The Man Who Saw the Future - Edmond Hamilton

0:00This is Matt Rogers from Lost Culture East. That's with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. This is Bowen Yang from Lost Culture East. That's Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. We've been talking about Kupy Mayo for a minute now, and wow! So many of you already love this stuff! And if you're thinking, wait, what is Kupy? Do you not have the internet? It's the OG Japanese mayonnaise. The one with the red cap. What makes it different? Egg yolks. Kupy is made with egg yolks only, giving it this rich, umami flavor that elevates to everything. Chefs use it. Restaurants use it. Where chefs work, of course. Food and flavor lovers use it. You haven't tried it yet? Well, find the red cap and see what everyone's talking about. Why don't you? Kupy. The original Japanese mayonnaise. Kupy. The man who saw the future by Edmund Hamilton.

1:22Jean-Démarsalais, inquisitor extraordinary of the King of France, raised his head from the parchedments that littered the crude desk at which he sat. His glance shifted along the long stone walled torch-lit room to the file of male-clad soldiers who stood like steel statues by its door. A word from him and two of them sprang forward. "'You may bring in the prisoner,' he said. The two disappeared through the door, and in moments there came a clang of opening bolts and grating of heavy hinges from somewhere in the building. Then the clang of the returning soldiers, and they entered the room with another man between them whose hands were fettered. He was a straight figure, and was dressed in drab tunic and hose. His dark hair was long and straight, and his face held a dreaming strength altogether different from the battered visages of the soldiers or the changeless mask of the inquisitor. The latter regarded the prisoner for a moment, and then lifted one of the parchedments from before him and read from it in a smooth, clear voice. Al-Ry-Lothier, a pachytheri's assistant of Paris, he read, is charged

2:27in this year of our Lord 1,444, with offending against God and the king by committing the crime of sorcery. The prisoner spoke for the first time, his voice low but steady. I am no sorcerer, Sire." Jean-Démarçalé read calmly on from the parchment. It has been stated by many witnesses that, for long, that part of Paris called Nanley by some, has been troubled by works of the devil. Ever and a non, great collapse of thunder have been heard issuing from an open field there without visible cause. They were evidently caused by a sorcerer of power, since even exorcists could not halt them. It is attested by many that the accused Al-Ry-Lothier, did in spite of the known diabolical nature of the thing, spend much time at the field in question. It is also attested that the said Al-Ry-Lothier did state that in his opinion the thunder claps were not of diabolical origin, and that if they were studied, their cause might be discovered.

3:30It being suspected from this that Al-Ry-Lothier was himself the sorcerer causing the thunder claps, he was watched, and on the third day of June was seen to go in the early morning to the unholy spot with certain instruments. There he was observed going through strange and diabolical congerations. When there came suddenly another thunder clap, and the said Al-Ry-Lothier did vanish entirely from view in that moment. This fact is attested beyond all doubt. The news spreading, many hundreds watched around the field during that day. Upon that night before midnight another thunder clap was heard, and the said Al-Ry-Lothier was seen by these hundreds to appear at the field center as swiftly and as strangely as he had vanished. The fierce stricken hundreds around the field heard him tell them how by diabolical power he had gone for hundreds of years into the future. A thing surely possible only to the devil and his minions. And heard him tell other blasphemies before they seized him and

4:32brought him to the inquisitor of the king, praying that he be burned and his work of sorcery thus halted. Therefore, Al-Ry-Lothier, since you were seen to vanish and to reappear as only the servants of the evil one might do, and were heard by many to utter the blasphemies mentioned, I must judge you a sorcerer with the penalty of death by fire. If anything there be that you can advance in palliation of your black offense, however, you may now do so before final sentences passed upon you. John de Marcellae laid down the parchment and raised his eyes to the prisoner. The latter looked round him quickly for a moment, a half-glimpsed panic for an instant in his eyes, then seemed to steady. Sire, I cannot change the sentence you will pass upon me, he said quietly. Yet do I wish well to relate once what happened to me and what I saw? Is it permitted me to tell that from first to last? The inquisitors had bent, and Al-Ry-Lothier spoke. His voice gaining in strength and fervor as he continued.

5:34Sire, I, Al-Ry-Lothier, am no sorcerer but a simple apocotharies assistant. It was always my nature, from earliest youth to desire to delve into matters unknown to men. The secrets of the earth and sea and sky, the knowledge hidden from us. I knew well that this was wicked, that the church teaches all we need to know, and that heaven frowns when we pry into its mysteries. But so strong was my desire to know that many times I concerned myself with matters forbidden. I had sought to know the nature of the lightning, and the manner of flight of the birds, and the way in which fishes are able to live beneath the waters and the mystery of the stars. So when these thunder claps began to be heard in the parts of Paris in which I lived, I did not fear them so much as my neighbors. I was eager to learn only what was causing them, for it seemed to me that their cause might be learned. So I began to go to that field from which they issued, to study them. I waited in it, and twice I heard the great thunder claps myself.

6:36I thought they came from near the field's center, and I studied that place, but I could see nothing there that was causing them. I dug in the ground. I looked up for hours into the sky, but there was nothing. And still, at intervals, the thunder claps sounded. I still kept going to the field, though I knew that many of my neighbors whispered that I was engaged in sorcery. Upon that morning of the third day of June, it had occurred to me to take certain instruments, such as load stones to the field to see whether anything might be learned with them. I went, a few superstitious ones following me at a distance. I reached the field's center, and started the examinations I had planned. Then came suddenly another thunder clap, and with it I passed from the sight of those who had followed and were watching, vanished from view. Sire, I cannot well describe what happened in that moment. I heard the thunder clap come as though from all the air around me, stunning my ears with its terrible burst of sound. And at the same moment that I heard it, I was buffeted as though by awful winds and seemed

7:38falling downwards through terrific depths. Then through the hellish uproar I felt myself bumping upon a hard surface, and the sounds quickly ceased from about me. I had involuntarily closed my eyes at the great thunder clap, but now slowly I opened them. I looked around me, first in stupa faction, and then in growing amazement. For I was not in that familiar field at all, Sire, that I had been in a moment before. I was in a room lying upon its floor, and it was such a room as I had never seen before. Its walls were smooth and white and gleaming. There were windows in the walls, and they were closed with sheets of glass so smooth and clear that one seemed looking through a clear opening rather than through glass. The floor was of stone, smooth and seamless as though carbon from one great rock, yet seeming not in some way to be stone at all. There was a great circle of smooth metal in set in it, and it was on it that I was lying. All around the room were many great things the like of which I had never seen.

8:38Some seemed of black metal, seemed contrivances or machines of some sort. Black cords of wire connecting them to each other, and from part of them came a humming sound that did not. This is Troy Millens from Earn Your Leisure. On Earn Your Leisure, we're all about smart money moves, and here's one most people skip, and it starts with insureify. Most of us never shop our car insurance. The policy renews every year, the rate creeps up a little at a time, and nobody calls you to tell you. You stay with the same company because it's easy, and that convenience costs you real money. That's what insureify fixes. Real quotes from more than 120 top insurance companies side by side. About two minutes free, no phone calls, no pressure. If there's nothing better for you right now, insureify keeps watching and tells you when that changes, so you're never stuck over paying. Millions of people have used insureify to shop for their car insurance. So insure with insureify. Go to insureify.com. That's INSUR. IFY.com. Insureify.com.

9:40This is Matt Rogers from Lost Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. This is Bowen Yang from Lost Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. Okay, we've been talking about Cupid male for a minute now, Bowen. Wow, the feedback we're getting. I mean, so many of you all love this stuff. You're stopping us in the street going, I love Cupid. And if you're thinking, wait, what is Cupid? Do you not have the internet? It's the OG Japanese mayonnaise. The one with the red cap and the little baby on the bottle. Once you know what, you start seeing it everywhere. People ask what makes it different from basic mayo? Well, the answer? Egg yolks. Cupid is made with egg yolks only, giving it this incredibly rich umami flavor that elevates everything. Burgers, fries, sandwiches, chicken, noodles, chefs use it, restaurants use it, people who really love food and flavor use it. Whatever you're eating, Cupid hit. So if you haven't tried Cupid yet, find the bottle with the red cap and see what everyone's talking about. You'll understand.

10:40Cupid, the original Japanese mayonnaise. Toyota's easy choice sales event is on. Whether you're looking for the performance of a camera, the versatility of Arab 4, the efficiency of a Corolla or all electric driving in the BZ. There's a Toyota that's just right for you. And with great deals across the lineup, now's the time to find yours. But hurry, these deals won't last long. Toyota's easy choice sales event ends soon. We make it easy. Toyota, let's go places. Stop. Others had glass tubes fixed on the front of them, and there were square black plates on which were many shining little handles and buttons. There was a sound of voices, and I turned to find the two men were bending over me. They were men like myself, yet they were at the same time like no man I had ever met. One was white-bearded, and the other plump and bare of face. Neither of them wore cloak or tunic or hose. Instead they wore loose and straight-hanging garments of cloth.

11:43They were both greatly excited, it seemed, and were talking to each other as they bent over me. I caught a word or two of their speech in a moment, and found it was French they were talking, but it was not the French I knew being so strange and with so many new words as to be almost a different language. I could understand the drift, though, of what they were saying. We have succeeded the plump one was shouting excitedly. We've brought someone through it last. They will never believe it the other replied. They'll say it was faked. Nonsense cried the first. We can do it again, Raston. We can show them before their own eyes. They bent toward me, seeing me staring at them. Where are you from, shouted the plump faced one? What time? What year? What century? He doesn't understand, Thear Corps. Muttered the white-bearded one. What year is it now, my friend? He asked me. I found voice to answer. You are the only sirs, whoever you be, you know that this is the year 1444, I said. That set them off again into a babble of excited talk of which I could make out only a word

12:46here and there. They lifted me up, seeing how sick and weak I felt, and seated me in a strange but very comfortable chair. I felt dazed. The two were still talking excitedly, but finally the white-bearded one, Raston, turned to me. He spoke to me very slowly so that I understood him clearly, and he asked me my name, and I told him. All Relotheiaire, he repeated, well all re, you must try to understand, you are not now in the year 1444. You are 500 years in the future, or what would seem to you the future. This is the year 1944, and Raston and I have jerked you out of your own time across five solid centuries, said the other grinning. I looked from one to the other. Miss Yuz, I pleaded and Raston shook his head. He does not believe, he said to the other, then to me. Where were you just before you found yourself here, Henri, he asked? In a field at the outskirts of Paris, I said, well, look from that window and see if you

13:48still believe yourself in your 15th century Paris. I went to the window and looked out. Mother of God, what a sight before my eyes. The familiar grey little houses, the open fields behind them, the saunterers in the dirt streets. All these were gone. It was a new and terrible city that lay about me. Its broad streets were of stone and great buildings of many levels rose on either side of them. Great numbers of people dressed like the two beside me moved in the streets and also strange vehicles or carriages, undrawn by horse or ox, that rushed to and fro and undrained of speed. I staggered back to the chair. You believe now, Henri, asked the white beard Raston kindly enough and I nodded meekly. My brain was whirling. He pointed to the circle of metal on the floor and the machines around the room. Those are what we used to jerk you from your own time to this one, he said. But how, sirs, I asked, for the love of God, how is it that you can take me from one time

14:48to another? Have ye become gods or devils? Neither one nor the other, Henri, he answered. We are simply scientists, physicists. Some men who want to know as much as man can know and who spend our lives in seeking knowledge. I felt my confidence returning. These were men such as I had dreamed might someday be. But what can you do with time, I asked, is not time a thing unalterable, unchanging? Both shook their heads. No, Henri, it is not. But lately have our men of science found that out. They went on to tell me things that I could not understand. It seemed they were telling me that their men of knowledge had found time to be a mere measurement or dimension, just as length or breadth or thickness. They mentioned names with reverence that I had never heard, Einstein, to sit or and Lorenz. I was in amaze at their words. They said that just as men used force to move or rotate matter from one point along the three known measurements to another, so might matter be rotated from one point in

15:50time, the fourth measurement to another, if the right force were used. They said that their machines produced that force and applied it to the metal circle from five hundred years before to this time of theirs. They had tried it many times, they said, but nothing had been on the spot at that time, and they had rotated nothing but the air above it from the one time to the other, and the reverse. I told them of the thunder-claps that had been heard at the spot in the field and that had made me curious. They said that they had been caused by the changing of the air above the spot from one time to the other in their trials. I could not understand these things. They said then that I had happened to be on the spot when they had again turned on their force and so had been rotated out of my own time into theirs. They said that they had always hoped to get someone living from a distant time in that way, since such a man would be a proof to all other men of knowledge of what they had been able to do. I could not comprehend, and they saw and told me not to fear. I was not fearful, but excited at the things that I saw around me.

16:54I asked of those things, and Raston and Thichor laughed and explained some of them to me as best they could. Much they said that I did not understand, but my eyes saw marvels in that room of which I had never dreamed. They showed me a thing like a small glass bottle with wires inside, and then told me to touch a button beneath it. I did so, and the bottles shone with a brilliant light exceeding that of scores of candles. I shrank back, but they laughed, and when Raston touched the button again, the light in the glass thing vanished. I saw that there were many of these things in the ceiling. They showed me also a rounded black object of metal with a wheel at the end. A belt ran around the wheel, and around smaller wheels connected to many machines. They touched a lever on this object, and a sound of humming came from it, and the wheel turned very fast, turning all the machines with the belt. It turned faster than any man could ever have turned it, yet when they touched the lever again, it's turning ceased. They said that it was the power of the lightning in the skies that they used to make the light

17:58and to turn that wheel. My brain reeled at the wonders that they showed. One took an instrument from the table that he held to his face, saying that he would summon the other scientists or men of knowledge to see their experiment that night. He spoke into the instrument as though to different men, and let me hear voices from it answering him. They said that the men who answered were leagues separated from him. I could not believe, and yet somehow I did believe. I was half-dazed with wonder, and yet excited too. The white bearded man Raston saw that, and encouraged me. Then they brought a small box with an opening, and placed a black disc on the box, and said it turning in some way. A woman's voice came from the opening of the box, singing. I shuttered when they told me that the woman was one who had died years before. Could the... This is Troy Millens from Ernie Leisure. On Ernie Leisure, we're all about smart money moves, and here's one most people skip, and it starts with insureify. Most of us never shop our car insurance. The policy renews every year, the rate creeps up a little at a time, and nobody calls you

19:03to tell you. You stay with the same company because it's easy, and that convenience costs you real money. That's what insureify fixes. Real quotes from more than 120 top insurance companies side by side. About two minutes free, no phone calls, no pressure. And if there's nothing better for you right now, insureify keeps watching and tells you when that changes, so you're never stuck over paying. Millions of people have used insureify to shop for their car insurance. So insure with insureify. Go to insureify.com. That's INSUR. IFY.com. Insureify.com. This is Matt Rodgers from Lost Cultures, thus with Matt Rodgers and Bowen Yang. This is Bowen Yang from Lost Cultures, thus Matt Rodgers and Bowen Yang. Okay, we've been talking about Cupid male for a minute now, Bowen. Wow, the feedback we're getting. I mean, so many of y'all love this stuff. You're stopping us in the street going, I love Cupid. And if you're thinking, wait, what is Cupid? Do you not have the internet? It's the OG Japanese mayonnaise.

20:03The one with the red cap and the little baby on the bottle. Once you know what, you start seeing it everywhere. People ask what makes it different from basic mayo? Well, the answer? Egg yolks. Cupid is made with egg yolks only, giving it this incredibly rich umami flavor that elevates everything. Burgers, fries, sandwiches, chicken, noodles. Chefs use it, restaurants use it. People who really love food and flavor use it. Whatever you're eating, Cupid hit. So if you haven't tried Cupid yet, find the bottle with the red cap and see what everyone's talking about. You'll understand Cupid, the original Japanese mayonnaise. Toyota's easy choice sales event is on. Whether you're looking for the performance of a camera, the versatility of her app for, the efficiency of a Corolla or all electric driving in the BZ. There's a Toyota that's just right for you. And with great deals across the lineup, now's the time to find yours. But hurry, these deals won't last long. Toyota's easy choice sales event ends soon.

21:06We make it easy. Toyota, let's go places. Dead speak thus? How can I describe what I saw there? Another box or cabinet there was with an opening also. I thought it was like that from which I had heard the dead woman singing, but they said it was different. They touched buttons on it and a voice came from it speaking in a tongue I knew not. They said that the man was speaking thousands of leagues from us in a strange land across the uncrossed western ocean, yet he seemed speaking by my side. They saw how dazed I was by these things and gave me wine. At that I took heart, for wine at least was as it had always been. You will want to see Paris, the Paris of our time, Omri, asked Rastin. But it is different and terrible, I said. I will take you, Thichord said, but first your clothes. He got a long light coat that they had me put on, that covered my tunic and hose, and a hat of grotesque round shape that they put on my head.

22:10They led me then out of the building and onto the street. I gazed astoundingly along the street. It had a raised walk at either side on which many hundreds of people moved to and fro, all dressed in as strange a fashion. Nothing like Rastin and Thichord seemed of gentle blood, yet in spite of this they did not wear a sword or even a dagger. There were no knights or squires or priests or peasants, all seemed dressed much the same. Small lads ran to and fro, selling what seemed sheets of very thin white parchment, many times folded and covered with lettering. Rastin said that these had written in them all the things that had happened through all the world, even but hours before. I said that to write even one of these sheets would take a clerk many days, but they said that the writing was done in some way very quickly by machines. In the broad stone street between the two raised walks were rushing back and forth the strange vehicles I had seen from the window. There was no animal pulling or pushing any one of them, yet they never halted their swift

23:12rush and carried many people at unthinkable speed. Sometimes those who walked stepped before the rushing vehicles, and then from them came terrible warning snarls or moans that made the walkers draw back. One of the vehicles stood at the walks edge before us, and we entered it and sat side by side on a soft leather seat. Thee corps sat behind a wheel on a post with levers beside him. He touched these and a humming sound came from somewhere in the vehicle, and then it too began to rush forward faster and faster along the street it went, yet neither of them seemed afraid. Many thousands of these vehicles were moving swiftly through the streets about us. We passed on between great buildings and along wider streets, my eyes and ears numbed by what I saw about me. Then the buildings grew smaller after we had gone for miles through them, and we were passing through the city's outskirts. I could not believe hardly that it was Paris in which I was. We came to a great flat and open field outside the city, and their Thee corps stopped, and

24:14we got out of the vehicle. There were big buildings at the field's end, and I saw other vehicles rolling out of them across the field. One's different from any I had yet seen, with flat wing-like projections on either side. They rolled out over the field very fast, and then I cried out, as I saw them rising from the ground into the air. Mother of God, they were flying! The men in them were flying! Raston and Thee corps took me forward to the great buildings. They spoke to men there, and one brought forward one of the winged cars. Raston told me to get in, and though I was terribly afraid there was too terrible a fascination that drew me in. Thee corps and Raston entered after me, and we sat in seats with the other men. He had before him levers and buttons, while at the car's front was a great thing like a double-orr or paddle. A loud roaring came, and that double-blade began to whirl so swiftly that I could not see it. Then the car rolled swiftly forward, bumping on the ground, and then ceased to bump.

25:16I looked down, then shuttered. The ground was already far beneath. I too was flying in the air. We swept upward at terrible speed that increased steadily. The thunder of the car was terrific, and as the man at the levers changed their position, we curved around and over, downward, and upward as though birds. Raston tried to explain to me how the car flew, but it was all too wonderful, and I could not understand. I only knew that a wild, thrilling excitement held me, and that it were worth life and death to fly thus if but for once, as I had always dreamed that men might someday do. Higher and higher we went. The earth lay far beneath, and I saw now that Paris was indeed a mighty city. Its vast mass of buildings stretching away almost to the horizon below us. A mighty city of the future that had been given my eyes to look on. There were other winged cars darting to and fro in the air about us, and they said that many of these were starting or finishing journeys of hundreds of leagues in the air. Then I cried out as I saw a great shape coming mirror us in the air.

26:20It was many rods and length, tapering to a point at both ends, a vast ship sailing in the air. There were great cabins on its lower part, and in them we glimpsed people gazing out, coming and going inside, dancing even. He told me that the vast ships of the air like this sailed to and fro for thousands of leagues with hundreds inside them. The huge vessel of the air passed us, and then our winged car began to descend. It circled smoothly down to the field like a swooping bird, and when we landed there, Raston and Thiccour led me back to the ground vehicle. It was later afternoon by then the sun sinking westward, and darkness had descended by the time we rolled back into the great city. But in that city was not darkness. Lights were everywhere in it, flashing brilliant lights that shone from its mighty buildings and that blinked and burned and ran like water in great symbols upon the buildings above the streets. Their glare was like that of day. We stopped before a great building into which Raston and Thiccour led me.

27:22It was vast inside, and in it were many people in rows on rows of seats. I thought it a cathedral at first, but saw soon that it was not. The wall at one end of it, toward which all in it were gazing, had on it pictures of people great in size, and those pictures were moving as though themselves alive. And they were talking to one another, too, as though with living voices I trembled. What magic! With Raston and Thiccour in seats beside me I watched the pictures enthralled. It was like looking through a great window into strange worlds. I saw the sea, seemingly tossing and roaring there before me, and then saw on it a ship, a vast ship of size incredible, without sails or oars holding thousands of people. I seemed on that ship as I watched, seemed moving forward with it. They told me it was sailing over the western ocean that never men had crossed. I feared. Then another scene, land appearing from the ship, a great statue up holding a torch, and

28:22we on the ship seemed passing beneath it. They said that the ship was approaching a city, the city of New York. It missed, hid all before us. Then suddenly the mists before the ship cleared, and there before me seemed to the city. Mother of God, what a city! Climbing range on range of great mountain-like buildings that aspired up as though to scale heaven itself. Far beneath narrow streets pierced through them, and in the picture we seemed to land from the ship to go through these streets of the city. It was an incredible city of madness. The streets and ways were mere chasms between the sky- toppling buildings. People, people, people, millions on millions of them rushed through the endless streets. Countless ground vehicles rushed to and fro also, and other different ones that roared above the streets and still others below them. Winged flying cars and great airships were sailing to and fro over the Titanic city, and in the waters around it great ships of the sea and smaller ships were coming as man never

29:24dreamed of shortly that reached out from the mighty city on all sides, and with the coming of darkness the city blazed with living light. The pictures changed, showed other mighty cities, though none so terrible as that one. It showed great mechanisms that appalled me. Giant metal things that scooped in an instant from the earth as much as a man might dig in days. Vast things that poured molten metal from them like water. Others that lifted loads that hundreds of men in oxen could not have stirred. They showed men of knowledge like raston and thecour beside me. Some were healers, working miraculous cures in a way that I could not understand. Others were gazing through giant tubes at the stars, and the pictures showed what they saw, showed that all of the stars were great suns like our sun, and that our sun was greater than earth. That earth moved around it instead of the reverse. How could such things be, I wondered? But they said that it was so. That earth was round like an apple, and that with other earths like it the planets moved

30:26around the sun. I heard, but could scarce understand. At last raston and thecour led me out of that place of living pictures and to their ground vehicle. We went again through the streets to their building where first I had found myself. As we went I saw that none challenged my right to go, nor asked who was my lord, and raston said that none now had lords, but that all were lords, king, and priest, and noble, having no more power than any in the land. Each man was his own master. It was what I had hardly dared to hope for in my own time, and this I thought was greatest of all the marvels they had shown me. We entered again their building, but raston and thecour took me first to another room, then the one in which I had found myself. They said that their men of knowledge were gathered there to hear of their feet, and to have it proved to them. You would not be afraid to return to your own time, all-mry? Asked raston, and I shook my head. I want to return, I told them. I want to tell my people there what I have seen, what the future is that they must strive

31:29for. But if they should not believe you, thecour asked? Still, I must go. Must tell them, I said. Raston grasped by hand. You are a man, all-mry, he said. Then throwing aside the cloak and hat I had worn outside. They went with me down to the big white-walled room where first I had found myself. It was lit brightly now by many of the shining glass things on sealing and walls, and in it were many men. They all stared strangely at me and at my clothes, and talked excitedly, so fast that I could not understand. Raston began to address them. He seemed explaining how he had brought me from my own time to his. He used many terms and words that I could not understand, incomprehensible references and phrases, and I could understand but little. I heard again the names of Einstein and Decider that I had heard before, repeated frequently by these men as they disputed with Raston and Thichor. They seemed disputing about me. One big man was saying, impossible I tell you, Raston, you have faked this fellow.

32:32Raston smiled. You don't believe that Thichor and I brought him here from his own time across five centuries? A chorus of excited negatives answered him. He had me stand up and speak to them. They asked me many questions, part of which I could not understand. I told them of my life and of the city of my own time, and of king and priest and noble, and of the many simple things that they seemed quite ignorant of. Some appeared to believe me, but others did not, and again their dispute broke out. There is a way to settle the argument gentleman said Raston finally. How all cried? Decor and I brought Henri across five centuries by rotating the time dimensions at this spot, he said. Suppose we reverse that rotation and send him back before your eyes. Would that be proof? They all said that it would. Raston turned to me. Stand on the metal circle, Henri, he said. I did so. All were watching very closely. The Thichor did something quickly with the levers and buttons of the mechanisms in the room.

33:32They began to hum and blue light came from the glass tubes on some. All were quiet, watching me as I stood there on the circle of metal. I met Raston's eyes, and something in me made me call goodbye to him. He waved his hand and smiled. Thichor pressed more buttons, and the hum of the mechanism grew louder. Then he reached toward another level. All in the room were tense, and I was tense. Then I saw Thichor's arm move as he turned one of the many levers. A terrific clap of thunder seemed to break around me, and as I closed my eyes before its shock, I felt myself whirling around and falling at the same time as though into a maelstrom just as I had done before. The awful falling sensation ceased in a moment, and the sound subsided. I opened my eyes. I was on the ground at the center of the familiar field from which I had vanished hours before upon the morning of that day. It was night now, though, for that day, I had spent five hundred years in the future. There were many people gathered around the field, fearful, and they screamed, and some fled when I appeared in the thunder-clap.

34:35I went toward those who remained. My mind was full of things I had seen, and I wanted to tell them of these things. I wanted to tell them how they must work ever toward the future time of wonder. But they did not listen. Before I had spoken minutes to them, they cried out on me as a sorcerer and a blasphemer and seized me and brought me here to the inquisitor, to you, Sire. And to you, Sire, I have told the truth in all things. I know that in doing so I have set the seal of my own fate, and that only a sorcerer would tell such a tale. Yet despite that, I am glad. Glad that I have told one, at least of this time, of what I saw five centuries in the future. Glad that I saw. Glad that I saw the things that some day, some time, must come to be. It was a weak later that they burned on Rilo Thear. Some de Marcellae lifting his gaze from his endless parchment accusation and examines on that afternoon looked out through the window at a thick curl of black smoke going up from the distant square.

35:36Strange that one he used, a sorcerer, of course, but such a one as I had never heard before. I wonder, he half whispered, was there any truth in that wild tale of his? The future? Who can say what men might do? There was silence in the room as he brooded for a moment, and then he shook himself as one ridding himself of absurd speculations. But Tush, enough of these crazy fancies, they will have me for a sorcerer if I yield to these wild fancies and visions of the future, and bending again with his pen to the parchment before him he went gravely on with his work. And of the man who saw the future by Edmund Hamilton.