"Robert F. Young - The First Sweet Sleep of Night" - читать интересную книгу автора (Young Robert F)

the
first
sweet
sleep
of
night
by Robert F. Young

The strange, bewildering fragrance from the Flower Islands was
as mysterious as life itself. And with it came desireтАФand death.

So lyrical in mood and so rich in poetic imagery is this astounding fictional excursion into the
still largely unexplored realm of comparative ethnology that the profundity of its underlying
premise may at first escape you. But we urge that you ponder that premise long and earnestly, for
in a kind of glorified nutshell Robert Young has encapsulated the entire tragedy of human life on
this planet, and shown us exactly what guilt feelings in juxtaposition with a cultural complex can
do to human nature throughout Time and Space.

WHEN SHE WAS seventeen Millicent Clarke had picked up the thin volume of her young life
entitled, "Men," closed it firmly, and placed it on the mental shelf labeled "Books I'll Never Read Again."
At the time it had seemed a logical classification, but several years later when she was majoring in
anthropology she found that she had to take the book down again now and then for purposes of
reference. As a feeling of frustration usually accompanied the act, it was not surprising that she came
eventually to specialize in matrilineal societies. The more markedly matrilineal they were, the better she
liked them.
The present society was positively fascinating. Not only was it markedly matrilineal, but it subsisted
on an Elysian land mass the equal of which Millicent had never seen in any of her previous planetary field
work.
Topographically, the land mass was a paradox. In one sense it was an imposing continent, and in
another it was nothing more than an emaciated island. It was more than a thousand miles in length, and it
rose out of the Sapphire Sea on a line with the Fomalhaut 4 equator; but for all its length, its width never
exceeded five miles.
The north coast was scalloped with white beaches. Hills began modestly as, sand dunes, acquired
trees and grass farther inland, rose ever and ever higher and finally dropped, in abrupt cliffs, to the line of
jagged rocks that comprised the south coast. The wind crashed the sea against the rocks from morning to
night. It had never slackened nor changed direction during the two Terran months since the subsidiary
camp had been established, and Millicent had begun to doubt if it ever would.
However, Millicent liked the windless days of the leeward side. The temperature was consistently
comfortable, so there wasn't really any need for a wind, though occasionally a fragment of moving air did
surmount the barrier of the cliffs and come tiptoeing over the grassy hills to the encampment. One came
up behind her now and caressed her short brown hair.
But she hardly noticed. She was too engrossed with her journal ...
 I am beginning to think (she wrote) that we have stumbled upon a pure matrilineal society,
although Dr. Vestor does not agree with me, and Dr. Hanley made the comment, in his usual
sarcastic manner, that I have arrived at a typically subjective conclusion, referring no doubt to
my absorption with my chosen specialty.
Nevertheless, postulating a pure susu throws at least some light upon our present impasse. If
the present susu is undiluted, as I think, it is unprecedented in our experience and our inability to
comprehend it stems largely from our tendeficy to use previous diluted susus for criteriaтАФ