t breathed about the commander's face was full
of perfume.

I feel nothing, he thought. Here is beauty and warmth, here is the home
of Man, and almost an Eden, but I feel nothing. It is just another mote
that circles a minor sun, and to me it is only an exploitable supply
dump of Nature, a place to accomplish Procedure 76-A, "Refueling Method
for Terrestroid Planets Without Facilities, Native Labor Exploitable."

It was only a way-station on the long long road from Scorpius to Ursa,
and it meant nothing, nothing at all. It had changed too much. Millenia
ago, when the Star Exodus had burst forth to carry Man halfway across
the galaxy, things had been different. A few colonies had kept accurate
histories of Earth intact, and when the Transpace Empire had gathered
itself into social integration, nearly five thousand years ago, the
histories had been made universally available. The baron had studied
them, but from the viewpoint of the spacer, the history of Humanity had
ceased in any way to be associated with Earth after the Star Exodus. Man
was a space creature, a denizen of the interstellum--or had been, before
the War of Secession--and when history moved into space, Earth was a
half-remembered hamlet. Ven Klaeden had seen the Earth-vistas that the
historians had reconstructed for the museums--vistas of roaring
industrial cities, flaming battlegrounds, teeming harbors and
spaceports. The cities were gone, and Earth had become a carefully
tended Japanese garden.

* * * * *

As he stared around, he felt a lessening of the anxiety that had gnawed
at him since the analyst Meikl had predicted dire consequences after the
landing. The cultural blood of Man had diverged into two streams so
vastly different that no intermingling seemed possible to him. It would
be easy, he decided, to keep the informational quarantine. The order had
already been issued. "All personnel are forbidden to attempt the
learning of the current Earth-tongue, or to teach any Empire-culture
language to the natives, or to attempt any written communication with
them. Staff-officers may communicate only under the provisions of
Memorandum J-43-C. The possession of any written or recorded material in
the native tongue, and the giving of written material to the natives,
shall be taken as violations of this order. No sign language or other
form of symbolic communication shall be used. This order shall be in
force until Semantics