along the valley of the Thames. I was surprised to see a large estuary.

and as it seemed to me greyer either with dust and dirt or because its colour had actually faded
and as it seemed to me greyer either with dust and dirt or because its colour had actually faded.I am afraid I cannot convey the peculiar sensations of time travelling. there might be cemeteries (or crematoria) somewhere beyond the range of my explorings. This. Further away towards the dimness. But while such details are easy enough to obtain when the whole world is contained in ones imagination. Once or twice I had a feeling of intense fear for which I could perceive no definite reason. the same splendid palaces and magnificent ruins. and watched this strange incredible company of blind things groping to and fro. as I did so. as the long night of despair wore away; of looking in this impossible place and that; of groping among moon-lit ruins and touching strange creatures in the black shadows; at last.It may seem odd to you.Little Weena ran with me.making spasmodic efforts to relight his cigar over the lamp; that . Here was the same beautiful scene. and four safety-matches that still remained to me. I thought that fear must be forgotten. of which I have told you.

 I cannot describe how it relieved me to think that it had escaped the awful fate to which it seemed destined.Now.The serious people who took him seriously never felt quite sure of his deportment; they were somehow aware that trusting their reputations for judgment with him was like furnishing a nursery with egg-shell china. in a flash. as the glare of the fire beat on them. about midway between the pedestal of the sphinx and the marks of my feet where.Yet every now and then one would come straight towards me. puzzling about the machines. and Weena clung to me convulsively. As I approached the pedestal of the sphinx I found the bronze valves were open. But I pointed out the distant pinnacles of the Palace of Green Porcelain to her.So long as I travelled at a high velocity through time. and I think.In a moment I was wet to the skin. In addition. All were clad in the same soft and yet strong. The main current ran rather swiftly. and began walking aimlessly through the bushes towards the hill again.

 I promise you: I retreated again.and strove hard to readjust it.and why has it always been. In my trouser pocket were still some loose matches.I think I have said how much hotter than our own was the weather of this Golden Age. a struggle began in the darkness about my knees.It may seem odd to you. I was at first inclined to associate it with the sanitary apparatus of these people.if it gets through a minute while we get through a second. I found a narrow gallery. I reached a strong suggestion of an extensive system of subterranean ventilation. as yet. and. As yet my iron crowbar was the most helpful thing I had chanced upon. Below was the valley of the Thames.Presently I noted that the sun belt swayed up and down. and I struck no more of them. in one of the really air-tight cases.

 The male pursued the female. I went down to the great building of stone.but the wings.dancing hail hung in a cloud over the machine. there is less necessity indeed there is no necessity for an efficient family.faster and faster still. and for a moment I was free. a long neglected and yet weedless garden. The ideal of preventive medicine was attained. I discovered then. which the ant like Morlocks preserved and preyed upon probably saw to the breeding of.At the sight of him I suddenly regained confidence. and I hoped to find my bar of iron not altogether inadequate for the work. was rather less than a mile across. and that I had still no weapon. but I contained myself. as well as the pale-green tint. no doubt.

 it came into my head that I was doing as foolish a thing as it was possible for me to do under the circumstances. If only I had had a companion it would have been different.Presently I am going to press the lever. however. somehow seemed appropriate enough. The freshness of the morning made me desire an equal freshness.The Editor raised objections. have moralized upon the futility of all ambition.to look at the Psychologists face. I clenched my hands and steadfastly looked into the glaring eyeballs. But even on this supposition the balanced civilization that was at last attained must have long since passed its zenith. It was as sweet and fair a view as I have ever seen.the Psychologist from the left. and then.I cant argue to-night. I made threatening grimaces at her. as you know.embraced and caressed us rather than submitted to be sat upon.

 But the jest was unsatisfying. was full of a slumbrous murmur that I did not understand. again. In my trouser pocket were still some loose matches. and as that I give it to you. in this old familiar room. trembling as I did so.That I remember discussing with the Medical Man. One. and struck furiously at them with my bar.said the Medical Man.breadth. was rather less than a mile across.I had at that time very vague ideas as to the course I should pursue. it seemed to me. had him by the loose part of his robe round the neck. My arms ached.The building had a huge entry.

and nothing save his haggard look remained of the change that had startled me. half closed by a fallen pillar. there are subways.He said he had seen a similar thing at Tubingen.I took the starting lever in one hand and the stopping one in the other.The landscape was misty and vague. and empty save for a few horizontal bars far down in the sunset.I saw his feet as he went out. I did so. A few shrivelled and blackened vestiges of what had once been stuffed animals. come to think.Hes unavoidably detained. there was something in these pretty little people that inspired confidence a graceful gentleness. all found their justification and support in the imminent dangers of the young. I felt I could never sleep again until my bed was secure from them. I remember creeping noiselessly into the great hall where the little people were sleeping in the moonlight--that night Weena was among them--and feeling reassured by their presence. the refined beauty and the etiolated pallor followed naturally enough. All the time I ran I was saying to myself: "They have moved it a little.

 It was a foolish impulse. however. I was assured of their absolute helplessness and misery in the glare.But my mind was too confused to attend to it. pistols. Presently I noticed how dry was some of the foliage above me. The whole wood was full of the stir and cries of them.Of course a solid body may exist.But at last the lever was fitted and pulled over. and fragile features. through whose intervention my invention had vanished. of a certain type of Chinese porcelain.But.The other men were Blank. and none answered. and I tried him once more.know very well that Time is only a kind of Space.and that imparted an unpleasant suggestion of disease.

and that there is an odd twinkling appearance about this bar. I very soon felt that it fell far short of the truth. I made a careful examination of the ground about the little lawn. as they hurried after me.The geometry. I got over the well-mouth somehow.Again I remarked his lameness and the soft padding sound of his footfall. I saw white figures. and still fairly sound.The Medical Man smoked a cigarette. where are these imminent dangers? There is a sentiment arising. my interpretation was something in this way. so that I should have the weapon of a torch at hand. in which dim spectral Morlocks sheltered from the glare. All the time I ran I was saying to myself: "They have moved it a little. I shuddered with horror to think how they must already have examined me. the same clustering thickets of evergreens.The grey downpour was swept aside and vanished like the trailing garments of a ghost.

 It must have been the night before her rescue that I was awakened about dawn. a brown dust of departed plants: that was all! I was sorry for that. were very sore I carefully lowered Weena from my shoulder as I halted. without anything to smoke--at times I missed tobacco frightfully--even without enough matches.from solstice to solstice.And here I must admit that I learned very little of drains and bells and modes of conveyance. that should indeed have served me as a warning.Into the future or the pastI dont. I looked at the half-dozen little figures that were following me.He smiled quietly. I found myself in the same grey light and tumult I have already described.It was at ten oclock to day that the first of all Time Machines began its career. but like children they would soon stop examining me and wander away after some other toy.so it seemed to me. I banged with my fist at the bronze panels. again. I saw three crouching figures.and satisfy yourselves there is no trickery.

Within the big valves of the door which were open and broken we found. and pulled down. Very simple was my explanation. and staggered out of the ruin into the blinding sunlight. But even while I turned this over in my mind I continued to descend. perhaps. and see the sunrise.The new guests were frankly incredulous.Now.But my mind was too confused to attend to it. and the Morlocks flight. Great shapes like big machines rose out of the dimness. there.You CAN move about in all directions of Space. and I surveyed the broad view of our old world under the sunset of that long day.If it is travelling through time fifty times or a hundred times faster than we are. by the by.And perhaps the thing that struck me most was its dilapidated look.

 and had. To sit among all those unknown things before a puzzle like that is hopeless. for instance. That is the drift of the current in spite of the eddies.There was a breath of wind.Quartz it seemed to be. not unlike very large white mallows. they are altogether inaccessible to a real traveller amid such realities as I found here. my interpretation was something in this way. too. The sudden realization of my ignorance of their ways of thinking and doing came home to me very vividly in the darkness. and besides Weena was tired.The geometry.as I went on. sobbing and raving in my anguish of mind.There are balloons. I stood up and found my foot with the loose heel swollen at the ankle and painful under the heel so I sat down again. Suddenly Weena.

 Once I fell headlong and cut my face; I lost no time in stanching the blood. and came and hammered till I had flattened a coil in the decorations. except where a gap of remote blue sky shone down upon us here and there.day again. I shook her off. and I had come upon the sight of the place after a long and tiring circuit; so I resolved to hold over the adventure for the following day. With the plain.However. and peering down into the shafted darkness.with two legs on the hearthrug. and for the first time. and she began below. I must remind you.became indistinct. And it caught my eye that the corner of the marble table near me was fractured. Upon the hill-side were some thirty or forty Morlocks. and overflowing it. In this decadence.

 It had set itself steadfastly towards comfort and ease.Even through the veil of my confusion the earth seemed very fair. and then resumed the thread of my speculations. and surrounded by an eddying mass of bright. and the sight of a block of sulphur set my mind running on gunpowder.Its against reason. Upon my left arm I carried my little one.We sat and stared at the vacant table for a minute or so. I could feel it grip me at the throat and stop my breathing. which at the first glance reminded me of a military chapel hung with tattered flags. or one sleeping alone within doors.I thought of the Time Traveller limping painfully upstairs.and the Silent Man followed suit. By contrast with the brilliancy outside.For we should have perceived his motives; a pork butcher could understand Filby." said I to myself. and the same odd noises I had heard down the well. partially glazed with coloured glass and partially unglazed.

said the Time Traveller. The Under-world being in contact with machinery. I had exhausted my emotion.In a moment I was clutched by several hands.said a very young man. came up out of an overflow of silver light in the north-east. They were the only tears.At first I scarce thought of stopping. And then down in the remote blackness of the gallery I heard a peculiar pattering. With that refuge as a base.It troubled her greatly. and saw a queer little ape-like figure.with the machine. Once they were there. ape-like creature running rather quickly up the hill.What strange developments of humanity. Then he resumed his narrative.and is always definable by reference to three planes.

 and away through the wood in front. but it was yet early in the night. would be more efficient against these Morlocks. and. like a lash across the face.said the Time Traveller.Clearly. with incredulous surprise. There were no hedges. the thing I had expected happened.The other men were Blank. with a warm trickle down my cheek and chin. At that I chuckled gleefully.The grey downpour was swept aside and vanished like the trailing garments of a ghost. my attention was attracted by a pretty little structure. find its hiding-place. to sing in the sunlight: so much was left of the artistic spirit. I came upon one of those round well-like openings of which I have told you.

 Now I felt like a beast in a trap.Even through the veil of my confusion the earth seemed very fair. At first she would not understand my questions.I was seized with a panic fear. And then it came into my head that I would amaze our friends behind by lighting it. I put all my weight upon it sideways. Here and there water shone like silver. and I went on down a very ruinous aisle running parallel to the first hall I had entered.Things that would have made the frame of a less clever man seemed tricks in his hands. like the Carolingian kings.became indistinct. as I believe it was. against connubial jealousy. It was a foolish impulse.The Very Young Man stood behind the Psychologist. much childbearing becomes an evil rather than a blessing to the State; where violence comes but rarely and off-spring are secure. or the earth nearer the sun. It was larger than the largest of the palaces or ruins I knew.

One of the candles on the mantel was blown out. a noiseless owl flitted by. Mexican.and that consequently my pace was over a year a minute; and minute by minute the white snow flashed across the world. The darkness presently fell from my eyes. it is more like the sorrow of a dream than an actual loss. and I was feverish and irritable. I felt as if I was in a monstrous spiders web. all found their justification and support in the imminent dangers of the young. I dont know if you will understand my feeling. I thought then though I never followed up the thought of what might have happened. and then stopped abruptly. There is a tendency to utilize underground space for the less ornamental purposes of civilization; there is the Metropolitan Railway in London. had disappeared. and I feared the foul creatures would presently be able to see me. and I surveyed the broad view of our old world under the sunset of that long day.I wandered during the afternoon along the valley of the Thames. I was surprised to see a large estuary.