Page:The Diothas, or, A far look ahead (IA diothasorfarlook01macn).pdf/29

 purpose. Electric motors of various kinds had been brought to a high degree of perfection, and were preferred for many reasons. Each of these cars, it seems, had its own motor. This was placed under the body of the car, between the wheels, and was so compact as to escape notice at a first glance.

"Electrical as well as chemical science," said my companion, "has made such progress since your period, that many things then regarded as difficult or impossible have become matters of every-day use. It requires, indeed, some effort on our part to conceive how the way to their discovery was so long missed. The great discovery of the principle that enables us to store a large amount of electric force in a small space was long missed by a hair'sbreadth, as it were. Yet this discovery brought about even greater changes in the social condition of mankind than did the improvement of the steam-engine. Electricity completed, in some cases, what steam had begun. Such, for example, was the gradual disuse of animal power, first for draught, at last for any purpose whatever. In other cases, electricity reversed the effect of steam. Such was the utter abolition of the factory system, with all its attendant evils."

We had been the first to enter the car, which, during the short time since our entrance, had been rapidly filling. Just before the car started, another passenger entered,— a lovely girl. I chanced to turn my eyes that way, as she momentarily paused in the doorway,—the pause of a dove about to alight; and my attention was irrevocably distracted from the concluding remarks of my companion. Many beautiful faces had come under my observation