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07 - The Time Machine - H G Wells · Daily Classic Science Fiction Books

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  Speaker 1: Chapter seven. Now, indeed I seemed in a worse case
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  Speaker 1: than before. Hitherto, except during my night's anguish at the
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  Speaker 1: loss of the time machine, I had felt a sustaining
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  Speaker 1: hope of ultimate escape. But that hope was staggered by
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  Speaker 1: these new discoveries. Hitherto I had merely thought myself impeded
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  Speaker 1: by the childish simplicity of the little people, and by
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  Speaker 1: some unknown forces which I had only to understand to overcome.
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  Speaker 1: But there was an altogether new elements in the sickening
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  Speaker 1: quality of the Morlocks, a something inhuman and malign. Instinctively
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  Speaker 1: I loathed them. Before I had felt as a man
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  Speaker 1: might feel who had fallen into a pit. My concern
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  Speaker 1: was with the pit and how to get out of it.
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  Speaker 1: Now I felt like a beast in a trap whose
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  Speaker 1: enemy would come upon him soon. The enemy I dreaded
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  Speaker 1: may surprise you. It was the darkness of the new moon.
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  Speaker 1: Weena had put this into my head by some at
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  Speaker 1: first incomprehensible remarks about the dark nights. It was not
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  Speaker 1: now such a very difficult problem to guess what the
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  Speaker 1: coming of dark nights might mean. The moon was on
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  Speaker 1: the wane each night, there was a longer interval of darkness,
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  Speaker 1: and now I understood to some slight degree at least
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  Speaker 1: the reason of the fear of the little upper world
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  Speaker 1: people for the dark. I wondered vaguely what foul villainy
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  Speaker 1: it might be that the Morlocks did under the new moon.
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  Speaker 1: I felt pretty sure now that my second hypothesis was
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  Speaker 1: all wrong. The upper world people might once have been
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  Speaker 1: the favored aristocracy and the Morlocks their mechanical servants, but
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  Speaker 1: that had long since passed away. The two species that
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  Speaker 1: had resulted from the evolution of man were sliding down
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  Speaker 1: towards or had already arrived at an altogether new relationship.
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  Speaker 1: The Eloi, like the Carolingian kings, had decayed to a mere,
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  Speaker 1: beautiful futility. They still possessed the earth on sufferance, since
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  Speaker 1: the Morlocks, subterranean for innumerable generations, had come at last
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  Speaker 1: to find the day that surface intolerable, and the Morlocks
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  Speaker 1: made their garments. I inferred and maintained them in their
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  Speaker 1: habitual needs, perhaps through the survival of an old habit
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  Speaker 1: of service. They did it as a standing horse paused
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  Speaker 1: with his foot, or as a man enjoys killing animals
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  Speaker 1: in sport. Because ancient and departed necessities had impressed it
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  Speaker 1: on the organism. But clearly the old order was already
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  Speaker 1: in part reversed. The nemesis of the delicate ones was
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  Speaker 1: creeping on apace. Ages ago, thousands of generations ago. Men
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  Speaker 1: had thrust his brother Men out of the ease and
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  Speaker 1: the sunshine, and now that brother was coming back changed.
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  Speaker 1: Already the eloy had begun to learn one old lesson anew.
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  Speaker 1: They were becoming reacquainted with fear. And suddenly there came
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  Speaker 1: into my head the memory of the meat I had
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  Speaker 1: seen in the underworld. It seemed odd, how it floated
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  Speaker 1: into my mind, not stirred up, as it were, by
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  Speaker 1: the current of my meditations, but coming in almost like
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  Speaker 1: a question from outside. I tried to recall the form
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  Speaker 1: of it. I had a vague sense of something familiar,
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  Speaker 1: but I could not tell what it was at the time. Still, however,
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  Speaker 1: helpless the little peopled in the presence of their mysterious fear,
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  Speaker 1: I was differently constituted. I came out of this age
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  Speaker 1: of ours, this ripe prime of the human race. When
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  Speaker 1: fear does not paralyze and mystery has lost its terrors,
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  Speaker 1: I at least would defend myself without further delay. I
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  Speaker 1: determined to make myself arms and a fastness where I
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  Speaker 1: might leap. With that refuge as a base, I could
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  Speaker 1: face this strange world with some of that confidence I
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  Speaker 1: had lost in realizing to what creatures night by night
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  Speaker 1: I lay exposed. I felt I could never sleep again
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  Speaker 1: until my bed was secure from them. I shuddered with
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  Speaker 1: horror to think how they must already have examined me.
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  Speaker 1: I wandered during the afternoon along the valley of the Thames,
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  Speaker 1: but found nothing that commended itself to my mind as inaccessible.
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  Speaker 1: All the buildings and trees seemed easily practical to such
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  Speaker 1: dexterous climbers as the Morlocks, to judge by their wells,
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  Speaker 1: must be. Then the tall pinnacles of the Palace of
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  Speaker 1: Green Porcelain, and the polished gleam of its walls came
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  Speaker 1: back to my memory, and in the evening, taking Weena
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  Speaker 1: like a child upon my shoulder, I went up the
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  Speaker 1: hills towards the southwest. The distance I had reckoned was
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  Speaker 1: seven or eight miles, but it must have been near eighteen.
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  Speaker 1: I had first seen the place on a moist afternoon,
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  Speaker 1: when distances are deceptively diminished. In addition, the heel of
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  Speaker 1: one of my shoes was loose, and a nail was
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  Speaker 1: working through the sole. They were comfortable old shoes. I
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  Speaker 1: wore about indoors, so that I was lame, and it
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  Speaker 1: was already long past sunset when I came in sight
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  Speaker 1: of the palace, silhouetted black against the pale yellow of
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  Speaker 1: the sky. Weena had been hugely delighted when I began
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  Speaker 1: to carry her, but after a while she desired me
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  Speaker 1: to let her down, and ran along by the side
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  Speaker 1: of me, occasionally darting off on either hand to pick
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  Speaker 1: flowers to stick in my pockets. My pockets had always
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  Speaker 1: puzzled Weena, but at the last she had concluded that
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  Speaker 1: they were an eccentric kind of vase for floral decoration.
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  Speaker 1: At least she utilized them for that purpose, and that
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  Speaker 1: reminds me. In changing my jacket, I found the time
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  Speaker 1: traveler paused, put his hand into his pocket, and silently
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  Speaker 1: placed two withered flowers, not unlike very large white mallows,
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  Speaker 1: upon the little table. Then he resumed his narrative, as
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  Speaker 1: the hush of the evening crept over the world, and
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  Speaker 1: we proceeded over the hill crest towards Wimbledon. Weena grew
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  Speaker 1: tired and wanted to return to the House of gray Stone.
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  Speaker 1: But I pointed out the distant pinnacles of the Palace
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  Speaker 1: of Green Porcelain to her, and contrived to make her
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  Speaker 1: understand that we were seeking a refuge there from her fear.
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  Speaker 1: You know that great pause that comes upon things before
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  Speaker 1: the dusk, even the breeze stops in the trees. To me,
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  Speaker 1: there is always an air of expectation about that evening stillness.
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  Speaker 1: The sky was clear, remote and empty, save for a
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  Speaker 1: few horizontal bars far down in the sunset. Well that night,
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  Speaker 1: the expectation took the color of my fears. In that
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  Speaker 1: darkling calm, my senses seemed peter naturally sharpened. I fancied
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  Speaker 1: I could even feel the the hollowness of the ground
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  Speaker 1: beneath my feet, could indeed almost see through it, the
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  Speaker 1: Morlocks on their ant hill, going hither and thither and
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  Speaker 1: waiting for the dark. In my excitement, I fancied that
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  Speaker 1: they would receive my invasion of their burrows as a
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  Speaker 1: declaration of war, And why had they taken my time machine?
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  Speaker 1: So we went on in the quiet, and the twilight
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  Speaker 1: deepened into night. The clear blue of the distance faded,
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  Speaker 1: and one star after another came out. The ground grew
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  Speaker 1: dim and the trees black. Ween As fears and her
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  Speaker 1: fatigue grew upon her, I took her in my arms
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  Speaker 1: and talked to her and caressed her. Then, as the
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  Speaker 1: darkness grew deeper, she put her arms round my neck, and,
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  Speaker 1: closing her eyes tightly, pressed her face against my shoulder.
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  Speaker 1: So we went down a long slope into a valley,
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  Speaker 1: and there, in the dimness, I almost walked into a
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  Speaker 1: little river. This I waited and went up on the
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  Speaker 1: opposite side of the valley, past a number of sleeping houses,
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  Speaker 1: and by a statue a fawn or some such figure
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  Speaker 1: minus the head. Here too were acacious. So far I
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  Speaker 1: had seen nothing of the Morlocks. But it was yet
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  Speaker 1: early in the night, and the darker hours before the
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  Speaker 1: old moon rose were still to come. From the brow
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  Speaker 1: of the next hill, I saw a thick wood spreading
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  Speaker 1: wide and black before me. I hesitated at this. I
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  Speaker 1: could see no end to it, either to the right
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  Speaker 1: or the left. Feeling tired, my feet in particular were
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  Speaker 1: very sore, I carefully lowered Weena from my shoulder as
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  Speaker 1: I halted and sat down upon the turf, I could
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  Speaker 1: no longer see the palace of green porcelain, and I
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  Speaker 1: was in doubt of my direction. I looked into the
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  Speaker 1: thickness of the wood and thought of what it might hide.
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  Speaker 1: Under that dense tangle of branches. One would be out
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  Speaker 1: of sight of the stars, even were there no other
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  Speaker 1: lurking danger, A danger I did not care to let
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  Speaker 1: my imagination loose. Upon there would still be all the
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  Speaker 1: roots to stumble over and the tree bowls to strike against.
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  Speaker 1: I was very tired too, after the excitements of the day,
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  Speaker 1: so I decided that I would not face it, but
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  Speaker 1: would pass the night upon the open hill. Weena, I
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  Speaker 1: was glad to find, was fast asleep. I carefully wrapped
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  Speaker 1: her in my jacket and sat down beside her to
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  Speaker 1: wait for the moonrise. The hillside was quiet and deserted,
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  Speaker 1: but from the black of the wood there came now
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  Speaker 1: and then a stir of living things above me shone.
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  Speaker 1: The stars for the night was very clear. I felt
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  Speaker 1: a certain sense of friendly comfort in their twinkling. All
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  Speaker 1: the old constellations had gone from the sky. However, that
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  Speaker 1: slow movement which is imperceptible in a hundred human life.
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  Speaker 1: Times had long since rearranged them in unfamiliar groupings. But
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  Speaker 1: the milky way, it seemed to me, was still the
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  Speaker 1: same tattered streamer of star dust as of yore. Southward,
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  Speaker 1: as I judged, it was a very bright red star
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  Speaker 1: that was new to me. It was even more splendid
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  Speaker 1: than our own green serious, and amid all these scintillating
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  Speaker 1: points of light, one bright planet shone kindly and steadily,
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  Speaker 1: like the face of an old friend. Looking at these
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  Speaker 1: stars suddenly dwarfed my own troubles and all the gravities
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  Speaker 1: of terrestrial life. I thought of their unfathomable distance, and
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  Speaker 1: the slow, inevitable drift of their movements out of the
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  Speaker 1: unknown past into the unknown future. I thought of the
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  Speaker 1: great processional cycle that the pole of the Earth describes.
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  Speaker 1: Only forty times had that silent revolution occurred during all
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  Speaker 1: the years that I had traversed, And during the few revolutions,
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  Speaker 1: all the activity, all the traditions, the complex organizations, the nations, languages, literatures, aspirations,
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  Speaker 1: even the mere memory of Man as I knew him,
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  Speaker 1: had been swept out of existence. Instead were these frail
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  Speaker 1: creatures who had forgotten their high ancestry and the white
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  Speaker 1: things of which I went in terror. Then I thought
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  Speaker 1: of the great fear that was between the two species,
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  Speaker 1: and for the first time, with a sudden shiver, came
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  Speaker 1: the clear knowledge of what the meat I had seen
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  Speaker 1: might be. Yet it was too horrible. I looked at
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  Speaker 1: little Weena sleeping beside me, her face white and star
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  Speaker 1: like under the stars, and forthwith dismissed the thought. Through
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  Speaker 1: that long night I held my mind off the Morlocks
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  Speaker 1: as well as I could, and whiled away the time
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  Speaker 1: by trying to fancy. I could find signs of the
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  Speaker 1: old constellations in the new confusion. The sky kept very clear,
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  Speaker 1: except for a hazy cloud or so, no doubt I
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  Speaker 1: dozed at times. Then, as my vigil wore on, came
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  Speaker 1: a faintness in the eastward sky, like the reflection of
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  Speaker 1: some colorless fire, and the old moon rose thin and
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  Speaker 1: peaked and white, and close behind and overtaking it and
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  Speaker 1: overflowing it. The dawn came pale at first, and then
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  Speaker 1: growing pink and warm. No Morlocks had approached us, indeed
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  Speaker 1: I had seen none upon the hill that night, and
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  Speaker 1: in the confidence of renewed day, it almost seemed to
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  Speaker 1: me that my fear had been unreasonable. I stood up
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  Speaker 1: and found my foot with the loose heel, swollen at
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  Speaker 1: the ankle, and painful under the heel. So I sat
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  Speaker 1: down again, took off my shoes and flung them away.
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  Speaker 1: I awakened Weena, and we went down into the wood,
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  Speaker 1: now green and pleasant instead of black, and forbidding we
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  Speaker 1: found some fruit wherewith to break our fast. We soon
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  Speaker 1: met others of the dainty ones, laughing and dancing in
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  Speaker 1: the sunlight, as though there were no such thing in
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  Speaker 1: nature as the night. And then I thought once more
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  Speaker 1: of the meat I had seen. I felt assured now
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  Speaker 1: of what it was, and from the bottom of my
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  Speaker 1: heart I pitied this last feeble rill from the great
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  Speaker 1: flood of humanity. Clearly, at some time in the long
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  Speaker 1: ago of human decay, the morlock's food had run short.
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  Speaker 1: Possibly they had lived on rats and such like vermin.
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  Speaker 1: Even now, man is far less discriminating and exclusive in
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  Speaker 1: his food than he was, far less than any monkey.
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  Speaker 1: His prejudice against human flesh is no deep seated instinct,
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  Speaker 1: and so these inhuman sons of men. I tried to
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  Speaker 1: look at the thing in a scientific spirit. After all,
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  Speaker 1: they were less human and more remote than our cannibal
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  Speaker 1: ancestors of three or four thousand years ago. And the
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  Speaker 1: intelligence that would have made this state of things a
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  Speaker 1: torment had gone. Why should I trouble myself? These eloi
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  Speaker 1: were mere fatted cattle, which the ant like morlocks preserved
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  Speaker 1: and preyed upon, probably saw to the breeding of. And
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  Speaker 1: there was Weena dancing at my side. Then I tried
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  Speaker 1: to preserve myself from the horror that was coming upon
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  Speaker 1: me by regarding it as a rigorous punishment of human selfishness.
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  Speaker 1: Man had been content to live in ease and delight
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  Speaker 1: upon the labors of his fellow man had taken necessity
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  Speaker 1: as his watchword and excuse, and in the fullness of time,
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  Speaker 1: necessity had come home to him. I even tried a
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  Speaker 1: Carlyle like scorn of this wretched aristocracy in decay, But
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  Speaker 1: this attitude of mind was impossible. However great their intellectual degradation,
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  Speaker 1: the Eloi had kept too much of the human form
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  Speaker 1: not to claim my sympathy and to make me perforce
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  Speaker 1: a sharer in their degradation and their fear. I had
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  Speaker 1: at that time very vague ideas as to the course
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  Speaker 1: I should pursue. My first was to secure some safe
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  Speaker 1: place of refuge, and to make myself such arms of
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  Speaker 1: metal or stone as I could contrive that necessity was immediate.
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  Speaker 1: In the next place, I hoped to procure some means
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  Speaker 1: of fire, so that I should have the weapon of
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  Speaker 1: a torch at hand, for nothing I knew would be
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  Speaker 1: more efficient against these morlocks. Then I wanted to arrange
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  Speaker 1: some contrivance to break open the doors of bronze under
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  Speaker 1: the white Sphinx. I had in mind a battering ram.
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  Speaker 1: I had a persuasion that if I could enter those
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  Speaker 1: doors and carry a blaze of light before me, I
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  Speaker 1: should discover the time machine and escape. I could not
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  Speaker 1: imagine the morlocks were strong enough to move it far away,
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  Speaker 1: Weena I had resolved to bring with me to our
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  Speaker 1: own time, and, turning such schemes over in my mind,
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  Speaker 1: I pursued our way towards the building which my fancy
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  Speaker 1: had chosen as our dwelling. End of Chapter seven