o are not a part of me-and-mine, on the
outside, and therefore inferior.

There must have been a signal from Bill Hayes, for the psychologist left
the generalities behind and came back to the issue.

The very ease of living on Eden fostered the growth of schisms, for
there was no common enemy to band the group into one solid me-and-mine
organism--the audience would recall that when Earth was divided into
nations it had always been imperative to find a common enemy in some
other nation; that this was the only cohesive force man had been able
to find to keep the nation from disintegrating.

Another nudge.

Factions took shape on Eden and clashed in town meetings. At last, as
expected, some dissident individuals and family groups could no longer
tolerate the irritation of living in the same neighborhood with the
rest. These broke off from the main colony, and migrated across the near
ridge to settle in an adjacent valley.

Psychologically, it was a most satisfactory development, playing out in
classical microcosm the massive behavior of total man. For, as everyone
knew, had men ever been able to settle their differences, had man been
able to get along peacefully with himself, he might have developed no
civilization at all.

Man's inability to stand the stench of his own kind was the most potent
of all forces in driving him out to the stars.

Bill Hayes, a weary and red-eyed moderator now, apparently decided he
could no longer stand the stench of the psychologist and abruptly cut
him off. He himself took over the summation. It boiled down to a simple
statement.

The colonists had reported everything that happened, of significance or
not. These reports had all been thoroughly sifted in the normal course
of E.H.Q.'s daily work as they were received. They had been collated and
extended both by human and machine minds to detect any subtle trends
away from norm.

There had been nothing, absolutely nothing. The reports might as well
have originated somewhere near Eugene, Oregon. They were about as
unusual as a Saturday night bath back on the farm.

Then silence. Sudden, inexplicable silence.

9

"It bothers me, it bothers me a lot," Cal said to the two E's, following
the review, "that Eden should be more favorable to effortless human
existence than Earth."

He snapped on the communicator and asked the ship be in readiness for
take-off.

McGinnis and Wong looked at one another.

"You think it might hav