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Microstructure of Smectite Clays
and Engineering Performance
Microstructure of Smectite
Clays and Engineering
Performance

Roland Pusch and

Raymond N. Yong
First published 2006
by Taylor & Francis
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Taylor & Francis
270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016
Taylor & Francis is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
© 2006 Roland Pusch & Raymond N. Yong
Typeset in Sabon by
Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd, Chennai, India
Printed and bound in Great Britain by
The Cromwell Press, Trowbridge, Wiltshire
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the publishers.
The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with
regard to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and
cannot accept any legal responsibility or liability for any efforts or
omissions that may be made.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested

ISBN10: 0–415–36863–4
ISBN13: 9–78–0–415–36863–6
Contents

List of figures ix
List of tables xix
Preface xxi

1 Introduction 1
1.1 Reference 4

2 Smectite clays 5
2.1 Particles 5
2.2 Basic properties of smectite particles 7
2.3 Non-expanding clay minerals in smectite
clays 19
2.4 Rock-forming minerals in smectitic clays 26
2.5 Inorganic amorphous matter in smectitic
clays 27
2.6 Organic material in smectitic clays 28
2.7 Origin and occurrence of commercially
exploited smectitic clays 29
2.8 References 40

3 Microstructure of natural smectite clay 42

3.1 Objective 42
3.2 Definitions 42
3.3 Microstructural evolution of sediments 43
3.4 Soil microstructure, macrostructure and physical
integrity 47
3.5 Methods for microstructural analysis 66
3.6 References 80
vi Contents
4 Microstructure of artificial clay-based engineered barriers 82
4.1 Objective 82
4.2 Preparation of smectitic barriers 82
4.3 Microstructural evolution of smectite ‘buffer’ 85
4.4 Microstructural evolution of smectitic fills 98
4.5 References 106

5 Clay properties and microstructural constitution 107

5.1 Objective 107
5.2 Hydraulic conductivity 107
5.3 Gas conductivity of artificially prepared
smectite clay 125
5.4 Ion diffusion 128
5.5 Expandability 130
5.6 Microbial function 135
5.7 Stress/strain behaviour 136
5.8 Concluding remarks 145
5.9 References 146

6 Microstructural function of smectite clay in waste

isolation 148
6.1 General 148
6.2 Clay for isolation of waste landfills 149
6.3 Clay for isolation of highly radioactive waste – deep
geological disposal 180
6.4 References 206

7 Long-term function of smectite clay for waste isolation 208

7.1 General 208
7.2 Clay liners of waste landfills 209
7.3 HLW isolation – a type of temperature-related mineral
conversion 219
7.4 References 247

8 Theoretical modelling of the performance of smectite clay

microstructure 250
8.1 Introduction 250
8.2 Purpose and objectives of models 251
8.3 Elements of the THMCB problem 252
 Contents vii
8.4 Basis for modelling 253
8.5 Modelling of microstructural evolution 268
8.6 Integrated THMC modelling 269
8.7 Applicability of models 292
8.8 Application of the codes to the AEspoe case 294
8.9 Models for special purposes 308
8.10 References 314

Index 317
Figures

1.1 Example of concept for disposal of HLW in argillaceous

rock (NAGRA, Switzerland) 2
1.2 Examples of repository concepts for disposal of HLW in
crystalline rock 3
1.3 Large block of highly compacted bentonite powder 4
2.1 Commonly assumed crystal constitution of a smectite
lamella 6
2.2 A simplified representation of silica tetrahedral and
octahedral unit 6
2.3 Micrographs of smectite (montmorillonite) particles 7
2.4 Model of hydrate configuration in interlamellar
montmorillonite with Edelmann/Favejee crystal
constitution 8
2.5 Interlamellar hydrated Ca ion complex with water
molecules 9
2.6 Possible crystal structure for Li- and Na-montmorillonite
with apical tetrahedrons 11
2.7 Proposed organization of water and ions at clay mineral
surfaces 12
2.8 Interacting electrical double-layers 13
2.9 Chemical potential of montmorillonite-rich clay 14
2.10 Diffusion coefficient and viscosity of porewater in
montmorillonite calculated by use of molecular dynamics 15
2.11 Soil-type humic acid forming polymers containing phenols
and amino acids 18
2.12 Generalized picture of positively charged organic ions or
molecules in the interlamellar space of smectites 19
2.13 Kaolinite, montmorillonite and illite minerals, using the
simplified crystal notation 20
2.14 Typical size distribution of illite particles 21
2.15 Size distribution (longest diameter) of MX-80 bentonite
dispersed in distilled water 22
2.16 Dispersed illite particles photographed using a TEM 22
x Figures
2.17 Stacks of chlorite lamellae 23
2.18 SEM picture of stacks of kaolinite particles 24
2.19 Basic hydroxy interlayer mineral with interlayer
hydroxy sheets 26
2.20 TEM micrograph of amorphous substance precipitated
on carbonate particles cementing them together 28
2.21 Bonding mechanism of organic molecules and clay
minerals 29
2.22 TEM micrograph gas-filled void in clay matrix 30
2.23 View of open pit mining of Friedland Ton (FIM GmbH) 36
3.1 Hierarchic representation of soil structure 45
3.2 Interpretation of presence of microstructures 46
3.3 Hydrogen bonds established by water molecules
located between particles 50
3.4 Bonds by sorbed bi- or polyvalent cations shown as ellipses 50
3.5 Dipole type bonding of particles with non-uniform
charge distribution 51
3.6 Rheograms for sodium kaolinite 52
3.7 Soft kaolinite clay 53
3.8 Rheograms for kaolinite mixed with the
polysaccharide Xanthan 53
3.9 Contribution of microstructure bonds and
cementation to triaxial compressive strength 54
3.10 Variation of calculated hydraulic conductivity coefficient 55
3.11 Partitioning of Pb onto soil solids in column leaching
experiments using a lead nitrate leachate 56
3.12 Clay aggregates in soft illitic sediments 58
3.13 Micrograph of 20 m aggregate of illite/mixed-layer
particles in low-electrolyte river water 58
3.14 Schematic showing failure of the total structure of a clay
sample under load 60
3.15 Microstructural changes by compression 61
3.16 Failure in clay at critical stress conditions 62
3.17 TEM micrograph of microstructural changes in
soft illitic clay 62
3.18 Theoretical relationship between bulk dry density in kg/m3
and the content of interlamellar water 64
3.19 Effective porosity 64
3.20 Influence of section thickness on the interpretation of
microstructural details 67
3.21 Close-up view of knife and specimen in ultramicrotomy 68
3.22 Swelling pressure built up during saturation of an air-dry
MX-80 bentonite sample 71
3.23 Structural effect on smectite clay due to drying 71
3.24 Light-micrographs of natural clay-rich materials 72
 Figures xi
3.25 TEM micrograph of ultrathin section of smectitic
Triassic clay 73
3.26 Smectitic moraine clay 73
3.27 Scanning micrograph of fractured freeze-dried
smectite clay sample 73
3.28 TEM micrograph of 500 Å ultrathin section and
channel section of clay 74
3.29 Method for defining microstructural features in 2D and 3D 76
3.30 Correlation of the average gel density (b) and the average
bulk density (av) 76
3.31 Example of digitalized micrograph of Wyoming bentonite 77
3.32 F2 and F3 versus gel density for Wyoming bentonite
(MX-80) 77
3.33 F2 and F3 versus bulk density for Wyoming bentonite
(MX-80) 78
3.34 Section thickness affecting the microstructural
interpretation 79
4.1 System of components in deep disposal of highly
radioactive waste 84
4.2 System of components in shallow disposal of chemical
waste and low-level radioactive waste 84
4.3 Typical grain size distribution of American Colloid’s
MX-80 85
4.4 Scanning electron micrograph of a lump of particles
in dried and ground natural bentonite 86
4.5 Compacting Wyoming bentonite (MX-80) powder 87
4.6 Clay block prepared by compacting clay powder under
100 MPa pressure 88
4.7 Sector-shaped block of smectite-rich clay 88
4.8 Unit cell 89
4.9 Model of the unit cell compressed in the compaction phase
and then hydrated resulting in permeable channels 89
4.10 Schematic picture of coagulation of clay particles 90
4.11 Expansion of Na-smectite clay by exposure to water
vapour in a CNRS high-voltage electron microscope 91
4.12 Procedure for borehole plugging with compacted clay
blocks 92
4.13 Growth of soft clay through the perforation 93
4.14 Arrangement of granules in compacted MX-80 93
4.15 Schematic pictures of stack assemblages and influence of
density at water saturation 95
4.16 Digitalized TEM micrograph of HDPy-treated MX-80 clay 97
4.17 Performance of backfill without and with clay component 99
4.18 Maturation of mixture of 10% smectite clay
and ballast particles 102
xii Figures
4.19 Fuller’s and Weymouth’s theoretical size distributions 103
4.20 Relationship between bentonite (MX-80) content and
dry density 103
4.21 Micrograph of thin section of acrylate-embedded mixture 105
5.1 Schematic illustration of the proportions of water held in
interlamellar spaces, micropores and macropores 108
5.2 Oedometer for permeation of soil samples and recording of
swelling pressure 110
5.3 Illustration of constant head hydraulic conductivity testing 111
5.4 Water entry experiment with negative hydraulic head 112
5.5 Schematic diagram showing critical and apparent threshold
gradients 113
5.6 Relation between the parameter P/T and the hydraulic
conductivity evaluated from oedometer tests 114
5.7 System of elements with different hydraulic conductivity 115
5.8 Change in hydraulic conductivity of a smectitic clay 117
5.9 FEM calculation 118
5.10 Piping in the form of a hydraulic wedge 118
5.11 Assumed size distribution of pore size in clays A, B and C 120
5.12 Schematic view of the 3D conceptual model 121
5.13 Channel network mapped as a cubic grid with gel-filled
channels intersecting at a node in the grid 121
5.14 Hydraulic conductivity of clays 124
5.15 Hydraulic conductivity of nearly pure illite 124
5.16 Impact of salt water on the hydraulic conductivity
of FIM clay 124
5.17 Example of the gas penetration process at the critical
pressure for a bentonite clay 127
5.18 Example of the gas penetration process at the critical
pressure for Na bentonite and graded ballast 127
5.19 Measured effective diffusivities for smectite clay 129
5.20 Development of swelling pressure of maturing clay 131
5.21 Swelling pressure tests on saturated samples of FIM clay 132
5.22 Development of swelling pressure in HDPy-treated
MX-80 clay 135
5.23 Bacterium embedded in montmorillonite clay 136
5.24 3D system of boxes representing voids that are open or
filled with soft clay gels 137
5.25 Shaly Canadian bentonite exploited for manufacturing
clay powder 138
5.26 Typical brittle-type stress/strain behaviour at uniaxial
compression of significantly cemented argillaceous rock 138
5.27 Schematic energy barrier spectrum in clay under shearing 139
5.28 Consecutive stages in the evolution of shear strain of
microstructural network of clay particles 139
 Figures xiii
5.29 General appearance of the creep behaviour of clays 142
5.30 Transition from sol to gel form soft smectite after
shearing 143
5.31 Thixotropic strength regain of smectite-rich clay 143
6.1 Typical general MSW landfill with top- and bottom-liner
systems 150
6.2 Typical landfill waste bottom-liner systems 151
6.3 General specifications for engineered barrier systems 153
6.4 Schematic diagram of a refuse dump of buried type 153
6.5 Water content of 0.9 m column of 10% Na bentonite
(MX-80) and 90% ballast 156
6.6 Comparison of predicted and measured water content of
FIM clay 156
6.7 Oedometer for sampling during the test 157
6.8 Predicted and measured wetting rate of FIM clay 158
6.9 Relation between smectite (MX-80) content and
dry bulk density 164
6.10 Specific permeability 166
6.11 Grain size distribution of mixture of moraine and
very fine Na bentonite 166
6.12 Compaction curves of a mixture of MX-80 clay and
crushed rock 168
6.13 Shear strain by differential settlement of a top liner 169
6.14 Direct shear apparatus used for the laboratory tests 169
6.15 Evaluated shear stress/strain behaviour 170
6.16 Failure envelope in Mohr–Coulomb representation 171
6.17 Section of sloping top liner 172
6.18 Generalized shape of the creep rate curve 174
6.19 Retention profiles for Pb, Cu and Zn 177
6.20 Three thousand year old mound at Hersby, Sollentuna,
Uppland in Sweden 180
6.21 KBS-3V deposition hole with copper-shielded canister 182
6.22 Temperature-driven redistribution of the original water
content 183
6.23 Schematic picture of hydraulically important structural
features in near-field rock 185
6.24 Different hydraulic boundary conditions 186
6.25 Interpretation of thin section of crystalline rock 187
6.26 Water content as a function of the distance form the
wet boundary 188
6.27 Flow conditions in porous medium with long hole 190
6.28 Increase in saturation of the clay for rock with
K  E–10 m/s 191
6.29 Increase in saturation of the clay for rock with
K  E–11 m/s 191
xiv Figures
6.30 Increase in saturation of the clay for the rock with
K  E–12 m/s 192
6.31 Placement (a, b, c) and compaction (d, e, f) of backfill
using the ‘inclined layer principle’ 194
6.32 Variation in dry density and water content 194
6.33 Clay block masonry with clay slurry (grout) filling the
gap to the rock 195
6.34 Freshly prepared mixture of FIM clay, slag cement and
strongly compacted MX-80 pellets 196
6.35 Repository consisting of a big concrete silo for
intermediate level waste, and vaults for low-level waste 197
6.36 Schematic picture of the microstructure of a
clay/ballast mixture 198
6.37 Longitudinal cross-section of rotationally symmetric
plug with clay seals 200
6.38 Geometry and appearance of the 1600 bentonite blocks 200
6.39 Recorded outflow through and along the plug 201
6.40 Tests of plugs of smectite clay 202
6.41 Simplified description of the process leading to expansion
of clay 203
6.42 Theoretical time-dependent movement 203
6.43 Hydraulic conductivity of soft Na-montmorillonite clay 204
6.44 One cubic meter block with two permeable 100 m
fractures 204
6.45 Experiment for electrophoretic sealing of fractures 205
7.1 Schematic illustration of the local regime at the
freezing front 210
7.2 SEM pictures showing change in size and shape of MUs
in high clay content soil 212
7.3 Experimental set-up of percolation test 214
7.4 Grain size distribution of ballasts A and B 214
7.5 Example of the impact of the hydraulic gradient on
hydraulic conductivity 215
7.6 Change in hydraulic conductivity 218
7.7 Diagram showing the expected conversion of smectite
to illite 221
7.8 Possible lattice constitutions of montmorillonite 222
7.9 CEC of the Libyan montmorillonite bentonite 223
7.10 SSA of the Libyan bentonite 223
7.11 Silt particle coated with small quartz particles 224
7.12 Comparison of montmorillonite-rich clay 224
7.13 Microstructural changes in the form of collapse of stacks
of lamellae and precipitation of dense siliceous particles 225
7.14 Distribution of precipitated silica 225
 Figures xv
7.15 Results of uniaxial testing of hydrothermally treated
montmorillonite clay 226
7.16 Example of uniaxial compression testing 226
7.17 Evolution of SiO2(aq) concentration profile
(steep curve ~500 years) 230
7.18 Evolution of quartz abundance profile
(lowest curve ~500 years) 230
7.19 Evolution of SiO2(aq) concentration profile
(lowest curve ~10 000 years) 231
7.20 Evolution of quartz abundance profile
(lowest curve ~10 000 years) 231
7.21 Rehydration potential of Ca/Mg montmorillonite 234
7.22 Cell for clay/cement–water experiments 235
7.23 Crystal structure of Friedland Ton muscovite-
montmorillonite 236
7.24 XRD diagram of FIM clay powders from outer and
inner parts 238
7.25 Schematic picture of cell with pellets confined during
water saturation and heating 240
7.26 Evolution of swelling pressure of strongly compressed
MX-80 pellets at room temperature 240
7.27 TEM micrograph of clay prepared by strongly
compressed MX-80 pellets 241
7.28 Schematic picture of the difference in dispersion and
gel formation of strongly compressed MX-80 pellets 242
7.29 XRD plot of samples extracted at different distances 244
7.30 Mineral assembly of the buffer clay 245
7.31 Swelling pressure of the untreated buffer clay 246
7.32 Sediment volume of moist clay 246
8.1 The simplified THMCB repository problem 253
8.2 Simple schematic showing basic elements of the
canister-buffer problem to be modelled 254
8.3 Illustration of a laboratory experiment demonstrating
the effect of swelling of buffer material in a constrained
sample 256
8.4 Assumption of properties and behaviour of unwetted
portion 258
8.5 Schematic showing compression of unwetted portion
of specimen 259
8.6 Different types of adsorption isotherms obtained from
batch equilibrium tests 260
8.7 Transformation of various clay minerals 262
8.8 Schematic showing the repeating layers of a 2:1 layer-lattice
mineral particle 263
xvi Figures
8.9 Schematic diagram showing the action of MUs in a
representative unit volume 264
8.10 Results from unsaturated flow into a natural low-swelling
clay soil column 265
8.11 Heat transfer and hydro-mechanical calculations 280
8.12 Schematic representation of an unsaturated porous
material 284
8.13 Pressure head (m) in the upper and salinity (%) at
447 m depth 295
8.14 Schematic view of generalized 3D model 295
8.15 (a) 3D tunnel domain and (b) 3D tunnel mesh 296
8.16 Measured and simulated temperature plots for mid-height
canister in Hole 1 297
8.17 Measured and simulated degree of saturation for mid-height
canister in Hole 1 298
8.18 Measured and simulated total pressure plots for mid-height
canister in Hole 1 298
8.19 Measured and simulated saturation plots for mid-height
canister in Hole 3 299
8.20 Evolution of temperature computed for three points in the
buffer in the ‘wet’ Hole 1 300
8.21 Predicted degree of saturation at mid-height of heater
number 1 301
8.22 Predicted temperature at mid-height canister in Hole 1 301
8.23 Predicted degree of saturation of the buffer at mid-height
canister in Hole 1 302
8.24 Predicted total stress at mid-height canister in Hole 1 302
8.25 Water saturation of buffer and backfill versus time for two
relevant cases (RF/RM BGR) 303
8.26 Temperature at mid-height of the canister in Hole 1 304
8.27 RH and temperature distributions in the buffer at mid-height
canister in Hole 1 304
8.28 Evolution of total pressure at mid-height of the buffer in the
wettest hole 305
8.29 Relative monovalent anion concentration 310
8.30 Effects of limitations in potassium availability to the
illitization of buffer smectite in KBS-3V 314

Colour plates
The following colour plates appear at the end of the book.
Colour Plate I: Micrograph of thin section of acrylate-embedded mixture
Colour Plate II: Example of digitalized micrograph of Wyoming bentonite
 Figures xvii
Colour Plate III: Digitalized TEM micrograph of HDPy-treated
MX-80 clay
Colour Plate IV: FEM calculation
Colour Plate V: 3D system of boxes representing voids that are open or
filled with soft clay gels
Colour Plate VI: View of open pit mining of Friedland Ton (FIM GmbH)
Colour Plate VII: Bacterium embedded in montmorillonite clay
Colour Plate VIII: Micrograph of 20 m aggregate of illite/mixed-layer
particles in low-electrolyte river water
Colour Plate IX: Growth of soft clay through the perforation
Colour Plate X: Shaly Canadian bentonite exploited for manufacturing
clay powder
Colour Plate XI: Schematic view of the 3D conceptual model
Tables

2.1 Number and thickness of interlamellar

hydrates in Å 9
2.2 d-spacing and water absorption of Na-montmorillonite in
atmosphere with different RH 10
2.3 Number of hydrate layers in compacted
Na-montmorillonite 16
2.4 Typical CEC ranges for some important smectites 17
2.5 CEC of montmorillonite determined with organic
cations and barium 18
2.6 Accessory minerals of major importance in buffers and
in the clay component of backfills 27
2.7 World production (P) and exports (E) of bentonite 31
2.8 Geological profile in the Tsukinuno Area (Tertiary age) 35
3.1 Void classification 65
4.1 Void size distribution in MX-80 94
4.2 Microstructural data for MX-80 in Na form(F2-value) 95
4.3 Microstructural data for MX-80 in Na form (F3-value) 96
4.4 Microstructural parameters of HDPy-treated MX-80 97
4.5 Semi-theoretical relationships between clay contents,
compaction degrees and physical soil data 104
5.1 Bulk and gel densities for MX-80 114
5.2 Microstructural data and conductivities for MX-80
in Na form 116
5.3 Microstructural data and conductivities for MX-80
in Ca form 116
5.4 Bulk hydraulic conductivity (K) of untreated and
HDPy-treated MX-80 clay 119
5.5 Number of differently sized channels 120
5.6 Hydraulic conductivity (K) of three clay types 122
5.7 Comparison of corrected theoretical hydraulic
conductivity and experimental values 123
5.8 Experimentally determined critical gas pressure in
MPa for MX-80 in Na form 126
xx Tables
5.9 Swelling pressure (ps) in MPa of well-characterized
smectite-rich materials at saturation with distilled water 132
5.10 Calculated and experimentally determined swelling
pressures 133
5.11 Swelling pressure (ps) of untreated and HDPy-treated
MX-80 clay 134
5.12 Thermal data of RMN and MX-80 clays 144
6.1 Hydraulic conductivity K of mixtures of 12% FIM clay
and ash before and after shearing 171
6.2 Net average hydraulic conductivity K of rock block 205
7.1 Literature data of unfrozen amount of water in different
soil types 213
7.2 Change in content of minus 2 m particles 215
7.3 Water saturation of MX-80 clay samples 217
7.4 Chemical composition of the Si-rich MERIT 5000 and the
Al-rich ELECTROLAND cements 237
7.5 Cement porewater composition 237
8.1 Constitutive equations and equilibrium restrictions 286
8.2 Equations and summary of variables 286
8.3 Actual and expected temperature in centigrade at the
canister and rock surfaces 305
8.4 Actual and expected degree of water saturation at the
canister and rock surfaces 306
8.5 Actual and expected pressure in MPa at the canister and
rock surfaces 306
8.6 Channel dimensions 310
Preface

Studies on the properties and behaviour of clay soils, conducted in Soil

Engineering, have revealed the importance of Soil Structure in the control
of the properties and response performance of clays. Early descriptions of
clay soil structure, in the 1950s–1960s, using such terms as ‘honeycomb’,
‘cardhouse’, ‘flocculated’, ‘dispersed’ and ‘oriented’ testify to the level of
descriptive scrutiny of the micromorphology of clay soils. Many of these
descriptive terms were based on evidence or deductions gained using thin
sections for light microscopy and controlled experiments on various kinds of
clays. With more sophisticated techniques presently available, for example
transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and scanning electron microscopy
(SEM) and nuclear magnetic resonance, and with considerable input from
colleagues in Soil Science and Clay Mineralogy working on the properties
and characteristics of clays, we have learnt more not only about soil
structure but also about the importance and role of the microstructural
units (MUs) that make up the total soil structure. The arrangement of these
MUs, (domains, peds, aggregate groups, etc. ) and the bondings established
between them are key to the macrostructural integrity of a soil.
The growing use of swelling clays, and particularly smectite clays, as
integral components in engineered clay barriers for waste isolation, has
fuelled the need for a body of literature dealing with the properties
of smectites and their performance under waste isolation scenarios. The
particular situation of isolation of canisters containing high level radioactive
waste (HLW) presents us with some very challenging issues with respect to the
use of the smectites as buffer and backfill material. To meet the challenges,
we need to understand how the clay material will respond to chemical and
heat attack, and to other degradative forces associated with abiotic and
biotic reactions and particularly under the a very long time span (hundreds
of thousands of years) and high temperature. Our individually separate and
collective work with swelling clays over the past 40 plus years have shown
the importance of developing an understanding of the layer-lattice structure
of the basic clay mineral, and particularly on how the mineral responds to
the various external forces and agents. The properties and characteristics of
the mineral that give it its swelling behaviour are those very same properties
xxii Preface
and characteristics that are seen to be highly dependent on the microstructural
constitution of the soil.
Since the primary focus of the book is with respect to the use of smectite
clays as buffer and barrier materials for waste isolation in general, and for
isolation of HLW in particular, no attempt is made to provide a detailed
background on the mineralogy and structure of smectites. Instead, a general
overview of the basic elements constituting the structure of phyllosilicates is
given so as to lay the basis for the performance of the layer-lattice material
upon water uptake (Chapter 2). The structure and performance of smectite
clays in particular, and clays in general, are considered in Chapter 3. Since
direct examination of MUs is not possible when these soils are undergoing
stress or are being subject to external inputs, we need to establish deductive
techniques that would give us insight into microstructural performance
using bulk macroscopic data (Chapter 5). The aim of these chapters is to
provide a microstructural basis for evaluating performance of the material.
Since the principal role of the compacted smectite clay in a barrier system is
to ‘manage’ the flow of fluids and contaminants, the available flow paths
and the processes restricting advective and diffusive flow are important
factors to be considered. Microstructrural control on these becomes impor-
tant (Chapter 6). Chapter 4 uses the background information provided in
the previous chapters and gives guidance on how these can be maximized.
We address the use of these clays as buffer and barrier systems for waste
isolation, in general and in particular for the HLW isolation problem, using
a specific underground HLW repository as an example (Chapter 7). Since
we are expected to design and construct isolation barriers for HLW
isolation that would function effectively for hundreds of thousands of
years, the use of analytical-computer models to predict the durability and
capability of such barriers is discussed in Chapter 8. The example in
Chapter 7 is used as the focus of the modelling efforts expended by various
representative groups involved in the isolation of HLW.
We would like to express our gratitude to our colleagues working in the
fields of Soil Engineering and Soil Science, and to the Swedish companies
Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Co, Stockholm, and Ragn-
Sell Waste Management AB, Hoegbytorp. We are grateful to them for their
inputs in our valuable discussions with them, for their encouragement, and
also for allowing the use of data emanating from projects conducted by
them. We extend our gratitude also to the European Commission (EC),
which financed, in part, international research projects such as the
Prototype Repository Project and the Cluster Repository Project (CROP),
which provided us with rich data sources.
Roland Pusch
Lund Sweden
Raymond N. Yong
North Saanich, B.C. Canada
February, 2005
1 Introduction

Soil mechanics investigators dealing with classical geotechnical problems

such as slope stability and settlement of buildings, have always sought to
understand the various mechanisms and physico-chemical processes upon
which to develop their mathematical models for prediction of soil behav-
iour. This led to the fruitful cooperation between mineralogists and soil
engineers exemplified by I.Th. Rosenqvist and L. Bjerrum in Norway, and
by T.W. Lambe and various soil physicists such as H. van Olphen and
P.F. Low in the United States half a century ago. Their work deepened our
understanding of the relationships between the microstructure and bulk
physical properties of illitic and kaolinitic clays, especially in respect to the
importance of the physical state of the porewater. Much less was known
about smectitic clays – to a very large extent because of the limited use of
the material. However, in the past two decades emphasis on the use of
swelling clays for buffer and barrier systems in the containment and isola-
tion of hazardous and non-hazardous waste materials requires us to obtain
a better understanding of such clays. A considerable portion of the mater-
ial contained in this book has been developed in conjunction with interna-
tional and Swedish research and development work on the requirements for
safe isolation of high level radioactive waste (HLW).
A group of swelling clays that well suits the buffer–barrier requirements
for containment of landfills and other facilities needing liner systems is the
smectite family. Such being the case, and especially in the context of isola-
tion of radioactive waste exposed to a special and demanding environment
of high temperature and radiation, the need for a better understanding of
the behaviour of smectite clays is paramount. There exists a critical require-
ment for knowledge and assurance of competent performance of the smec-
tite clays over the long time period (tens of thousands of years) of safe and
secure isolation of the HLW. The long time period for performance assur-
ance is a significantly more important parameter than in conventional soil
mechanics. This has led to some very comprehensive research studies on the
microstructure of the smectitic clays, and its importance in the physical
behaviour of such clays – especially in respect to the influence of chemical
factors. The outcome of past and ongoing studies can be seen in the many
2 Introduction
research reports issued by the international organizations charged with the
responsibility for the safe disposal of radioactive waste in Europe, such as
the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Co (SKB).
One such example is the European Commission (EC) study ‘Microstruc-
tural and chemical parameters of bentonite as determinants of waste isola-
tion efficiency’ (Contract F14W-CT95-0012). This study has shown that the
microstructural properties and characteristics (features) are predominant
factors in the determination of the isolation potential of bentonite-based
buffers and backfills.

Longitudinal section

Bentonite Blocks Highly compacted

compacted Granular Bentonite

Shaft B

Disposal gallery
230 m

10
9
8
7
6

50
m
40
m
5
4 l
3 m Shaft A sa
2 1000 po
1 f dis 0)
o 1
e 2 6–
as ies
Ph aller
1 of (g
Shaft A: waste transportation and ventilation exhaust Phase
al
Shaft B: personal and ventilation inlet dispos )
es 1–5
1...10: order of gallery filling (galleri

Figure 1.1 Example of concept for disposal of HLW in argillaceous rock (NAGRA,
Switzerland).
 Another Random Document on
Scribd Without Any Related Topics
Presently the ground seemed to billow at a spot along Saya's side
and then at another. Ten minutes after the arrival of the third beetle,
a little rampart had reared itself all about Saya's body, following her
outlines precisely. Then her body moved slightly, in little jerks,
seeming to settle perhaps half an inch into the ground.
The burying-beetles were of that class of creatures which exploited
the bodies of the fallen. Working from below, they excavated the
earth. When there was a hollow space below they turned on their
backs and thrust up with their legs, jerking at the body until it sank
into the space they had made ready. The process would be repeated
until at last all their dead treasures had settled down below the level
of the surrounding ground. The loosened dirt then fell in at the
sides, completing the inhumation. Then, in the underground
darkness, it was the custom for the beetles to feast magnificently,
gorging themselves upon the food they had hidden from other
scavengers—and of course rearing their young also upon its
substance.
Ants and flies were rivals of these beetles and not infrequently the
sexton-beetles came upon carrion after ants had taken their toll, and
when it already swarmed with maggots. But in this case Saya was
not dead. The fact that she still lived, though unconscious, was the
factor that had given the sexton-beetles this splendid opportunity.
She breathed gently and irregularly, her face drawn with the sorrow
of the night before, while the desperately hurrying beetles swarmed
about beneath her body, channelling away the soil so she would sink
lower and lower into it. She descended slowly, a half-inch by a half-
inch. The bright-red tufts of thread appeared again and a beetle
made its way to the open air. It moved hastily about, inspecting the
progress of the work.
It dived below again. Another inch and, after a long time, another,
were excavated.
Matters still progressed when Burl stepped out from a group of
overshadowing toadstools and halted. He cast his eyes over the
landscape and was struck by its familiarity. He was, in fact, very near
the spot he had left the night before in that maniacal ride on the
back of a flying beetle. He moved back and forth, trying to account
for the feeling of recognition.
He saw the low cliff, then, and moved eagerly toward it, passing
within fifty feet of Saya's body, now more than half-buried in the
ground. The loose dirt around the outline of her figure was
beginning to topple in little rivulets upon her. One of her shoulders
was already half-screened from view. Burl passed on, unseeing.
He hurried a little. In a moment he recognized his location exactly.
There were the mining-bee burrows. There was a thrown-away lump
of edible mushroom, cast aside as the tribesfolk fled.
His feet stirred up a fine dust, and he stopped short. A red puffball
had burst here. It fully accounted for the absence of the tribe, and
Burl sweated in sudden fear. He thought instantly of Saya. He went
carefully to make sure. This was, absolutely, the hiding place of the
tribe. There was another mushroom-fragment. There was a spear,
thrown down by one of the men in his flight. Red dust had settled
upon the spear and the mushroom-fragments.
Burl turned back, hurrying again, but taking care to disturb the dust
no more than he could possibly help.
The little excavation into which Saya was sinking inch by inch was
not in his path. Her body no longer lay above the ground, but in it.
Burl went by, frantic with anxiety about the tribe, but about Saya
most of all.
Her body quivered and sank a fraction into the ground. Half a dozen
small streams of earth were tumbling upon her. In minutes she
would be wholly hidden from view.
Burl went to beat among the mushroom-thickets, in quest of the
bodies of his tribesfolk. They could have staggered out of the red
dust and collapsed beyond. He would have shouted, but the deep
sense of loneliness silenced him. His throat ached with grief. He
searched on....
There was a noise. From a huge clump of toadstools—perhaps the
very one he had climbed over in the night—there came the sound of
crashings and the breaking of the spongy stuff. Twin tapering
antennae appeared, and then a monster beetle lurched into the
open space, its ghastly mandibles gaping sidewise.
It was all of eight feet long and supported by six crooked, saw-
toothed legs. Huge, multiple eyes stared with preoccupation at the
world. It advanced deliberately with clankings and clashings as of a
hideous machine. Burl fled on the instant, running directly away
from it.
A little depression lay in the ground before him. He did not swerve,
but made to jump over it. As he leaped he saw the color of bare
flesh, Saya, limp and helpless, sinking slowly into the ground with
tricklings of dirt falling down to cover her. It seemed to Burl that she
quivered a little.
Instantly there was a terrific struggle within Burl. Behind him was
the giant meat-eating beetle; beneath him was Saya whom he loved.
There was certain death lurching toward him on evilly crooked legs—
and the life he had hoped for lay in a shallow pit. Of course he
thought Saya dead.
Perhaps it was rage, or despair, or a simple human madness which
made him act otherwise than rationally. The things which raise
humans above brute creation, however, are only partly reasonable.
Most human emotions—especially the creditable ones—cannot be
justified by reason, and very few heroic actions are based upon
logical thought.
Burl whirled as he landed, his puny spear held ready. In his left hand
he held the haunch of a creature much like the one which clanked
and rattled toward him. With a yell of insane defiance—completely
beyond justification by reason—Burl flung that meat-filled leg at the
monster.
It hit. Undoubtedly, it hurt. The beetle seized it ferociously. It
crushed it. There was meat in it, sweet and juicy.
The beetle devoured it. It forgot the man standing there, waiting for
death. It crunched the leg-joint of a cousin or brother, confusing the
blow with the missile that had delivered it. When the tidbit was
finished it turned and lumbered off to investigate another mushroom
thicket. It seemed to consider then an enemy had been conquered
and devoured and that normal life could go on.
Then Burl stopped quickly, and dragged Saya from the grave the
sexton-beetles had labored so feverishly to provide for her. Crumbled
soil fell from her shoulders, from her face, and from her body. Three
little eight-inch beetles with black and red markings scurried for
cover in terrified haste. Burl carried Saya to a resting-place of soft
mould to mourn over her.
He was a completely ignorant savage, save that he knew more of
the ways of insects than anybody anywhere else—the Ecological
Service, which had stocked this planet, not being excepted. To Burl
the unconsciousness of Saya was as death itself. Dumb misery smote
him, and he laid her down gently and quite literally wept. He had
been beautifully pleased with himself for having slain one flying
beetle. But for Saya's seeming death, he would have been almost
unbearable with pride over having put another to flight. But now he
was merely a broken-hearted, very human young man.
But a long time later Saya opened her eyes and looked about
bewilderedly.
They were in considerable danger for some time after that, because
they were oblivious to everything but each other. Saya rested in half-
incredulous happiness against Burl's shoulder as he told her jerkily of
his attempt on a night-bound butterfly, which turned out to be a
flying beetle that took him aloft. He told of his search for the tribe
and then his discovery of her apparently lifeless body. When he
spoke of the monster which had lurched from the mushroom thicket,
and of the desperation with which he had faced it, Saya looked at
him with warm, proud eyes. But Burl was abruptly struck with the
remarkable convenience of that discovery. If his tribesmen could
secure an ample supply of meat, they might defend themselves
against attack by throwing it to their attackers. In fact, insects were
so stupid that almost any object thrown quickly enough and fast
enough, might be made to serve as sacrifices instead of themselves.
A timid, frightened whisper roused them from their absorption. They
looked up. The boy Dik stood some distance away, staring at them
wide-eyed, almost convinced that he looked upon the living dead. A
sudden movement on the part of either of them would have sent
him bolting away. Two or three other bobbing heads gazed
affrightedly from nearby hiding-places. Jon was poised for flight.
The tribe had come back to its former hiding-place simply as a way
to reassemble. They had believed both Burl and Saya dead, and they
accepted Burl's death as their own doom. But now they stared.
Burl spoke—fortunately without arrogance—and Dik and Tet came
timorously from their hiding-places. The others followed, the tribe
forming a frightened half-circle about the seated pair. Burl spoke
again and presently one of the bravest—Cori—dared to approach
and touch him. Instantly a babble of the crude labial language of the
tribe broke out. Awed exclamations and questions filled the air.
But Burl, for once, showed some common sense. Instead of a
vainglorious recital, he merely cast down the long tapering antennae
of the flying-beetle. They looked, and recognized their origin.
Then Burl curtly ordered Dor and Jak to make a chair of their hands
for Saya. She was weak from her fall and the loss of blood. The two
men humbly advanced and obeyed. Then Burl curtly ordered the
march resumed.
They went on, more slowly than on previous days, but none-the-less
steadily. Burl led them across-country, marching in advance with a
matter-of-fact alertness for signs of danger. He felt more confidence
than ever before. It was not fully justified, of course. Jon now
retrieved the spear he had discarded. The small party fairly bristled
with weapons. But Burl knew that they were liable to be cast away
as impediments if flight seemed necessary.
As he led the way Burl began to think busily in the manner that only
leaders find necessary. He had taught his followers to kill ants for
food, though they were still uneasy about such adventures. He had
led them to attack great yellow grubs upon giant cabbages. But they
had not yet faced any actual danger, as he had done. He must drive
them to face something....
The opportunity came that same day, in late afternoon. To westward
the cloud-bank was barely beginning to show the colors that presage
nightfall, when a bumble-bee droned heavily overhead, making for
its home burrow. The little, straggling group of marching people
looked up and saw the scanty load of pollen packed in the stiff
bristles of the bee's hind-legs. It sped onward heavily, its almost
transparent wings mere blurs in the air.
It was barely fifty feet above the ground. Burl dropped his glance
and tensed. A slender-waisted wasp was shooting upward from an
ambush among the noisome fungi of this plain.
The bee swerved and tried to escape. The wasp over-hauled it. The
bee dodged frantically. It was a good four feet in length,—as large
as the wasp, certainly—but it was more heavily built and could not
make the speed of which the wasp was capable. It dodged with less
agility. Twice, in desperation, it did manage to evade the plunging
dives of the wasp, but the third time the two insects grappled in
mid-air almost over the heads of the humans.
They tumbled downward in a clawing, biting, tangle of bodies and
legs. They hit the ground and rolled over and over. The bee
struggled to insert her barbed sting in the more supple body of her
adversary. She writhed and twisted desperately.
But there came an instant of infinite confusion and the bee lay on
her back. The wasp suddenly moved with that ghastly skilled
precision of a creature performing an incredible feat instinctively,
apparently unaware that it is doing so. The dazed bee was swung
upright in a peculiarly artificial pose. The wasp's body curved, and its
deadly, rapier-sharp sting struck....
The bee was dead. Instantly. As if struck dead by lightning. The
wasp had stung in a certain place in the neck-parts where all the
nerve-cords pass. To sting there, the wasp had to bring its victim to
a particular pose. It was precisely the trick of a desnucador, the
butcher who kills cattle by severing the spinal cord. For the wasp's
purposes the bee had to be killed in this fashion and no other.
Burl began to give low-toned commands to his followers. He knew
what was coming next, and so did they. When the sequel of the
murder began he moved forward, his tribesmen wavering after him.
This venture was actually one of the least dangerous they could
attempt, but merely to attack a wasp was a hair-raising idea. Only
Burl's prestige plus their knowledge made them capable of it.
The second act of the murder-drama was gruesomeness itself. The
pirate-wasp was a carnivore, but this was the season when the
wasps raised young. Inevitably there was sweet honey in the half-
filled crop of the bee. Had she arrived safely at the hive, the sweet
and sticky liquid would have been disgorged for the benefit of bee-
grubs. The wasp avidly set to work to secure that honey. The bee-
carcass itself was destined for the pirate-wasp's own offspring, and
that squirming monstrosity is even more violently carnivorous than
its mother. The parent wasp set about abstracting the dead bee's
honey, before taking the carcass to its young one, because honey is
poisonous to the pirate-wasp's grub. Yet insects cannot act from
solicitude or anything but instinct. And instinct must be maintained
by lavish rewards.
So the pirate-wasp sought its reward—an insane, insatiable,
gluttonous satisfaction in the honey that was poison to its young.
The wasp foiled its murdered victim upon its back again and
feverishly pressed on the limp body to force out the honey. And this
was the reason for its precise manner of murder. Only when killed by
the destruction of all nerve-currents would the bee's body be left
limp like this. Only a bee killed in this exact fashion would yield its
honey to manipulation.
The honey appeared, flowing from the dead bee's mouth. The wasp,
in trembling, ghoulish ecstasy, devoured it as it appeared. It was lost
to all other sights or sensations but its feast.
And this was the moment when Burl signalled for the attack. The
tribesmen's prey was deaf and blind and raptured. It was aware of
nothing but the delight it savored. But the men wavered,
nevertheless, when they drew near. Burl was first to thrust his spear
powerfully into the trembling body.
When he was not instantly destroyed the others took courage. Dor's
spear penetrated the very vitals of the ghoul. Jak's club fell with
terrific force upon the wasp's slender waist. There was a crackling,
and the long, spidery limbs quivered and writhed. Then Burl struck
again and the creature fell into two writhing halves.
They butchered it rather messily, but Burl noticed that even as it
died, sundered and pierced with spears, its long tongue licked out in
one last rapturous taste of the honey that had been its undoing.
Some time later, burdened with the pollen laden legs of the great
bee, the tribe resumed its journey.
Now Burl had men behind him. They were still timid and prone to
flee at the least alarm, but they were vastly more dependable than
they had been. They had attacked and slain a wasp whose sting
would have killed any of them. They had done battle under the
leadership of Burl, whose spear had struck the first blow. They were
sharers of his glory and, therefore, much more nearly like the
followers of a chieftain ought to be.
Their new spirit was badly needed. The red puffballs were certainly
no less numerous in the new territory the tribe traversed than in the
territory they had left. And the season of their ripening' was further
advanced. More and more of the ground showed the deadly rime of
settled death-dust. To stay alive was increasingly difficult. When the
full spore-casting season arrived, it would be impossible. And that
season could not be far away.
The very next day after the killing of the wasp, survival despite the
red dust had begun to seem unimaginable. Where, earlier, one saw a
red-dust cloud bursting here and there at intervals, on this day there
was always a billowing mass of lethal vapor in the air. At no time
was the landscape free of a moving mist of death. Usually there
were three or four in sight at once. Often there were half a dozen.
Once there were eight. It could be guessed that in one day more
they would ripen in such monstrous numbers that anything which
walked or flew or crawled must breathe in the spores and perish.
And that day, just at sunset, the tribe came to the top of a small rise
in the ground. For an hour they had been marching and
countermarching to avoid the suddenly-billowing clouds of dust.
Once they had been nearly hemmed in when three of the dull-red
mists seemed to flow together, enclosing the three sides of a circle.
They escaped then only by the most desperate of sprinting.
But now they came to the little hillock and halted. Before them
stretched a plain, all of four miles wide, colored a brownish brick-red
by the red puffballs. The tribe had seen mushroom forests—they had
lived in them—and knew of the dangers that lurked there. But the
plain before them was not simply dangerous; it was fatal. To right
and left it stretched as far as the eye could see, but away on its
farther edge Burl caught a glimpse of flowing water.
Over the plain itself a thin red haze seemed to float. It was simply a
cloud of the deadly spores, dispersed and indefinite, but constantly
replenished by the freshly bursting puffballs. While the tribesfolk
stood and watched, thick columns of dust rose here and there and at
the other place, too many to count. They settled again but left
behind enough of the fine powder to keep a thin red haze over all
the plain. This was a mass of literally millions of the deadly growths.
Here was one place where no carnivorous beetles roamed and
where no spiders lurked. There were nothing here but the sullen
columns of dust and the haze that they left behind.
And of course it would be nothing less than suicide to try to go back.
 8. A FLIGHT CONTINUES
Burl kept his people alive until darkness fell. He had assigned
watchers for each direction and when flight was necessary the adults
helped the children to avoid the red dust. Four times they changed
direction after shrill-voiced warnings. When night settled over the
plain they were forced to come to a halt.
But the puffballs were designed to burst by day. Stumbled into, they
could split at any time, and the humans did hear some few of the
tearing noises that denoted a spore-spout in the darkness. But after
slow nightly rain began they heard no more.
Burl led his people into the plain of red puffballs as soon as the rain
had lasted long enough to wash down the red haze still hanging in
the air and turn the fallen spores to mud.
It was an enterprise of such absolute desperation that very likely no
civilized man would have tried it. There were no stars, for guidance,
nor compasses to show the way. There were no lights to enable
them to dodge the deadly things they strove to escape, and there
was no possibility of their keeping a straight course in the darkness.
They had to trust to luck in perhaps the longest long-shot that
humans every accepted as a gamble.
Quaintly, they used the long antennae of a dead flying-beetle as
sense-organs for themselves. They entered the red plain in a long
single file, Burl leading the way with one of the two feathery whips
extended before him. Saya helped him check on what lay in the
darkness ahead, but made sure not to leave his side. Others trailed
behind, hand in hand.
Progress was slow. The sky was utter blackness, of course, but
nowhere in the lowlands is there an absolute black. Where fox-fire
doesn't burn without consuming, there are mushrooms with glows of
their own. Rusts sometimes shone faintly. Naturally there were no
fireflies or glow-worms of any sort; but neither were there any living
things to hunt the tiny tribe as it moved half-blindly in single file
through the plain of red puffballs. Within half an hour even Burl did
not believe he had kept to his original line. An hour later they
realized despairingly that they were marching helpless through
puffballs which would make the air unbreathable at dawn. But they
marched on.
Once they smelled the rank odor of cabbages. They followed the
scent and came upon them, glowing palely with parasitic moulds on
their leaves. And there were living things here: huge caterpillars
eating and eating, even in the dark, against the time of
metamorphosis. Burl could have cried out infuriatedly at them
because they were—so he assumed—immune to the death of the
red dust. But the red dust was all about, and the smell of cabbages
was not the smell of life.
It could have been, of course. Caterpillars breathe like all insects at
every stage of their development. But furry caterpillars breathe
through openings which are covered over with matted fur. Here, that
matted fur acted to filter the air. The eggs of the caterpillars had
been laid before the puffballs were ready to burst. The time of
spore-bearing would be over before the grubs were butterflies or
moths. These creatures were safe against all enemies—even men.
But men groped and blundered in the darkness simply because they
did not think to take the fur garments they wore and hold them to
their noses to serve as gas-masks or air-filters. The time for that
would come, but not yet.
With the docility of despair, Burl's tribe followed him through all the
night. When the sky began to pale in the east, they numbly resigned
themselves to death. But still they followed.
And in the very early gray light—when only the very ripest of the red
puffballs spouted toward a still-dark sky—Burl looked harassedly
about him and could have groaned. He was in a little circular
clearing, the deadly red things all about him. There was not yet light
enough for colors to appear. There was merely a vast stillness
everywhere, and a mocking hint of the hot and peppery scent of
death-dust—now turned to mud—all about him.
Burl dropped in bitter discouragement. Soon the misty dust-clouds
would begin to move about; the reddish haze would form above all
this space....
Then, quite suddenly, he lifted his head and whooped. He had heard
the sound of running water.
His followers looked at him with dawning hope. Without a word to
them, Burl began to run. They followed hastily and quickened their
pace when his voice came back in a shout of triumph. In a moment
they had emerged from the tangle of fungus growths to stand upon
the banks of a wide river—the same river whose gleam Burl had
seen the day before, from the farther side of the red puffball plain.
Once before, Burl had floated down a river upon a mushroom raft.
That journey had been involuntary. He had been carried far from his
tribe and Saya, his heart filled with desolation. But now he viewed
the swiftly-running current with delight.
He cast his eyes up and down the bank. Here and there it rose in a
low bluff and thick shelf-fungi stretched out above the water. They
were adaptations of the fungi that once had grown on trees and now
fed upon the incredibly nourishing earth-banks formed of dead
growing things. Burl was busy in an instant, stabbing the relatively
hard growths with his spear and striving to wrench them free. The
tribesmen stared blankly, but at a snapped order they imitated him.
Soon two dozen masses of firm, light fungus lay upon the shore.
Burl began to explain what they were for, but Dor remonstrated.
They were afraid to part from him. If they might embark on the
same fungus-raft, it would be a different matter. Old Tama scolded
him shrilly at the thought of separation. Jon trembled at the mere
idea.
Burl cast an apprehensive glance at the sky. Day was rapidly
approaching. Soon the red puffballs would burst and shoot their
dust-clouds into the air. This was no time to make stipulations. Then
Saya spoke softly.
Burl made the suggested great sacrifice. He took the gorgeous
velvet cloak of moth-wing from his shoulder and tore it into a dozen
long, irregular pieces along the lines of the sinews reinforcing it. He
planted his spear upright in the largest raft, fastening the other
cranky craft to it with the improvised lines.
In a matter of minutes the small flotilla of rafts bobbed in the
stream. One by one, Burl settled the folk upon them with stern
commands about movement. Then he shoved them out from the
bank. The collection of uneasy, floating things moved slowly out
from shore to where the current caught them. Burl and Saya sat on
the same section of fungus, the other trustful but frightened tribes-
people clustered timorously about.
As they began to move between the mushroom-lined banks of the
river, and as the mist of nighttime lifted from its surface, columns of
red dust spurted sullenly upward on the plain. In the light of dawn
the deadly red haze was forming once more over the puffball plain.
By that time, however, the unstable rafts were speeding down the
river, bobbing and whirling in the stream, with wide-eyed people as
their passengers gazing in wonderment at the shores.
Five miles downstream, the red growths became less numerous and
other forms of fungus took their places. Moulds and rusts covered
the ground as grass did on more favored planets. Toadstools showed
their creamy, rounded heads, and there were malformed things with
swollen trunks and branches mocking the trees that were never seen
in these lowlands. Once the tribesmen saw the grisly bulk of a
hunting-spider outlined on the river-bank.
All through the long day they rode the current, while the insect life
that had been absent in the neighborhood of the death-plain
became abundant again. Bees once more droned overhead, and
wasps and dragonflies. Four-inch mosquitoes appeared, to be driven
off with blows. Glittering beetles made droning or booming noises as
they flew. Flies of every imaginable metallic hue flew about. Huge
butterflies danced above the steaming land and running river in
seeming ecstasy at simply being alive.
All the thousand-and-one forms of insect life flew and crawled and
swam and dived where the people of the rafts could see them.
Water-beetles came lazily to the surface to snap at other insects on
the surface. The shell-covered boats of caddis-flies floated in the
eddies and backwaters.
The day wore on and the shores flowed by. The tribesmen ate of
their food and drank of the river. When afternoon came the banks
fell away and the current slackened. The shores became indefinite.
The river merged itself into a vast swamp from which came a
continual muttering.
The water seemed to grow dark when black mud took the place of
the clay that had formed its bed. Then there appeared floating green
things which did not move with the flowing water. They were the
leaves of the water-lilies that managed to survive along with
cabbages and a very few other plants in the midst of a fungus world.
Twelve feet across, any one of the green leaves might have
supported the whole of Burl's tribe.
They became so numerous that only a relatively narrow, uncovered
stream flowed between tens of acres of the flat, floating leaves.
Here and there colossal waxen blossoms could be seen. Three men
could hide in those enormous flowers. They exhaled an almost
overpowering fragrance into the air.
And presently the muttering sound that had been heard far away
grew in volume to an intermittent deep-bass roar. It seemed to come
from the banks on either side. It was the discordant croaking of
frogs, eight feet in length, which lived and throve in this swamp.
Presently the tribesfolk saw them: green giants sitting immobile
upon the banks, only opening their huge mouths to croak.
Here in the swamps there was such luxuriance of insect life that a
normal tribal hunting-ground—in which tribesmen were not yet
accustomed to hunt—would seem like a desert by comparison.
Myriads of little midges, no more than three or four inches across
their wings, danced above the water. Butterflies flew low, seemingly
enamoured of their reflections in the glassy water.
The people watched as if their eyes would become engorged by the
strange new things they saw. Where the river split and split and
divided again, there was nothing with which they were familiar.
Mushrooms did not grow here. Moulds, yes. But there were cattails,
with stalks like trees, towering thirty feet above the waterways.
After a long, long time though, the streams began to rejoin each
other. Then low hills loomed through the thicker haze that filled the
air here. The river flowed toward and through them. And here a wall
of high mountains rose toward the sky, but their height could not be
guessed. They vanished in the mist even before the cloud-bank
swallowed them.
The river flowed through a river-gate, a water-gap in the mountains.
While day still held fully bright, the bobbing rafts went whirling
through a narrow pass with sheer walls that rose beyond all seeing
in the mist. Here there was even some white water. Above it,
spanning a chasm five hundred feet across, a banded spider had
flung its web. The rafts floated close enough to see the spider, a
monster even of its kind, its belly swollen to a diameter of yards. It
hung motionless in the center of the snare as the humans swept
beneath it.
Then the mountains drew back and the tribe was in a valley where,
look as they might, there was no single tawny-red puffball from
whose spreading range the tribesmen were refugees. The rafts
grounded and they waded ashore while still the day held. And there
was food here in plenty.
But darkness fell before they could explore. As a matter of
precaution Burl and his folk found a hiding-place in a mushroom-
thicket and hid until morning. The night-sounds were wholly familiar
to them. The noise of katydids was louder than usual—the feminine
sound of that name gives no hint of the sonorous, deep-toned notes
the enlarged creatures uttered—and that implied more vegetation as
compared with straight fungoid flora. A great many fireflies glowed
in the darkness shrouding the hiding-place, indicating that the huge
snails they fed on were plentiful. The snails would make very
suitable prey for the tribesmen also. But men were not yet
established in their own minds as predators.
They were, though, definitely no longer the furtive vermin they had
been. They knew there were such things as weapons. They had
killed ants for food and a pirate-wasp as an exercise in courage. To
some degree they were acquiring Burl's own qualities. But they were
still behind him—and he still had some way to go.
The next day they explored their new territory with a boldness which
would have been unthinkable a few weeks before. The new haven
was a valley, spreading out to a second swamp at its lower end.
They could not know it, but beyond the swamp lay the sea.
Exploring, because of strictly practical purposes and not for the sake
of knowledge, they found a great trap-door in the earth, sure sign of
the lair of a spider. Burl considered that before many days the
monster would have to be dealt with. But he did not yet know how it
could be done.
His people were rapidly becoming a tribe of men, but they still
needed Burl to think for them. What he could not think out, so far,
could not be done. But a part of the proof that they needed Burl to
think for them lay in the fact that they did not realize it. They
gathered facts about their environment. The nearest ant-city was
miles away. That meant that they would encounter its scouting
foragers rather than working-parties. The ant-city would be a source
of small prey—a notion that would have been inconceivable a little
while ago. There were numerous giant cabbages in the valley and
that meant there were big, defenseless slugs to spear whenever
necessary.
They saw praying-mantises—the adults were eighteen feet tall and
as big as giraffes, but much less desirable neighbors—and knew that
they would have to be avoided. But there were edible mushrooms on
every hand. If one avoided spiders and praying-mantises and the
meat-eating beetles; if one were safely hidden at night against the
amorous male spiders who took time off from courtship to devour
anything living that came their way; and if one lived at high-tension
alertness, interpreting every sound as possible danger and every
unknown thing as certain peril—then one could live quite
comfortably in this valley.
For three days the tribesmen felt that they had found a sort of
paradise. Jon had his belly full to bursting all day long. Tet and Dik
became skilled ant-hunters. Dor found a better spear and practiced
thoughtfully with it.
There were no red puffballs here. There was food. Burl's folk could
imagine no greater happiness. Even old Tama scolded only rarely.
They surely could not conceive of any place where a man might walk
calmly about with no danger at all of being devoured. This was
paradise!
And it was a deplorable state of affairs. It is not good for human
beings to feel secure and experience contentment. Men achieve only
by their wants or through their fears. Back at their former foraging-
ground, the tribe would never have emulated Burl with any passion
so long as they could survive by traditional behavior. Before the
menace of the red puffballs developed, he had brought them to the
point of killing ants, with him present and ready to assist. They
would have stayed at about that level. The red dust had forced their
flight. During that flight they had achieved what was—compared to
their former timidity—prodigies of valor.
But now they arrived at paradise. There was food. They could
survive here in the fashion of the good old days before they learned
the courage of desperation. They did not need Burl to keep them
alive or to feed them. They tended to disregard him. But they did
not disperse. Social grouping is an instinct in human beings as it is in
cattle or in schools of fish. Also, when Burl was available there was a
sense of pleasant confidence. He had gotten them out of trouble
before. If more trouble came, he would get them out of it again. But
why look for trouble?
Burl's tribesmen sank back into a contented lethargy. They found
food and hid themselves until it was all consumed. A part of the
valley was found where they were far enough from visible dangers
to feel blissfully safe. When they did move, though still with
elaborate caution, it was only to forage for food. And they did not
need to go far because there was plenty of food. They slipped back.
Happier than they had ever been, the foragers finally began to
forget to take their new spears or clubs with them. They were furtive
vermin in a particularly favorable environment.
And Burl was infuriated. He had known adulation. He was cherished,
to be sure, but adulation no longer came his way. Even Saya....
An ironically natural change took place in Saya. When Burl was a
chieftain, she looked at him with worshipful eyes. Now that he was
as other men, she displayed coquetry. And Burl was of that
peculiarly direct-thinking sort of human being who is capable of
leadership but not of intrigue. He was vain, of course. But he could
not engage in elaborate maneuvers to build up a romantic situation.
When Saya archly remained with the women of the tribe, he
considered that she avoided him. When she coyly avoided speech
with him, he angrily believed that she did not want his company.
When they had been in the valley for a week Burl went off on a
bitter journey by himself. Part of his motivation, probably, was a
childish resentment. He had been the great man of the tribe. He was
no longer so great because his particular qualities were not needed.
And—perhaps with some unconscious intent to punish them for their
lessened appreciation—he went off in a pet.
He still carried spear and club, but the grandeur of his costume had
deteriorated. His cloak was gone. The moth-antennae he had worn
bound to his forehead were now so draggled that they were
ridiculous. He went off angrily to be rid of his fellows' indifference.
He found the upward slopes which were the valley's literal
boundaries. They promised nothing. He found a minor valley in
which a labyrinth spider had built its shining snare. Burl almost
scorned the creature. He could kill it if he chose, merely by stabbing
it though the walls of its silken nest as it waited for unlucky insects
to blunder into the intricate web. He saw praying-mantises. Once he
came upon that extraordinary egg-container of the mantis tribe: a
gigantic leaf-shaped mass of solidified foam, whipped out of some
special plastic compound which the mantis secretes, and in which
the eggs are laid.
He found a caterpillar wrapped in its thick cocoon and, because he
was not foraging and not particularly hungry, he inspected it with
care. With great difficulty he even broke the strand of silk that
formed it, unreeling several feet in curiosity. Had he meditated, Burl
would have seen that this was cord which could be used to build
snares as spiders did. It could also be used to make defenses in
which—if built strongly and well—even hunting-spiders might be
tangled and dispatched.
But again he was not knowingly looking for things to be of use. He
coddled his sense of injury against the tribe. He punished them by
leaving them.
He encountered a four-foot praying-mantis that raised its saw-
toothed forelimbs and waited immobile for him to come within
reach. He had trouble getting away without a fight. His spear would
have been a clumsy weapon against so slender a target and the club
certainly not quick enough to counter the insect's lightning-like
movements.
He was bothered. That day he hunted ants. The difficulty was mainly
that of finding individual ants, alone, who could be slaughtered
without drawing hordes of others into the fight. Before nightfall he
had three of them—foot-long carcasses—slung at his belt. Near
sunset he came upon another fairly recent praying-mantis hatchling.
It was almost an ambush. The young monster stood completely
immobile and waited for him to walk into its reach.
Burl performed a deliberate experiment—something that had not
been done for a very long time on the forgotten planet. The small,
grisly creature stood as high as Burl's shoulders. It would be a
deadly antagonist. Burl tossed it a dead ant.
It struck so swiftly that the motion of its horrible forearms could not
be seen. Then it ignored Burl, devouring the tidbit.
It was a discovery that was immediately and urgently useful.
On the second day of his aimless journey Burl saw something that
would be even more deadly and appalling than the red dust had
been for his kind. It was a female black hunting-spider, the so-called
American tarantula. When he glimpsed the thing the blood drained
from Burl's face.
As the monster moved out of sight Burl, abandoning any other
project he might have intended, headed for the place his tribe had
more or less settled in. He had news which offered the satisfaction
of making him much-needed again, but he would have traded that
pleasure ten hundred times over for the simple absence of that one
creature from this valley. That female tarantula meant simply and
specifically that the tribe must flee or die. This place was not
paradise!
The entry of the spider into the region had preceded the arrival of
the people. A giant, even of its kind, it had come across some pass
among the mountains for reasons only it could know. But it was
deadliness beyond compare. Its legs spanned yards. The fangs were
needle-sharp and feet in length—and poisoned. Its eyes glittered
with insatiable, insane blood-lust. Its coming was ten times more
deadly to the humans—as to the other living creatures of the valley
—than a Bengal tiger loosed in a human city would have been. It
was bad enough in itself, but it brought more deadly disaster still
behind it.
Bumping and bouncing behind its abdomen as it moved, fastened to
its body by dirtied silken ropes, this creature dragged a burden
which was its own ferocity many times multiplied. It was dragging an
egg-bag larger than its body—which was feet in diameter. The
female spider would carry this ghastly burden—cherishing it—until
the eggs hatched. And then there would be four to five hundred
small devils loose in the valley. From the instant of their hatching
they would be as deadly as their parent. Though the offspring would
be small—with legs spanning no more than a foot—their bodies
would be the size of a man's fist and able to leap two yards. Their
tiny fangs would be no less envenomed than their mother's. In stark,
maniacal hatred of all other life they would at least equal the huge
gray horror which had begot them.
Burl told his tribesmen. They listened, eyes large with fright but not
quite afraid. The thing had not yet happened. When Burl insistently
commanded that they follow him on a new journey, they nodded
uneasily but slipped away. He could not gather the tribe together.
Always there were members who hid from him—and when he went
in search of them, the ones he had gathered vanished before he
could return.
There were days of bright light and murder, and nights of slow rain
and death in the valley. The great creatures under the cloud-bank
committed atrocities upon each other and blandly dined upon their
victims. Unthinkingly solicitous parents paralyzed creatures to be left
living and helpless for their young to feed on. There were enormities
of cruelty done in the matter-of-fact fashion of the insect world. To
these things the humans were indifferent. They were uneasy, but
like other humans everywhere they would not believe the worst until
the worst arrived.
Two weeks after their coming to the valley, the worst was there.
When that day came the first gray light of dawn found the humans
in a shivering, terrified group in a completely suicidal position. They
were out in the open—not hidden but in plain view. They dared not
hide any more. The furry gray monster's brood had hatched. The
valley seemed to swarm with small gray demons which killed and
killed, even when they could not devour. When they encountered
each other they fought in slavering fury and the victors in such duels
dined upon their brethren. But always they hunted for more things
to kill. They were literally maniacs—and they were too small and too
quick to fight with spears or clubs.
So now, at daybreak, the humans looked about despairingly for
death to come to them. They had spent the night in the open lest
they be trapped in the very thickets that had formerly been their
protection. They were in clear sight of the large gray murderer, if it
should pass that way. And they did not dare hide because of that
ogreish creature's brood.
The monster appeared. A young girl saw it and cried out chokingly.
It had not seen them. They watched it leap upon and murder a
vividly-colored caterpillar near the limit of vision in the morning-mist.
It was in the tribe's part of the valley. Its young swarmed
everywhere. The valley could have been a paradise, but it was
doomed to become a charnel-house.
And then Burl shook himself. He had been angry when he left his
tribe. He had been more angry when he returned and they would
not obey him. He had remained with them, petulantly silent,
displaying the offended dignity he felt and elaborately refusing to
acknowledge any overtures, even from Saya. Burl had acted rather
childishly. But his tribesmen were like children. It was the best way
for him to act.
They shivered, too hopeless even to run away while the shaggy
monster feasted a half-mile away. There were six men and seven
women besides himself, and the rest were children, from gangling
adolescents to one babe in arms. They whimpered a little. Then
Saya looked imploringly at Burl—coquetry forgotten now. The other
whimpered more loudly. They had reached that stage of despair,
now, when they could draw the monster to them by blubbering in
terror.
This was the psychological moment. Burl said dourly:
"Come!"
He took Saya's hand and started away. There was but one direction
in which any human being could think to move in this valley, at this
moment. It was the direction away from the grisly mother of
horrors. It happened to be the way up the valley wall. Burl started
up that slope. Saya went with him.
Before they had gone ten yards Dor spoke to his wife. They followed
Burl, with their three children. Five yards more, and Jak agitatedly
began to bustle his family into movement. Old Jon, wheezing,
frantically scuttled after Burl, and Cori competently set out with the
youngest of her children in her arms and the others marching before
her. Within seconds more, all the tribe was in motion.
Burl moved on, aware of his following, but ignoring it. The
procession continued in his wake simply because it had begun to do
so. Dik, his adolescent brashness beaten down by terror,
nevertheless regarded Burl's stained weapon with the inevitable
envy of the half-grown for achievement. He saw something half-
buried in the soil and—after a fearful glance behind—he moved
aside to tug at it. It was part of the armor of a former rhinoceros
beetle. Tet joined him. They made an act of great daring of lingering
to find themselves weapons as near as possible to Burl's.
A quarter-mile on, the fugitives passed a struggling milkweed plant,
no more than twenty feet high and already scabrous with scale and
rusts upon its lower parts. Ants marched up and down its stalk in a
steady single file, placing aphids from their nearby ant-city on
suitable spots to feed,—and to multiply as only parthenogenic aphids
can do. But already, on the far side of the milkweed, an ant-lion
climbed up to do murder among them. The ant-lion, of course, was
the larval form of a lace-wing fly. The aphids were its predestined
prey.
Burl continued to march, holding Saya's hand. The reek of formic
acid came to his nostrils. He ignored it. Ants were as much prey to
his tribesmen, now, as crabs and crayfish to other, shore-dwelling
tribesmen on long-forgotten Earth. But Burl was not concerned with
food, now. He stalked on toward the mountain-slopes.
Dik and Tet brandished their new weapons. They looked fearfully
behind them. The monster from whom they fled was lost in its
gruesome feasting,—and they were a long way from it, now. There
was a steady, single-file procession of ants, with occasional gaps in
the line. The procession passed the line through one of those gaps.
Beyond it, Tet and Dik conferred. They dared each other. They went
scrambling back to the line of ants. Their weapons smote. The
slaughtered ants died instantly and were quickly dragged from the
formic-acid-scented path. The remaining ants went placidly on their
way. The weapons struck again.
The two adolescents had to outdo each other. But they had as much
food as they could carry. Gloating—each claiming to have been most
daring and to have the largest bag of game—they ran panting after
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