II
IN NO TIME
Before months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and seconds were counted and named, consider how peculiar it all must have seemed. For example, when the Unknown-about Folk of those prehistoric times wished to know when a thing would happen, of course they can have had no word when, and no answer. If a little Prehistoric Girl gave a party, she cannot have known when to tell her guests to come, so she must have had to wait until the supper was ready and then invite them; and if they were not perfectly-bred little guests, they may have been offended because they hadn’t been invited before—only they would not have known how to say or to think “before,” so they cannot have been quite sure what they were offended at; but they may have been offended anyway, as happens now with that same kind of guest. And if a little Prehistoric Boy asked his father
16
