The Time Machine - Chapter 4

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Episode Transcript

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Chapter four of the Time Machine byH. G. Wells. In another
moment, we were standing face toface, I and this fragile thing out
of futurity. He came straight upto me and laughed into my eyes.
The absence from his bearing of anysign of fear struck me at once.

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Then he turned to the two otherswho were following him, and spoke to
them in a strange and very sweetand liquid tongue. There were others coming,
and presently a little group of perhapseight or ten of these exquisite creatures
were about me. One of themaddressed me. It came into my head
oddly enough that my voice was tooharsh and deep for them, So I

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shook my head, and, pointingto my ears, shook it again.
He came a step forward, hesitated, and then touched my hand. Then
I felt other soft little tentacles uponmy back and shoulders. They wanted to
make sure I was real. Therewas nothing in this at all alarming.
Indeed, there was something in thesepretty little people that inspired confidence, a

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graceful gentleness, a certain childlike ease. And besides, they looked so frail
that I could fancy myself flinging thewhole dozen of them, about like nine
pins. But I made a suddenmotion to warn them when I saw their
little pink hands feeling the time machinehappily. Then, when it was not
too late, I thought of adanger I had hitherto forgotten, and reaching

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over the bars of the machine,I unscrewed the little levers that would set
it in motion, and put thesein my pocket. Then I turned again
to see what I could do inthe way of communication, And then,
looking more nearly into their features,I saw some further peculiarities in their dressden
China type of prettiness. Their hair, which was uniformly curly, came to

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a sharp end at the neck andcheek. There was not the faintest suggestion
of it on the face, andtheir ears were singularly minute. Their mouths
were small, with bright red,rather thin lips, and the little chins
ran to a point. The eyeswere large and mild. And this may
seem egotism on my part, Ifancied even that there was a certain lack

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of the interest I might have expectedin them, as they made no effort
to communicate with me, but simplystood round me, smiling and speaking in
soft cooing notes to each other.I began the conversation. I pointed to
the time machine and to myself,then, hesitating for a moment, how
to express time? I pointed tothe sun at once. A quaintly pretty

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little figure in checkered purple and whitefollowed my gesture and then astonished me by
imitating the sound of thunder. Fora moment, I staggered, though the
import of his gesture was plain enough. The question had come into my mind
abruptly. Were these creatures fools?You may hardly understand how it took me.

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You see, I had always anticipatedthat the people of the year eight
hundred and two thousand odd would beincredibly in front of us in knowledge,
art everything. Then one of themsuddenly asked me a question that showed him
to be on the intellectual level ofone of our five year old children.
Asked me, in fact, ifI had come from the sun in a
thunderstorm. It let loose the judgmentI had suspended upon their clothes, their

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frail, light limbs and fragile features. A flow of disappointment rushed across my
mind. For a moment, Ifelt that I had built the time machine
in vain I nodded, pointed tothe sun, and gave them such a
vivid rendering of a thunderclap as startledthem. They all withdrew a pace or

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so and bowed. Then came one, laughing towards me, carrying a chain
of beautiful flowers, altogether new tome, and put it about my neck.
The idea was received with melodious applause, and presently they were all running
to and fro for flowers, andlaughingly flinging them upon me, until I
was almost smothered with blossom. Youwho have never seen the light can scarcely

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imagine what delicate and wonderful flowers countlessyears of culture had created. Then someone
suggested that their plaything should be exhibitedin the nearest building, And so I
was led past the sphinx of whitemarble, which had seemed to watch me
all the while with a smile atmy astonishment, towards a vast gray edifice

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of fretted stone. As I wentwith them, the memory of my confident
anticipations of a profoundly grave and intellectualposterity came with irresistible merriment to my mind.
The building had a huge entry andwas altogether of colossal dimensions. I
was naturally most occupied the growing crowdof little people, and with the big

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open portals that yawned before me,shadowy and mysterious. My general impression of
the world I saw over their headswas a tangled waste of beautiful bushes and
flowers, a long, neglected andyet weedless garden. I saw a number
of tall spikes of strange white flowers, measuring a foot perhaps across the spread

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of the waxen petals. They grewscattered, as if wild, among the
variegated shrubs, but as I say, I did not examine them closely.
At this time, the time machinewas left deserted on the turf among the
rhododendrons. The arch of the doorwaywas richly carved, but naturally I did
not observe the carving very narrowly,though I fancied. I saw suggestions of

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old Phoenician decorations as I passed through, and it struck me that they were
very badly broken and weather worn.Several more brightly clad people met me in
the doorway, and so we entered. I dressed in dingy nineteen century garments,
looking grotesque enough, garlanded with flowers, and surrounded by an eddying mass

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of bright, soft colored robes andshining white limbs. In a melodious whirl
of laughter and laughing speech, thebig doorway opened into a proportionately great hall,
hung with brown. The roof wasin shadow, and the windows,
partially glazed with colored glass and partiallyunglazed, admitted a tempered light. The

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floor was made up of huge blocksof some very hard white metal, not
plates nor slabs, blocks, andit was so much worn, as I
judged by the going to and froof past generations, as to be deeply
channeled. Along the more frequented ways. Transverse to the length were innumerable tables

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made of slabs of polished stone,raised perhaps a foot from the floor,
And upon these were heaps of fruitsaw I recognized as a kind of hypertrophied
raspberry and orange, but for themost part they were strange. Between the
tables was scattered a great number ofcushions. Upon these my conductors seated themselves,

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signing for me to do likewise.With a pretty absence of ceremony,
they began to eat the fruit withtheir hands, flinging peel and stalks,
and so forth into the round openingsin the sides of the tables. I
was not loth to follow their example, for I felt thirsty and hungry as
I did so, I surveyed thehall at my leisure, and perhaps the

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thing that struck me most was itsdilapidated look. The stained glass windows,
which displayed only a geometrical pattern,were broken in many places, and the
curtains that hung across the lower endwere thick with dust, and it caught
my eye that the corner of themarble table near me was fractured. Nevertheless,

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the general effect was extremely rich andpicturesque. There were perhaps a couple
of hundred people dining in the hall, and most of them, seated as
near to me as they could come, were watching me with interest, their
little eyes shining over the fruit theywere eating. All were clad in the
same soft and yet strong, silkymaterial. Fruit, by the bye,

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was all their diet. These peopleof the remote future were strict vegetarians,
and while I was with them,in spite of some carnal cravings, I
had to be frugivorous. Also.Indeed, I found afterwards that horses,
cattle, sheep, dogs had followedthe ichtheosaurus into extinction. But the fruits

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were very delightful. One in particular, had seemed to be in season all
the time I was there. Aflowery thing in a three sided husk was
especially good, and I made atmy staple. At first I was puzzled
by all these strange fruits and bythe strange flowers I saw, But later
I began to perceive their import However, I am telling you of my fruit

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dinner in the distant future. Now, so soon as my appetite was a
little checked, I determined to makea resolute attempt to learn the speech of
these new men of mine. Clearlythat was the next thing to do.
The fruits seemed a convenient thing tobegin upon, and holding one of these
up, I began a series ofinterrogative sounds and gestures. I had some

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considerable difficulty in conveying my meaning.At first my efforts met with a stare
of surprise or inextinguishable laughter. Butpresently a fair haired little creature seemed to
grasp my intention and repeat it aname. They had to chatter and explain
the business at great length to eachother, and my first attempt to make

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the exquisite little sounds of their languagecaused an immense amount of amusement. However,
I felt like a schoolmaster amidst children, and persisted, and presently I
had a score of noun substantives,at least at my command, and then
I got to demonstrate pronouns and eventhe verb to eat. But it was

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slow work, and the little peoplesoon tired and wanted to get away from
my interrogations. So I determined,rather of necessity, to let them give
their lessons in little doses when theyfelt inclined, And very little doses I
found they were before long, forI never met people more indolent or more

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easily fatigued. A queer thing Isoon discovered about my little hosts, and
that was the lack of interest.They would come to me with eager cries
of astonishment, like children, butlike children they would soon stop examining me
and wander away after some other toy. The dinner and my conversation beginnings ended.

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I noted for the first time thatalmost all though who had surrounded me
at first, were gone. Itis odd, too, how speedily I
came to disregard these little people.I went out through the portal into the
sunlit world again, as soon asmy hunger was satisfied, I was continually
meeting more of these men of thefuture, who would follow me at a

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little distance, chatter and laugh aboutme, and, having smiled and gesticulated
in a friendly way, leave meagain to my own devices. The calm
of evening was upon the world asI emerged from the Great Hall, and
the scene was lit by the warmglow of the setting sun. At first
things were very confusing. Everything wasso entirely different from the world I had

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known, even the flowers. Thebig building I had left was situated on
the slope of a broad river valley, but the Thames had shifted perhaps a
mile from its present position. Iresolved to mount to the summit of a
crest perhaps a mile and a halfaway, from which I could get a
wider view of this our planet inthe year eight hundred and two thousand,

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seven hundred and one A d forthat I should explain was the date the
little dials of my machine recorded.As I walked. I was watched for
every impression that could possibly help toexplain the condition of ruinous splendor in which
I found the world. For ruinous. It was a little way up the

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hill for instance, was a greatheap of granite bound together by masses of
aluminium, A vast labyrinth of precipitouswalls and crumpled heaps. Amidst which were
thick heaps of very beautiful pagoda likeplants, nettles, possibly but wonderfully tinted
with brown about the leaves and incapableof stinging. It was evidently that derelict

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remains of some vast structure. Towhat end built I could not determine.
It was here that I was destined, at a later date to have a
very strange experience, the first intimationof a still stranger discovery. But of
that I will speak in its properplace. Looking round with a sudden thought

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from a terrace on which I restedfor a while, I realized that there
were no small houses to be seen. Apparently the single house, and possibly
even the household, had vanished.Here and there among the greenery were palace
like buildings, but the house andthe cottage, which formed such characteristic features
of our own English landscape, haddisappeared. Communism, said I to myself,

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And on the heels of that cameanother thought. I looked at the
half dozen little figures that were followingme. Then, in a flash,
I perceived that all had the sameform of costume, the same soft,
hairless visage, and the same girlishrotundity of limb. It may seem strange,
perhaps that I had not noticed thisbefore, but everything was so strange

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now I saw the fact plainly enough, in costume and in all the differences
of texture and bearing that now markoff the sexes from each other. These
people of the future were alike,and the children seemed to my eyes to
be but the miniatures of their parents. I judge then that the children of
that time were extremely precocious physically atleast, And I found afterwards abundant verification

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of my opinion. Seeing the easeand security in which these people were living,
I felt that this close resemblance ofthe sexes was, after all,
what one would expect for the strengthof a man and the softness of a
woman. The institution of the familyand the differentiation of occupations are mere militant

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necessities of an age of physical force. Where population is balanced and abundant.
Much childbearing becomes an evil rather thana blessing. To the state where violence
comes but rarely an offspring are secure, there is less necessity. Indeed,
there is no necessity for an efficientfamily, and the specialization of the sexes

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with reference to their children's needs disappears. We see some beginnings of this even
in our own time, and inthis future age it was complete. This,
I must remind you, was myspeculation at the time. Later I
was to appreciate how far it fellshort of the reality. While I was

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musing upon these things, my attentionwas attracted by a pretty little structure,
like a well under a cupula.I thought, in a transitory way,
of the oddness of well still existing, and then resumed the thread of my
speculations. There were no large buildingstowards the top of the hill, and
as my walking powers were evidently miraculous, I was presently left alone for the

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first time. With a strange senseof freedom and adventure, I pushed on
up to the crest. There Ifound a seat of some yellow metal that
I did not recognize, corroded inplaces with a kind of pinkish rust,
and half smothered in soft moss.The armrests cast and filed into the resemblance

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of griffin's heads. I sat downon it and I surveyed the broad view
of our old world under the sunsetof that long day. It was as
sweet and fair a view as Ihave ever seen. The sun had already
gone below the horizon, and thewest was flaming gold, touched with some

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horizontal bars of purple and crimson.Below was the valley of the Thames,
in which the river lay like aband of burnished steel. I have already
spoken of the great palaces dotted aboutamong the variegated greenery, some in ruins
and some still occupied. Here inthe air rose a white or silvery figure

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in the waste garden of the earth. Here and there came the sharp vertical
line of some cupula or obelisk.There were no hedges, no signs of
proprietary rights, no evidences of agriculture. The whole earth had become a garden.
So watching, I began to putmy interpretation upon the things I had
seen, And as it shaped itselfto me that evening my interpretation was something.

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In this way, Afterwards I foundI had got only a half truth,
or only a glimpse of one facetof the truth. It seemed to
me that I had happened upon humanity, upon the wane. The ruddy sunset
set me thinking of the sunset ofmankind. For the first time, I

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began to realize an odd consequence ofthe social effort in which we are present,
engaged, and yet come to thinkit is a logical consequence. Enough
strength is the outcome of need.Security sets a premium on feebleness. The
work of ameliorating the conditions of life, the true civilizing process that makes life

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more and more secure, had gonesteadily on to a climax. One triumph
of a united humanity over nature hadfollowed another. Things that are now mere
dreams had become projects, deliberately putin hand and carried forward. And the
harvest was what I saw. Afterall, the sanitation and the agriculture of

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to day are still in the rudimentarystage. The science of our time has
attacked but a little department of thefield of human disease. But even so
it spreads its operations very steadily andpersistently. Our agriculture and horticulture destroy a
weed just here and there, andcultivate perhaps a score or so of wholesome

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plants, leaving the greater number tofight out a balance as they can.
We improve our favorite plants and animals, and how few they are. Gradually
by selective breeding, now a newand better peach, now a seedless grape,
Now a sweeter and larger flower,Now a more convenient breed of cattle.

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We improve them gradually because our idealsare vague and tentative, and our
knowledge is very limited, because naturetwo is shy and slow in our clumsy
hands. Someday all this will bebetter organized, and still better, that
is the drift of the current.In spite of the eddies, the whole

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world will be intelligent, educated,and cooperating. Things will move faster and
faster towards the subjugation of nature.In the end, wisely and carefully we
shall readjust the balance of animal andvegetable to suit our human needs. This
adjustment, I say, must havebeen done, and done well done.

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Indeed, for all time, inthe space of time across which my machine
had leaped, the air was freefrom gnats, the earth from weeds or
fungi. Everywhere were fruits and sweetand delightful flowers. Brilliant butterflies flew hither
and thither. The ideal of preventivemedicine was attained. Diseases had been stamped

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out. I saw no evidence ofany contagious diseases during all my stay,
and I shall have to tell youlater that even the processes of putrification and
decay had been profoundly affected by thesechanges. Social triumphs, too had been
effected. I saw mankind housed insplendid shelters, gloriously clothed, and as

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yet I had found them engaged inno toil. There were no signs of
struggle, neither social nor economical struggle. The shop, the advertisement traffic,
all that commerce which constitutes the bodyof our world was gone. It was
natural, on that golden evening thatI should jump at the idea of a

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social paradise. The difficulty of increasingpopulation had been met, I guessed,
and population had ceased to increase.But with this change and condition comes inevitably
adaptations to the change. What,unless biological science is a mass of errors,
is the cause of human intelligence andvigor, hardship and freedom. Conditions

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under which the active, strong andsubtle survive and the weaker go to the
wall. Conditions that put a premiumupon the loyal alliance of capable men,
upon self restraint, patience and decision, and the institution of the family,
and the emotions that arise therein thefierce jealousy, the tenderness for offspring,

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parental self devotion, all found theirjustification and support in the imminent dangers of
the young. Now where are theseimminent dangers? There is a sentiment arising,
and it will grow against connubial jealousy, against fierce maternity, against passion
of all sorts, unnecessary things nowand things that make us uncomfortable, savage

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survivals, discords in a refined andpleasant life. I thought of the physical
slightness of the people, their lackof intelligence, and those big abundant ruins,
and its strengthened my belief in aperfect conquest of nature. For after
the battle comes quiet. Humanity hadbeen strong, energetic, and intelligent,

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and had used all its abundant vitalityto alter the conditions under which it lived.
And now came the reaction of thealtered conditions, under the new conditions
of perfect comfort and security. Thatrestless energy that with us is strength,
would become weakness. Even in ourown time. Certain tendencies and desires,

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once necessary to survival or a constantsource of failure, physical courage and the
love of battle, for instance,are no great help may even be hindrances
to a civilized man, And ina state of physical balance and security,
power intellectual as well as physical,would be out of place. For countless

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years, I judge, there hadbeen no danger of war or solitary violence,
no danger from wild beasts, nowasting disease to require strength of constitution,
no need of toil for such alife. What we should call the
weak are as well equipped as thestrong, or indeed no longer weak.

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Better equipped indeed they are, forthe strong would be fretted by an energy
for which there was no outlet.No doubt, the exquisite beauty of the
buildings I saw was the outcome ofthe last surgings of the now purposeless energy
of mankind, before it settled downinto perfect harmony with the conditions under which
it lived, the flourish of thattriumph which began the last great peace.

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This has ever been the fate ofenergy in security. It takes to art
and to eroticism, and then comelanguor and decay. Even this artistic impetus
would at last die away. Hadalmost died in the time I saw to
adorn themselves with flowers, to dance, to sing in the sunlight. So

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much was left of the artistic spirit, and no more even that would fade
in the end into a contented inactivity. We are kept keen on the grindstone
of pain and necessity. And itseemed to me that here was that hateful
grindstone broken at last. As Istood there in the gathering dark, I

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thought that in this simple explanation Ihad mastered the problem of the world,
mastered the whole secret of these deliciouspeople. Possibly the checks they had devised
for the increase of population had succeededtoo well, and their numbers had rather
diminished than kept stationary. That wouldaccount for the abandoned ruins. Very simple

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was my explanation, and plausible enough, as most wrong theories are. End
of Chapter four