them

like this - didn't matter with what happened in turn, but they just wrapped up among them, in that

strange speech. In this way, if they maintained that same behavior, they could be visited, observed

and maybe until photographed, without presenting any resistance. The problem would come if one

tried to speak with them.

- For speaking in that, did you bring your photographic camera? -, John asked.

- Of course, father. Do you think I would forget to bring it in a moment like this?

- I only wanted to check. You can do many photographic stills, if they don't get angry.

- It is what I wait.Just after entering in the farm, John and Lucretius saw the arboreal ones in the same area

where they appeared, talking happily amongst themselves, laughing, walking for there and for here,

as if they were in a peripatetic class.

John has approximated the tractor to them and, as he waited, none of them gave attention to

the presence of the proprietors of the place. They continued in their amusement, talking and

laughing.

Lucretius then could take a lot of pictures, in several angles. They were more than one hour

in that work and in perfect observation of the gait, of the physiognomy and of that people's

behavior.

They went back home and decided that on that same Sunday they would go to the house of

Dr. Victor, to leave him informed of the situation. With father and son's testimony, and with the

photographic proofs, they knew that Dr. Victor would give credit to the report.

As John didn't try any communication with the arboreal ones on that day, he evaluated, with

the agreement of Lucretius, that the visit of the two to the farm on that day was a simple walk,

although a walk very different of the usual one. The great concern henceforth, the two ended, it

would be to find a middle of establishing communication with them without taking blow. How

would it be possible? They would have to think a lot.

And does the risk that these people run sleeping in the ground, amid the bushes? Certainly,

they don't know diseases, nor the effects of the bites of insects. John meditated that they really had

luck, because in the island there were not more poisonous serpents, which could attack at night. And

also because they were not in the winter, otherwise how the children would tolerate, done just dressin those leaves? Anyway, that situation should not persist.

Guild

In the schedule that would be the fourth class of the day, soon after the interval, on Monday,

the school had for tradition to promote the 'guild hour', when the students went to the auditorium,

and sometimes for the sports block, to practice activities of their own choice. The most common

were the soirées, of poems and songs, always after the section of official communications and

reports. On that Monday, especially, Lucretius, who was the president of the guild, got ready to

present to the friends the stunning newness: the pictures of the arboreal ones.

Lucretius was a president on that year because, for the statute of the entity, the annual presidency was occupied by the student of more age of the most advanced series. As Lucretius was

in that condition, it fit to him to exercise the position, once there were not in that phase students of



the medium course. The following year, however, he would have to pass the position for Renata,

because, still by the statute, the same student could not occupy the position in two following years.

As those two were the oldest of the school and they were in the most advanced series, they were

alternating the exercise of the presidency.

Lucretius sat down to the table, ahead of the auditorium, beside Renata, vice president, and

informed that he would have a newness that would change the way of life of Fringe. But he asked

for some time, so that the spirits got ready for the information.- I would like that Renata, that always plays guitar for us to sing together, she caught the

instrument and she sat down in the middle of the living room with us for us to sing some three

songs of the folklore of Fringe. After this, somebody reads some poem. In that height I will say

what have to tell you.

- His desire is an order, Mr. President, and then hands to the work, Renata said, already

removing the guitar of the case and heading to the arena in front of the table, free space between the

stage and the armchairs of the living room.

In that attic, a lot of times the students sat down in the ground, in lotus position, forming a

circle, to develop their artistic activities. It was like this on that day.

After the songs and after Virginia, of the fifth series, read a comic poem, which made the

group to laugh widely and to relax, Lucretius took the word and exposed what happened on theweekend. He had decided that he would not talk anything about the way as the arboreal ones

appeared, because that could lead to endless discussions and, worse than this, it would not arrive to

any place, because there was not explanation for what his father had witnessed, and that

explanation, if it comes to happen, will just come after some decades, and this with a lot of

optimism, as his father had said.

- My friends, we have more inhabitants now in the island - Lucretius began -. We are not

only the twenty residents with which we are accustomed.

- How so? Where are they? -, Renata was ahead.

- In the farm, Lucretius answered, already presenting the pictures, which he had printed at

home. The pictures I has took of them are here, he said.

- Wow! How much people! -, Virginia got scared.

- And where did they come from? -, Renata investigated.

- We don't know - Lucretius answered -. My father simply has seen them as soon as he

arrived to the farm and began to try the tractor that he has won of the Japan's government.

- And didn't they say of where come, nor what are they making there? -, Renata insisted.

- They speak a very strange language and we don't have as establishing communication with

them, Lucretius said. That is our great problem now, because if we don't talk with them we will be

two human groups to find ourselves odd inside the island. The most serious is that we are alone

twenty, and they are more than 300, in my father's evaluation.

Lucretius had also decided to omit the relative facts to the attempt of telepathic conversation

of John and the consequent suffered aggression, because that would be also very difficult of explaining to his friends.

- Can we go there, to know them? -, Andrews, a student of the third series, wanted to know.

- No, Andrews, is very risky, because we still don't know what they are - Lucretius

answered. When we can communicate with them, we will try to bring them to live at the several

empty houses of the north line of Fringe and also of the old town.

- And those children are so beautiful! -, Virginia wondered, still looking at the pictures.

- And soon they will be our friends - Lucretius said, hopeful. I don't know if my mother,

alone, will be able to supply classes for so many students.

- Your mother and my father, reminded Renata.

- Oh, yes, and also Dr. Victor, agreed Lucretius.



Manual

While the students lived that revelation in the school on that morning, John went to the

clinic of Dr. Victor, to also take to him the newness and to advise in relation to strategies. For

precaution, the situation involved military reasoning and preparations.

John nothing had hidden of Dr. Victor, informing him before that the one that he would tell

him it would seem crazy people's fantasy, but that he would not have any reason for inventions of this sort, nor they would be, him and Lucretius, being victims of some family hallucination.

The first recommendation of Dr. Victor, after hearing the report, was that John read with

attention the user's manual, that should have come with the machine. John told that in fact there was

a small box, with some small tools and with some papers, including a little book that should be the

manual, but that it was in Japanese. Anyway, he would seek it with more care as soon as he returned

home.

It was right that in the afternoon of that same day Dr. Victor would go with him to the farm.

With the knowledge of strategy and fight of Dr. Victor, maybe they would get to dominate one of

the arboreal ones and, then, to insist on the telepathic communication to try to pull some

information.

They would not carry any instrument to hurt the arboreal ones, and firearms were evenforbidden in the island, since the end of the war, except the ones of the reserved arsenal of the army,

but Dr. Victor would use, if necessary, some resources of martial arts.

As soon as he returned to the house, John opened the box with the papers and got a shock.

Under the manual in Japanese there was another little book, which was the same manual, but in

English. How didn't he see this before? It might only have been for the anxiety in using the tractor.

In less than half hour John read, carefully, the whole manual. Everything was there. The

explanation on the operation of the buttons, the preparation of the machine before to switch it and to

use it for each one of the foreseen ends, everything was very well explained.

John's great flaw went not to have installed the lateral screens in the exit of the water of

irrigation of the machine. Those screens were the sprinklers. Driving the tractor among the furrows

of plantation, the sprinklers were to irrigate the earth, and there were also instructions on how to

control the flow of the water. Nothing of that John knew before.

Switching on, as he did, the machine, without installing the sprinklers, the risk was of

provoking flood in turn, what was explained also in the manual. There was a mechanism in the

machine that attracted the steam of water of the atmosphere of the surroundings, liquefying it, and

that didn't have stop condition other than the use of the flow controls that were in the panel. Without

having had previous access to that information, John used the machine in a way absolutely reckless.

Fortunately the only noticed effect, besides the provoked floods, was this of bringing the arboreal

ones to the light, something very positive for an island with population about to extinction, unless

that people were revealed in such a hostile way that they came to force the twenty inhabitants to

abandon Fringe and to flee for the continent. Next days would have to bring an answer to that, Johnreasoned.

Lunch

Around two hours of the afternoon Dr. Victor arrived to John's house in accordance with

what was combined, for of there they go for the farm. Lucretius insisted to go together and he got to

be attended. In the tractor, there was place for the three ones.

In the road John told about the manual.

- Didn't I say? - Dr. Victor got exalted, pointing the finger for John's nose -. The Japanese are

very provident and they would not send the machine without a manual that you could read and to

understand.- In fact, I underestimated the teleological capacity of the Japanese in this case, John said.

In the entrance of the farm, John decided to drive in the direction contrary to that of the



forest where the arboreal ones should be, surrounding the property.

When passing for the plantation of olive trees, it was John's time to loosen curses.

- Imbecile! Delinquent!

- What happened, John? -, Dr. Victor asked.

- They almost put an end to my olives! -, John screamed. Look what they did! They took the

fruits, pulled branches!

- Poor! -, Dr. Victor said. They need to feed.More ahead, observing the cassava plantation, John saw that a great area had been

devastated. The arboreal ones pulled the roots of the plantation and they left the stems and the

leaves there on the ground, as if there a gale had past. That cassava plantation was resulted of a lot

of seedlings that John's father had imported from the continent and John treated it with a lot of

affection. Dr. Victor asked calm John, reminding that the arboreal ones also needed to eat, and that

they were many.

- We are not accustomed with so much people to feed, Dr. Victor said.

- It is, you are right, I need to get used to with the idea, John agreed.

When approximating the tractor of the area where the arboreal ones were, which was the

same where they had appeared, John was taken of a fort pity feeling.

The arboreal ones were eating, some was seat, other walking for the roundness. They wereeating raw cassava, just pulling the peel with their hands and ingesting the root dirties of earth,

because that was not being washed. They also had green olives, which they chewed, throwing the

kernel away.

While Lucretius photographed the arboreal ones, John and Dr. Victor observed them. Dr.

Victor asked John not to try the telepathic communication by the time, until they could study slowly

the behavior of those new inhabitants of the island. Lucretius, showing the viewfinder of the

camera, called John and Dr. Victor's attention for an about twelve year-old girl's face, that he found

of an peculiar beauty. His father and his teacher agreed.

- The leaves which they dress should be withered already, don't they, John? -, Dr. Victor

wanted to know.

- Yes - John answered -, but see that they are renewing the costume. Look at that lady, who is

gluing new leaves to the garment, using mistletoe of plants.

- I am seeing, Dr. Victor said. This means that they are laborious.

- A good sign, agreed John.

- And I also see that there are families with a son, but also families with two children.

- Great! -, John said. By what we can see, they are free from the genetic modification that

affected us.

- Other detail - Dr. Victor observed - is that the families use the same sort of leaf to dress.

Look at that mother with the daughter.

- It is true, John said.

- I think each family uses the leaf of the tree from which she appeared, Lucretius interfered.- Gee, it should be quite so! -, Dr. Victor agreed. But I need to admit to the two here that, if I

had any plausible explanation for those people's appearance in the island, I would never believe in

that history that they appeared of the trees.

- I imagine, John said.

- General, I would also have the same position in your place, Lucretius agreed, he who

always called Dr. Victor as doctor, but has decided to change the treatment this time.

- A general is, before everything, an observer of lands and indications, John affirmed.

- With certainty, Dr. Victor agreed.

- Some women are combing their hair, with chips of trees, Dr. Victor noticed.

- They worry about their aspect, what is also very good, John said.



Ring

After one and a half hour of observation of the behavior of the arboreal ones, Dr. Victor had

already esteemed their number, gathering adults and children, same the ones of lap: 418 people.

After announcing that number, he suggested to John that tried the telepathic contact. He suggested

that John chose a slim man, who was isolated of the group, obviously.

One of those men had gone to the close rivulet, to drink water. When he was returning, Johndecided to approach him. Very close him Dr. Victor was.

Again, John articulated friendly message, in front of the man.

- You are welcome to my farm, he said, telepathically.

- Crapulence! Excrement! -, the arboreal returned, also for telepathic message, already

jumping on John, cuffing him.

Dr. Victor intervened suddenly, but the arboreal, maybe already foreseeing the form of the

attack, immobilized the doctor and continued attacking John, now with kicks. John faced the

attacks, trying to liberate Dr. Victor, but he didn't obtain success, until Lucretius decided to switch

the tractor and, in low speed, to leave towards the three men.

When the arboreal tried to escape of being run over by the machine, glued to Dr. Victor,

John got to pull the general and to free him, running with him upward of the tractor. With thevehicle in movement, John took the place of Lucretius in the steering wheel of the vehicle and he

abandoned the place. They decided to return their houses, in Fringe.

- I ask that you excuse me for the risk that you ran when I switched the machine and I went

upward of the fight, Lucretius asked.

- Don't worry, Lucretius, answered Dr. Victor. It was a good decision, in spite of risky.

- I was afraid of not getting to control the speed - Lucretius said -, but when my father left

the manual on top of the table, at home, I read on that part of how to switch and to drive the

machine. I think I learned.

- It seems that yes, John said. But it is better to avoid, except in an emergency, as it was

some minutes ago.



6.

CASSAVA

Tuesday morning, in the school, Lucretius told Julianne, already in the beginning of the first

class, what he had seen in the farm, with the lunge of the arboreal ones in the field of olive trees, the

crop that they did in the cassava farming and, in the end, the fight of his father and of Dr. Victor

against one of the arboreal ones who had gone to drink water in the rivulet.

Julianne then remembered certain legends on the origin of the cassava currents among the

Indians from South America, Central America and Mexico. She asked the students if they wanted to

know those legends. Before the positive answer, she assigned Virginia, of the fifth series, to

research the legends and to present them the following day to the friends. That could be during the

class of Geography, because the students were very advanced in that content.

In that height, John was arriving to the farm with his tractor, because he had decided to goalone in that morning for working finally in the irrigation of recent plantations that he had done.

John fit in the sprinklers in the lateral of the tractor and began to irrigate his lands. He

thought in as that creation of the Japanese was useful for dry areas.

In the beginning, the arboreal ones, who never worried about the arrival or the departure of

the owner of the farm, were there in their area of appearance, involved, as always, in their own

conversations, comprehensible only for them same. But little by little they began approaching,

slowly. John noticed that the smell of the burned olive oil moved with the stomach. It gave the

impression that somebody was preparing lunch in the roundness and this brought appetite.

The arboreal ones approached the place where John was working, but they didn't invade the

farming. They got parked, observing the machine to go and to come.

Around 10:30 of the morning, they began to return to they camp outdoors. From a distanceJohn could see that they began to eat the cassavas that they had there in stock.

John wondered on because they were eating lunch so early. Therefore he noticed that the

burned olive oil in the tractor is what had wakened up in them the will of advancing the meal.

Because John himself no longer was tolerating of hunger. He worked a little more and, before 11 h,

he went back to the city, to prepare a succulent lunch.

Legends

On Wednesday, as foreseen, in the beginning of the Geography's class Julianne asked

Virginia on the research of the indigenous legends. Virginia said that she has had access to several

histories, but that she selected the two that she found more representative of the culture of those

people. She showed Julianne the paper in that she brought printed the material that she collected and

then Julianne suggested that she read in first place the legend of the Guarani people.



Virginia returned to her place and sat down. Therefore, Julianne asked her to stand up and

read.

The first legend that Virginia read was the one that proceeds.

"The girl Atioloh and the boy Zokooieh were children of Zatiamare and his wife Kokoteroh.

The father, Zatiamare, gave a lot of attention Zokooieh, but he despised Atioloh. When he needed to

speak with her, he made this only for whistles. He never caught her in the lap, nor balanced her in

the net. To the measure in that she went growing and taking conscience of that paternal contempt,the girl Atioloh asked the mother to bury her alive, because she didn't want more to live. Zokooieh,

obviously, refused to assist her. But the girl continued insisting, for following months, until the

mother gave in. She first buried her in the savanna, where there was a lot of heat and the girl didn't

accept to be in that place. Then she buried her in the field, also a hot place, and again the girl

complained. Finally, she buried her in the forest, a fresh place, of the pleasure of Atioloh, who asked

her mother not to look back when she heard a scream. Little later, returning of there, the mother

heard the scream. She ran to the place where had buried the daughter and she saw a big and leafy

bush, that soon shrank, getting low. The mother then went back there the following days to water

the plant, until it grew. Removing the roots of the plant of the soil later she discovered that it was

eatable, and like this the cassava appeared. For the history of the Indians, therefore, the cassava was

a person who became plant".That was a history of the natives of the area of the Swampland. Now Virginia would read the

other legend, which was of the Tupi Indians of the north of the Amazonian. Julianne explained

before that, by her vision, the second legend seemed to have suffered influence of the culture of the

old world.

"In certain time the single daughter of the boss of the village appeared pregnant. Being

dishonored, he wanted to know who was the child's father. Without an answer, it he punished the

daughter hardly for several days, but always receiving the answer that there was no man in her life.

Thinking she lied, in certain moment, at night, the boss decided to kill her. When he slept, he had a

dream in that a man of very clear skin appeared telling him that his daughter was innocent and that,

in fact, she had not had relationship with any man. The father forgave the daughter and after nine

months a beautiful girl, of white skin, was born. As the news ran for the neighboring nations, many

ones came to visit the child, curious for knowing somebody of such a different ethnic group. The

child received the name of Mani and she was very precocious, speaking and walking a lot before the

expected moment. Without any apparent disease and without any pain, after thirteen moons the girl

died, having been buried inside of the own house. Daily her grave was watered with the mother's

tears, that didn't accept the loss. With the time, a plant, which the Indians ignored, was born there,

what did with that they didn't pull it. After it having grown, the plant gave flowers and fruits. Birds

that ate their fruits got intoxicated and that was a phenomenon that those Indians didn't know. With

this they started to worship that plant. One day the earth under the plant split and the roots appeared,

in which the Indians recognized the body of the small Mani, because the pulp was as white as the

girl's skin. They saw that those roots were eatable and like this they learned how to use them asfood. The South American name of the cassava, 'mandioca', comes from Mani, the girl's name, and

'oca', which means house, in Tupi-Guarani. The scientific name of the cassava is 'manihot

utilissima'".

All of the students liked the two histories and they applauded Virginia in the end. Lucretius

began to think: as the two legends showed the cassava appearing of people, it would not be difficult

hereafter to convince the inhabitants of Fringe that the arboreal ones are people that appeared of

trees. The problem is that all would say that those histories of the Indians were just legends and that

they could not be used as base to justify the history of the appearance of the arboreal ones.

Authorities

Thursday morning John went to the Parliament, to tell Prime Minister Luke on the last

events. In agreement with the prime minister's opinion, he could communicate the facts also to the



prince and the princess. He didn't intend to tell the authorities on the way as he had seen the

arboreal ones appear, because he could be seen as crazy. He would just say that, arriving to the

farm, at a given moment he noticed that people there. With Dr. Victor it was different, because,

besides working with Julianne, in the school, he was John's largest friend in Fringe.

John would like to have established friendly communication with the arboreal ones first,

before taking the news to the Parliament and the Palace, but, given the failure of the attempts, he

saw that it was already hour of informing the official leaders of the island.Luke's reaction was of concern. For him, the correct would be to bind the arboreal ones, to

tie them and to bring them all to Fringe, for then to try to civilize them.

John disagreed vehemently of this proposal. He argued that the damage with the

consumption of the cassava and of the olives belonged to him and that the new inhabitants of the

island appeared before in his farm and from there they had not left. Besides, they were shown as

very peaceful people, just reacting when they were approached.

John also omitted that the approach that was doing was of the telepathic type.

After a lot of conversation, he got to convince Luke that the strategy of the contact had to be

under the responsibility of him and of the general. Only in case of some disaster, what didn't seem

imminent, the other inhabitants of Fringe could enter in the subject.

The larger reason of the visit of John to the prime minister on that moment was to alert himon the need to enlarge the import of supplies next days, because now they were not only twenty

people in the island, but 438. A good stock of woven should be made arrangements also. Luke

agreed that he should treat of that emergency. He would speak soon to Dr. Victor, who, with his

boat, could go until the continent and to get provisions for next days, at least.

Starting from this, they went to tell about the newness to the prince and the princess.

As it was of waiting, the chief of State and his consort got very surprised with the news.

After he to have recovered of the shock, the prince left John and Luke talking with the

princess and went for a walk in the gardens of the palace, to put the ideas in the place, as he

explained to the three ones.

Ten minutes later he returned with a request: he wanted to go with John until the farm, to

know the new subjects, because John had statement that they were peaceful, since one didn't move

with them.

- Your Highness decided, then we go - John said -, but I admit that I had not thought about

that before.

- I also want to know that people, the princess said.

- As Your Highnesses know, my tractor has seat for three - John said. Then we can go, the

three, yes.

- The prime minister will expect another opportunity, Luke said, laughing.

- Each thing in its time, Excellency, confirmed John.

Visit

As they had combined of leaving at three after noon, on that schedule John passed the palace

with his tractor and he made to arise in it the head couple of the island. The prince was of suit and

tie, while the princess dressed a pomp clothes. As John demonstrated surprise for the couple's

costume, the prince explained that a first appearance front to the new inhabitants would have to be

done to character, so that they knew how the political system worked.

When arriving to the farm, how the prince had foreseen, the arboreal ones were not

disturbed, but showed admiration for the couple. Women and children didn't remove the princess's

eyes, what left her very happy, understanding this attitude as a tacit demonstration of welcomes.

John said the couple that the arboreal ones were always shown indifferent in the previous

visits, same when he took to the farm Dr. Victor. It was as if nobody different from them was going by the place.

The princess wanted to go down and to walk among the arboreal ones, but John and the



prince considered that this would be premature. It would be best to get in the vehicle and to take

advantage of the acceptance signs that came from that people.

John drove the tractor for other areas of the farm, to present the plantations to the chief of

State and his wife. After half hour of walk, they decided to return to the place where the arboreal

ones were, because the princess wanted to appreciate them once again.

John informed that he would take a risk to go down and to walk among the new subjects.

Before, he explained to the prince like he could switch and drive the tractor, in the case of happening some problem with the owner of the tractor.

He went down and, with very care for not doing any telepathic unaware communication with

the arboreal ones, walked among them, for there and for here, and, as he already waited, he didn't

wake up any attention. It was as if no man dressed with woven was walking over there.

At the end of the accounts, the attentions and the glances were gone back to the princess and

her pomp dress. The men, these also looked at the first lady's dress, but they worried in to analyze

and to admire the yellow tie of the prince.

Meanwhile, John could calmly observe the games and the children's conversations, the

faggot games among the men and even the courtship between the boys and the girls.

The prince, after all, had other tasks and he needed to return to palace. He made sign to John

asking that he returned to the machine so that they could leave in turn to the city.In the palace, Luke waited for him and he then asked the premier to summon an

extraordinary session of the Parliament for the afternoon of the following day, Friday, so that he

could make the official communication to the city giving account of the new demographic counting

of the island, that became of 438 inhabitants.

Message

On that Friday, all of the inhabitants of Fringe attended the parliament, to hear the prince. He

began his speech saying that he had made contact with the new inhabitants, who found camped

beside John's farm. He said to have been very animated with the reception that the arboreal ones

gave to him and the princess, because that indicated that, as soon as one could establish

communication with the new subjects, they would be quickly integrated to the life of Fringe.

The prince proposed that the new inhabitants left of being called of arboreal as soon as they

could dress common woven, because the name 'arboreal' was related to the fact that their garments

were made of leaves of trees. The prince had made independently that deduction that the name came

from the leaves, without knowing that, in reality, the new subjects came from trees and that it was

for this that Lucretius had given that name to them. As don't they used to displease to the prince, all

of them agreed with the proposal, shaking theis heads positively. He still explained that some

species of future discrimination could grow in the case of the denomination 'arboreal' was not

abandoned, and this was his concern.

- My wife found them a very amusing people, and I agree with her - the prince said,completing his communication.

- And none of us should harass them, the princess said.

The couple was very acclaimed after the speech. In the sequence, John lifted the arm, asking

a word, and he said that, even Dr. Victor, who is general, knew how to maintain the calm, without

hitting back the attack, when of the unsuccessful attempt that he and the doctor did to establish

verbal contact with the new inhabitants. New palms broke out in the plenary session, driven now to

Dr. Victor.

At the end of the session, Luke asked John not to forget that in the next departure to the

farm, he, Luke, would go together.

Understanding

It was done so. On Saturday in the morning, John and Luke climbed the tractor to go to the



farm, but they went by the Luke's house, taking him to know the arboreal ones.

Arriving to the camp, in the farm, John and Luke got off the machine and they left Lucretius

there, taking care of the equipment.

How before, John walked slowly among the arboreal ones, always followed for Luke,

without the new subjects gave importance to his presence in the place. John said Luke that, while he

didn't think about some new approach method, he would not try to communicate with that people.

After walking in the camp enough time so that Luke knew well the new inhabitants of the place, the two went down until the rivulet, to drink water, because that stream was of drinking

water, and in it small fishes lived. John expressed Luke in his moment fear that a storm came at

night, because that people were camped without huts, sleeping to the dew.

Arriving to the fountain in the stream, the place where John used take his horses to drink

water, when they were not at the pasture, which was below, they saw that a girl was returning. John

noticed that she was the girl that Lucretius found impressive in the picture.

When they returned, they saw that she was stopped in front of the tractor, analyzing the

machine. On that moment, Lucretius went down and he walked towards the girl.

John was very concerned. He had not tried any communication with women, and now

Lucretius seemed that would try to approach the girl.

The one that John and Luke saw, however, it was something with that they didn't count. Thegirl smiled at Lucretius and, soon afterwards, she ran for him and hugged him. Then, both sat down

in the ground and Lucretius began to do drawings in the soil, with a piece of faggot.

John and Luke got stopped, with fear of destroying that encounter and that understanding, so

dreamed by him and, maybe stiller, by Lucretius.

Finally, Lucretius noticed that his father and the premier were observing the interaction

between him and the girl and, on that moment, both got up. In the sequence, they hugged each other

and the girl left, going towards the camp.

John and Luke approached Lucretius.

- What miracle was that, son? -, John asked.

- Later I will tell you, Lucretius answered.

- Do you have courage of trying the same contact type there with that boy? -, John asked,

pointing discreetly for the slim boy that before had attacked him, when he came to the farm with Dr.

Victor.

- I think I can take a risk, but you get close and of warning, Lucretius said.

The three walked in the boy's direction and Lucretius advanced the step when they

approached him. They saw, finally, the repeated girl's same attitude in the man's gestures. He smiled

at Lucretius and opened his arms, inviting to a hug.

The two walked side by side for about 50 meters and then they shook hands, saying good-

bye. Lucretius returned to the place where John and Luke had got.

- You discovered the key, son, John said.

- Yes, I think I discovered, Lucretius confirmed.- What is this mystery? -, Luke wanted to know.

- I cannot tell now, but you will know more ahead, Lucretius answered.



7.

TRAPEZE

So invigorated John were with the new reality that wanted to return soon to Fringe, not only

to have a conversation alone with Lucretius, but also to begin the planning of the new actions

starting from there.

When arising in the tractor and following the way back, John and Luke observed Lucretius

to receive smiles of the arboreal ones and promising hands, which should mean 'good bye'.

- And now Your Excellency should care to prepare Fringe and the old inhabitants to receive

their new neighbors, John said Luke.- Without a doubt, Luke said. It is my more urgent task from now on.

Leaving Luke to his house, John and Lucretius followed talking and John wanted to know

immediately which was the technique used by the son to obtain that result. Lucretius asked the

father for calm, saying that as soon as they were at home, drinking a cold juice, he would tell the

secret.

After they sit down, already in the living room, drinking an apple juice, Lucretius

pronounced.

- Do you remember that you had spoken to me that the telepathy depended on a certain

specific mental effort on the part of who wanted to do the communication?

- I remind, yes, John answered. I remind that I spoke to you this.

- Because yesterday I made an experience, Lucretius said. I thought I could also get.- How was it? -, John asked.

- In the school yesterday, I was behind Renata, Lucretius said. Then I made a mental

communication, for seeing if my hypothesis of the mental effort would work. I screamed mentally:

"Be careful"! Then she was turned and said: "Something"? I answered: "Nothing, I didn't say

anything"!

- Then you got it, John said. You made the test and you proved.

- Yes, Lucretius said, but I already came trying before without obtaining any success. When I

thought I had already noticed which was the base of the effort that should be done, then I tried with

Renata. And it worked.

- Great! -. John commemorated. But when I said to the arboreal ones that my approach was

friendly, blow is what came there. What sort of message did you transmit to the girl?- I knew that should not say that was friend, or thing like this, Lucretius said.

- Then what you did?



- I tried something that my mother said that is universal language and that doesn't involve

judgement of value, Lucretius answered.

- Music?

- No, father. Mathematical. More specifically, Geometry.

- What? How was it?

- With the girl I articulated the proposition: "The sum of the angles of the triangle is equal to

180 degrees, two right angles".- Then she smiled and came to hug you.

- As you saw, Lucretius said.

- And to the slim boy, what did you say?

- I looked at him and I transmitted: "The area of the trapeze is equal to the height multiplied

by the half of the sum of the larger base with the smaller base."

- And to those what were promising their hands, what did you say?

- I returned to the theorem of the sum of the angles of the triangle, which is a simpler

sentence. I just said: "The sum of the angles of the triangle is equal to 180 degrees."

- After the girl hugged you, the two were seating, talking mentally. What did both you treat?

- I tried to say other things, Lucretius said. For instance, I drew our house and I told her that

we slept in a place like this and that they could also have their houses.- Did you ask the girl's name?

- Yes, sir. Her name is Jendi, with an oxytone "i", as in 'free'. And I also said my name to her.

- And about the slim boy?

- His name is Galiel.

- Then the problem is the approach. After the universal sentence, we can deal with any

matter with them.

- I imagine that yes, Lucretius agreed.

- Tomorrow, Sunday, we go there, well very early, because we are going on foot. We will try

to bring them all for the city, walking.

- Yes, I agree - Lucretius said. We go, yes.

Sunday

After the walk until the farm, John and Lucretius went to the camp and they combined that

John would make the experience of the communication with an arboreal one who was close. He

chose one of them and began a good dialogue. After the "geometric" greeting and of some free

conversations, he asked who was the more senior among them. The speaker pointed the man that

cuffed John in the first approach attempt. John went until the man and communicated the

Pythagorean Theorem: "In a right triangle, the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the

cathetus."

The man that before had cuffed him without pity, now smiled and ran to hug him.John said him that, as he was the dean of the group, he would do of him the spokesperson of

the messages that he would need to transmit to the new inhabitants of the island. The man, whom

name was Teval, agreed, and then John asked that he transmitted to the others that all were invited

to accompany them to Fringe, where they would have homes to their disposition. Meanwhile,

Lucretius went being hugged by the adolescents, by the children and by for the adults.

The man climbed a trunk of trees and transmitted to the others the John's proposal, speaking

in that strange language of the arboreal ones. As dean, was not difficult to obtain the approval of

whole the group.

Soon afterwards, all headed for the highway, following the steps of John, Lucretius and

Teval, who went ahead proceeding.

When arriving to the central square of Fringe, prince Stephen, princess Lucy and premier Luke were put to, seating in an of the marble banks and talking about the future of Fringe, now that

they would have a much larger population than the one of the last years.



They got up and received the arboreal ones, who went making reverence as passing ahead of

the couple of leaders, following orientation given by John to Teval, who transmitted the information

to the others.

- Didn't I say? -, the princess affirmed, as soon as all the arboreal ones came. Besides

amusing, they are all very educated!

- They were well guided by John - Luke told -, and they learn the things with a lot of speed.

- We will learn their language and also to teach them ours, the prince said.- I was thinking about that also, Luke agreed.

While the leaders spoke, Lucretius was already seating in an of the banks of the square

beside Jendi, learning terms of the language of the arboreal ones and teaching the equivalent words

of the traditional language of the island.

Using sheets and towels brought by the women of Fringe, Marina had sewn a great number

of gowns to dress the new neighbors. The gowns were sewn in lightning time, because it was an

emergency situation and all the adults and adolescents got their garments. For the children, Marina

prepared ribbons of colored fabrics, which were tied to the body, of the waist down. They deserved

more complete clothes and well done, but that would happen as soon as Marina could use the

fabrics that Dr. Victor had been of bringing of the continent. The doctor, in fact, was the only

inhabitant absent of the great party that would take place on this Sunday as reception to the arborealones. Of course, as soon as they dressed with the prepared gowns for Marina, they stopped being

arboreal, as it was desire of the prince.

After the new neighbors got dressed with the gowns, the women of Fringe went bringing to

the square pizzas, pies, hors d'oeuvre, fried cassava, cheeses, juices and several fruits. While some

prepared the victuals, another went bringing them, aided by the adolescents.

Luke observed that the new neighbors sopped pizzas, salty and cheeses with olive oil. He

never sees people so appraiser of olives and yours derived, the olive oil.

He asked John to invite Teval to participate in the Parliament, representing the new

neighbors. The next session would make a voting to approve the proposal, accomplishing him as an

effective member. Consulted, Teval proposed that also Galiel was invited, to represent the young

line of the group. He was almost sure that Galiel would accept the proposal, because they were a lot

of friends, but he would need to consult him, anyway.

It was part of Luke's plans to create a representative system in Fringe next years, because the

number of inhabitants now would allow this. He talked about this with John, who transmitted the

idea to Teval. He also said that it would be important to create an official party, which was able to

be divided in three sub-lemmas more ahead, so that the election could happen by the proportional

system, as in the European Union. And he was already planning for the next years the turn of a

representative to the World Assembly of the United Nations, something that was not taking place

there were many decades.

Names

Little later, Teval talked with Galiel and asked that the adolescents and youths talked

amongst themselves. He informed that he had already accepted the invitation to participate in the

Parliament and he asked if there was some restriction. As nobody was opposed to his own

indication, after also receiving the youths' approval for Galiel, he took the news to John and Luke.

Just an adolescent, Samiol, had manifested disagreement as for the participation of Galiel, thinking

just Teval should accept the incumbency. Samiol, as a due vote, was convinced to give in and to

accept, with courtesy, the position of the other ones.

Next days, Cecilia, the notary public, had a long work from to do the birth registrations of all

the new inhabitants. When they was informed that they would need a second name, a family name,

they decided amongst themselves that each family would choose the name of a tree or of a bush aslast name. They didn't know about the piece of advice of the prince, so that they were not called

arboreal, in way to avoid future discriminations. But Cecilia judged pertinent his request and, before



emitting the first birth certificate, she took the case to the Parliament, which approved the demand.

The last names of the inhabitants of Fringe were all derived of names of professions, as Potter,

Blacksmith, Shepherd and other, then they didn't see problem in registering the new neighbors with

names of trees.

On Tuesday in the morning she began to emit the documents. As most of the families wanted

the last name Olivier, Cecilia informed that she would make a draw among the family mothers. The

winning was Mezani, that had two children and she was wife of Remiul, so that the first registeredcouple took the names Mezani Olivier and Remiul Olivier. Since then, other families went choosing

last name and the wife of Teval chose Cherry. The mother of Galiel preferred to adopt the last name

Grapevine and the one of Jendi, Tamarind. Names as Pine, Pear, Sequoia, Chestnut, Oak, Imburana,

Lemon, Mango, Palm, Timber, Cedar and many others were chosen. All those names were among

the options presented to the group by Cecilia, that insisted on to do a research and to bring a

relationship of varied names, in way to assist all of the families. The mother of Samiol, Inuca, chose

the last name of Thorn.

Hypotheses

In the middle of the following week, Dr. Victor had come back from the continent and hewas in visit to John's house, to know the news.

John told him about the key of the communication, that Lucretius had discovered, on the

new neighbors' arrival to the city and also on the party. He told about how he found strange as that

people appreciated olive oil.

Dr. Victor then has posed an explanation for that people's appearance in the farm. With water

and flood, those trees were accustomed, and it was not by this that they became people. But when

John arrived with the machine worked by olive oil and it flooded the place, all of the 'enchanted'

people that were there were wakened up for the human life, by the simple aroma of the olive oil

being burned.

In the conversation, Lucretius said that he noticed that all the masculine names finish with

the letter 'L', and that the feminine ones finish in vowel, being that the gender distinction in the

names. He also told that he read certain time that Pythagoras didn't allow their disciples to eat bean,

because he thought the beans could become people.

- Forsake of this were you inspired to use the geometric sentences in the communication

with them? -, Dr. Victor wanted to know.

- Unconsciously, maybe yes, Lucretius said. I just thought about the subject of the logic and

of the universal language, but, as I knew that history of the beans, maybe that has influenced me,

yes.

- For next years - Dr. Victor said - we will continue to investigate and to try to solve the

mystery of our new neighbors' appearance, but hardly we will arrive to a satisfactory explanation.

- Oh, yes, we will have to think a lot, John agreed.The following months, the old arboreal ones integrated quickly into the life of the island,

learning professions, learning the language of Fringe and beginning in the literacy. In the years that

came for the front, the inhabitants of Fringe wooed those people, married them and generated

children. In the coexistence with the new neighbors, the inhabitants of Fringe noticed that they were

feeding a great anguish, which was that of the perspective of their people's disappearance and of

their culture. The entrance of the former-arboreal ones brought to those inhabitants a happiness that

they didn't imagine that could exist.

Documents

The Flooding Machine