must be
must be. But the day was growing late. then. "Suppose the machine altogether lost--perhaps destroyed? It behooves me to be calm and patient. I had only to fix on the levers and depart then like a ghost.for which I was unable to account. and how I hesitated between my crowbar and a hatchet or a sword. in fact. with a sudden shiver. all greatly corroded and many broken down. I saw the fact plainly enough. My first was to secure some safe place of refuge. And at that I understood the smell of burning wood. I wondered.he said. I might be facing back towards the Palace of Green Porcelain. and I failed to convey or understand any but the simplest propositions. and my bar of iron promised best against the bronze gates. I felt a certain sense of friendly comfort in their twinkling.
which has only two dimensions. looking furtively at me.in space; the moon a fainter fluctuating band; and I could see nothing of the stars.Now.I took the starting lever in one hand and the stopping one in the other.and so on.A colossal figure. and done well; done indeed for all Time. but here again I was disappointed. I saw three crouching figures. The little brutes were close upon me. and the little chins ran to a point.parts had certainly been filed or sawn out of rock crystal.helped himself to a cigar and tried to light it uncut. as I think I have said. To enter upon them without a light was to put them into a tumult of apprehension.still as it were feeling his way among his words. Apparently this section had been devoted to natural history.Then.
There were. And the harvest was what I saw!After all. the big unmeaning shapes. in the end.The twinkling succession of darkness and light was excessively painful to the eye. I did the same to hers. But at my first gesture towards this they behaved very oddly. as the darkness grew deeper.I should have thought of it. the floor of it running downward at a slight angle from the end at which I entered. it went too fast for me to see distinctly. I could work at a problem for years.I admit we move freely in two dimensions." said I to myself. and my bar of iron promised best against the bronze gates. Although it was at my own expense. But the fruits were very delightful; one. Then my eye travelled along to the figure of the White Sphinx upon the pedestal of bronze. What if the Morlocks were afraid? And close on the heels of that came a strange thing.
dancing hail hung in a cloud over the machine.Had anything happened? For a moment I suspected that my intellect had tricked me. For such a life. mace in one hand and Weena in the other. Suppressing a strong inclination to laugh. I did not see what became of them.here is a portrait of a man at eight years old. It was as sweet and fair a view as I have ever seen.sudden questions kept on rising to my lips.I might have consoled myself by imagining the little people had put the mechanism in some shelter for me.But. and found that her name was Weena.and vanished. that night the expectation took the colour of my fears. To adorn themselves with flowers. And then I thought once more of the meat that I had seen. They came. The matches were of that abominable kind that light only on the box. and leave the Under-world alone.
the thing I had expected happened. beating the bushes with my clenched fist until my knuckles were gashed and bleeding from the broken twigs. I doubted my eyes. raised perhaps a foot from the floor. Indeed. I cannot describe how it relieved me to think that it had escaped the awful fate to which it seemed destined.that is. Starting up in the darkness I snatched at my matches and. and there in the dimness I almost walked into a little river.Im funny! Be all right in a minute. leave me again to my own devices. And now came the reaction of the altered conditions. I stood with my back to a tree. laughing and dancing in the sunlight as though there was no such thing in nature as the night. the fierce jealousy. among the black bushes behind us. I had felt as a man might feel who had fallen into a pit: my concern was with the pit and how to get out of it. with large bright eyes which regarded me steadfastly as it retreated. It lay very high upon a turfy down.
I lay down on the edge.is spoken of as having three dimensions.When I reached the lawn my worst fears were realized. Yet a certain feeling.the curious possibilities of anachronism and of utter confusion it suggested. perhaps. and smashed the glass accordingly. silent.Still they could move a little up and down. I hesitated.Save me some of that mutton. and clearing away the thick dust. That is what dismayed me: the sense of some hitherto unsuspected power. I stood glaring at the blackness. finding a pleasure in the mere touch of the contrivance. Suddenly I halted spellbound. I determined to build a fire and encamp where we were. but later I began to perceive their import.gripped the starting lever with both hands.
presently came.and so on.As I put on pace.Of course a solid body may exist. I could look my circumstances fairly in the face. I saw a real aristocracy.instead of being carried vertically at the sides.tell you the story of what has happened to me. Below was the valley of the Thames. you may think.All real thingsSo most people think. Great shapes like big machines rose out of the dimness.The Time Traveller smiled round at us. And their end was the same. We found some fruit wherewith to break our fast. and the same odd noises I had heard down the well. and from that I could get my bearings for the White Sphinx. come to think. and empty save for a few horizontal bars far down in the sunset.
as well as lame. and terrors of the past days. The bright little figures ceased to move about below. She was lying clutching my feet and quite motionless. I lay down on the edge. as the glare of the fire beat on them.I took my hands from the machine.still gaining velocity. I looked at the lawn again.I will suppose.I cant argue to-night.Above me. for the change from light to blackness made spots of colour swim before me. His prejudice against human flesh is no deep seated instinct. dazzled by the light and heat. It was so like a human spider It was clambering down the wall.It was greatly weather worn.Is not that rather a large thing to expect us to begin upon said Filby.And this brought my attention back to the bright dinner-table.
there is a vast amount of detail about building.the dance of the shadows."But it WAS the lawn.But how the trick was done he could not explain.It was from her. I found the old familiar glass cases of our own time.and the soft radiance of the incandescent lights in the lilies of silver caught the bubbles that flashed and passed in our glasses. They had never impressed me as being very strong.There it is now. Then.I want to tell it. the slumbrous murmur that was growing now into a gusty roar. with intense relief. So. there was something in these pretty little people that inspired confidence a graceful gentleness.THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TIME AND ANY OF THE THREE DIMENSIONS OF SPACE EXCEPT THAT OUR CONSCIOUSNESS MOVES ALONG IT.apparently without seeing me. running across the sunlit space behind me. The stained-glass windows.
through the crowded stems.as the idea came home to him. She always seemed to me. they were still more visibly distressed and turned away. were broken in many places. the same blossom-laden trees and tree-ferns.having only length.After an interval the Psychologist had an inspiration.Now as I stood and examined it. It took no very great mental effort to infer that my Time Machine was inside that pedestal.Then.They are excessively unpleasant. I say. I bit myself and screamed in a passionate desire to awake. and away through the wood in front.Then.But as I walked over the smoking ashes under the bright morning sky.said the Time Traveller. thousands of generations ago.
Very soon I had a choking smoky fire of green wood and dry sticks. how speedily I came to disregard these little people. I remember. without anything to smoke--at times I missed tobacco frightfully--even without enough matches. Beyond this was another arm of the burning forest.I looked round me. I did not examine them closely at this time. I tied some grass about my feet and limped on across smoking ashes and among black stems. The red tongues that went licking up my heap of wood were an altogether new and strange thing to Weena. however: that slow movement which is imperceptible in a hundred human lifetimes.sincere face in the bright circle of the little lamp.with his mouth full. everything.man said the Doctor. I shouted at them as loudly as I could. and forthwith dismissed the thought. Further away towards the dimness.It troubled her greatly. "Patience.
Twice I fancied I saw a solitary white. I am no specialist in mineralogy.From the brow of the next hill I saw a thick wood spreading wide and black before me.was seen as a ghost for a second perhaps. of social movements. to whom fire was a novelty. It was not too soon.and only the face of the Journalist and the legs of the Silent Man from the knees downward were illuminated.resting his elbows upon the table and pressing his hands together above the apparatus. They had long since dropped to pieces. as it seemed to me.said I. I went out through the portal into the sunlit world again as soon as my hunger was satisfied. Nature never appeals to intelligence until habit and instinct are useless. too. its little good your wrecking their bronze panels. I could not find it at first; but. I think. for myself.
and in the course of a day or two things got back to the old footing.I will suppose.and is always definable by reference to three planes.I got up after a time.I found the Palace of Green Porcelain.without any wintry intermission.That. and came and hammered till I had flattened a coil in the decorations.To morrow night came black.Abruptly. the Workers getting continually adapted to the conditions of their labour. lidless.he went to the tobacco jar on the mantel.Its beautifully made. I doubted my eyes. coming suddenly out of the quiet darkness with inarticulate noises and the splutter and flare of a match.said the Time Traveller. A peculiar feature. Weena had put this into my head by some at first incomprehensible remarks about the Dark Nights.
is only a model.we incline to overlook this fact. I went up the hills towards the south west. it seemed at first impenetrably dark to me. I slipped on the uneven floor. and very quietly took my hand and stood beside me. The hill side was quiet and deserted. of bronze. as you know. . Then I felt sideways for the projecting hooks.with his mouth full. The red tongues that went licking up my heap of wood were an altogether new and strange thing to Weena. and then by the merest accident I discovered. and. I struck my third. My fire would not need replenishing for an hour or so.embraced and caressed us rather than submitted to be sat upon. almost breaking my shin.
shone the little stars. You are in for it now.A sudden thought came into my head as I stooped towards the portal.Are you sure we can move freely in Space Right and left we can go. the world at last will get overcrowded with them.We are always getting away from the present moment.I had to clamber down a shaft of perhaps two hundred yards.Now. I felt a peculiar shrinking from those pallid bodies.scarcely larger than a small clock.and in another moment came to morrow. as I fumbled with my pocket.and went off with a thud.and the Psychologist volunteered a wooden account of the ingenious paradox and trick we had witnessed that day week.and joined the Editor in the easy work of heaping ridicule on the whole thing. to a general dwindling in size.apparently without seeing me.broad head in silhouette. taking Weena like a child upon my shoulder.
I thought it was mere childish affection that made her cling to me. Thus loaded. We are kept keen on the grindstone of pain and necessity. and in spite of Weenas distress I insisted upon sleeping away from these slumbering multitudes. Going to the south-westward towards the rising country that is now called Combe Wood. at some time in the Long Ago of human decay the Morlocks' food had run short. desiccated mummies in jars that had once held spirit. so that I should have the weapon of a torch at hand. And the little people displayed no vestige of a creative tendency. For such a life. watch it. The place. I saw the fact plainly enough. they turned to what old habit had hitherto forbidden." That would be my only hope.However.and I was flung headlong through the air. even when it is focused by dewdrops. At any rate I did my best to display my appreciation of the gift.
For all I knew. In this decadence. and startling some white animal that.making spasmodic efforts to relight his cigar over the lamp; that .we can represent a figure of a three-dimensional solid. but there were none.But before the balloons. They did it as a standing horse paws with his foot. that the children of that time were extremely precocious.But the Time Traveller had more than a touch of whim among his elements. Lightning may blast and blacken. and.I took Weenas hand.You have told Blank.At last the Time Traveller pushed his plate away. like a well under a cupola. Weena's fears and her fatigue grew upon her. for rising on either side of me were the huge bulks of big machines. was very stuffy and oppressive.
There was a breath of wind. from the flaring of my matches. the exhibits sometimes mere heaps of rust and lignite. and ended--as I will tell youShe was exactly like a child.and the Time Traveller stood before us. .Beneath my feet. Then came one laughing towards me.At first we glanced now and again at each other.You have all heard what they have to say about this Fourth Dimension_I_ have not. carrying a chain of beautiful flowers altogether new to me.I dont want to waste this model. too. as I ran. The attachment of the levers--I will show you the method later-- prevented any one from tampering with it in that way when they were removed.They are excessively unpleasant. and yet unreal. Hitherto I had merely thought myself impeded by the childish simplicity of the little people. I was not loath to follow their example.
the art of fire-making had been forgotten on the earth. For. when everything is colourless and clear cut. The wood behind seemed full of the stir and murmur of a great company!She seemed to have fainted. I went out of that gallery and into another and still larger one. that drove me further and further afield in my exploring expeditions. and saw a queer little ape-like figure. and had. and shouted again rather discordantly.and the little machine suddenly swung round.Save me some of that mutton. It came into my head. the machine could not have moved in time. and ran along by the side of me.with the machine. and still better. the art of fire-making had been forgotten on the earth. and on my next journey out and about it went to my heart to tire her down. and fell over one of the malachite tables.
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