plants could have real intelligence ... that flowers could hold the mastery of a planet. I'm ready to accept almost any theory but that one...."

"Your mind sticks on parallel evolution," Scott argued. "There's no premise for it. On Earth animals took the spotlight, pushing the plants into a subordinate position. Animals got the head start, jumped the gun on the plants. But there's absolutely no reason why plants should not develop along precisely the same lines here that animals developed on Earth."

"But the Martian lily lives only one season ... ten months ... and then it dies," Hugh protested. "The next season's growth comes from seed. How could plants build intelligence? Each new crop would have to start all over again."

"Not necessarily," declared Scott. "Animals are born with instinct, which is nothing more or less than inherited intelligence. In mankind there are strange evidences of racial memory. Why couldn't the plants do the same thing with their seed ... progress even a step further? Why couldn't the seed carry, along with its other attributes, all the intelligence and knowledge of the preceding generation? That way the new plant wouldn't have to start from scratch, but would start with all the accumulated knowledge of its immediate ancestor ... and would add to that knowledge and pass the sum total on to the generation that was to follow."

Hugh kicked absent-mindedly at the sand.

"There would be advantages in that sort of development," he agreed. "It might even be the logical course of survival on a planet like Mars. Some old Martian race, for all we know, might deliberately have shaped their development toward a plant existence when they realized the conditions toward which the planet was headed."

"A plant society would be a strange one," said Scott. "A sort of totalitarian society. Not the kind of a society animals would build ... for an animal is an individual and a plant is not. In a plant race individuality would count for nothing, the race would count for everything. The driving force would be the preservation and advancement of the race as a whole. That would make a difference."

Hugh glanced up sharply.

"You're damned right that would make a difference," he said. "They would be a deadly race. Once they got started, nothing could stop that singleness of purpose."

His face seemed to blanch under the tan.

 Prev. P 21/27 next