UTOPIA by SIR THOMAS MORE

BOOK II

THE island of Utopia is in the middle 200 miles broad, and holds
almost at the same breadth over a great part of it; but it grows
narrower toward both ends. Its figure is not unlike a crescent:
between its horns, the sea comes in eleven miles broad, and
spreads itself into a great bay, which is environed with land to
the compass of about 500 miles, and is well secured from winds. In
this bay there is no great current; the whole coast is, as it
were, one continued harbor, which gives all that live in the
island great convenience for mutual commerce; but the entry into
the bay, occasioned by rocks on the one hand, and shallows on the
other, is very dangerous. In the middle of it there is one single
rock which appears above water, and may therefore be easily
avoided, and on the top of it there is a tower in which a garrison
is kept; the other rocks lie under water, and are very dangerous.
The channel is known only to the natives, so that if any stranger
should enter into the bay, without one of their pilots, he would
run great danger of shipwreck; for even they themselves could not
pass it safe, if some marks that are on the coast did not direct
their way; and if these should be but a little shifted, any fleet
that might come against them, how great soever it were, would be
certainly lost.

On the other side of the island there are likewise many harbors;
and the coast is so fortified, both by nature and art, that a
small number of men can hinder the descent of a great army. But
they report (and there remain good marks of it to make it
credible) that this was no island at first, but a part of the
continent. Utopus that conquered it (whose name it still carries,
for Abraxa was its first name) brought the rude and uncivilized
inhabitants into such a good government, and to that measure of
politeness, that they now far excel all the rest of mankind;
having soon subdued them, he designed to separate them from the
continent, and to bring the sea quite round them. To accomplish
this, he ordered a deep channel to be dug fifteen miles long; and
that the natives might not think he treated them like slaves, he
not only forced the inhabitants, but also his own soldiers, to
labor in carrying it on. As he set a vast number of men to work,
he beyond all men's expectations brought it to a speedy
conclusion. And his neighbors who at first laughed at the folly of
the undertaking, no sooner saw it brought to perfection than they
were struck with admiration and terror.

There are fifty-four cities in the island, all large and well
built: the manners, customs, and laws of which are the same, and
they are all contrived as near in the same manner as the ground on
which they stand will allow. The nearest lie at least twenty-four
miles distance from one another, and the most remote are not so
far distant but that a man can go on foot in one day from it to
that which lies next it. Every city sends three of its wisest
Senators once a year to Amaurot, to consult about their common
concerns; for that is the chief town of the island, being situated
near the centre of it, so that it is the most convenient place for
their assemblies. The jurisdiction of every city extends at least
twenty miles: and where the towns lie wider, they have much more
ground: no town desires to enlarge its bounds, for the people
consider themselves rather as tenants than landlords. They have
built over all the country, farmhouses for husbandmen, which are
well contrived, and are furnished with all things necessary for
country labor. Inhabitants are sent by turns from the cities to
dwell in them; no country family has fewer than forty men and
women in it, besides two slaves. There is a master and a mistress
set over every family; and over thirty families there is a
magistrate.

Every year twenty of this family come back to the town, after they
have stayed two years in the country; and in their room there are
other twenty sent from the town, that they may learn country work
from those that have been already one year in the country, as they
must teach those that come to them the next from the town. By this
means such as dwell in those country farms are never ignorant of
agriculture, and so commit no errors, which might otherwise be
fatal, and bring them under a scarcity of corn. But though there
is every year such a shifting of the husbandmen, to prevent any
man being forced against his will to follow that hard course of
life too long, yet many among them take such pleasure in it that
they desire leave to continue in it many years. These husbandmen
till the ground, breed cattle, hew wood, and convey it to the
towns, either by land or water, as is most convenient. They breed
an infinite multitude of chickens in a very curious manner; for
the hens do not sit and hatch them, but vast numbers of eggs are
laid in a gentle and equal heat, in order to be hatched, and they
are no sooner out of the shell, and able to stir about, but they
seem to consider those that feed them as their mothers, and follow
them as other chickens do the hen that hatched them.

They breed very few horses, but those they have are full of
mettle, and are kept only for exercising their youth in the art of
sitting and riding them; for they do not put them to any work,
either of ploughing or carriage, in which they employ oxen; for
though their horses are stronger, yet they find oxen can hold out
longer; and as they are not subject to so many diseases, so they
are kept upon a less charge, and with less trouble; and even when
they are so worn out, that they are no more fit for labor, they
are good meat at last. They sow no corn, but that which is to be
their bread; for they drink either wine, cider, or perry, and
often water, sometimes boiled with honey or licorice, with which
they abound; and though they know exactly how much corn will serve
every town, and all that tract of country which belongs to it, yet
they sow much more, and breed more cattle than are necessary for
their consumption; and they give that overplus of which they make
no use to their neighbors. When they want anything in the country
which it does not produce, they fetch that from the town, without
carrying anything in exchange for it. And the magistrates of the
town take care to see it given them; for they meet generally in
the town once a month, upon a festival day. When the time of
harvest comes, the magistrates in the country send to those in the
towns, and let them know how many hands they will need for reaping
the harvest; and the number they call for being sent to them, they
commonly despatch it all in one day.


1901. New York: Ideal Commonwealths. P.F. Collier & Son. The
Colonial Press. This book is in the public domain, released
July 1993 by the Internet Wiretap. Prepared by Kirk Crady
(kcrady@polaris.cv.nrao.edu) from scanner output provided by
Internet Wiretap.

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