Free Philip Van Doren Stern (ed) by Travelers In Time Page B

amid such realities as I found here. Conceive the tale of London which a negro, fresh from Central Africa, would take back to his tribe! What would he know of railway companies, of social movements, of telephone and telegraph wires, of the Parcels Delivery Company, and postal orders and the like? Yet we, at least, should be willing enough to explain these things to him! And even of what he knew, how much could he make his untravelled friend either apprehend or believe? Then, think how narrow the gap between a negro and a white man of our own times, and how wide the interval between myself and these of the Golden Age! I was sensible of much which was unseen, and which contributed to my comfort; but save for a general impression of automatic organisation, I fear I can convey very little of the difference to your mind.

"In the matter of sepulture, for instance, I could see no signs of crematoria nor anything suggestive of tombs. But it occurred to me that, possibly, there might be cemeteries (or crematoria) somewhere beyond the range of my explorings. This, again, was a question I deliberately put to myself, and my curiosity was at first entirely defeated upon the point. The thing puzzled me, and I was led to make a further remark, which puzzled me still more: that aged and infirm among this people there were none.
    "I must confess that my satisfaction with my first theories of an automatic civilisation and a decadent humanity did not long endure. Yet I could think of no other. Let me put my difficulties. The several big palaces I had explored were mere living places, great dining-halls and sleeping apartments. I could find no machinery, no appliances of any kind. Yet these' people were clothed in pleasant fabrics that must at times need renewel, and their sandals, though undecorated, were fairly
complex specimens of metalwork. Somehow such things must be made. And the
little people displayed no vestige of a creative tendency. There were no shops,
no workshops, no sign of importations among them. They spent all their time in
playing gently, in bathing in the river, in making love in a half-playful
fashion, in eating fruit and sleeping. I could not see how things were kept
going.
    "Then,
again, about the Time Machine: something, I knew not what, had taken it into
the hollow pedestal of the White Sphinx. Why? For the life of me I could not
imagine. Those waterless wells, too, those flickering pillars. I felt I lacked
a clue. I felt—how shall I put it? Suppose you found an inscription, with
sentences here and there in excellent plain English, and interpolated
therewith, others made up of words, of letters even, absolutely unknown to you?
Well, on the third day of my visit, that was how the world of Eight Hundred and
Two Thousand Seven Hundred and One presented itself to me!
    "That
day, too, I made a friend—of a sort. It happened that, as I was watching some
of the little people bathing in a shallow, one of them was seized with cramp
and began drifting downstream. The main current ran rather swiftly, but not too
strongly for even a moderate swimmer. It will give you an idea, therefore, of
the strange deficiency in these creatures, when I tell you that none made the
slightest attempt to rescue the weakly crying little thing which was drowning
before their eyes. When I realised this, I hurriedly slipped off my clothes,
and, wading in at a point lower down, I caught the poor mite and drew her safe
to land. A little rubbing of the limbs soon brought her round, and I had the
satisfaction of seeing she was all right before I left her. I had got to such a
low estimate of her kind that I did not expect any gratitude from her. In that,
however, I was wrong.
    "This
happened in the morning. In the afternoon I met my little woman, as I believe
it was, as I was returning towards my centre from an exploration, and she
received me with cries of delight and presented me with a big garland of
flowers—evidently made for me and me alone. The