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1"Now, the smoke of the fire beat over towards me, and it must have made me heavy of a sudden. Moreover, the vapour of
2camphor was in the air. My fire would not need replenishing for an hour or so. I felt very weary after my exertion, and
3sat down. The wood, too, was full of a slumbrous murmur that I did not understand. I seemed just to nod and open my
4eyes. But all was dark, and the Morlocks had their hands upon me. Flinging off their clinging fingers I hastily felt in
5my pocket for the match-box, and--it had gone! Then they gripped and closed with me again. In a moment I knew what had
6happened. I had slept, and my fire had gone out, and the bitterness of death came over my soul. The forest seemed full
7of the smell of burning wood. I was caught by the neck, by the hair, by the arms, and pulled down. It was indescribably
8horrible in the darkness to feel all these soft creatures heaped upon me. I felt as if I was in a monstrous spider's
9web. I was overpowered, and went down. I felt little teeth nipping at my neck. I rolled over, and as I did so my hand
10came against my iron lever. It gave me strength. I struggled up, shaking the human rats from me, and, holding the bar
11short, I thrust where I judged their faces might be. I could feel the succulent giving of flesh and bone under my blows,
12and for a moment I was free. "The strange exultation that so often seems to accompany hard fighting came upon me. I knew
13that both I and Weena were lost, but I determined to make the Morlocks pay for their meat. I stood with my back to a
14tree, swinging the iron bar before me. The whole wood was full of the stir and cries of them. A minute passed. Their
15voices seemed to rise to a higher pitch of excitement, and their movements grew faster. Yet none came within reach. I
16stood glaring at the blackness. Then suddenly came hope. What if the Morlocks were afraid? And close on the heels of
17that came a strange thing. The darkness seemed to grow luminous. Very dimly I began to see the Morlocks about me--three
18battered at my feet--and then I recognised, with incredulous surprise, that the others were running, in an incessant
19stream, as it seemed, from behind me, and away through the wood in front. And their backs seemed no longer white, but
20reddish. As I stood agape, I saw a little red spark go drifting across a gap of starlight between the branches, and
21vanish. And at that I understood the smell of burning wood, the slumbrous murmur that was growing now into a gusty roar,
22the red glow, and the Morlocks' flight. "Stepping out from behind my tree and looking back, I saw, through the black
23pillars of the nearer trees, the flames of the burning forest. It was my first fire coming after me. With that I looked
24for Weena, but she was gone. The hissing and crackling behind me, the explosive thud as each fresh tree burst into
25flame, left little time for reflection. My iron bar still gripped, I followed in the Morlocks' path. It was a close
26race. Once the flames crept forward so swiftly on my right as I ran that I was outflanked and had to strike off to the
27left. But at last I emerged upon a small open space, and as I did so, a Morlock came blundering towards me, and past me,
28and went on straight into the fire! "And now I was to see the most weird and horrible thing, I think, of all that I
29beheld in that future age. This whole space was as bright as day with the reflection of the fire. In the centre was a
30hillock or tumulus, surmounted by a scorched hawthorn. Beyond this was another arm of the burning forest, with yellow
31tongues already writhing from it, completely encircling the space with a fence of fire. Upon the hillside were some
32thirty or forty Morlocks, dazzled by the light and heat, and blundering hither and thither against each other in their
33bewilderment. At first I did not realise their blindness, and struck furiously at them with my bar, in a frenzy of fear,
34as they approached me, killing one and crippling several more. But when I had watched the gestures of one of them
35groping under the hawthorn against the red sky, and heard their moans, I was assured of their absolute helplessness and
36misery in the glare, and I struck no more of them. "Yet every now and then one would come straight towards me, setting
37loose a quivering horror that made me quick to elude him. At one time the flames died down somewhat, and I feared the
38foul creatures would presently be able to see me. I was thinking of beginning the fight by killing some of them before
39this should happen; but the fire burst out again brightly, and I stayed my hand. I walked about the hill among them and
40avoided them, looking for some trace of Weena. But Weena was gone. "At last I sat down on the summit of the hillock, and
41watched this strange incredible company of blind things groping to and fro, and making uncanny noises to each other, as
42the glare of the fire beat on them. The coiling uprush of smoke streamed across the sky, and through the rare tatters of
43that red canopy, remote as though they belonged to another universe, shone the little stars. Two or three Morlocks came
44blundering into me, and I drove them off with blows of my fists, trembling as I did so. "For the most part of that night
45I was persuaded it was a nightmare. I bit myself and screamed in a passionate desire to awake. I beat the ground with my
46hands, and got up and sat down again, and wandered here and there, and again sat down. Then I would fall to rubbing my
47eyes and calling upon God to let me awake. Thrice I saw Morlocks put their heads down in a kind of agony and rush into
48the flames. But, at last, above the subsiding red of the fire, above the streaming masses of black smoke and the
49whitening and blackening tree stumps, and the diminishing numbers of these dim creatures, came the white light of the
50day. "I searched again for traces of Weena, but there were none. It was plain that they had left her poor little body in
51the forest. I cannot describe how it relieved me to think that it had escaped the awful fate to which it seemed
52destined. As I thought of that, I was almost moved to begin a massacre of the helpless abominations about me, but I
53contained myself. The hillock, as I have said, was a kind of island in the forest. From its summit I could now make out
54through a haze of smoke the Palace of Green Porcelain, and from that I could get my bearings for the White Sphinx. And
55so, leaving the remnant of these damned souls still going hither and thither and moaning, as the day grew clearer, I
56tied some grass about my feet and limped on across smoking ashes and among black stems that still pulsated internally
57with fire, towards the hiding-place of the Time Machine. I walked slowly, for I was almost exhausted, as well as lame,
58and I felt the intensest wretchedness for the horrible death of little Weena. It seemed an overwhelming calamity. Now,
59in this old familiar room, it is more like the sorrow of a dream than an actual loss. But that morning it left me
60absolutely lonely again--terribly alone. I began to think of this house of mine, of this fireside, of some of you, and
61with such thoughts came a longing that was pain. "But, as I walked over the smoking ashes under the bright morning sky,
62I made a discovery. In my trouser pocket were still some loose matches. The box must have leaked before it was lost.
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