In process of time some of the shrewdest highlanders devised an attachment to the curtain system by which the rainfall could also be distributed at the will of the operators.  Then the rich Marsmen on the elevations said to the toilers:  “Give us one-fifth more of your products, and we will give you your share of the rainfall.”

The poor laborers had no alternative; so they labored still more diligently to pay their taxes for light and rain, and the burden became so heavy that they could no longer bear it.  So they sent up a petition praying for sunlight and rain for a one-fifth instead of a two-fifths tribute.  The rich refused to listen to this prayer, whereat the toilers refused to comply with these intolerable demands.

Then did the rich magnates of the elevations draw their curtains to keep both sunshine and rain from the valley.  The laborers consumed all they had until, in desperation, they asked again for sunlight and rain, but the rich refused to give either unless the toilers would promise to give a two-fifths tribute; to do this the toilers at length agreed.  Then the curtains were withdrawn, the sunlight once more kissed the valley, the rain again fell upon the fields, and some of the poor, ignorant people devoutly thanked their God for these gifts.

[Illustration:  Monopolizing Light and Rain on Mars.]

It occurred later that one of the many toilers, whom his Creator had endowed with unusual wisdom, became the leader of the masses in struggling for their rights.  He traveled the whole length of the valley and advocated that the people should unite, march to the summit of the hill, destroy the fastenings that held these curtains and, as the coverings would fall, destroy them with fire.  This leader declared that they were entitled to sunlight and rain without paying tribute to man.  Gradually the workers were won to his views.  The rich, seeing that their investments were threatened, hired a few brilliant orators and sent them to the people to persuade them not to give heed to a man of one idea.  These orators argued that it would be a great crime to destroy the property of others, and that their only way of securing happiness was to toil on with patience and keep looking for brighter days.  The people listened to the specious sophistries and thus pushed aside their redeemer, putting off forever the day of their deliverance.

Similar troubles continued to arise in the valley, but the rich always succeeded in quieting the people before they rose to determined action.

Then the rich decided to put an end to these agitations among the toilers.  Accordingly they cut off all communication from valley to valley, either by epistle or person, and refused longer to permit any poor toiler, or his children, to pursue any study whatever.  By this method, in the course of a few hundred years, the valley dwellers lapsed into ignorant slaves, not knowing, except by tradition, that there were other people in other parts of Mars.  Thus the rich continued to flourish on all the highlands, for they had extended this same policy until the toilers of the whole planet were practically galley slaves, each consigned to his own narrow canon.