THE THIRD PLANET OUT from Sol was in its normal condition.  It had on it 230,000 more human souls today than yesterday, but, among the five billion terrestrials such a minute increase was not noticeable.  The Kingdom of South Africa , Federation associate member, had again been cited before the High Court for persecution of its white minority.  The lords of women's fashions, gathered in solemn conclave in Rio , had decreed that hem lines would go down and that navels would again be covered.  The three Federation defense stations swung silently in the sky, promising instant death to any who disturbed the planet's peace.  Commercial space stations swung not so silently, disturbing the planet's peace with endless clamor of the virtues of endless trademarked trade goods.  Half a million more mobile homes had set down on the shores of Hudson Bay than had migrated by the same date last year, the Chinese rice belt had been declared an emergency malnutrition area by the Federation Assembly, and Cynthia Duchess, known as the Richest Girl in the World, had dismissed and paid off her sixth husband.  All was normal.