THE LAW OF SELECTION In actual mundane time, to use a somewhat halting expression, Professor Marmion's walk had occupied about a couple of hours.

His strange experiences had, of course, occupied none, since they had taken place beyond the bounds of Time.
Meanwhile, Miss Nitocris had finished her digest of the morning papers, given the cook a few directions, and then gone out on the lawn at the back of the house to have a quiet read and enjoy the soft air and sunshine of that lovely May morning.

She lay down in a hammock chair in the shade of a fine old cedar at the bottom of the lawn, and began to read, and soon she began to dream.

The news in the papers, even the most responsible of them, had been very serious.

The shadow of war was once more rising in the East--war which, if it came, England could scarcely escape, and if it did Someone would have to go and fight in that most perilous of all forms of battle, torpedo attack.
The book she had taken with her was one of exceedingly clever verse written years before by just such another as herself; a girl, beautiful, learned, and yet absolutely womanly, and endowed, moreover, with that gift so rare among learned women, the gift of humour.