Passage 1: from the time machine by h. g. wells (1898)
it was at ten o'clock to-day that the first of all time machines began its career. i gave it a last tap, tried all
the screws again, put one more drop of oil on the quartz rod, and sat myself in the saddle. . i took the
starting lever in one hand and the stopping one in the other, pressed the first, and almost immediately the
second. i seemed to reel; i felt a nightmare sensation of falling; and, looking round, i saw the laboratory
exactly as before. had anything happened? for a moment i suspected that my intellect had tricked me.
then i noted the clock. a moment before, as it seemed, it had stood at a minute or so past ten; now it was
nearly half-past three!
the purpose of a time machine is
to tell time
to travel through time
to increase the number of hours in a day
to give the writer something to do