ding-room, scanning furtively those who sat at the desks, but the
face she might perchance have discovered was not there.

One day at the end of the month she sat with books open before her, but
by no effort could fix her attention upon them. It was gloomy, and one
could scarcely see to read; a taste of fog grew perceptible in the warm,
headachy air. Such profound discouragement possessed her that she
could not even maintain the pretence of study; heedless whether anyone
observed her, she let her hands fall and her head droop. She kept asking
herself what was the use and purpose of such a life as she was condemned
to lead. When already there was more good literature in the world than
any mortal could cope with in his lifetime, here was she exhausting
herself in the manufacture of printed stuff which no one even pretended
to be more than a commodity for the day's market. What unspeakable
folly! To write--was not that the joy and the privilege of one who had
an urgent message for the world?

Her father, she knew well, had no such message; he had abandoned all
thought of original production, and only wrote about writing.

She herself would throw away her pen with joy but for the need of
earning money. And all these people about her, what aim had they save to
make new books out of those already existing, that yet newer books
might in turn be made out of theirs? This huge library, growing into
unwieldiness, threatening to become a trackless desert of print--how
intolerably it weighed upon the spirit!

Oh, to go forth and labour with one's hands, to do any poorest,
commonest work of which the world had truly need! It was ignoble to sit
here and support the paltry pretence of intellectual dignity. A few
days ago her startled eye had caught an advertisement in the newspaper,
headed 'Literary Machine'; had it then been invented at last, some
automaton to supply the place of such poor creatures as herself to
turn out books and articles? Alas! the machine was only one for holding
volumes conveniently, that the work of literary manufacture might be
physically lightened. But surely before long some Edison would make the
true automaton; the problem must be comparatively such a simple one.
Only to throw in a given number of old books, and have them reduced,
blended, modernised into a single one for to-day's consumption.

The fog grew thicker; she looked up at the windows beneath the dome and
saw that they were a dusky yellow. Then