It was first published in the October 1942 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories and reprinted in the 1972 collection The Early Asimov.

Due to the peculiar workings of the science fiction magazine publishing industry, the story appeared a month before "The Imaginary".

[1] In the Homo Sol stories, the Galactic Federation has developed psychology into a hard science, with quantitative equations and solutions for behavior.

A few years after the people of Homo Sol have joined the Galactic Federation, a group of students from Earth arrive to study at Arcturus University.

Shortly thereafter, they are kidnapped as an upperclassman's prank (hazing) and deposited on a planet inhabited only by primitive people, who are quarantined until they develop hyperspace travel.