‘Obviously. An organism, by virtue of its physical structure, embodies order; the more complex the organism, the greater the amount of order. It was my hypothesis that increasing the order in organic matter would be evidenced by imparting form to it. However, most living matter has already assumed its ideal form. The question is, what has life but not form?’
The elder nomenclator did not wait for a response. ‘The answer is, an unfertilized ovum. The ovum contains the vital principle that animates the creature it ultimately gives rise to, but it has no form itself. Ordinarily, the ovum incorporates the form of the foetus compressed within the spermatozoon that fertilizes it. The next step was obvious.’ Here Ashbourne waited, looking at Stratton expectantly.
Stratton was at a loss. Ashbourne seemed disappointed, and continued. ‘The next step was to artificially induce the growth of an embryo from an ovum, by application of a name.’
‘But if the ovum is unfertilized,’ objected Stratton, ‘there is no preexisting structure to enlarge.’
‘Precisely.’
‘You mean structure would arise out of a homogenous medium? Impossible.’
‘Nonetheless, it was my goal for several years to confirm this hypothesis. My first experiments consisted of applying a name to unfertilized frog eggs.’
‘How did you embed the name into a frog’s egg?’
‘The name is not actually embedded, but rather impressed by means of a specially manufactured needle.’ Ashbourne opened a cabinet that sat on the worktable between two of the microscope stations. Inside was a wooden rack filled with small instruments arranged in pairs. Each was tipped with a long glass needle; in some pairs they were nearly as thick as those used for knitting, in others as slender as a hypodermic. He withdrew one from the largest pair and handed it to Stratton to examine. The glass needle was not clear, but instead seemed to contain some sort of dappled core.
Ashbourne explained. ‘While that may appear to be some sort of medical implement, it is in fact a vehicle for a name, just as the more conventional slip of parchment is. Alas, it requires far more effort to make than taking pen to parchment. To create such a needle, one must first arrange fine strands of black glass within a bundle of clear glass strands so that the name is legible when they are viewed end-on. The strands are then fused into a solid rod, and the rod is drawn out into an ever-thinner strand. A skilled glassmaker can retain every detail of the name no matter how thin the strand becomes. Eventually one obtains a needle containing the name in its cross section.’
‘How did you generate the name that you used?’
‘We can discuss that at length later. For the purposes of our current discussion, the only relevant information is that I incorporated the sexual epithet. Are you familiar with it?’
‘I know of it.’ It was one of the few epithets that was dimorphic, having male and female variants.
‘I needed two versions of the name, obviously, to induce the generation of both males and females.’ He indicated the paired arrangement of needles in the cabinet.
Stratton saw that the needle could be clamped into the brass framework with its tip approaching the slide beneath the microscope; the knurled wheels presumably were used to bring the needle into contact with an ovum. He returned the instrument. ‘You said the name is not embedded, but impressed. Do you mean to tell me that touching the frog’s egg with this needle is all that’s needed? Removing the name doesn’t end its influence?’
‘Precisely. The name activates a process in the egg that cannot be reversed. Prolonged contact of the name had no different effect.’
‘And the egg hatched a tadpole?’
‘Not with the names initially tried; the only result was that symmetrical involutions appeared in the surface of the egg. But by incorporating different epithets, I was able to induce the egg to adopt different forms, some of which had every appearance of embryonic frogs. Eventually I found a name that caused the egg not only to assume the form of a tadpole, but also to mature and hatch. The tadpole thus hatched grew into a frog indistinguishable from any other member of the species.’
‘You had found a euonym for that species of frog,’ said Stratton.
Ashbourne smiled. ‘As this method of reproduction does not involve sexual congress, I have termed it “parthenogenesis”.’
Stratton looked at both him and Fieldhurst. ‘It’s clear what your proposed solution is. The logical conclusion of this research is to discover a euonym for the human species. You wish for mankind to perpetuate itself through nomenclature.’
‘You find the prospect troubling,’ said Fieldhurst. ‘That is to be expected: Dr. Ashbourne and myself initially felt the same way, as has everyone who has considered this. No one relishes the prospect of humans being conceived artificially. But can you offer an alternative?’ Stratton was silent, and Fieldhurst went on. ‘All who are aware of both Dr. Ashbourne’s and Dubuisson and Gille’s work agree: there is no other solution.’
Stratton reminded himself to maintain the dispassionate attitude of a scientist. ‘Precisely how do you envision this name being used?’ he asked.
Ashbourne answered. ‘When a husband is unable to impregnate his wife, they will seek the services of a physician. The physician will collect the woman’s menses, separate out the ovum, impress the name upon it, and then reintroduce it into her womb.’
‘A child born of this method would have no biological father.’
‘True, but the father’s biological contribution is of minimal importance here. The mother will think of her husband as the child’s father, so her imagination will impart a combination of her own and her husband’s appearance and character to the foetus. That will not change. And I hardly need mention that name impression would not be made available to unmarried women.’
‘Are you confident this will result in well-formed children?’ asked Stratton. ‘I’m sure you know to what I refer.’ They all knew of the disastrous attempt in the previous century to create improved children by mesmerizing women during their pregnancies.
Ashbourne nodded. ‘We are fortunate in that the ovum is very specific in what it will accept. The set of euonyms for any species of organism is very small; if the lexical order of the impressed name does not closely match the structural order of that species, the resulting foetus does not quicken. This does not remove the need for the mother to maintain a tranquil mind during her pregnancy; name impression cannot guard against maternal agitation. But the ovum’s selectivity provides us assurance that any foetus induced will be well formed in every aspect, except the one anticipated.’
Stratton was alarmed. ‘What aspect is that?’
‘Can you not guess? The only incapacity of frogs created by name impression was in the males; they were sterile, for their spermatozoa bore no preformed foetuses inside. By comparison, the female frogs created were fertile: their eggs could be fertilized in either the conventional manner, or by repeating the impression with the name.’
Stratton’s relief was considerable. ‘So the male variant of the name was imperfect. Presumably there needs to be further differences between the male and female variants than simply the sexual epithet.’
‘Only if one considers the male variant imperfect,’ said Ashbourne, ‘which I do not. Consider: while a fertile male and a fertile female might seem equivalent, they differ radically in the degree of complexity exemplified. A female with viable ova remains a single organism, while a male with viable spermatozoa is actually many organisms: a father and all his potential children. In this light, the two variants of the name are well matched in their actions: each induces a single organism, but only in the female sex can a single organism be fertile.’