THE EDGE OF NIGHT 65 



admitted that calling regularly at an old apple 

 tree is far short of a full man's work in the world, 

 even when such calling falls outside of his shop 

 or office-hours. For there are no such hours. The 

 business of life allows no spare time any more. 

 One cannot get rich nowadays in office-hours, nor 

 become great, nor keep telegraphically informed, 

 nor do his share of talking and listening. Every- 

 body but the plumber and paper-hanger works 

 overtime. How the earth keeps up a necessary 

 amount of whirling in the old twenty-four-hour 

 limit is more than we can understand. But she 

 can't keep up the pace much longer. She must 

 have an extra hour. And how to snatch it from 

 the tail-end of eternity is the burning cosmo- 

 logical question. 



And this is the burning question with regard 

 to our individual whirling — How to add time, 

 or, what amounts to exactly the same, How to 

 increase the whirling. 



There have been many hopeful answers. The 

 whirl has been vastly accelerated. The fly-wheel 

 of the old horse treadmill is now geared to an 

 electric dynamo. But it is not enough ; it is 

 not the answer. And I despair of the answer — 



