THE TIME MACHINE

Back Forward Menu

Page 1: G. Wells [1898] I The Time Traveller (for so it will be co...
Page 2: You must follow me carefully. I shall have to controvert o...
Page 3: There I object,' said Filby. 'Of course a solid body may e...
Page 4: There are really four dimensions, three which we call the ...
Page 5: But some foolish people have got hold of the wrong side of...
Page 6: See?' 'I think so,' murmured the Provincial Mayor; and, kn...
Page 7: Here is a popular scientific diagram, a weather record. Th...
Page 8: I admit we move freely in two dimensions. But how about up...
Page 9: We are always getting away from the present moment. Our me...
Page 10: He can go up against gravitation in a balloon, and why sho...
Page 11: Long ago I had a vague inkling of a machine--' 'To travel ...
Page 12: One might get one's Greek from the very lips of Homer and ...
Page 13: You are going to verify _that_?' 'The experiment!' cried F...
Page 14: The thing the Time Traveller held in his hand was a glitte...
Page 15: I sat in a low arm-chair nearest the fire, and I drew this...
Page 16: He pointed to the part with his finger. 'Also, here is one...
Page 17: The Psychologist seemed about to speak to me, but changed ...
Page 18: At that the Time Traveller laughed cheerfully. 'Well?' he ...
Page 19: Into the future or the past--I don't, for certain, know wh...
Page 20: Not a bit,' said the Time Traveller, and, to the Psycholog...
Page 21: You see?' he said, laughing. We sat and stared at the vaca...
Page 22: Quartz it seemed to be. 'Look here,' said the Medical Man,...
Page 23: The fact is, the Time Traveller was one of those men who a...
Page 24: So I don't think any of us said very much about time trave...
Page 25: You've just come? It's rather odd. He's unavoidably detain...
Page 26: The Editor wanted that explained to him, and the Psycholog...
Page 27: Then he came into the room. He walked with just such a lim...
Page 28: Save me some of that mutton. I'm starving for a bit of mea...
Page 29: Has he been doing the Amateur Cadger? I don't follow.' I m...
Page 30: Hadn't they any clothes-brushes in the Future? The Journal...
Page 31: He smiled quietly, in his old way. 'Where's my mutton?' he...
Page 32: The rest of the dinner was uncomfortable. For my own part,...
Page 33: But the thing's a mere paradox,' said the Editor. 'I can't...
Page 34: Afterwards he got more animated. In writing it down I feel...
Page 35: There it is now, a little travel-worn, truly; and one of t...
Page 36: Then I noted the clock. A moment before, as it seemed, it ...
Page 37: They are excessively unpleasant. There is a feeling exactl...
Page 38: The landscape was misty and vague. I was still on the hill...
Page 39: They merged at last into a kind of hysterical exhilaration...
Page 40: The peculiar risk lay in the possibility of my finding som...
Page 41: I told myself that I could never stop, and with a gust of ...
Page 42: Presently I thought what a fool I was to get wet. I stood ...
Page 43: I stood looking at it for a little space--half a minute, p...
Page 44: I was seized with a panic fear. I turned frantically to th...
Page 45: But with this recovery of a prompt retreat my courage reco...
Page 46: His flushed face reminded me of the more beautiful kind of...
Page 47: One of them addressed me. It came into my head, oddly enou...
Page 48: And then, looking more nearly into their features, I saw s...
Page 49: For a moment I was staggered, though the import of his ges...
Page 50: They all withdrew a pace or so and bowed. Then came one la...
Page 51: I was naturally most occupied with the growing crowd of li...
Page 52: The big doorway opened into a proportionately great hall h...
Page 53: With a pretty absence of ceremony they began to eat the fr...
Page 54: These people of the remote future were strict vegetarians,...
Page 55: At first my efforts met with a stare of surprise or inexti...
Page 56: They would come to me with eager cries of astonishment, li...
Page 57: I resolved to mount to the summit of a crest, perhaps a mi...
Page 58: Looking round with a sudden thought, from a terrace on whi...
Page 59: But everything was so strange. Now, I saw the fact plainly...
Page 60: We see some beginnings of this even in our own time, and i...
Page 61: I sat down on it, and I surveyed the broad view of our old...
Page 62: It seemed to me that I had happened upon humanity upon the...
Page 63: Our agriculture and horticulture destroy a weed just here ...
Page 64: The air was free from gnats, the earth from weeds or fungi...
Page 65: But with this change in condition comes inevitably adaptat...
Page 66: For after the battle comes Quiet. Humanity had been strong...
Page 67: Better equipped indeed they are, for the strong would be f...
Page 68: Possibly the checks they had devised for the increase of p...
Page 69: The bright little figures ceased to move about below, a no...
Page 70: The bare thought of it was an actual physical sensation. I...
Page 71: Not a creature seemed to be stirring in that moonlit world...
Page 72: The attachment of the levers--I will show you the method l...
Page 73: I have no doubt they found my second appearance strange en...
Page 74: I do not remember all I did as the moon crept up the sky. ...
Page 75: I saw the wild folly of my frenzy overnight, and I could r...
Page 76: I wasted some time in futile questionings, conveyed, as we...
Page 77: One thing was clear enough to my mind. It took no very gre...
Page 78: In three strides I was after him, had him by the loose par...
Page 79: Patience," said I to myself. "If you want your machine aga...
Page 80: It may have been my fancy, or it may have had something to...
Page 81: From every hill I climbed I saw the same abundance of sple...
Page 82: Further, I threw a scrap of paper into the throat of one, ...
Page 83: But while such details are easy enough to obtain when the ...
Page 84: But it occurred to me that, possibly, there might be cemet...
Page 85: And the little people displayed no vestige of a creative t...
Page 86: It happened that, as I was watching some of the little peo...
Page 87: The thing took my imagination. Very possibly I had been fe...
Page 88: I had not, I said to myself, come into the future to carry...
Page 89: But she dreaded the dark, dreaded shadows, dreaded black t...
Page 90: I had been restless, dreaming most disagreeably that I was...
Page 91: They moved hastily. I did not see what became of them. It ...
Page 92: But the jest was unsatisfying, and I was thinking of these...
Page 93: By contrast with the brilliancy outside, it seemed at firs...
Page 94: I put out my hand and touched something soft. At once the ...
Page 95: It made me shudder. It was so like a human spider! It was ...
Page 96: I thought of the flickering pillars and of my theory of an...
Page 97: But they were interested by my matches, and I struck some ...
Page 98: Then, those large eyes, with that capacity for reflecting ...
Page 99: I dare say you will anticipate the shape of my theory; tho...
Page 100: About London, for instance, perhaps half the prettier coun...
Page 101: Once they were there, they would no doubt have to pay rent...
Page 102: Its triumph had not been simply a triumph over Nature, but...
Page 103: Why had the Morlocks taken my Time Machine? For I felt sur...
Page 104: I felt a peculiar shrinking from those pallid bodies. They...
Page 105: It occurred to me even then, that in the course of a few d...
Page 106: It was larger than the largest of the palaces or ruins I k...
Page 107: She danced beside me to the well, but when she saw me lean...
Page 108: And not simply fatigued! One of the bars bent suddenly und...
Page 109: It was not too soon. My arms ached, my back was cramped, a...
Page 110: I tried to call to them, but the language they had was app...
Page 111: The place, by the by, was very stuffy and oppressive, and ...
Page 112: If only I had thought of a Kodak! I could have flashed tha...
Page 113: The sense of these unseen creatures examining me was indes...
Page 114: I struck another light, and waved it in their dazzled face...
Page 115: With the last twenty or thirty feet of it a deadly nausea ...
Page 116: Hitherto I had merely thought myself impeded by the childi...
Page 117: I wondered vaguely what foul villainy it might be that the...
Page 118: But, clearly, the old order was already in part reversed. ...
Page 119: Without further delay I determined to make myself arms and...
Page 120: In addition, the heel of one of my shoes was loose, and a ...
Page 121: Then he resumed his narrative. 'As the hush of evening cre...
Page 122: And why had they taken my Time Machine? 'So we went on in ...
Page 123: I hesitated at this. I could see no end to it, either to t...
Page 124: I carefully wrapped her in my jacket, and sat down beside ...
Page 125: I thought of the great precessional cycle that the pole of...
Page 126: The sky kept very clear, except for a hazy cloud or so. No...
Page 127: And then I thought once more of the meat that I had seen. ...
Page 128: Man had been content to live in ease and delight upon the ...
Page 129: I had in mind a battering ram. I had a persuasion that if ...
Page 130: It lay very high upon a turfy down, and looking north-east...
Page 131: At the first glance I was reminded of a museum. The tiled ...
Page 132: Here and there I found traces of the little people in the ...
Page 133: To judge from the size of the place, this Palace of Green ...
Page 134: A few shrivelled and blackened vestiges of what had once b...
Page 135: Suddenly Weena came very close to my side. So suddenly tha...
Page 136: Further away towards the dimness, it appeared to be broken...
Page 137: And I longed very much to kill a Morlock or so. Very inhum...
Page 138: But as it was, the thing that struck me with keenest force...
Page 139: In part it was a modest _cancan_, in part a step dance, in...
Page 140: I was about to throw it away, but I remembered that it was...
Page 141: In another place was a vast array of idols--Polynesian, Me...
Page 142: It was after that, I think, that we came to a little open ...
Page 143: They had never impressed me as being very strong, and I ho...
Page 144: And I began to suffer from sleepiness too; so that it was ...
Page 145: And then it came into my head that I would amaze our frien...
Page 146: I believe she would have cast herself into it had I not re...
Page 147: Then I seemed to know of a pattering about me. I pushed on...
Page 148: With a sudden fright I stooped to her. She seemed scarcely...
Page 149: The camphor flickered and went out. I lit a match, and as ...
Page 150: Moreover, the vapour of camphor was in the air. My fire wo...
Page 151: I could feel the succulent giving of flesh and bone under ...
Page 152: And their backs seemed no longer white, but reddish. As I ...
Page 153: This whole space was as bright as day with the reflection ...
Page 154: Yet every now and then one would come straight towards me,...
Page 155: For the most part of that night I was persuaded it was a n...
Page 156: As I thought of that, I was almost moved to begin a massac...
Page 157: But as I walked over the smoking ashes under the bright mo...
Page 158: The gay robes of the beautiful people moved hither and thi...
Page 159: And a great quiet had followed. 'It is a law of nature we ...
Page 160: The Under-world being in contact with machinery, which, ho...
Page 161: I now felt safe against being caught napping by the Morloc...
Page 162: For once, at least, I grasped the mental operations of the...
Page 163: The matches were of that abominable kind that light only o...
Page 164: XI 'I have already told you of the sickness and confusion ...
Page 165: As I drove on, a peculiar change crept over the appearance...
Page 166: At last, some time before I stopped, the sun, red and very...
Page 167: Overhead it was a deep Indian red and starless, and south-...
Page 168: The sensation reminded me of my only experience of mountai...
Page 169: I could see the many palps of its complicated mouth flicke...
Page 170: I cannot convey the sense of abominable desolation that hu...
Page 171: Then I stopped once more, for the crawling multitude of cr...
Page 172: I fancied I saw some black object flopping about upon this...
Page 173: From the edge of the sea came a ripple and whisper. Beyond...
Page 174: Then like a red-hot bow in the sky appeared the edge of th...
Page 175: For a long time I must have been insensible upon the machi...
Page 176: But now her every motion appeared to be the exact inversio...
Page 177: For a time my brain went stagnant. Presently I got up and ...
Page 178: No. I cannot expect you to believe it. Take it as a lie--o...
Page 179: What a pity it is you're not a writer of stories!' he said...
Page 180: The Medical Man rose, came to the lamp, and examined the f...
Page 181: He spoke like one who was trying to keep hold of an idea t...
Page 182: The Time Traveller put the lamp down on the bench, and ran...
Page 183: I determined to go next day and see the Time Traveller aga...
Page 184: And he looked frankly into my eyes. He hesitated. His eye ...
Page 185: A gust of air whirled round me as I opened the door, and f...
Page 186: No, sir. No one has come out this way. I was expecting to ...
Page 187: Will he ever return? It may be that he swept back into the...
Page 188: But to me the future is still black and blank--is a vast i...