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approach the centre of the figure. If they follow the path from the interior to the exterior they must traverse the widest of the circles before finding the cross-passage that leads them to the centre. The system is closed. No radius starting from the centre allows of any expansion or of breaking through. At the same time it is without limit, the juxtaposition of the increasingly widening circles configures every possible revolution. It is virtually that infinite sphere whose centre is everywhere, circumference nowhere.
    One of the women relates the death of Adèle Donge and how the embalming of her body was carried out. The story tells how she is placed on a trestle table. The intestines are withdrawn through the open belly. The abdomen emptied of its organs is washed with water to which sulphuric acid has been added. Then it is dried. Various substances are introduced, ground mint benzoin sage styrax mixed with formalin phenol permanganate hydrogen peroxide. The separated layers and membranes have to be reunited, they must be sewn together. The head is emptied of the brain after the cranium has been drilled using a trephine. Balsamatic desiccative antiseptic substances are introduced into the cranial cavity. The viscera are preserved like precious materials in large glass jars that bear inscriptions. They ignore the brain. They abandon it carelessly on some piece of furniture. A domestic animal might seize and devour it. The women yawn at this account or else they applaud without much enthusiasm.
    Now they are marching through a field of tall flowers. The orange-yellow tufts bend over above their heads. When the women stumble against the stalks pollen falls from the shaken pistils in great quantity. The giant flower is a stem whose extremity is rolled up on itself, it is whorled, it copies the shape of a bishop's crozier. The hermaphrodis is a flower that gives off an overpowering perfume. Among the marchers some can no longer keep up. They fall on their knees, they let themselves sink to the ground, head dropping, body like a gun-dog's. Or else they writhe with their arms, they cry out, they throw themselves face down as if seized with madness. They advance into the forest, between the stiff woody stems, faces caught by the sun, covered by the pollen that escapes continually from the invisible stamens.

    JILL STEPHANIE CYDIPPA
    OLEA ALBERTINE DELMIRA
    ANDREA SOPHONISBE ALBA
    CLELIA TAI-REN BUTHAYNA
    JEPHTHA HOLAA BLANDINA
    ATIKA NAUNAME CHRYSEIS

    The story told by Emily Norton takes place at a time when every detail of a birth is ceremoniously regulated. When the child is born the midwife begins to utter cries like women who fight in battle. This means that the mother has conquered as a warrior and that she has captured a child. The women look over Emily Norton's shoulder at the effigies of women with mouths wide open, screaming, squatting, the child's head between their thighs.
    They say that at the point they have reached they must examine the principle that has guided them. They say it is not for them to exhaust their strength in symbols. They say henceforward what they are is not subject to compromise. They say they must now stop exalting the vulva. They say that they must break the last bond that binds them to a dead culture. They say that any symbol that exalts the fragmented body is transient, must disappear. Thus it was formerly. They, the women, the integrity of the body their first principle, advance marching together into another world.
    Things being in this state, they summon the trades. Distaffs looms rollers shuttles combs point-paper presses cams cloth toiles cashmere twill calico crepe chintz satin spools of thread sewing-machines typewriters reams of paper stenographers' pads ink-bottles knitting-needles ironing-boards machine-tools spinners bobbin-winders staplers assembly-lines tweezers blow-lamps soldering-irons bonders yarn for braiding for twisting knitting-machines cauldrons great wooden tubs