noon
I watched their every movement as they approached the edge and as they left it . Often they passed beyond it , so that I could see them no more . Often they sheltered themselves from that tropical sun beneath the trees . Think of living on a world where from the vertical heat of the hottest noon of the equator to the twilight of the poles is a walk of only fifty paces ! What atmosphere they had , to temper and diffuse those rays , I could not then conjecture . I knew that at half-past ten they would pass into the inevitable eclipse which struck them every night at this period of their orbit , and must , I thought , be a luxury to them , as recalling old memories of night when they were on this world . As they approached the line of shadow , some fifteen minutes before it was due , I counted on the edge thirty-seven specks arranged evidently in order ; and , at one moment , as by one signal , all thirty - seven jumped into the air , -- high jumps .