Introduction

According to Charles Edward Prendick, the nephew of the protagonist, a ship named the Lady Vain collided with a derelict and resulted in the deaths of all crew and passengers with the exception of his uncle, "a private gentleman" named Edward Prendick. His uncle was then found eleven months and four days later adrift in a boat belonging to a missing ship named the Ipecacuanha. Although at first he gave a fantastic account of the eleven month interim, he later claimed to have no memory of it.

Charles Edward then attempts to establish a factual background for the story, noting that Noble's Island, an uninhabited volcanic inlet, is in the vicinity of where his uncle had been picked up. Furthermore, he observes that the Ipecacuanha did actually leave port carrying a variety of animals and under the command of a drunken captain John Davis, and that it disappeared at a time that fits his uncle's story.

Chapter I-IN THE DINGHY OF THE 'LADY VAIN'

Edward Prendick now narrates, and he explains that he is one of the four men thought to have made it to a lifeboat after the Lady Vain sank, although he asserts that there were in fact only three men; the fourth drowned attempting to join them.

They drift for six days until they can stand the starvation and thirst no longer, and one of them, Helmar, broaches the subject of cannibalism. Although the sailor agrees to draw lots for it, Prendick steadfastly refuses until the morning of the seventh day. He finally concedes, and the lot falls on the sailor, who reneges and wrestles with Helmar. The two of them fall overboard in the struggle.

On the eighth day, a ship rescues Prendick, who by this point is so addled that he no longer remembers any particulars of the incident. What he can recall, however, are the faces of the captain of the ship and M'ling (although he does not as yet recognize either of them).

Chapter II-THE MAN WHO WAS GOING NOWHERE

Prendick awakens in a cabin to find a young man tending to him, who he learns is named Montgomery. He gives Prendick some "scarlet stuff, iced" that "tasted like blood, and made [him] feel stronger." Montgomery explains that he is a medical man and that he and Prendick are aboard a small trader named the Ipecacuanha, captained and owned by a "silly ass" named John Davis. Montgomery offers some mutton and then asks Prendick how he came to be alone in the dinghy, implying that Montgomery suspects Prendick may have eaten or killed other passengers. Upon hearing a howling sound, however, Montgomery swears and leaves the cabin.

He and Prendick chat further upon his return, and the reader learns that Prendick has taken to natural history as a diversion from his "comfortable independence." Montgomery is also a man of science, having studied biology at a university, and he eagerly questions Prendick about London and England, not having been there in some time, apparently. He is very vague about his past, saying only that he "made a young ass" of himself.

A day of sleeping and eating renews some of Prendick's strength, and he asks Montgomery his destination. Montgomery says rather vaguely, "an island...Where I live," and refuses to elaborate.

Analysis

Wells provokes the reader's suspension of disbelief through a subtle method of validation. Through the voice of Charles Edward, he implies that the story is true without explicitly saying so. By giving circumstantial evidence for the story, even if it is also fictional, he almost challenges the reader to disbelieve the story.

Furthermore, the introduction connects the story with a number of literary antecedents by establishing the shipwreck theme. Isolation on an exotic island allows certain associations and contextual backgrounds to pervade the story, recalling Shakespeare's The Tempest and the more recent Robinson Crusoe.

The description of Prendick as a "private gentleman" is also significant, since it places him quite clearly in the upper class and sets the framework for later development of class and social themes. Similarly, naming the ship the Lady Vain is most likely a commentary on the snobbery and arrogance of upper class gentlemen like Prendick. Wells was known for his criticism of the British social structure, and many of his books (The Time Machine in particular) reflected these opinions. Moreau's island can thus be seen as a social experiment of two classes and very critical of monarchic government.

Shipwreck was a common theme in Wells's era, and when Prendick cites the "Medusa case," he refers to an actual event in which only 15 of 100 passengers survived. Furthermore, in the 1884 case of Regina v. Dudley and Stephens, a court did not excuse two sailors who had resorted to cannibalism after being stranded by shipwreck. It was a real fear for many of Wells's readers, and he knew it.

Chapter I also introduces the theme of animalism in people, exemplified by the survivalist barbarism of Prendick's shipmates. Also worth noting is that Prendick remembers only the faces of the drunken captain and M'ling, two characters linked by a comparable lack of the dignity and elegance that Dr. Moreau strives to reproduce. The alcoholism of the captain will also become an important reference later in the book, echoed in Montgomery's ill-fated attempt to share his brandy with the Beast Men.

Prendick develops in this early chapter as well, displaying a certain lack of practicality or, depending on interpretation, nobility in his refusal to allow cannibalism. His admitted delirium toward the end of the drifting and during his rescue is also significant, since it can represent a mental break and therefore supports the hypothesis that the entire episode could just be a figment of his parched brain. The fact that most chapters begin with him waking and end with him falling asleep also seems to fit that interpretation.

In Chapter II, Prendick's consumption of a blood-flavored liquid and mutton represents a somewhat perverted Communion, and it thus establishes some of the religious undertones of the story. Montgomery is, in a sense, initiating him into the world of Moreau and the Beast Men.

The friendship of Prendick and Moreau begins in this chapter, and their common bond is demonstrated through similar educational and regional backgrounds. A class separation is present, however, because it seems that Prendick took up science merely as the whim of a bored member of the elite, while science is and has been Montgomery's living.

The suspense that will later drive the story also begins here, with Montgomery's past and the island destination mentioned but left unexplained.

Chapter III-THE STRANGE FACE

On their way out of the cabin, Prendick and Montgomery encounter a beastly-looking man (M'Ling, as it turns out), who startles Prendick with his grotesqueness. He sees something familiar in the face, but he cannot determine what. Montgomery angrily asks why M'ling is not in the forward of the ship, and M'Ling tells him that he is not allowed.

As the two of them come out onto the deck, Prendick sees the deck covered with refuse and caged animals, including rabbits, dogs, a llama, and a puma. Prendick questions Montgomery about the unusual cargo, but his answers are vague and irresolute.

Suddenly M'Ling runs out onto the deck, pursued by the violent and drunken captain. The crew and dogs join in the harassment. Montgomery is furious. He tells the captain to keep his hands off of M'ling. There follows an argument between the two, in which the captain keeps asserting his right to do what he likes on his ship. Prendick intervenes, and although he brings the captain's intoxicated wrath upon himself, he prevents a fight.

Chapter IV-AT THE SCHOONER'S RAIL

As night falls, land is sighted. The schooner makes for the island. Prendick and Montgomery, after dinner with the ship's mate (the captain having passed out on his cabin floor), go onto the deck rail to talk. Montgomery seems painfully reminiscent of London, and Prendick tries to satisfy him with as much news and gossip as he can remember. Prendick also wonders about the beasts on board and M'ling, but he does not voice his concerns for fear of angering him. Prendick thanks him for saving his life, and Montgomery verges on revealing his past, alluding to how he "lost [his] head for ten minutes on a foggy night." But Montgomery eventually decides not to share his story, and Prendick does not pursue the matter.

Suddenly, Prendick's eyes meet M'ling's (M'ling had been standing nearby), and he notices a passing but distinctly bestial glow in them. The glow greatly unnerves him. He goes to bed with unpleasant dreams.

Chapter V-THE LANDING ON THE ISLAND

Prendick awakes from dreams of "guns and howling mobs" to the sounds of the ship unloading. He emerges onto the deck and encounters the drunken captain, who rudely points him toward Montgomery and Doctor Moreau (although Prendick does not yet know his name). He wants Prendick off his ship, but Moreau refuses to take Prendick. After a heated argument among the three of them, the sailors begin trying to push Prendick overboard. They finally manage to shove him into the boat from the Lady Vain. They cut him adrift, and seeing both the schooner and Montgomery fading away brings Prendick the sudden realization that he is as deserted and desolate as he had been after the shipwreck. He begins crying and wailing.

Analysis

The introduction of M'ling in Chapter III is significant for many reasons. Chiefly it foreshadows the rest of the story. For example, Prendick hints at his bestiality, describing the coarse hair, muzzle-like face, and huge mouth. This chapter also exposes us to the tragedy of the Beast Men, exemplified in how the crew and even the dogs abuse the frightened and cowering M'ling. Thus, very early on, Wells ensures that his readers will be sympathetic to the Beast Men. We already find such beings pitiable and unsettling.

Other foreshadowing builds suspense, such as the unexplained animal menagerie and the captain's angry comments about the island and the voyage thus far. Of particular note is the captain's frenzied characterization of M'ling, which carries religious implications: "That's just what he is--he's a devil, an ugly devil."

The short Chapter IV does not give the reader much new information. It merely reinforces some characterizations. It shows that Prendick is polite, Montgomery is mysterious, the captain is a drunk, and M'ling is animalistic. Montgomery's untold story points to sinister events on the island.

The quiet conversation furthers the friendship between Prendick and Montgomery, despite Montgomery's reductive attempts to call their meeting chance and nothing more. Prendick seems to agree somewhat, musing that Montgomery seemed to have "come out of Immensity merely to save [his] life." In both instances, they devalue personal initiative as a causative agent, and in doing so are minimizing responsibility for the consequences of their actions. If they are passive with respect to nature and fate, Dr. Moreau is brutally active.

Prendick's dreams in Chapter V reflect a growing animalism in the novel. He sees "guns and howling mobs." With this, the cruelty of the captain, and Doctor Moreau's refusal to take Prendick, the novel is presenting a very unflattering image of Prendick's fellow man. The humans all too often act like animals. The animals on board, meanwhile, elicit sympathy given that they are dumped roughly from the ship. As in earlier chapters, Wells is working to prejudice the reader toward the beasts over the men.

Chapter VI-THE EVIL-LOOKING BOATMEN

Seeing the gravity of Prendick's danger, the islanders take pity and come back for him. As he awaits his rescue, he has an opportunity to observe more closely Moreau and the three natives who accompany him. Moreau is "powerfully built...with a fine forehead and rather heavy features" as well as "an expression of pugnacious resolution." The natives are swathed in white, "even to their fingers and feet," are very short-legged compared to their torsos, and have "elfin" faces with lank blank hair.

While Moreau coolly returns Prendick's stare, the natives seem uncomfortable and look away. Having studied them all to his satisfaction, Prendick turns his attention to the island itself. He notices another man similar to M'ling and the natives waving by the launch, and as it nears the shore he helps bring it to dock. As he and the natives move to secure the boat, Prendick notices that their legs seem "disjointed in some odd way, almost as if they were jointed in the wrong place."

Too tired to assist in the unloading, Prendick stands to the side until Moreau approaches him. Moreau seems polite enough. He shows a bit more respect for Prendick after learning that he studied biology under Huxley [as did H.G. Wells]. "This is a biological station--of a sort," he tells him. He also tells Prendick that he is uncertain when the next opportunity to leave the island will present itself; it could be about a year until they might see another ship.

After Moreau leaves to go inside an enclosure near the beach, Montgomery makes a mysterious comment about the island being an "infernally rum place" and advises Prendick to "watch [his] goings carefully." He does not elaborate, however, and instead proceeds to empty a cage of rabbits onto the sand and watches them scatter into the undergrowth, telling them to multiply and replenish the island.

Moreau returns with brandy and biscuits, and although Prendick sets into the biscuits with gusto, he refuses the brandy and explains that he has been an abstainer since birth.

Chapter VII-THE LOCKED DOOR

Having finished breakfast, Prendick resumes his conversation with Montgomery and Moreau. Moreau says he is eager to begin working with the "new stuff," to which Montgomery replies with somewhat resentful sarcasm. They then begin discussing where to house Prendick. Moreau cryptically dismisses "over there" as an option, and they end up deciding to put him in an outer room of the enclosure where they live and work. They lead Prendick to his room, which is sparsely furnished with books, a table and chair, and a window. There is also another door that leads deeper into the complex, but Moreau locks it immediately "for fear of accidents."

As Montgomery follows Moreau out, Prendick hears him call out the doctor's name. It is familiar to him, and as he attempts to remember its context, M'ling enters with breakfast. As he bends down to set the tray on the table, Prendick is shocked to discover that he has pointed ears. After M'ling leaves the room, Prendick suddenly remembers why Moreau's name seemed familiar. Moreau had been a brilliant physiologist until a journalist posed as a lab assistant and exposed the gruesomeness of his experiments. There was a public outcry and little support from his colleagues, so Moreau chose to leave England rather than abandon his research. As these memories return to him, Prendick suddenly recognizes the "antiseptic odor of the operating room." He realizes that the animals on the ship must be for Moreau's experiments in vivisection, although he does not think that vivisection alone should warrant such secrecy.

Chapter VIII-THE CRYING OF THE PUMA

Around midday, Montgomery joins Prendick for lunch. Prendick opens the conversation by pointedly telling him that he remembers the name Moreau. Montgomery acknowledges this declaration but does not explain, and instead offers Prendick whiskey, which he declines. Montgomery then makes a small comment about alcohol being the reason for his situation, but Prendick cuts him off and asks about M'ling's pointed ears. Montgomery acts very unconvincingly surprised.

The puma being operated on suddenly cries out, and both men wince to hear it. Having gotten no reaction about M'ling's ears, Prendick then asks about the three swathed natives who helped unload the launch; again, Montgomery adopts a willfully ignorant attitude. He begins to ramble about the benefits of alcohol, claiming that it was what revived Prendick when he lay feverish and wasted aboard the Ipecacuanha. The puma's cries, in the meantime, have been growing in intensity and frequency. Prendick finds such a strong sense of emotional appeal in them that he feels "as if all the pain in the world had found a voice." He leaves the enclosure, but he muses that if he "had known such pain was in the next room, and had it been dumb," he "could have stood it well enough."

Analysis

In Chapter VI, the foreshadowing runs thick as Prendick makes increasingly perceptive observations of the Beast Men, giving the reader the clear impression that something is wrong--although like Prendick, we do not know what. Accompanying the heightened suspense is the introduction of Doctor Moreau, although he is as yet unnamed in Prendick's experience.

Moreau is strong, mature, white-haired, and resolute. Much of Moreau's power is in his image. Prendick's description echoes many traditional interpretations of God, and the description establishes him as the unquestioned authority on the island. His manner fits his profession, and he appears to move and talk with purpose and precision. Moreau, if anyone, can command nature to do his work.

Prendick's abstinence is an interesting character trait, and it might be explained in a variety of ways. Perhaps the alcohol represents blood, and thus his imbibing it would somehow represent his surrender to the island's bloody culture and its forsaking of the rest of the world. Still, he cannot help having drunk the bloody drink Montgomery used to revive him aboard the Ipecacuanha, which brought him into the cult of Moreau--but he can refuse to go any further. Montgomery, on the other hand, no longer has any home besides the island, so he takes his communion often and with enthusiasm. Or else, perhaps, Prendick's abstention is meant to enhance his credibility, assuring the reader that he was in a sensible frame of mind throughout the ordeal, and suggesting more generally that he was of good moral character. On an island out of control, Prendick stays sober.

The shifty behavior of the swathed attendants and their visible discomfort at Prendick's attention signals their inferiority. They seem to be immediately aware of his humanity and to feel ashamed of their inadequacy.

Chapter VII begins a structural parallel between Prendick's location and the depth of his understanding of what is happening around him. While on the beach, he is ignorant of the identity of his hosts and their activities. Once inside the outermost layer of the enclosure, however, he remembers the story of Doctor Moreau's exile, notices M'ling's pointed ears, and seems much closer to truth of the matter. By this point, some of the suspense of the story includes dramatic irony, since perceptive readers probably have guessed something of what Moreau is doing but must wait for Prendick to come to the same realization.

Also, the story of Moreau's past helps to fill out his character, and the fact that he was hounded out of England in disgrace makes him a bit more pitiable and understandable to the reader. Society was not ready to handle his degree of experimentation with nature; or conversely, his society already knew all too well that Moreau's experiments were crossing an ethical or natural boundary. Moreau's past also grounds him in respectability: he is not a madman running amok on an island, but a brilliant scientist whose experiments and research have (at least) subjugated his sense of sympathy. Overall, the difference between Moreau and his fellow men is exaggerated by Prendick's memory--a man like Moreau must be banished--which reinforces, despite the bestial habits of so many humans, the lack of fraternity and universality across humanity. Moreau has been trained by other men, yet he has become fundamentally unlike them--or at least some of them.

In Chapter VIII, the symbolism of alcohol develops, since not only does Prendick refuse the brandy a second time, but also Montgomery blames the alcohol for the unexplained troubles in London from which Moreau rescued him. Montgomery also reveals that it was indeed alcohol he administered to the sick Prendick, and Montgomery claims that it saved Prendick's life. The alcohol seems to resemble some sort of initiation rite in this context, and one which apparently must be repeated periodically. It is more than just Montgomery's bad habit. Prendick has been drawn in by the sip aboard the Ipecacuanha, but unlike Montgomery he has no wish to remain and will not drink.

Montgomery also proves to Prendick that he will be more or less useless in helping Prendick determine what is happening on the island, assuming a transparent ignorance whenever Prendick questions him too closely. His relationship to Prendick is thus only as a superficial friend, not an ally.

Prendick's vivid and empathetic description of the puma's cries lends the animal a distinctly human appeal. His and Montgomery's reactions to the noise underscore a common but somewhat paradoxical attitude toward animals. Throughout the book, Prendick responds with a mix of arrogance and indifference when the animals and Beast Folk act aggressively or independently, but when they display vulnerability or fear, he is sympathetic to their distress. It is as if they seem most human to him when they appear to connect with him on some emotional level, whether it be a sign of distress or the way M'ling devotes himself to Montgomery. Wells is exploring the relation between human and animal by focusing on the grey area in between.

Chapter IX-THE THING IN THE FOREST

Prendick walks until the jungle has muffled the puma's cries. Resting in the shade, he begins to doze off. He awakes to see a man on the other side of the stream, down on all fours and sucking the water. Leaning forward, he draws the attention of the man, who stands up guiltily. Prendick notices that his legs are barely half the length of his body, and he seems as ill-proportioned as the other natives. The man slinks away, but Prendick is suddenly and violently aware of his vulnerability in the wilderness. The strains of the puma again reach his ears, however, and he turns away from them and goes deeper into the jungle.

Hidden in the undergrowth, he happens upon three grotesque people with pink skin and bristly hair on their foreheads, dancing and chanting indistinctly. Prendick finds that in each one, there is the unmistakable mark of the hog in countenance, gait, and manner. As he begins to head back to the enclosure, he becomes aware of somebody stalking him. Dusk is turning to night, and Prendick rushes through the undergrowth in a panic, hearing his pursuer crash after him. He picks up a rock and readies it in his kerchief like a makeshift sling, at which point he hears his antagonist stalk away. Coming out onto the beach, he hears his pursuer once more.

Prendick finally loses his nerve entirely and sprints along the sand in terror, hearing the quick patter of footsteps getting closer and closer. Exhausted, he turns suddenly and swings the sling, connecting with the forehead of his enemy. The thing, which had been running on all fours, staggers into him and then collapses face down on the sand. As Prendick sits panting beside the unconscious form, he hears his name called from far along the beach.

Chapter X-THE CRYING OF THE MAN

Prendick follows a light back to the enclosure. He staggers up to Montgomery, who has been calling his name. He seems quite anxious that Prendick went out by himself about the island, but seeing him on the verge of collapse, Montgomery sits him down and administers some brandy. Having recovered somewhat, Prendick begins to question him about what he saw in the jungle and the thing that hunted him. Montgomery, however, tells him that it must have been his imagination. Prendick is quite distraught, and Montgomery finally coerces him into taking a sleeping draft.

He groggily awakens to broad daylight, falls out of his hammock on all fours, and begins to eat the meat set before him. Montgomery pokes his head in from the inner door to check up on him, but as he closes the door he forgets to lock it. Prendick suddenly remembers what happened the night before, and as it hits him he suddenly hears an agonized cry from within the enclosure--this time it is a man's voice. As soon as he realizes what kind of being he is hearing, Prendick storms into the inner section of the enclosure. He rushes past a startled Montgomery and catches a glimpse of a red, scarred, bandaged form on a bed before Moreau appears. Moreau seizes Prendick by the shoulder and hurls him back out into his room, slamming and locking the door behind him.

As Prendick gets up, it suddenly occurs to him that if Moreau is indeed practicing vivisection on human subjects, his own life may be in danger.

Analysis

Prendick displays an almost bestial terror in his flight, abandoning his reason for the mad, blind panic of the sprint along the beach. The Beast Man that pursues him is also the first to be openly aggressive. Wells continues to mix man and animal by leading Prendick farther and farther into the Beasts' world.

The appearance of the Swine Folk is also significant, because it exposes Prendick to the Beast Folk's obsession with being human. For example, when the three are dancing on two legs and one slips back onto all fours, he gets back up as quickly as possible. The description of how they recite the Law (for that is most likely what they are chanting) marks how "their eyes began to sparkle and their ugly faces to brighten with an expression of strange pleasure. Saliva dripped from their lipless mouths." Overall, the jungle scene gives the impression of the brainless satisfaction of doing something correctly, implying that the Swine Folk take pleasure in the Law only because it makes them feel like they are appropriate and normal. This sentiment conveys the desperation in their struggle to assume a semblance of humanity. (And it is a human thing to struggle in this way.)

On a related note, it is interesting that the Beast Man who hunts Prendick seems to feel shame despite his actions. He looks guilty when Prendick catches him on all fours. Before night falls, he flees from Prendick, unwilling to attack in daylight. Like the Swine Folk's recitation of the Law, this self-consciousness reveals that even if the Beast Man cannot fully control his instincts, he does at least feel ashamed of them. This is the crux of Moreau's cruelty, because all he has accomplished is to teach the animals to despise themselves without having a viable alternative.

But is this our position as human beings as well? Are we always to be ashamed of the ways we fall short in expressing our full potential as people? The Beasts are not so far from humanity as readers might hope.

In Chapter X, it is important to note that following Prendick's discovery of, as Montgomery puts it, the island's "curiosities," he now takes some brandy from Montgomery. Much as before, the act signals Prendick's increasing entanglement in the affairs of the island; the brandy is another step toward Montgomery's world. Prendick observes that Montgomery "found a certain satisfaction" in giving him the alcohol.

In this context, it is significant that the hammock dumps Prendick on all fours. Such small, subtle characterizations lead the reader to recognize connections and similarities between Prendick and the Beast Folk.

Similarly, Prendick's misinterpretation of the puma's cries as those of a man at once exaggerates and diminishes the barrier between man and beast. On the one hand, he makes the distinction that "it was no brute this time. It was a human being in torment!" On the other hand, the fact that he does not recognize it as the puma reveals that, at least to a degree, Moreau really can turn an animal into a person. In this sense, we see the narrative diminishing the boundary between man and animal. What is that intangible but unavoidable something that is unique to humans among the "animals"? If the Beasts do not count as human, what are they lacking?

Finally, Prendick's sudden horror at the idea of the vivisection of men introduces a possible hypocrisy. Exactly why is it acceptable to practice vivisection on animals but not men? Is it more gruesome to operate on an unwilling human? Is it hypocritical that Prendick can best understand the torment of the creatures when he fears he may face the same fate?

It is possible that some of these questions are misguided in that in real life, there is no such thing as the Beast Folk. To some degree readers are expected to appreciate the wildness of the tale and the mysterious impossibility of the hybrid beings without trying to identify a distinct human nature. Yet readers must wonder if, in evolutionary history, half-humans did exist, and what their moral and mental status would have been.

Chapter XI-THE HUNTING OF THE MAN

Prendick is convinced that Moreau has been vivisecting a human being and that the creatures he saw in the jungle were the results of similar experiments. Furthermore, he believes he is the next subject. He rips a leg off a chair as a crude weapon and then flings open the outer door, only to find Montgomery about to lock it from the outside. As he flees around the corner, he hears Montgomery shouting for him to stop and to cease being "a silly ass."

He heads into the jungle, but once he takes a moment to catch his breath he realizes that he has no food or even a particularly formidable weapon when compared to Montgomery's and Moreau's revolvers. He resolves to drown himself rather than give himself up, but he suddenly encounters the Beast Man who had met the launch on his arrival to the island. This Ape Man seems to feel an affinity with Prendick due to the fact that they both have five fingers. As the Ape Man leads Prendick toward "the huts," Prendick tries to engage him in conversation. But Prendick finds him to be quite unintelligent and rather parrot-like in his speech. At the end of the journey, the Ape Man has taken him to an enormous, dark, and odorous chasm that he calls "home."

Chapter XII-THE SAYERS OF THE LAW

Prendick notices a small, flayed, sloth-like creature beside him, who follows him into the the main chamber of the Beast Men's home. A featureless lump in the center, the Sayer of the Law, questions Prendick. Upon learning that he intends to stay with them, the Sayer announces that he must then learn the Law. He begins a call-and-response litany that turns into a feverish mess of tapping and swaying bodies and drunken chanting.

The first part of the Law consists of various prohibitions that seem to exist to keep the Beasts from reverting to bestiality, and every line ends with the refrain "Are we not Men?" The next part bears praise and reverence for Moreau, referring to his "House of Pain" and his "Hand that makes...wounds...heals. " The Sayer of the Law then inspects Prendick's hand and nails, noting how well formed they are. He mentions the punishments for those who break the Law, to which all the Beast Folk respond with a chorus of "None escape." At this point they exchange furtive looks among themselves. The Sayer of the Law explains that all of the Beast Men must fight to control different "wants," whether it be the "want to follow things that move...to kill and bite" or the want "to go tearing with teeth and hands into the roots of things," and so on.

As the group begins a second incantation of the Law, Prendick hears the yelp of one of Moreau's staghounds, which he had heard tracking him earlier. As Moreau enters the enclosure, Prendick flees out the back, alternately impeded and helped by Beast Men. He escapes into the jungle, now pursued by both Beast Men and Moreau. He finds his way to the sea, but he suddenly decides that he is not quite ready to surrender himself to drowning; his "blood was too warm," he notes.

Analysis

However much Prendick wishes to avoid the fate of Moreau's animal subjects, he behaves very much like a scared animal himself. He rushes from the enclosure, thinking that had he been locked in by Montgomery, he would have been "as ready as a hospital rabbit for [his] fate." He runs furiously into the jungle, wildly and blindly, with "chest straining, [his] heart beating in [his] ears," running from his pursuers like a fox from the hounds. It is fitting that he acts most animalistically immediately before meeting the community of Beast Folk.

Prendick's brief flirtation with the idea of suicide represents one of the few times he considers taking initiative. Perhaps the only way to defeat a bleak, indifferent world is to leave it. Yet, he cannot bring himself to take this final step, citing "an odd wish to see the whole adventure out." This cowardice, this practicality, or whatever one wants to call it (even a device used by Wells to keep the story going), despite its rationality, reveals how small a role Prendick plays in controlling his own life. In leaving things to chance or fate, the book takes another dip into fatalism.

The Ape Man is an interesting specimen, because he seems to be the closest thing to a perfect intermediary between man and animal. As an ape, he is one of the beings most similar to humans, and even Prendick admits that he "did not feel the same repugnance towards this creature that [he] had experienced in [his] encounters with the other Beast Men." In making this distinction between Beast Men in terms of humanity, Wells seems to promote the idea of a spectrum spanning human and beast. Not all animals are equally far from humanity, and if there is something undefinable that makes humans human, perhaps it is not so much a qualitative difference as a quantitative one. What does the Ape Man have, other than five fingers, that makes him more human?

Along with the Ape Man, the little sloth-creature appears to be one of the more human Beast Folk. Prendick evokes a host of emotions and associations by describing it as looking "more like a flayed child than anything else in the world." As such, it functions in giving the Beast Folk a sense of innocence that plays a large role in provoking a reader's sympathy.

The Law is a profoundly important part of the story, since it represents everything the Beast Folk strive for and, implicitly, the reasons why they cannot succeed. Even so, it seems to be imposed on them from without, from the false god Moreau. All its prohibitions, "Not to go on all-Fours," "Not to suck up Drink," "Not to eat Flesh or Fish," and so on, are examples of the instincts that Moreau has tried to repress through a combination of vivisection and brainwashing. In fact, the Law takes on religious implications in the way the Beast Folk recite it: "they swayed from side to side, and beat their hands upon their knees." The prohibitions are similar to commandments, and the way they refer both reverently and fearfully to Moreau's "House of Pain" and "Hand that makes" seems like the worship of a god. Indeed, the Beast Folk's desire to be humans functions as a motivation for a religion of sorts, in that Moreau has imposed this goal of perfection. They have been all but forced to believe in this goal, and they must trust him as they strive for it. He is both their prophet and their savior, although they find it impossible to follow his Law.

This is a kind of original sin. Humans too inevitably sin no matter how hard they try to reach perfection. It seems to be part of our nature. "Looking askance at one another" when they talk of the punishments for those who break the Law, the Beasts are all aware of the futility and ridiculousness of their situation, and like humans, they avoid confessing their sins in public.

The dependency on Moreau, the attempts to act human, the walking on two legs, and so on constitute an elaborate pretense born of Moreau's arrogance in thinking he can create humans out of animals. Perhaps Wells believes we should ask the same question of ourselves: does God require us to realize a nature that is impossible to reach while we live in an imperfect world? There does not seem to be any forgiveness in Moreau's unchristian religion--but would his religion be satisfactory if failures were confessed and forgiven but without any other changes?

Finally, Prendick's inability to take the ultimate step of suicide reflects his lack of personal initiative. No matter how far beyond his control the rest of the events on the island can be, it is always his choice and option to take his own life. The fact that he cannot do it reflects an animalistic survival instinct. But it also reflects human curiosity; he wants to see what will happen to him next.

Chapter XIII-A PARLEY

Prendick makes his way down to the sea. He stands at the edge of the water facing the jungle. It then occurs to him that he should try to make his way to the enclosure, find a weapon of some kind, and exact "a price for [his] life." As he heads westward, suddenly the Beast Men, Moreau, and Montgomery burst out of the trees, prompting Prendick to wade straight out into the water. Montgomery frantically asks him what he is doing, to which Prendick states firmly that he would rather die than be "tortured by you."

Moreau calmly asks him why he should think he was in any danger from them. Prendick voices his suspicions that the Beast Men were once proper men. He calls to the Beast Men, inciting them to revolt against their masters, but Moreau and Montgomery drown him out with shouting. Prendick continues addressing the Beast Men, however, telling them that Moreau and Montgomery are vulnerable and can be killed.

As Prendick's breath fails him, Moreau takes the opportunity to tell him that the creatures are in fact animals that he has vivisected to look like men. Prendick scoffs, but Moreau suddenly offers to throw his and Montgomery's revolvers down and allow him to hold them while they explain. He points out that if he had meant any harm toward Prendick, he had had many opportunities to do so already, and he reminds Prendick that he had opposed Prendick's presence on the island from the beginning. He also tells him that they did not intend for the Beast Men to join the pursuit and that he had tried to pull them off the scent for Prendick's own good. Prendick mentions the "man" he saw n the enclosure, but Moreau explains that it was the puma.

Prendick finally agrees to come with them to talk, and Moreau responds with characteristic condescension: "you have wasted the best part of my day with your confounded panic." As they set out for the enclosure, Prendick makes the following observation about the Beast Men: "They may once have been animals. But never before did I see an animal trying to think."

Chapter XIV-DOCTOR MOREAU EXPLAINS

Prendick sits alone with Moreau, who explains the happenings on his island. First, he solicits a concession from Prendick that the thing he saw in the enclosure was indeed the puma (he made Prendick see the creature up close upon returning). When Prendick starts to talk of its suffering, Moreau becomes annoyed and cuts him short.

He next tells Prendick that all of the Beast Men were once fully-formed animals that Moreau had vivisected and altered toward a human model. Moreau talks of all the potential of vivisection, and he maintains that his goal of a permanent surgical transformation of animal to man is entirely possible. He explains that he can vivisect the mind of the animal as well as its body, and he even can teach it once its brain has been appropriately altered.

Moreau does confess that his choice of the human form as his model was somewhat arbitrary, claiming that there is a certain elegance in it that attracted him. Prendick, however, finds "a strange wickedness" in that choice. He asks Moreau how he justifies causing such agony in the name of curiosity, but Moreau dismisses the importance of pain and calls Prendick a materialist. He argues that pain is evolutionarily unnecessary, even going so far as to dabble in religious arguments when he declares that "pleasure and pain have noting to do with heaven and hell." He calls humanity's preoccupation with pain and pleasure "the mark of the beast upon them."

He then tells Prendick a little of the history of the island, noting with some wonder that it has been eleven years since he first arrived with Montgomery and six natives, one of whom was killed by a serpentine monster that Moreau created as "purely an experiment." He tells Prendick that after his first mostly successful vivisection, the creation of a Gorilla Man, he had planned to take it back with him to England to show to the community that had hounded him out. But he could not ignore the fact that the Gorilla Man was not human, and he has wanted to create a perfect transformation before going back.

He goes on broodingly about how there seems to be some bestial element that his scalpel cannot touch. No matter how well he can mimic physical and even mental form, there is always a gradual reversion in his creatures. He comments on their primitive society, however, saying that although all he can see in them is his own failure, he finds "a kind of travesty of humanity" in their affairs, describing an "upward striving in them, part vanity, part waste sexual emotion, part waste curiosity." Prendick is not happy with what he hears, but he accepts the explanation for what it is and concedes that Moreau does not wish him harm.

Analysis

Unable to sacrifice himself in the noble dignity of preserving his integrity against vivisection, Prendick at first behaves like the frantic, hunted animal he is at the beginning of Chapter XIII and in the couple chapters before it. But then he decides to make a principled stand, intending to exact as much of a toll on Moreau and his followers as he can in exchange for his life. Furthermore, in this chapter he really does seem willing to drown himself. At this point, he is showing a strength of character that he seemed to lack earlier.

His appeal to the Beast Men is especially important, because it represents an attempt to break Moreau's hold over them. Their reverence seems based on the belief that Moreau and Montgomery are otherworldly and cannot be hurt. This belief only reinforces the sense of pretense and play-acting that seems to be the basis of life on the island. While the Beast Men must pretend that they respect the Law, Moreau must maintain the untarnished image of a deity. Neither side can afford to slip up if the society is to be maintained. For instance, Moreau refuses to put his hands up when he gives Prendick the guns, calling it "undignified" and motioning to the Beast Men behind him. As Montgomey puts it rather succinctly, "it's a damned silly ceremony."

Perhaps the most important line in this chapter is Prendick's departing impression that the Beast Men "may once have been animals...But never before did I see an animal trying to think." Not only does this idea foreshadow the impending revolt and reversion to bestiality, but it also ironically grants the Beast Men one of their few moments of humanity. Yet, they are trying to think rather than actually thinking. It is their peak and therefore the beginning of their end.

Chapter XIV is very important in terms of characterizing Moreau, for here he articulates his motivations and goals. He admits that he has no loftier aim to his experiments than simple curiosity about the plasticity of animal flesh and the limits of vivisection. Furthermore, his choice of a human model is, according to Moreau, entirely arbitrary, even if there is, as Prendick puts it, "a strange wickedness in that choice." The claim seems false, for Moreau would best restore his reputation if he could return with an animal made human rather than an animal made into another animal. Anyway, the important question is why it is so cruel for Moreau to impose humanity on the animals, even aside from all the pain he inflicts in the process? What is it about striving without success for humanity that makes it so awful for the Beast Folk?

Incidentally, it is worth noting that when Moreau cites the lesser successes of vivisection, he is referring to actual events. The Victorian era in England was a time in which the promises of science allowed scientists a great deal of free reign in their experiments with animals, so the idea of vivisecting animals to make them human was not as far-fetched to Victorians as modern readers, knowing something about DNA in addition to anatomy, may find it. Although it may be horrible to imagine, it was not deemed entirely beyond the bounds of possibility.

It is in Chapter XIV also that Moreau explains why he feels justified in his experiments. To him, "pain and pleasure...they are for us, only so long as we wriggle in the dust." It is interesting that he uses this philosophy to defend his experiments on animals, for even if other humans are capable of reaching this realization that pain is not real, the animals are not capable of this intellectual detachment. His perception of pain is entirely irrelevant to how the animals feel except in that he discounts the value of physical suffering.

Finally, Moreau's mention of the serpent-like creature that killed one of the natives reinforces the allusion to the Garden of Eden. Moreau admits that he should not have made it in the first place, calling it "purely an experiment." To what extent does Wells view humankind as some sort of divine experiment?

Chapter XV-CONCERNING THE BEAST FOLK

Prendick awakes the next day to M'ling and Montgomery bringing him breakfast. With Moreau's explanation still fresh in his mind, he questions Montgomery more closely about the Beast Men. Montgomery tells him that the Beast Men are bound by certain restrictions Moreau has imposed, such as the required belief that certain things (for example, the deaths of either Moreau or Montgomery) are impossible. This brainwashing process keeps them from attacking Moreau as well as each other.

Furthermore, although the Beast Men's sense of shame causes them to more or less respect the Law during the daylight, their self-control weakens at night. There are about sixty Beast Men currently on the island, although Moreau has made closer to a hundred and twenty. Every so often they bear offspring, but these generally die and display no inheritance of acquired human characteristics.

Prendick then begins to describe the Beast Folk in more detail, noting the chief differences between them and humans: disproportionately small legs, outward curvature of the spine, muzzle-like and protruding faces, and deformed hands. Prendick also finds himself getting more and more habituated to their grotesqueness, probably due in part to the influence of Montgomery's thinly veiled affection for them. He also learns more about M'ling, Montgomery's assistant, who is completely devoted despite the fact that Montgomery is variously affectionate and abusive. He closes the chapter with the observation that no matter how used to the Beast Men he became, every so often he would see a flash of unmistakable animalism in them that would shatter the illusion of humanity.

Chapter XVI-HOW THE BEAST FOLK TASTED BLOOD

As Montgomery and Prendick walk along the island, they encounter a tree with long strips of bark torn off. Montgomery comments on the Beast Men's hypocritical deviancy from the Law. They then come upon the Ape Man and the Satyr, who salute Montgomery. When he tells them to salute Prendick in turn, however, they hesitate. The Ape Man still believes Prendick was "made" as the rest of them are, and the Satyr argues that he bled and wept when they chased him. Montgomery threatens them, but as he and Prendick continue past, they hear the two continuing to voice doubts and make snide remarks about Prendick.

On their way back to the enclosure, Prendick and Montgomery come upon a rabbit torn to pieces. Montgomery is quite shaken by the discovery, even more so when Prendick tells him that he found a rabbit similarly mutilated on the first day he left the enclosure--and that the Beast Man who had first chased him had been sucking his drink from the river. Above all else, Montgomery and Moreau fear what the taste of blood may do to the Beast Folk.

They return to Moreau, who decides to call the Beast Men together to identify the offender in front of all of them. The Leopard Man comes late to the gathering, bearing a great bruise on his forehead, presumably where Prendick struck him. The Beast Folk recite the Law, but Moreau stops them at "Not to eat Flesh or Fish; that is the Law." At this point, Prendick notices that both the Leopard Man and the Hyena-Swine look guilty. Moreau challenges the Leopard Man several times (amid choruses of "Who breaks the Law-goes back to the House of Pain!" from the other Beast Folk), but when he lifts his gaze from him, the Leopard Man panics, strikes him, and flees into the jungle. The whole assembly devolves into a mad stampede of pursuit, Prendick included, although only out of fear of attack from the Hyena-Swine and Satyr, who seem to be considering attacking him in the confusion. They force the Leopard Man into a corner of the island, but as they approach his hiding place Prendick suddenly catches a glimpse of him through the maze of underbrush. He sees in the creature's blind terror something unmistakably human, and he feels an overwhelming sense of pity for him. He draws his revolver and shoots it between the eyes before Moreau gets to him. Moreau is furious at being denied exacting the proper punishment, but he has no choice but to accept it.

The other Beast Folk meanwhile are "overflowing with noisy expressions of their loyalty to the Law" in a sad scene of hypocrisy that Prendick feels is reflective of "the whole balance of human life in miniature." He pities the shackles of humanity that they must suffer all their lives, for no better reason than Moreau's wanton curiosity. Prendick adds that he began to lose faith "in the sanity of the world" in the days after the Leopard Man's death, feeling crushed and torn by the workings of fate.

Analysis

One of the most interesting parts of Chapter XV is Montgomery's description of how Moreau has brainwashed the Beast Folk. He tells Prendick that Moreau has convinced them that certain things are not possible and certain things are not to be done. Yet, these teachings alone can cause confusion among the Beast Folk when they, for instance, break the Law by accident or impulse, discovering that they are able to do things that Moreau told them they were unable to do. Beyond being confused, they are also ashamed of their transgressions to a degree beyond the animal (when, for instance, a dog realizes it has been "bad"). This heightened moral awareness implies some sort of value system that does not seem natural among animals. This otherwise human sense of right and wrong makes their impossible struggle tragic. But it also is perhaps the most far-fetched aspect of the story. It is not clear whether this personal awareness is attributed to Moreau's surgery or his teaching, but either way it seems to introduce a hybridization of the animal and human that stretches believability. Can the Beast Folk really think and judge, or not?

Prendick also distinguishes between the Beast Men and Beast Women, mentioning that the females are "liable to much furtive persecution in spite of the monogamy the Law enjoined" and that they "had...an instinctive sense of their own repulsive clumsiness, and displayed in consequence a more than human regard for the decencies and decorum of external costume." This observation functions like the description of the sloth creature as a "flayed child" in that it pulls at certain sympathies within the reader, enhancing the engagement he has with the Beast Folk. The more Wells can stamp them with aspects of humanity, especially in terms of establishing vulnerability, the more the reader feels for their distress.

Furthermore, Prendick's habituation to the Beast Folk reveals at once how similar and yet how different they are, compared with him. He recognizes people in them, seeing "some really human yokel" in one of the bovine creatures or imagining that he once saw the Fox-Bear Woman's face "before in some city byway." Wells is working very hard to make the Beast Folk seem as human as possible. Still, he acknowledges through Prendick that the transformation is never complete. Even when Prendick goes so far as to glance "with a transitory daring into the eyes of some lithe white-swathed female figure," he inevitably notices the slit pupils or pointed teeth or some other indication of the falseness of their assumed humanity.

In Chapter XVI, the Ape Man's and the Satyr's confusion about whether Prendick is a man or a Beast Man indicates how strongly Moreau's brainwashing has influenced them. Even though Prendick is unmistakably closer to Moreau and Montgomery in appearance and manner than any of the Beast Folk, they define his humanity in terms of the whiteness of his face and in his mortal physical aspect (he bled and wept).

Prendick reacts to the same vulnerability in the Beast Folk in diametrically opposite ways. When he sees them writhing on the ground in front of Moreau, with "their wincing attitudes and the furtive dread in their bright eyes," he wonders "that [he] had ever believed them to be men." Yet, when he sees the terror and panic in the Leopard Man's face, he "realized again the fact of its humanity." To some degree this variation reflects the varying success of Moreau's experiments. But in addition, perhaps, the difference involves the role that Prendick perceives that he plays in each situation. When the Beast Men are groveling in front of Moreau, there is no appeal for him to help them. He can do nothing for them, and he sees their fear and apprehension as pointless and foreign. In contrast, with the Leopard Man he is aware of a general plea from the creature, a panicked cry for assistance that he thinks he can answer. It is this engagement in the vulnerability of the being that allows Prendick to feel important and protective; it helps him recognize humanity.

The most important part of Chapter XVI is Prendick's thoughts toward the end, when he sees the Beast Folk gathered around the body of the Leopard Man. He empathizes with their pain, knowing that "before they had been beasts...and as happy as living things could be...Now they stumbled in the shackles of humanity, lived in a fear that never died, fretted by a law they could not understand." More than that, he is profoundly affected by the pointlessness of it all--Moreau has been hauntingly careless and irresponsible with them. The bleak fatalism that Prendick describes following the Leopard Man's death is especially significant, since he is expressing the general mood of the story. This is very much a world outside of his control. He figures that

a blind fate, a vast pitiless mechanism, seemed to cut and shape the fabric of existence, and I, Moreau by his passion for research, Montgomery by his passion for drink, the Beast People, with their instincts and mental restrictions, were torn and crushed, ruthlessly, inevitably, amid the infinite complexity of its incessant wheels.

Chapter XVII-A CATASTROPHE

After the tragedy of the Leopard Man, Prendick finds that he no longer can feel anything but abhorrence for the Beast Folk. One day, however, while Moreau is working on the puma, the creature breaks free from its restraints. It charges past Prendick, striking him and breaking his arm. Moreau follows shortly thereafter, carrying a revolver. Montgomery is the last to arrive, frantic and panicked, but he stops long enough to bind Prendick's arm in a sling and to listen to Prendick's explanation of what happened. Then he too exits the enclosure, leaving Prendick to stay and wait for the situation to be resolved.

Much later in the day, Prendick suddenly hears a shot and then another. Montgomery appears around the corner accompanied by M'ling, who has some very suspicious brown stains around his mouth. Seeing Moreau, he enters the enclosure in defeat and asks for brandy. He tells Prendick that he wandered through the forest calling for Moreau, and then two Swine-Men rushed him. He shot one through the head, and M'ling killed the other. On the way back, they also encountered an Ocelot Man hiding in the bushes--whom Montgomery shot rather cruelly, Prendick thinks. Prendick asks for greater explanation, but Montgomery simply reaches for more brandy.

Chapter XVIII-THE FINDING OF MOREAU

After Montgomery has taken a third swallow of brandy, Prendick stops him and convinces him that they should search for Moreau. As they walk, they meet a company of Beast Men informing them that Moreau is dead. "Is there a Law now?" asks the Ape Man. Prendick seizes upon an idea and tells the Beast Folk that Moreau has merely changed his shape--that he is now still watching them all from on high. He then commands them to take him and Montgomery to the body of Moreau.

As they make their way, however, they are suddenly attacked by a feral Beast Man who has been pursuing a strange little pink creature. Prendick shoots it and tells the other Beast Folk that the offender's disregard for the Law has caused his death. They finally find Moreau's smashed and broken body next to that of the mutilated puma. With the seven Beast Men, they carry his corpse to the enclosure. After locking themselves in, they go into the laboratory to put an end to all that remains living there.

Analysis

Chapter XVII is the beginning of the end of the book, with many things starting to fall apart. Moreau, the man single-handedly holding the island together, goes missing; the Beast Men attack men; and M'ling tastes blood. Prendick's loathing for the Beast Men is based on his feeling that they are "caricatures of [his] Maker's image," again calling to mind comparisons between God and Moreau--but this creation experiment is now unraveling.

There is also some significance in the puma's sex and its attack on Moreau. Wells characterizes it with "a shriek almost exactly like that of an angry virago" (a large, strong, courageous woman), and its femininity is a rarity in the male-centric world of Doctor Moreau. There is perhaps some social commentary in the way the chained female breaks free from her fetters and strikes the man who restrained her. Wells was an ardent supporter of feminism, but he may be acknowledging the hesitation many felt with giving women full freedom and opportunity. (Of course, readers should beware reading too much into the sex of individual characters.)

In Chapter XVIII, Montgomery's alcoholism plays a prominent role. With Moreau missing, Montgomery's incapacitation leaves matters to Prendick--and Prendick takes up the mantle. Symbolically, Montgomery's drunkenness represents a total and complete surrender; he is now inextricably a part of the island. It seems that Prendick is turning that way as well, with his participation in the island's theological and moral system.

When the Ape Man asks if the Law exists without Moreau, Prendick's lies are eerily reminiscent of the concept of an invisible, omnipresent god-figure whose spirit outlives his body: "You cannot see him. But he can see you. Fear the Law." The fabrication of Moreau's resurrection somewhat reflects that of Christ (though the body remains on the ground in this case), which continues the religious allusions in the story.

Chapter XIX-MONTGOMERY'S 'BANK HOLIDAY'

Prendick attempts to have a serious conversation with Montgomery about their options now that Moreau is dead, but Montgomery refuses to act sensibly. He tries to convince Prendick to drink with him. Failing in that, he decides to give some to M'ling. Prendick tries to stop him, but Montgomery threatens him with a revolver and leaves the enclosure with bottle in hand. Prendick sees him approach three Beast Men and M'ling, offer them the drink, and then lead them howling and shouting around the island.

Prendick goes back inside the enclosure. He begins to think about his means of escape. He decides to stock the dinghy with provisions. After burning Moreau on a pyre, he will set out the next morning alone.

Suddenly he hears a clamor outside and then the crack of a pistol. He rushes out to find a struggling mass of black figures, the majority of which flee as Prendick comes charging toward them brandishing his pistol. He finds the Sayer of the Law dead atop Montgomery, fingers still at his throat; Montgomery seriously injured; and M'ling and a Wolf Man dead as well. He hears a thud and hissing behind him, and he turns to see the enclosure go up in flames. It appears that he upset the lamp in his haste, and the lamp has set the enclosure on fire.

Montgomery had also made a fire, and Prendick discovers to his horror that he has burnt the boats. His anger subsides, however, seeing Montgomery's pitiful condition. Montgomery only manages to say "Sorry" and "The last of this silly universe. What a mess--" before dying. As Prendick surveys the desolation and bleakness before him, three Beast Men approach hesitatingly yet with unfriendly bearing.

Chapter XX-ALONE WITH THE BEAST FOLK

Prendick has no choice but to be bold with the Beast Men. He cracks Montgomery's whip and orders them to salute and bow down. He also explains the deaths around him as punishments for transgressions of the Law. He has the Beast Men carry the bodies into the sea.

Suddenly he hears something behind him. He turns to find the Hyena-Swine crouched together as if preparing to strike at him. Prendick is tempted to shoot the creature, but he commands it to bow down instead. When it refuses, he shoots and misses, and it runs yelping into the forest.

After he dismisses his three servants, he begins to wonder what he will do now that he is the only man left on the island--and now that the enclosure has been destroyed. He knows that the Hyena-Swine is a very real threat to his safety, and he begins to grow paranoid. A Beast Man approaches him, much in the way a dog comes to its master, but the unsettled Prendick drives it away. He spends the night in solitude. In the morning he makes his way to the home of the Beast Folk.

Tired and defeated, he asks them for food, sinking from the position of Moreau's replacement to simply a leader among fellows. He holes himself up in a hut, and then he gives in to exhaustion.

Analysis

Although Montgomery is raving and drunk, he does give some surprising insight into the arbitrary pointlessness of their situation: "What's it all for, Prendick? Are we bubbles blown by a baby?" He has hit at the root of their dilemma, pointing out the helplessness that has defined his and Prendick's actions throughout the story. His dying words echo the same sentiment, a kind of disillusionment with agency that reflects just how dependent he was on Moreau to make sense of the world. The god of their world is dead, so it seems that fate is all they have left. Montgomery has forgotten his ability to take charge of his own life.

Montgomery's idea to give alcohol to the Beast Men is the lowest point of his descent into the bestiality of the island. Representing the communion that brought him and Prendick alike into the world of the island, the alcohol perhaps may be used to bring the Beast Men into a common world with the men. The idea may have some merit, since the alcohol at least frees them in the sense that it removes the barriers and inhibitions that Doctor Moreau erected; who is to say that the Beast Men will revert to animality rather than rise to some kind of better humanity in greater realization of their limits? Montgomery is unlikely to succeed, however, in bringing them to his world, but he has more chance of regressing successfully by joining theirs. This late in the story, he has become so alienated from regular men that it seems like a small step for him. It is unfortunate that once he joins them, he has little time to enjoy their company before the mix ends in disaster. .

In this context there is a parallel between the Leopard Man and Montgomery in terms of how Prendick reacts to them. Seeing that Montgomery has burned the boats, Prendick readies himself to fly into a rage, but "suddenly his hand moved, so feebly, so pitifully, that my wrath vanished." Again, Prendick finds a sense of forlorn humanity in this unassuming, unapologetic display of weakness, and it moves him profoundly.

Without Moreau or Montgomery, Prendick is the only man left on the island in Chapter XX. He has also lost his shelter, his arm is broken, and he has few cartridges left for his revolver. It hits him that he can no longer simply wait for a ship to come. Neither can he rely on anyone else to make his decisions for him. He is forced to assume responsibility for himself, in these last moments, unlike Montgomery. He has retained a vital element of human agency.

Moreau's agency, however, is not characterized by the hard-edged independence that Moreau was as the ruler. By approaching the Beast Men and asking for food and shelter, he displays a weakness and humility that reflects the softer side of humanity. Still, in doing so, he irrevocably eliminates the possibility of re-establishing the theocracy that kept the island together; his new pronouncements of an invisible Moreau are unlikely to make much of a difference. Violence is becoming rife on the island, and the Sayer of the Law is dead. The Beast Folk are unlikely to be persuaded by the softer religion that Prendick might be able to offer in exchange; they do not seem interested in sacrifice, friendship, love, altruism, or voluntarism, and it is not clear that Moreau has taught them much of these things at all.

Chapter XXI-THE REVERSION OF THE BEAST FOLK

Prendick awakens to find the same Beast Man who approached him the night before now sitting at his side in the hut. The Dog Man explains that he believes Prendick to be the Master, although the rest of the Beast Men believe there is no longer any authority on the island. They still wish to follow the Law, but they are without any fear of punishment for transgressions. Prendick plays the role for the Dog Man, saying that he will kill all the sinners in time. He then leaves the hut to address the gathered Beast Folk, telling them that the House of Pain and the Master are still present, just hidden from their eyes. They are reluctantly convinced. Prendick notes, "an animal may be ferocious and cunning enough, but it takes a real man to tell a lie."

This ability, combined with a skill for the hatchet and throwing stones, keeps Prendick more or less safe among the Beast Men for the ten months he then spends with them in solitude. The Hyena-Swine remains at large for most of this period, and Prendick also notices a very distinct loss of humanity in the Beast Folk. They develop difficulty in articulation and speech, difficulty in walking erect, loss of the finer control of their hands, and so on. As they become more and more bestial, so does Prendick turn the way of an island savage, at least in appearance. He has no human company.

He watches for boats, but seeing none touch the island, he turns to the idea of a raft. One day, however, the pink sloth creature leads him to a scene in the woods. The Dog Man, his closest companion during this period, has been killed by the Hyena-Swine. Prendick shoots it between the eyes, ending its threat. He sadly realizes that such relapses must occur eventually among all the carnivores on the island. He returns to the idea of a raft, but he can think of no way to store water for the days he will spend adrift.

A sail suddenly appears one day, but as Prendick hails it to the island, he notices that it moves strangely. It turns out that the crew is dead. He dumps the bodies and takes the boat to the stream, where he fills up with water and fruit. He sets out alone.

Chapter XXII-THE MAN ALONE

Prendick drifts for three days. He is picked up by a ship headed for San Francisco. They do not believe his story but believe that the solitude and the sun have driven him mad. Fearing similar reactions from others, he later professes to remember nothing of the year between the first shipwreck and his final rescue.

Prendick admits that despite being home, he is uneasy. He cannot shake the suspicion that all the people he meets are somehow Beast Men, tainted with an animal influence and always in danger of a sudden reversion. He moves into seclusion, finding this terror unbearable in London. Studying chemistry and astronomy, he finds "a sense of infinite peace and protection in the glittering hosts of heaven," without which he would not care to live.

Analysis

When Prendick convinces the Beast Folk that Moreau and the House of Pain still exist, he makes the observation that only men are capable of lying. This idea implies that there is some quality of humanity that involves being able to recognize and assess different set of realities, to distinguish between fact and fiction. Still, the Beast Men are not entirely incapable of deception; the Hyena-Swine, for example, although it was transparently malicious, did seem to attempt to hide it from Prendick at first. Thus the beasts may be simply underdeveloped in the cognitive and moral ability one needs in order to lie. Perhaps one really needs to be able to think in order to lie well.

The reversion of the Beast Men warns us to beware of the temptations to follow our animal natures rather than our higher natures. Like humans, the Beast Men fight their reversion at first, avoiding having to speak or walk on two legs. The Ape Man experiences an especially drastic transformation, degenerating from somewhat intelligent speech and conversation to unintelligible jabbering. Prendick says that "he was the silliest creature I ever met; he had developed in the most wonderful way the distinctive silliness of man without losing one jot of the natural folly of a monkey." (One might think of the stock market scene in Planet of the Apes.)

Sex differences again surface when the emancipated Beast Women "disregard the injunction of decency--deliberately for the most part. Others even attempted public outrages upon the institution of monogamy." Despite being something of a feminist himself, again Wells appears to have some reservations about what will happen when women are no longer bound by the strict rules of womanly conduct. The males and females alike revert to a more primitive nature.

Prendick mirrors the Beast Folk's reversion with a regression of his own, growing long hair and wearing the tatters that used to be his clothes. At least in appearance, the difference between the Beast People and him is shrinking. His clumsiness with carpentry is an important part of this characterization. Despite having spent more than ten months on the island, he is still an upper-class gentleman with little knowledge of such practical matters--the suggestion here is that upper-class decadence is closer to the animals than middle-class agency.

In Chapter XXII, Wells reaches the conclusion of his exploration of the barrier between man and animal. The examples Wells uses are significant. For instance, Prendick compares preachers giving sermons with the Ape Man having one of his "Big Thinks," those occasions when the Ape Man discovered a new word but did not understand it and merely gabbled about it. Here Wells seems to put religion on the level of the animals rather than raising it to the level of transcendence that most of his neighbors would do. Now that Prendick has returned to civilized England, he cannot fully reconcile the world around him with the one he left behind on the island. He can no longer distinguish between men and Beast Men. He finds the bestiality in people immediately and unnervingly clear. The pull downward can easily be felt. What, other than self-assertion of one's own agency, provides the upward pull into something more, rather than something less, than mere humanity? Is astronomy going to do the job? The upper boundary of humanity is hardly explored, since this book is about our lower boundary.

Back in the world of technology, Prendick is awash in a London that humans have built to improve their lives. Prendick has learned that the manipulation of nature without attention to the consequences can spell doom, like it did on the island. How many inventions in London are hurting rather than helping mankind?

• Biography of H.G. Wells
• About The Island of Dr. Moreau
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• Summary and Analysis of Chapters XI-XII
• Summary and Analysis of Chapters XIII-XIV
• Summary and Analysis of Chapters XV-XVI
• Summary and Analysis of Chapters XVII-XVIII
• Summary and Analysis of Chapters XIX-XX
• Summary and Analysis of Chapters XXI-XXII
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