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book one the coming of the martianschapter one the eve of the war no one would have believed in the lastyears of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closelyby intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concernsthey were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with amicroscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a dropof water. with infinite complacency men went to andfro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their assurance of theirempire over matter.
it is possible that the infusoria under themicroscope do the same. no one gave a thought to the older worldsof space as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea oflife upon them as impossible or improbable. it is curious to recall some of the mentalhabits of those departed days. at most terrestrial men fancied there mightbe other men upon mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome amissionary enterprise. yet across the gulf of space, minds thatare to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast andcool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surelydrew their plans against us.
and early in the twentieth century came thegreat disillusionment. the planet mars, i scarcely need remind thereader, revolves about the sun at a mean distance of 140,000,000 miles, and thelight and heat it receives from the sun is barely half of that received by this world. it must be, if the nebular hypothesis hasany truth, older than our world; and long before this earth ceased to be molten, lifeupon its surface must have begun its course. the fact that it is scarcely one seventh ofthe volume of the earth must have accelerated its cooling to the temperatureat which life could begin.
it has air and water and all that isnecessary for the support of animated existence. yet so vain is man, and so blinded by hisvanity, that no writer, up to the very end of the nineteenth century, expressed anyidea that intelligent life might have developed there far, or indeed at all,beyond its earthly level. nor was it generally understood that sincemars is older than our earth, with scarcely a quarter of the superficial area andremoter from the sun, it necessarily follows that it is not only more distantfrom time's beginning but nearer its end. the secular cooling that must somedayovertake our planet has already gone far
indeed with our neighbour. its physical condition is still largely amystery, but we know now that even in its equatorial region the midday temperaturebarely approaches that of our coldest winter. its air is much more attenuated than ours,its oceans have shrunk until they cover but a third of its surface, and as its slowseasons change huge snowcaps gather and melt about either pole and periodicallyinundate its temperate zones. that last stage of exhaustion, which to usis still incredibly remote, has become a present-day problem for the inhabitants ofmars.
the immediate pressure of necessity hasbrightened their intellects, enlarged their powers, and hardened their hearts. and looking across space with instruments,and intelligences such as we have scarcely dreamed of, they see, at its nearestdistance only 35,000,000 of miles sunward of them, a morning star of hope, our own warmer planet, green with vegetation andgrey with water, with a cloudy atmosphere eloquent of fertility, with glimpsesthrough its drifting cloud wisps of broad stretches of populous country and narrow,navy-crowded seas. and we men, the creatures who inhabit thisearth, must be to them at least as alien
and lowly as are the monkeys and lemurs tous. the intellectual side of man already admitsthat life is an incessant struggle for existence, and it would seem that this toois the belief of the minds upon mars. their world is far gone in its cooling andthis world is still crowded with life, but crowded only with what they regard asinferior animals. to carry warfare sunward is, indeed, theironly escape from the destruction that, generation after generation, creeps uponthem. and before we judge of them too harshly wemust remember what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought,not only upon animals, such as the vanished
bison and the dodo, but upon its inferiorraces. the tasmanians, in spite of their humanlikeness, were entirely swept out of existence in a war of extermination wagedby european immigrants, in the space of fifty years. are we such apostles of mercy as tocomplain if the martians warred in the same spirit? the martians seem to have calculated theirdescent with amazing subtlety--their mathematical learning is evidently far inexcess of ours--and to have carried out their preparations with a well-nigh perfectunanimity.
had our instruments permitted it, we mighthave seen the gathering trouble far back in the nineteenth century. men like schiaparelli watched the redplanet--it is odd, by-the-bye, that for countless centuries mars has been the starof war--but failed to interpret the fluctuating appearances of the markingsthey mapped so well. all that time the martians must have beengetting ready. during the opposition of 1894 a great lightwas seen on the illuminated part of the disk, first at the lick observatory, thenby perrotin of nice, and then by other observers.
english readers heard of it first in theissue of nature dated august 2. i am inclined to think that this blaze mayhave been the casting of the huge gun, in the vast pit sunk into their planet, fromwhich their shots were fired at us. peculiar markings, as yet unexplained, wereseen near the site of that outbreak during the next two oppositions.the storm burst upon us six years ago now. as mars approached opposition, lavelle ofjava set the wires of the astronomical exchange palpitating with the amazingintelligence of a huge outbreak of incandescent gas upon the planet. it had occurred towards midnight of thetwelfth; and the spectroscope, to which he
had at once resorted, indicated a mass offlaming gas, chiefly hydrogen, moving with an enormous velocity towards this earth. this jet of fire had become invisible abouta quarter past twelve. he compared it to a colossal puff of flamesuddenly and violently squirted out of the planet, "as flaming gases rushed out of agun." a singularly appropriate phrase it proved. yet the next day there was nothing of thisin the papers except a little note in the daily telegraph, and the world went inignorance of one of the gravest dangers that ever threatened the human race.
i might not have heard of the eruption atall had i not met ogilvy, the well-known astronomer, at ottershaw. he was immensely excited at the news, andin the excess of his feelings invited me up to take a turn with him that night in ascrutiny of the red planet. in spite of all that has happened since, istill remember that vigil very distinctly: the black and silent observatory, theshadowed lantern throwing a feeble glow upon the floor in the corner, the steady ticking of the clockwork of the telescope,the little slit in the roof--an oblong profundity with the stardust streakedacross it.
ogilvy moved about, invisible but audible. looking through the telescope, one saw acircle of deep blue and the little round planet swimming in the field. it seemed such a little thing, so brightand small and still, faintly marked with transverse stripes, and slightly flattenedfrom the perfect round. but so little it was, so silvery warm--apin's-head of light! it was as if it quivered, but really thiswas the telescope vibrating with the activity of the clockwork that kept theplanet in view. as i watched, the planet seemed to growlarger and smaller and to advance and
recede, but that was simply that my eye wastired. forty millions of miles it was from us--more than forty millions of miles of void. few people realise the immensity of vacancyin which the dust of the material universe swims. near it in the field, i remember, werethree faint points of light, three telescopic stars infinitely remote, and allaround it was the unfathomable darkness of empty space. you know how that blackness looks on afrosty starlight night. in a telescope it seems far profounder.
and invisible to me because it was soremote and small, flying swiftly and steadily towards me across that incredibledistance, drawing nearer every minute by so many thousands of miles, came the thing they were sending us, the thing that was tobring so much struggle and calamity and death to the earth. i never dreamed of it then as i watched; noone on earth dreamed of that unerring missile.that night, too, there was another jetting out of gas from the distant planet. i saw it.a reddish flash at the edge, the slightest
projection of the outline just as thechronometer struck midnight; and at that i told ogilvy and he took my place. the night was warm and i was thirsty, and iwent stretching my legs clumsily and feeling my way in the darkness, to thelittle table where the siphon stood, while ogilvy exclaimed at the streamer of gasthat came out towards us. that night another invisible missilestarted on its way to the earth from mars, just a second or so under twenty-four hoursafter the first one. i remember how i sat on the table there inthe blackness, with patches of green and crimson swimming before my eyes.
i wished i had a light to smoke by, littlesuspecting the meaning of the minute gleam i had seen and all that it would presentlybring me. ogilvy watched till one, and then gave itup; and we lit the lantern and walked over to his house. down below in the darkness were ottershawand chertsey and all their hundreds of people, sleeping in peace. he was full of speculation that night aboutthe condition of mars, and scoffed at the vulgar idea of its having inhabitants whowere signalling us. his idea was that meteorites might befalling in a heavy shower upon the planet,
or that a huge volcanic explosion was inprogress. he pointed out to me how unlikely it wasthat organic evolution had taken the same direction in the two adjacent planets."the chances against anything manlike on mars are a million to one," he said. hundreds of observers saw the flame thatnight and the night after about midnight, and again the night after; and so for tennights, a flame each night. why the shots ceased after the tenth no oneon earth has attempted to explain. it may be the gases of the firing causedthe martians inconvenience. dense clouds of smoke or dust, visiblethrough a powerful telescope on earth as
little grey, fluctuating patches, spreadthrough the clearness of the planet's atmosphere and obscured its more familiarfeatures. even the daily papers woke up to thedisturbances at last, and popular notes appeared here, there, and everywhereconcerning the volcanoes upon mars. the seriocomic periodical punch, iremember, made a happy use of it in the political cartoon. and, all unsuspected, those missiles themartians had fired at us drew earthward, rushing now at a pace of many miles asecond through the empty gulf of space, hour by hour and day by day, nearer andnearer.
it seems to me now almost incrediblywonderful that, with that swift fate hanging over us, men could go about theirpetty concerns as they did. i remember how jubilant markham was atsecuring a new photograph of the planet for the illustrated paper he edited in thosedays. people in these latter times scarcelyrealise the abundance and enterprise of our nineteenth-century papers. for my own part, i was much occupied inlearning to ride the bicycle, and busy upon a series of papers discussing the probabledevelopments of moral ideas as civilisation progressed.
one night (the first missile then couldscarcely have been 10,000,000 miles away) i went for a walk with my wife. it was starlight and i explained the signsof the zodiac to her, and pointed out mars, a bright dot of light creeping zenithward,towards which so many telescopes were pointed. it was a warm night.coming home, a party of excursionists from chertsey or isleworth passed us singing andplaying music. there were lights in the upper windows ofthe houses as the people went to bed. from the railway station in the distancecame the sound of shunting trains, ringing
and rumbling, softened almost into melodyby the distance. my wife pointed out to me the brightness ofthe red, green, and yellow signal lights hanging in a framework against the sky.it seemed so safe and tranquil. > book one the coming of the martianschapter two the falling star then came the night of the first fallingstar. it was seen early in the morning, rushingover winchester eastward, a line of flame high in the atmosphere. hundreds must have seen it, and taken itfor an ordinary falling star.
albin described it as leaving a greenishstreak behind it that glowed for some seconds. denning, our greatest authority onmeteorites, stated that the height of its first appearance was about ninety or onehundred miles. it seemed to him that it fell to earthabout one hundred miles east of him. i was at home at that hour and writing inmy study; and although my french windows face towards ottershaw and the blind was up(for i loved in those days to look up at the night sky), i saw nothing of it. yet this strangest of all things that evercame to earth from outer space must have
fallen while i was sitting there, visibleto me had i only looked up as it passed. some of those who saw its flight say ittravelled with a hissing sound. i myself heard nothing of that. many people in berkshire, surrey, andmiddlesex must have seen the fall of it, and, at most, have thought that anothermeteorite had descended. no one seems to have troubled to look forthe fallen mass that night. but very early in the morning poor ogilvy,who had seen the shooting star and who was persuaded that a meteorite lay somewhere onthe common between horsell, ottershaw, and woking, rose early with the idea of findingit.
find it he did, soon after dawn, and notfar from the sand pits. an enormous hole had been made by theimpact of the projectile, and the sand and gravel had been flung violently in everydirection over the heath, forming heaps visible a mile and a half away. the heather was on fire eastward, and athin blue smoke rose against the dawn. the thing itself lay almost entirely buriedin sand, amidst the scattered splinters of a fir tree it had shivered to fragments inits descent. the uncovered part had the appearance of ahuge cylinder, caked over and its outline softened by a thick scaly dun-colouredincrustation.
it had a diameter of about thirty yards. he approached the mass, surprised at thesize and more so at the shape, since most meteorites are rounded more or lesscompletely. it was, however, still so hot from itsflight through the air as to forbid his near approach. a stirring noise within its cylinder heascribed to the unequal cooling of its surface; for at that time it had notoccurred to him that it might be hollow. he remained standing at the edge of the pitthat the thing had made for itself, staring at its strange appearance, astonishedchiefly at its unusual shape and colour,
and dimly perceiving even then someevidence of design in its arrival. the early morning was wonderfully still,and the sun, just clearing the pine trees towards weybridge, was already warm. he did not remember hearing any birds thatmorning, there was certainly no breeze stirring, and the only sounds were thefaint movements from within the cindery cylinder. he was all alone on the common. then suddenly he noticed with a start thatsome of the grey clinker, the ashy incrustation that covered the meteorite,was falling off the circular edge of the
end. it was dropping off in flakes and rainingdown upon the sand. a large piece suddenly came off and fellwith a sharp noise that brought his heart into his mouth. for a minute he scarcely realised what thismeant, and, although the heat was excessive, he clambered down into the pitclose to the bulk to see the thing more clearly. he fancied even then that the cooling ofthe body might account for this, but what disturbed that idea was the fact that theash was falling only from the end of the
and then he perceived that, very slowly,the circular top of the cylinder was rotating on its body. it was such a gradual movement that hediscovered it only through noticing that a black mark that had been near him fiveminutes ago was now at the other side of the circumference. even then he scarcely understood what thisindicated, until he heard a muffled grating sound and saw the black mark jerk forwardan inch or so. then the thing came upon him in a flash. the cylinder was artificial--hollow--withan end that screwed out!
something within the cylinder wasunscrewing the top! "good heavens!" said ogilvy. "there's a man in it--men in it!half roasted to death! trying to escape!"at once, with a quick mental leap, he linked the thing with the flash upon mars. the thought of the confined creature was sodreadful to him that he forgot the heat and went forward to the cylinder to help turn. but luckily the dull radiation arrested himbefore he could burn his hands on the still-glowing metal.
at that he stood irresolute for a moment,then turned, scrambled out of the pit, and set off running wildly into woking.the time then must have been somewhere about six o'clock. he met a waggoner and tried to make himunderstand, but the tale he told and his appearance were so wild--his hat had fallenoff in the pit--that the man simply drove on. he was equally unsuccessful with the potmanwho was just unlocking the doors of the public-house by horsell bridge. the fellow thought he was a lunatic atlarge and made an unsuccessful attempt to
shut him into the taproom. that sobered him a little; and when he sawhenderson, the london journalist, in his garden, he called over the palings and madehimself understood. "henderson," he called, "you saw thatshooting star last night?" "well?" said henderson."it's out on horsell common now." "good lord!" said henderson. "fallen meteorite!that's good." "but it's something more than a meteorite.it's a cylinder--an artificial cylinder, man!
and there's something inside."henderson stood up with his spade in his hand."what's that?" he said. he was deaf in one ear. ogilvy told him all that he had seen.henderson was a minute or so taking it in. then he dropped his spade, snatched up hisjacket, and came out into the road. the two men hurried back at once to thecommon, and found the cylinder still lying in the same position. but now the sounds inside had ceased, and athin circle of bright metal showed between the top and the body of the cylinder.air was either entering or escaping at the
rim with a thin, sizzling sound. they listened, rapped on the scaly burntmetal with a stick, and, meeting with no response, they both concluded the man ormen inside must be insensible or dead. of course the two were quite unable to doanything. they shouted consolation and promises, andwent off back to the town again to get help. one can imagine them, covered with sand,excited and disordered, running up the little street in the bright sunlight justas the shop folks were taking down their shutters and people were opening theirbedroom windows.
henderson went into the railway station atonce, in order to telegraph the news to london. the newspaper articles had prepared men'sminds for the reception of the idea. by eight o'clock a number of boys andunemployed men had already started for the common to see the "dead men from mars." that was the form the story took.i heard of it first from my newspaper boy about a quarter to nine when i went out toget my daily chronicle. i was naturally startled, and lost no timein going out and across the ottershaw bridge to the sand pits.
book one the coming of the martianschapter three on horsell common i found a little crowd of perhaps twentypeople surrounding the huge hole in which the cylinder lay.i have already described the appearance of that colossal bulk, embedded in the ground. the turf and gravel about it seemed charredas if by a sudden explosion. no doubt its impact had caused a flash offire. henderson and ogilvy were not there. i think they perceived that nothing was tobe done for the present, and had gone away to breakfast at henderson's house.
there were four or five boys sitting on theedge of the pit, with their feet dangling, and amusing themselves--until i stoppedthem--by throwing stones at the giant mass. after i had spoken to them about it, theybegan playing at "touch" in and out of the group of bystanders. among these were a couple of cyclists, ajobbing gardener i employed sometimes, a girl carrying a baby, gregg the butcher andhis little boy, and two or three loafers and golf caddies who were accustomed tohang about the railway station. there was very little talking. few of the common people in england hadanything but the vaguest astronomical ideas
in those days. most of them were staring quietly at thebig table like end of the cylinder, which was still as ogilvy and henderson had leftit. i fancy the popular expectation of a heapof charred corpses was disappointed at this inanimate bulk.some went away while i was there, and other people came. i clambered into the pit and fancied iheard a faint movement under my feet. the top had certainly ceased to rotate. it was only when i got thus close to itthat the strangeness of this object was at
all evident to me. at the first glance it was really no moreexciting than an overturned carriage or a tree blown across the road.not so much so, indeed. it looked like a rusty gas float. it required a certain amount of scientificeducation to perceive that the grey scale of the thing was no common oxide, that theyellowish-white metal that gleamed in the crack between the lid and the cylinder hadan unfamiliar hue. "extra-terrestrial" had no meaning for mostof the onlookers. at that time it was quite clear in my ownmind that the thing had come from the
planet mars, but i judged it improbablethat it contained any living creature. i thought the unscrewing might beautomatic. in spite of ogilvy, i still believed thatthere were men in mars. my mind ran fancifully on the possibilitiesof its containing manuscript, on the difficulties in translation that mightarise, whether we should find coins and models in it, and so forth. yet it was a little too large for assuranceon this idea. i felt an impatience to see it opened. about eleven, as nothing seemed happening,i walked back, full of such thought, to my
home in maybury.but i found it difficult to get to work upon my abstract investigations. in the afternoon the appearance of thecommon had altered very much. the early editions of the evening papershad startled london with enormous headlines: "a message received from mars.""remarkable story from woking," and so forth. in addition, ogilvy's wire to theastronomical exchange had roused every observatory in the three kingdoms.
there were half a dozen flies or more fromthe woking station standing in the road by the sand pits, a basket-chaise fromchobham, and a rather lordly carriage. besides that, there was quite a heap ofbicycles. in addition, a large number of people musthave walked, in spite of the heat of the day, from woking and chertsey, so thatthere was altogether quite a considerable crowd--one or two gaily dressed ladiesamong the others. it was glaringly hot, not a cloud in thesky nor a breath of wind, and the only shadow was that of the few scattered pinetrees. the burning heather had been extinguished,but the level ground towards ottershaw was
blackened as far as one could see, andstill giving off vertical streamers of smoke. an enterprising sweet-stuff dealer in thechobham road had sent up his son with a barrow-load of green apples and gingerbeer. going to the edge of the pit, i found itoccupied by a group of about half a dozen men--henderson, ogilvy, and a tall, fair-haired man that i afterwards learned was stent, the astronomer royal, with severalworkmen wielding spades and pickaxes. stent was giving directions in a clear,high-pitched voice. he was standing on the cylinder, which wasnow evidently much cooler; his face was
crimson and streaming with perspiration,and something seemed to have irritated him. a large portion of the cylinder had beenuncovered, though its lower end was still embedded. as soon as ogilvy saw me among the staringcrowd on the edge of the pit he called to me to come down, and asked me if i wouldmind going over to see lord hilton, the lord of the manor. the growing crowd, he said, was becoming aserious impediment to their excavations, especially the boys.they wanted a light railing put up, and help to keep the people back.
he told me that a faint stirring wasoccasionally still audible within the case, but that the workmen had failed to unscrewthe top, as it afforded no grip to them. the case appeared to be enormously thick,and it was possible that the faint sounds we heard represented a noisy tumult in theinterior. i was very glad to do as he asked, and sobecome one of the privileged spectators within the contemplated enclosure. i failed to find lord hilton at his house,but i was told he was expected from london by the six o'clock train from waterloo; andas it was then about a quarter past five, i went home, had some tea, and walked up tothe station to waylay him.
book one the coming of the martianschapter four the cylinder opens when i returned to the common the sun wassetting. scattered groups were hurrying from thedirection of woking, and one or two persons were returning. the crowd about the pit had increased, andstood out black against the lemon yellow of the sky--a couple of hundred people,perhaps. there were raised voices, and some sort ofstruggle appeared to be going on about the pit.strange imaginings passed through my mind. as i drew nearer i heard stent's voice:
"keep back!keep back!" a boy came running towards me."it's a-movin'," he said to me as he passed; "a-screwin' and a-screwin' out. i don't like it.i'm a-goin' 'ome, i am." i went on to the crowd. there were really, i should think, two orthree hundred people elbowing and jostling one another, the one or two ladies therebeing by no means the least active. "he's fallen in the pit!" cried some one. "keep back!" said several.the crowd swayed a little, and i elbowed my
way through.every one seemed greatly excited. i heard a peculiar humming sound from thepit. "i say!" said ogilvy; "help keep theseidiots back. we don't know what's in the confoundedthing, you know!" i saw a young man, a shop assistant inwoking i believe he was, standing on the cylinder and trying to scramble out of thehole again. the crowd had pushed him in. the end of the cylinder was being screwedout from within. nearly two feet of shining screw projected.
somebody blundered against me, and inarrowly missed being pitched onto the top of the screw. i turned, and as i did so the screw musthave come out, for the lid of the cylinder fell upon the gravel with a ringingconcussion. i stuck my elbow into the person behind me,and turned my head towards the thing again. for a moment that circular cavity seemedperfectly black. i had the sunset in my eyes. i think everyone expected to see a manemerge--possibly something a little unlike us terrestrial men, but in all essentials aman.
i know i did. but, looking, i presently saw somethingstirring within the shadow: greyish billowy movements, one above another, and then twoluminous disks--like eyes. then something resembling a little greysnake, about the thickness of a walking stick, coiled up out of the writhingmiddle, and wriggled in the air towards me- -and then another. a sudden chill came over me.there was a loud shriek from a woman behind. i half turned, keeping my eyes fixed uponthe cylinder still, from which other
tentacles were now projecting, and beganpushing my way back from the edge of the pit. i saw astonishment giving place to horroron the faces of the people about me. i heard inarticulate exclamations on allsides. there was a general movement backwards. i saw the shopman struggling still on theedge of the pit. i found myself alone, and saw the people onthe other side of the pit running off, stent among them. i looked again at the cylinder, andungovernable terror gripped me.
i stood petrified and staring. a big greyish rounded bulk, the size,perhaps, of a bear, was rising slowly and painfully out of the cylinder.as it bulged up and caught the light, it glistened like wet leather. two large dark-coloured eyes were regardingme steadfastly. the mass that framed them, the head of thething, was rounded, and had, one might say, a face. there was a mouth under the eyes, thelipless brim of which quivered and panted, and dropped saliva.the whole creature heaved and pulsated
convulsively. a lank tentacular appendage gripped theedge of the cylinder, another swayed in the air. those who have never seen a living martiancan scarcely imagine the strange horror of its appearance. the peculiar v-shaped mouth with itspointed upper lip, the absence of brow ridges, the absence of a chin beneath thewedgelike lower lip, the incessant quivering of this mouth, the gorgon groups of tentacles, the tumultuous breathing ofthe lungs in a strange atmosphere, the
evident heaviness and painfulness ofmovement due to the greater gravitational energy of the earth--above all, the extraordinary intensity of the immenseeyes--were at once vital, intense, inhuman, crippled and monstrous. there was something fungoid in the oilybrown skin, something in the clumsy deliberation of the tedious movementsunspeakably nasty. even at this first encounter, this firstglimpse, i was overcome with disgust and dread.suddenly the monster vanished. it had toppled over the brim of thecylinder and fallen into the pit, with a
thud like the fall of a great mass ofleather. i heard it give a peculiar thick cry, andforthwith another of these creatures appeared darkly in the deep shadow of theaperture. i turned and, running madly, made for thefirst group of trees, perhaps a hundred yards away; but i ran slantingly andstumbling, for i could not avert my face from these things. there, among some young pine trees andfurze bushes, i stopped, panting, and waited further developments. the common round the sand pits was dottedwith people, standing like myself in a
half-fascinated terror, staring at thesecreatures, or rather at the heaped gravel at the edge of the pit in which they lay. and then, with a renewed horror, i saw around, black object bobbing up and down on the edge of the pit. it was the head of the shopman who hadfallen in, but showing as a little black object against the hot western sun. now he got his shoulder and knee up, andagain he seemed to slip back until only his head was visible.suddenly he vanished, and i could have fancied a faint shriek had reached me.
i had a momentary impulse to go back andhelp him that my fears overruled. everything was then quite invisible, hiddenby the deep pit and the heap of sand that the fall of the cylinder had made. anyone coming along the road from chobhamor woking would have been amazed at the sight--a dwindling multitude of perhaps ahundred people or more standing in a great irregular circle, in ditches, behind bushes, behind gates and hedges, sayinglittle to one another and that in short, excited shouts, and staring, staring hardat a few heaps of sand. the barrow of ginger beer stood, a queerderelict, black against the burning sky,
and in the sand pits was a row of desertedvehicles with their horses feeding out of nosebags or pawing the ground. book one the coming of the martianschapter five the heat-ray after the glimpse i had had of the martiansemerging from the cylinder in which they had come to the earth from their planet, akind of fascination paralysed my actions. i remained standing knee-deep in theheather, staring at the mound that hid them.i was a battleground of fear and curiosity. i did not dare to go back towards the pit,but i felt a passionate longing to peer into it.
i began walking, therefore, in a big curve,seeking some point of vantage and continually looking at the sand heaps thathid these new-comers to our earth. once a leash of thin black whips, like thearms of an octopus, flashed across the sunset and was immediately withdrawn, andafterwards a thin rod rose up, joint by joint, bearing at its apex a circular diskthat spun with a wobbling motion. what could be going on there? most of the spectators had gathered in oneor two groups--one a little crowd towards woking, the other a knot of people in thedirection of chobham. evidently they shared my mental conflict.
there were few near me.one man i approached--he was, i perceived, a neighbour of mine, though i did not knowhis name--and accosted. but it was scarcely a time for articulateconversation. "what ugly brutes!" he said."good god! what ugly brutes!" he repeated this over and over again. "did you see a man in the pit?"i said; but he made no answer to that. we became silent, and stood watching for atime side by side, deriving, i fancy, a certain comfort in one another's company. then i shifted my position to a littleknoll that gave me the advantage of a yard
or more of elevation and when i looked forhim presently he was walking towards woking. the sunset faded to twilight beforeanything further happened. the crowd far away on the left, towardswoking, seemed to grow, and i heard now a faint murmur from it. the little knot of people towards chobhamdispersed. there was scarcely an intimation ofmovement from the pit. it was this, as much as anything, that gavepeople courage, and i suppose the new arrivals from woking also helped to restoreconfidence.
at any rate, as the dusk came on a slow,intermittent movement upon the sand pits began, a movement that seemed to gatherforce as the stillness of the evening about the cylinder remained unbroken. vertical black figures in twos and threeswould advance, stop, watch, and advance again, spreading out as they did so in athin irregular crescent that promised to enclose the pit in its attenuated horns. i, too, on my side began to move towardsthe pit. then i saw some cabmen and others hadwalked boldly into the sand pits, and heard the clatter of hoofs and the gride ofwheels.
i saw a lad trundling off the barrow ofapples. and then, within thirty yards of the pit,advancing from the direction of horsell, i noted a little black knot of men, theforemost of whom was waving a white flag. this was the deputation. there had been a hasty consultation, andsince the martians were evidently, in spite of their repulsive forms, intelligentcreatures, it had been resolved to show them, by approaching them with signals,that we too were intelligent. flutter, flutter, went the flag, first tothe right, then to the left. it was too far for me to recognise anyonethere, but afterwards i learned that
ogilvy, stent, and henderson were withothers in this attempt at communication. this little group had in its advancedragged inward, so to speak, the circumference of the now almost completecircle of people, and a number of dim black figures followed it at discreet distances. suddenly there was a flash of light, and aquantity of luminous greenish smoke came out of the pit in three distinct puffs,which drove up, one after the other, straight into the still air. this smoke (or flame, perhaps, would be thebetter word for it) was so bright that the deep blue sky overhead and the hazystretches of brown common towards chertsey,
set with black pine trees, seemed to darken abruptly as these puffs arose, and toremain the darker after their dispersal. at the same time a faint hissing soundbecame audible. beyond the pit stood the little wedge ofpeople with the white flag at its apex, arrested by these phenomena, a little knotof small vertical black shapes upon the black ground. as the green smoke arose, their facesflashed out pallid green, and faded again as it vanished.then slowly the hissing passed into a humming, into a long, loud, droning noise.
slowly a humped shape rose out of the pit,and the ghost of a beam of light seemed to flicker out from it. forthwith flashes of actual flame, a brightglare leaping from one to another, sprang from the scattered group of men.it was as if some invisible jet impinged upon them and flashed into white flame. it was as if each man were suddenly andmomentarily turned to fire. then, by the light of their owndestruction, i saw them staggering and falling, and their supporters turning torun. i stood staring, not as yet realising thatthis was death leaping from man to man in
that little distant crowd.all i felt was that it was something very strange. an almost noiseless and blinding flash oflight, and a man fell headlong and lay still; and as the unseen shaft of heatpassed over them, pine trees burst into fire, and every dry furze bush became withone dull thud a mass of flames. and far away towards knaphill i saw theflashes of trees and hedges and wooden buildings suddenly set alight. it was sweeping round swiftly and steadily,this flaming death, this invisible, inevitable sword of heat.
i perceived it coming towards me by theflashing bushes it touched, and was too astounded and stupefied to stir. i heard the crackle of fire in the sandpits and the sudden squeal of a horse that was as suddenly stilled. then it was as if an invisible yetintensely heated finger were drawn through the heather between me and the martians,and all along a curving line beyond the sand pits the dark ground smoked andcrackled. something fell with a crash far away to theleft where the road from woking station opens out on the common.
forth-with the hissing and humming ceased,and the black, dome-like object sank slowly out of sight into the pit. all this had happened with such swiftnessthat i had stood motionless, dumbfounded and dazzled by the flashes of light. had that death swept through a full circle,it must inevitably have slain me in my surprise. but it passed and spared me, and left thenight about me suddenly dark and unfamiliar. the undulating common seemed now darkalmost to blackness, except where its
roadways lay grey and pale under the deepblue sky of the early night. it was dark, and suddenly void of men. overhead the stars were mustering, and inthe west the sky was still a pale, bright, almost greenish blue. the tops of the pine trees and the roofs ofhorsell came out sharp and black against the western afterglow. the martians and their appliances werealtogether invisible, save for that thin mast upon which their restless mirrorwobbled. patches of bush and isolated trees here andthere smoked and glowed still, and the
houses towards woking station were sendingup spires of flame into the stillness of the evening air. nothing was changed save for that and aterrible astonishment. the little group of black specks with theflag of white had been swept out of existence, and the stillness of theevening, so it seemed to me, had scarcely been broken. it came to me that i was upon this darkcommon, helpless, unprotected, and alone. suddenly, like a thing falling upon me fromwithout, came--fear. with an effort i turned and began astumbling run through the heather.
the fear i felt was no rational fear, but apanic terror not only of the martians, but of the dusk and stillness all about me. such an extraordinary effect in unmanningme it had that i ran weeping silently as a child might do.once i had turned, i did not dare to look back. i remember i felt an extraordinarypersuasion that i was being played with, that presently, when i was upon the veryverge of safety, this mysterious death--as swift as the passage of light--would leap after me from the pit about the cylinderand strike me down.
book one the coming of the martianschapter six the heat-ray in the chobham road it is still a matter of wonder how themartians are able to slay men so swiftly and so silently. many think that in some way they are ableto generate an intense heat in a chamber of practically absolute non-conductivity. this intense heat they project in aparallel beam against any object they choose, by means of a polished parabolicmirror of unknown composition, much as the parabolic mirror of a lighthouse projects abeam of light.
but no one has absolutely proved thesedetails. however it is done, it is certain that abeam of heat is the essence of the matter. heat, and invisible, instead of visible,light. whatever is combustible flashes into flameat its touch, lead runs like water, it softens iron, cracks and melts glass, andwhen it falls upon water, incontinently that explodes into steam. that night nearly forty people lay underthe starlight about the pit, charred and distorted beyond recognition, and all nightlong the common from horsell to maybury was deserted and brightly ablaze.
the news of the massacre probably reachedchobham, woking, and ottershaw about the same time. in woking the shops had closed when thetragedy happened, and a number of people, shop people and so forth, attracted by thestories they had heard, were walking over the horsell bridge and along the road between the hedges that runs out at lastupon the common. you may imagine the young people brushed upafter the labours of the day, and making this novelty, as they would make anynovelty, the excuse for walking together and enjoying a trivial flirtation.
you may figure to yourself the hum ofvoices along the road in the gloaming. as yet, of course, few people in wokingeven knew that the cylinder had opened, though poor henderson had sent a messengeron a bicycle to the post office with a special wire to an evening paper. as these folks came out by twos and threesupon the open, they found little knots of people talking excitedly and peering at thespinning mirror over the sand pits, and the newcomers were, no doubt, soon infected bythe excitement of the occasion. by half past eight, when the deputation wasdestroyed, there may have been a crowd of three hundred people or more at this place,besides those who had left the road to
approach the martians nearer. there were three policemen too, one of whomwas mounted, doing their best, under instructions from stent, to keep the peopleback and deter them from approaching the there was some booing from those morethoughtless and excitable souls to whom a crowd is always an occasion for noise andhorse-play. stent and ogilvy, anticipating somepossibilities of a collision, had telegraphed from horsell to the barracks assoon as the martians emerged, for the help of a company of soldiers to protect thesestrange creatures from violence. after that they returned to lead that ill-fated advance.
the description of their death, as it wasseen by the crowd, tallies very closely with my own impressions: the three puffs ofgreen smoke, the deep humming note, and the flashes of flame. but that crowd of people had a far narrowerescape than mine. only the fact that a hummock of heatherysand intercepted the lower part of the heat-ray saved them. had the elevation of the parabolic mirrorbeen a few yards higher, none could have lived to tell the tale. they saw the flashes and the men fallingand an invisible hand, as it were, lit the
bushes as it hurried towards them throughthe twilight. then, with a whistling note that rose abovethe droning of the pit, the beam swung close over their heads, lighting the topsof the beech trees that line the road, and splitting the bricks, smashing the windows, firing the window frames, and bringing downin crumbling ruin a portion of the gable of the house nearest the corner. in the sudden thud, hiss, and glare of theigniting trees, the panic-stricken crowd seems to have swayed hesitatingly for somemoments. sparks and burning twigs began to fall intothe road, and single leaves like puffs of
flame.hats and dresses caught fire. then came a crying from the common. there were shrieks and shouts, and suddenlya mounted policeman came galloping through the confusion with his hands clasped overhis head, screaming. "they're coming!" a woman shrieked, andincontinently everyone was turning and pushing at those behind, in order to cleartheir way to woking again. they must have bolted as blindly as a flockof sheep. where the road grows narrow and blackbetween the high banks the crowd jammed, and a desperate struggle occurred.
all that crowd did not escape; threepersons at least, two women and a little boy, were crushed and trampled there, andleft to die amid the terror and the darkness. book one the coming of the martianschapter seven how i reached home for my own part, i remember nothing of myflight except the stress of blundering against trees and stumbling through theheather. all about me gathered the invisible terrorsof the martians; that pitiless sword of heat seemed whirling to and fro,flourishing overhead before it descended and smote me out of life.
i came into the road between the crossroadsand horsell, and ran along this to the crossroads. at last i could go no further; i wasexhausted with the violence of my emotion and of my flight, and i staggered and fellby the wayside. that was near the bridge that crosses thecanal by the gasworks. i fell and lay still.i must have remained there some time. i sat up, strangely perplexed. for a moment, perhaps, i could not clearlyunderstand how i came there. my terror had fallen from me like agarment.
my hat had gone, and my collar had burstaway from its fastener. a few minutes before, there had only beenthree real things before me--the immensity of the night and space and nature, my ownfeebleness and anguish, and the near approach of death. now it was as if something turned over, andthe point of view altered abruptly. there was no sensible transition from onestate of mind to the other. i was immediately the self of every dayagain--a decent, ordinary citizen. the silent common, the impulse of myflight, the starting flames, were as if they had been in a dream.
i asked myself had these latter thingsindeed happened? i could not credit it.i rose and walked unsteadily up the steep incline of the bridge. my mind was blank wonder.my muscles and nerves seemed drained of their strength.i dare say i staggered drunkenly. a head rose over the arch, and the figureof a workman carrying a basket appeared. beside him ran a little boy.he passed me, wishing me good night. i was minded to speak to him, but did not. i answered his greeting with a meaninglessmumble and went on over the bridge.
over the maybury arch a train, a billowingtumult of white, firelit smoke, and a long caterpillar of lighted windows, went flyingsouth--clatter, clatter, clap, rap, and it had gone. a dim group of people talked in the gate ofone of the houses in the pretty little row of gables that was called oriental terrace.it was all so real and so familiar. and that behind me! it was frantic, fantastic!such things, i told myself, could not be. perhaps i am a man of exceptional moods.i do not know how far my experience is common.
at times i suffer from the strangest senseof detachment from myself and the world about me; i seem to watch it all from theoutside, from somewhere inconceivably remote, out of time, out of space, out ofthe stress and tragedy of it all. this feeling was very strong upon me thatnight. here was another side to my dream. but the trouble was the blank incongruityof this serenity and the swift death flying yonder, not two miles away. there was a noise of business from thegasworks, and the electric lamps were all alight.i stopped at the group of people.
"what news from the common?" said i. there were two men and a woman at the gate."eh?" said one of the men, turning. "what news from the common?"i said. "'ain't yer just been there?" asked themen. "people seem fair silly about the common,"said the woman over the gate. "what's it all abart?" "haven't you heard of the men from mars?"said i; "the creatures from mars?" "quite enough," said the woman over thegate. "thenks"; and all three of them laughed.
i felt foolish and angry.i tried and found i could not tell them what i had seen.they laughed again at my broken sentences. "you'll hear more yet," i said, and went onto my home. i startled my wife at the doorway, sohaggard was i. i went into the dining room, sat down,drank some wine, and so soon as i could collect myself sufficiently i told her thethings i had seen. the dinner, which was a cold one, hadalready been served, and remained neglected on the table while i told my story. "there is one thing," i said, to allay thefears i had aroused; "they are the most
sluggish things i ever saw crawl. they may keep the pit and kill people whocome near them, but they cannot get out of it.but the horror of them!" "don't, dear!" said my wife, knitting herbrows and putting her hand on mine. "poor ogilvy!"i said. "to think he may be lying dead there!" my wife at least did not find my experienceincredible. when i saw how deadly white her face was, iceased abruptly. "they may come here," she said again andagain.
i pressed her to take wine, and tried toreassure her. "they can scarcely move," i said. i began to comfort her and myself byrepeating all that ogilvy had told me of the impossibility of the martiansestablishing themselves on the earth. in particular i laid stress on thegravitational difficulty. on the surface of the earth the force ofgravity is three times what it is on the surface of mars. a martian, therefore, would weigh threetimes more than on mars, albeit his muscular strength would be the same.his own body would be a cope of lead to
him. that, indeed, was the general opinion.both the times and the daily telegraph, for instance, insisted on it the next morning,and both overlooked, just as i did, two obvious modifying influences. the atmosphere of the earth, we now know,contains far more oxygen or far less argon (whichever way one likes to put it) thandoes mars. the invigorating influences of this excessof oxygen upon the martians indisputably did much to counterbalance the increasedweight of their bodies. and, in the second place, we all overlookedthe fact that such mechanical intelligence
as the martian possessed was quite able todispense with muscular exertion at a pinch. but i did not consider these points at thetime, and so my reasoning was dead against the chances of the invaders. with wine and food, the confidence of myown table, and the necessity of reassuring my wife, i grew by insensible degreescourageous and secure. "they have done a foolish thing," said i,fingering my wineglass. "they are dangerous because, no doubt, theyare mad with terror. perhaps they expected to find no livingthings--certainly no intelligent living things.""a shell in the pit" said i, "if the worst
comes to the worst will kill them all." the intense excitement of the events had nodoubt left my perceptive powers in a state of erethism.i remember that dinner table with extraordinary vividness even now. my dear wife's sweet anxious face peeringat me from under the pink lamp shade, the white cloth with its silver and glass tablefurniture--for in those days even philosophical writers had many little luxuries--the crimson-purple wine in myglass, are photographically distinct. at the end of it i sat, tempering nuts witha cigarette, regretting ogilvy's rashness,
and denouncing the shortsighted timidity ofthe martians. so some respectable dodo in the mauritiusmight have lorded it in his nest, and discussed the arrival of that shipful ofpitiless sailors in want of animal food. "we will peck them to death tomorrow, mydear." i did not know it, but that was the lastcivilised dinner i was to eat for very many strange and terrible days. book one the coming of the martianschapter eight friday night the most extraordinary thing to my mind, ofall the strange and wonderful things that happened upon that friday, was thedovetailing of the commonplace habits of
our social order with the first beginnings of the series of events that was to topplethat social order headlong. if on friday night you had taken a pair ofcompasses and drawn a circle with a radius of five miles round the woking sand pits, idoubt if you would have had one human being outside it, unless it were some relation of stent or of the three or four cyclists orlondon people lying dead on the common, whose emotions or habits were at allaffected by the new-comers. many people had heard of the cylinder, ofcourse, and talked about it in their leisure, but it certainly did not make thesensation that an ultimatum to germany
would have done. in london that night poor henderson'stelegram describing the gradual unscrewing of the shot was judged to be a canard, andhis evening paper, after wiring for authentication from him and receiving no reply--the man was killed--decided not toprint a special edition. even within the five-mile circle the greatmajority of people were inert. i have already described the behaviour ofthe men and women to whom i spoke. all over the district people were diningand supping; working men were gardening after the labours of the day, children werebeing put to bed, young people were
wandering through the lanes love-making,students sat over their books. maybe there was a murmur in the villagestreets, a novel and dominant topic in the public-houses, and here and there amessenger, or even an eye-witness of the later occurrences, caused a whirl of excitement, a shouting, and a running toand fro; but for the most part the daily routine of working, eating, drinking,sleeping, went on as it had done for countless years--as though no planet marsexisted in the sky. even at woking station and horsell andchobham that was the case. in woking junction, until a late hour,trains were stopping and going on, others
were shunting on the sidings, passengerswere alighting and waiting, and everything was proceeding in the most ordinary way. a boy from the town, trenching on smith'smonopoly, was selling papers with the afternoon's news. the ringing impact of trucks, the sharpwhistle of the engines from the junction, mingled with their shouts of "men frommars!" excited men came into the station aboutnine o'clock with incredible tidings, and caused no more disturbance than drunkardsmight have done. people rattling londonwards peered into thedarkness outside the carriage windows, and
saw only a rare, flickering, vanishingspark dance up from the direction of horsell, a red glow and a thin veil of smoke driving across the stars, and thoughtthat nothing more serious than a heath fire was happening.it was only round the edge of the common that any disturbance was perceptible. there were half a dozen villas burning onthe woking border. there were lights in all the houses on thecommon side of the three villages, and the people there kept awake till dawn. a curious crowd lingered restlessly, peoplecoming and going but the crowd remaining,
both on the chobham and horsell bridges. one or two adventurous souls, it wasafterwards found, went into the darkness and crawled quite near the martians; butthey never returned, for now and again a light-ray, like the beam of a warship's searchlight swept the common, and the heat-ray was ready to follow. save for such, that big area of common wassilent and desolate, and the charred bodies lay about on it all night under the stars,and all the next day. a noise of hammering from the pit was heardby many people. so you have the state of things on fridaynight.
in the centre, sticking into the skin ofour old planet earth like a poisoned dart, was this cylinder.but the poison was scarcely working yet. around it was a patch of silent common,smouldering in places, and with a few dark, dimly seen objects lying in contortedattitudes here and there. here and there was a burning bush or tree. beyond was a fringe of excitement, andfarther than that fringe the inflammation had not crept as yet. in the rest of the world the stream of lifestill flowed as it had flowed for immemorial years.
the fever of war that would presently clogvein and artery, deaden nerve and destroy brain, had still to develop. all night long the martians were hammeringand stirring, sleepless, indefatigable, at work upon the machines they were makingready, and ever and again a puff of greenish-white smoke whirled up to thestarlit sky. about eleven a company of soldiers camethrough horsell, and deployed along the edge of the common to form a cordon. later a second company marched throughchobham to deploy on the north side of the several officers from the inkerman barrackshad been on the common earlier in the day,
and one, major eden, was reported to bemissing. the colonel of the regiment came to thechobham bridge and was busy questioning the crowd at midnight.the military authorities were certainly alive to the seriousness of the business. about eleven, the next morning's paperswere able to say, a squadron of hussars, two maxims, and about four hundred men ofthe cardigan regiment started from aldershot. a few seconds after midnight the crowd inthe chertsey road, woking, saw a star fall from heaven into the pine woods to thenorthwest.
it had a greenish colour, and caused asilent brightness like summer lightning. this was the second cylinder. book one the coming of the martianschapter nine the fighting begins saturday lives in my memory as a day ofsuspense. it was a day of lassitude too, hot andclose, with, i am told, a rapidly fluctuating barometer. i had slept but little, though my wife hadsucceeded in sleeping, and i rose early. i went into my garden before breakfast andstood listening, but towards the common there was nothing stirring but a lark.
the milkman came as usual.i heard the rattle of his chariot and i went round to the side gate to ask thelatest news. he told me that during the night themartians had been surrounded by troops, and that guns were expected.then--a familiar, reassuring note--i heard a train running towards woking. "they aren't to be killed," said themilkman, "if that can possibly be avoided." i saw my neighbour gardening, chatted withhim for a time, and then strolled in to breakfast. it was a most unexceptional morning.my neighbour was of opinion that the troops
would be able to capture or to destroy themartians during the day. "it's a pity they make themselves sounapproachable," he said. "it would be curious to know how they liveon another planet; we might learn a thing or two." he came up to the fence and extended ahandful of strawberries, for his gardening was as generous as it was enthusiastic. at the same time he told me of the burningof the pine woods about the byfleet golf links. "they say," said he, "that there's anotherof those blessed things fallen there--
number two.but one's enough, surely. this lot'll cost the insurance people apretty penny before everything's settled." he laughed with an air of the greatest goodhumour as he said this. the woods, he said, were still burning, andpointed out a haze of smoke to me. "they will be hot under foot for days, onaccount of the thick soil of pine needles and turf," he said, and then grew seriousover "poor ogilvy." after breakfast, instead of working, idecided to walk down towards the common. under the railway bridge i found a group ofsoldiers--sappers, i think, men in small round caps, dirty red jackets unbuttoned,and showing their blue shirts, dark
trousers, and boots coming to the calf. they told me no one was allowed over thecanal, and, looking along the road towards the bridge, i saw one of the cardigan menstanding sentinel there. i talked with these soldiers for a time; itold them of my sight of the martians on the previous evening. none of them had seen the martians, andthey had but the vaguest ideas of them, so that they plied me with questions. they said that they did not know who hadauthorised the movements of the troops; their idea was that a dispute had arisen atthe horse guards.
the ordinary sapper is a great deal bettereducated than the common soldier, and they discussed the peculiar conditions of thepossible fight with some acuteness. i described the heat-ray to them, and theybegan to argue among themselves. "crawl up under cover and rush 'em, say i,"said one. "get aht!" said another. "what's cover against this 'ere 'eat?sticks to cook yer! what we got to do is to go as near as theground'll let us, and then drive a trench." "blow yer trenches! you always want trenches; you ought to ha'been born a rabbit snippy."
"ain't they got any necks, then?" said athird, abruptly--a little, contemplative, dark man, smoking a pipe. i repeated my description."octopuses," said he, "that's what i calls 'em.talk about fishers of men--fighters of fish it is this time!" "it ain't no murder killing beasts likethat," said the first speaker. "why not shell the darned things strite offand finish 'em?" said the little dark man. "you carn tell what they might do." "where's your shells?" said the firstspeaker.
"there ain't no time.do it in a rush, that's my tip, and do it at once." so they discussed it.after a while i left them, and went on to the railway station to get as many morningpapers as i could. but i will not weary the reader with adescription of that long morning and of the longer afternoon. i did not succeed in getting a glimpse ofthe common, for even horsell and chobham church towers were in the hands of themilitary authorities. the soldiers i addressed didn't knowanything; the officers were mysterious as
well as busy. i found people in the town quite secureagain in the presence of the military, and i heard for the first time from marshall,the tobacconist, that his son was among the dead on the common. the soldiers had made the people on theoutskirts of horsell lock up and leave their houses. i got back to lunch about two, very tiredfor, as i have said, the day was extremely hot and dull; and in order to refreshmyself i took a cold bath in the afternoon. about half past four i went up to therailway station to get an evening paper,
for the morning papers had contained only avery inaccurate description of the killing of stent, henderson, ogilvy, and theothers. but there was little i didn't know.the martians did not show an inch of themselves. they seemed busy in their pit, and therewas a sound of hammering and an almost continuous streamer of smoke.apparently they were busy getting ready for a struggle. "fresh attempts have been made to signal,but without success," was the stereotyped formula of the papers.a sapper told me it was done by a man in a
ditch with a flag on a long pole. the martians took as much notice of suchadvances as we should of the lowing of a cow. i must confess the sight of all thisarmament, all this preparation, greatly excited me. my imagination became belligerent, anddefeated the invaders in a dozen striking ways; something of my schoolboy dreams ofbattle and heroism came back. it hardly seemed a fair fight to me at thattime. they seemed very helpless in that pit oftheirs.
about three o'clock there began the thud ofa gun at measured intervals from chertsey or addlestone. i learned that the smouldering pine woodinto which the second cylinder had fallen was being shelled, in the hope ofdestroying that object before it opened. it was only about five, however, that afield gun reached chobham for use against the first body of martians. about six in the evening, as i sat at teawith my wife in the summerhouse talking vigorously about the battle that waslowering upon us, i heard a muffled detonation from the common, and immediatelyafter a gust of firing.
close on the heels of that came a violentrattling crash, quite close to us, that shook the ground; and, starting out uponthe lawn, i saw the tops of the trees about the oriental college burst into smoky red flame, and the tower of the little churchbeside it slide down into ruin. the pinnacle of the mosque had vanished,and the roof line of the college itself looked as if a hundred-ton gun had been atwork upon it. one of our chimneys cracked as if a shothad hit it, flew, and a piece of it came clattering down the tiles and made a heapof broken red fragments upon the flower bed by my study window.
i and my wife stood amazed.then i realised that the crest of maybury hill must be within range of the martians'heat-ray now that the college was cleared out of the way. at that i gripped my wife's arm, andwithout ceremony ran her out into the road. then i fetched out the servant, telling heri would go upstairs myself for the box she was clamouring for. "we can't possibly stay here," i said; andas i spoke the firing reopened for a moment upon the common."but where are we to go?" said my wife in terror.
i thought perplexed.then i remembered her cousins at leatherhead."leatherhead!" i shouted above the sudden noise. she looked away from me downhill.the people were coming out of their houses, astonished."how are we to get to leatherhead?" she said. down the hill i saw a bevy of hussars rideunder the railway bridge; three galloped through the open gates of the orientalcollege; two others dismounted, and began running from house to house.
the sun, shining through the smoke thatdrove up from the tops of the trees, seemed blood red, and threw an unfamiliar luridlight upon everything. "stop here," said i; "you are safe here";and i started off at once for the spotted dog, for i knew the landlord had a horseand dog cart. i ran, for i perceived that in a momenteveryone upon this side of the hill would be moving.i found him in his bar, quite unaware of what was going on behind his house. a man stood with his back to me, talking tohim. "i must have a pound," said the landlord,"and i've no one to drive it."
"i'll give you two," said i, over thestranger's shoulder. "what for?""and i'll bring it back by midnight," i "lord!" said the landlord; "what's thehurry? i'm selling my bit of a pig.two pounds, and you bring it back? what's going on now?" i explained hastily that i had to leave myhome, and so secured the dog cart. at the time it did not seem to me nearly sourgent that the landlord should leave his. i took care to have the cart there andthen, drove it off down the road, and, leaving it in charge of my wife andservant, rushed into my house and packed a
few valuables, such plate as we had, and soforth. the beech trees below the house wereburning while i did this, and the palings up the road glowed red. while i was occupied in this way, one ofthe dismounted hussars came running up. he was going from house to house, warningpeople to leave. he was going on as i came out of my frontdoor, lugging my treasures, done up in a tablecloth.i shouted after him: "what news?" he turned, stared, bawled something about"crawling out in a thing like a dish
cover," and ran on to the gate of the houseat the crest. a sudden whirl of black smoke drivingacross the road hid him for a moment. i ran to my neighbour's door and rapped tosatisfy myself of what i already knew, that his wife had gone to london with him andhad locked up their house. i went in again, according to my promise,to get my servant's box, lugged it out, clapped it beside her on the tail of thedog cart, and then caught the reins and jumped up into the driver's seat beside mywife. in another moment we were clear of thesmoke and noise, and spanking down the opposite slope of maybury hill towards oldwoking.
in front was a quiet sunny landscape, awheat field ahead on either side of the road, and the maybury inn with its swingingsign. i saw the doctor's cart ahead of me. at the bottom of the hill i turned my headto look at the hillside i was leaving. thick streamers of black smoke shot withthreads of red fire were driving up into the still air, and throwing dark shadowsupon the green treetops eastward. the smoke already extended far away to theeast and west--to the byfleet pine woods eastward, and to woking on the west.the road was dotted with people running towards us.
and very faint now, but very distinctthrough the hot, quiet air, one heard the whirr of a machine-gun that was presentlystilled, and an intermittent cracking of rifles. apparently the martians were setting fireto everything within range of their heat- ray. i am not an expert driver, and i hadimmediately to turn my attention to the horse.when i looked back again the second hill had hidden the black smoke. i slashed the horse with the whip, and gavehim a loose rein until woking and send lay
between us and that quivering tumult.i overtook and passed the doctor between woking and send. book one the coming of the martianschapter ten in the storm leatherhead is about twelve miles frommaybury hill. the scent of hay was in the air through thelush meadows beyond pyrford, and the hedges on either side were sweet and gay withmultitudes of dog-roses. the heavy firing that had broken out whilewe were driving down maybury hill ceased as abruptly as it began, leaving the eveningvery peaceful and still. we got to leatherhead without misadventureabout nine o'clock, and the horse had an
hour's rest while i took supper with mycousins and commended my wife to their care. my wife was curiously silent throughout thedrive, and seemed oppressed with forebodings of evil. i talked to her reassuringly, pointing outthat the martians were tied to the pit by sheer heaviness, and at the utmost couldbut crawl a little out of it; but she answered only in monosyllables. had it not been for my promise to theinnkeeper, she would, i think, have urged me to stay in leatherhead that night.would that i had!
her face, i remember, was very white as weparted. for my own part, i had been feverishlyexcited all day. something very like the war fever thatoccasionally runs through a civilised community had got into my blood, and in myheart i was not so very sorry that i had to return to maybury that night. i was even afraid that that last fusilladei had heard might mean the extermination of our invaders from mars.i can best express my state of mind by saying that i wanted to be in at the death. it was nearly eleven when i started toreturn.
the night was unexpectedly dark; to me,walking out of the lighted passage of my cousins' house, it seemed indeed black, andit was as hot and close as the day. overhead the clouds were driving fast,albeit not a breath stirred the shrubs about us.my cousins' man lit both lamps. happily, i knew the road intimately. my wife stood in the light of the doorway,and watched me until i jumped up into the dog cart. then abruptly she turned and went in,leaving my cousins side by side wishing me good hap.
i was a little depressed at first with thecontagion of my wife's fears, but very soon my thoughts reverted to the martians.at that time i was absolutely in the dark as to the course of the evening's fighting. i did not know even the circumstances thathad precipitated the conflict. as i came through ockham (for that was theway i returned, and not through send and old woking) i saw along the western horizona blood-red glow, which as i drew nearer, crept slowly up the sky. the driving clouds of the gatheringthunderstorm mingled there with masses of black and red smoke.
ripley street was deserted, and except fora lighted window or so the village showed not a sign of life; but i narrowly escapedan accident at the corner of the road to pyrford, where a knot of people stood withtheir backs to me. they said nothing to me as i passed. i do not know what they knew of the thingshappening beyond the hill, nor do i know if the silent houses i passed on my way weresleeping securely, or deserted and empty, or harassed and watching against the terrorof the night. from ripley until i came through pyrford iwas in the valley of the wey, and the red glare was hidden from me.
as i ascended the little hill beyondpyrford church the glare came into view again, and the trees about me shivered withthe first intimation of the storm that was upon me. then i heard midnight pealing out frompyrford church behind me, and then came the silhouette of maybury hill, with its tree-tops and roofs black and sharp against the red. even as i beheld this a lurid green glarelit the road about me and showed the distant woods towards addlestone.i felt a tug at the reins. i saw that the driving clouds had beenpierced as it were by a thread of green
fire, suddenly lighting their confusion andfalling into the field to my left. it was the third falling star! close on its apparition, and blindinglyviolet by contrast, danced out the first lightning of the gathering storm, and thethunder burst like a rocket overhead. the horse took the bit between his teethand bolted. a moderate incline runs towards the foot ofmaybury hill, and down this we clattered. once the lightning had begun, it went on inas rapid a succession of flashes as i have ever seen. the thunderclaps, treading one on the heelsof another and with a strange crackling
accompaniment, sounded more like theworking of a gigantic electric machine than the usual detonating reverberations. the flickering light was blinding andconfusing, and a thin hail smote gustily at my face as i drove down the slope. at first i regarded little but the roadbefore me, and then abruptly my attention was arrested by something that was movingrapidly down the opposite slope of maybury hill. at first i took it for the wet roof of ahouse, but one flash following another showed it to be in swift rolling movement.
it was an elusive vision--a moment ofbewildering darkness, and then, in a flash like daylight, the red masses of theorphanage near the crest of the hill, the green tops of the pine trees, and this problematical object came out clear andsharp and bright. and this thing i saw!how can i describe it? a monstrous tripod, higher than manyhouses, striding over the young pine trees, and smashing them aside in its career; awalking engine of glittering metal, striding now across the heather; articulate ropes of steel dangling from it, and theclattering tumult of its passage mingling
with the riot of the thunder. a flash, and it came out vividly, heelingover one way with two feet in the air, to vanish and reappear almost instantly as itseemed, with the next flash, a hundred yards nearer. can you imagine a milking stool tilted andbowled violently along the ground? that was the impression those instantflashes gave. but instead of a milking stool imagine it agreat body of machinery on a tripod stand. then suddenly the trees in the pine woodahead of me were parted, as brittle reeds are parted by a man thrusting through them;they were snapped off and driven headlong,
and a second huge tripod appeared, rushing,as it seemed, headlong towards me. and i was galloping hard to meet it!at the sight of the second monster my nerve went altogether. not stopping to look again, i wrenched thehorse's head hard round to the right and in another moment the dog cart had heeled overupon the horse; the shafts smashed noisily, and i was flung sideways and fell heavilyinto a shallow pool of water. i crawled out almost immediately, andcrouched, my feet still in the water, under a clump of furze. the horse lay motionless (his neck wasbroken, poor brute!) and by the lightning
flashes i saw the black bulk of theoverturned dog cart and the silhouette of the wheel still spinning slowly. in another moment the colossal mechanismwent striding by me, and passed uphill towards pyrford. seen nearer, the thing was incrediblystrange, for it was no mere insensate machine driving on its way. machine it was, with a ringing metallicpace, and long, flexible, glittering tentacles (one of which gripped a youngpine tree) swinging and rattling about its strange body.
it picked its road as it went stridingalong, and the brazen hood that surmounted it moved to and fro with the inevitablesuggestion of a head looking about. behind the main body was a huge mass ofwhite metal like a gigantic fisherman's basket, and puffs of green smoke squirtedout from the joints of the limbs as the monster swept by me. and in an instant it was gone.so much i saw then, all vaguely for the flickering of the lightning, in blindinghighlights and dense black shadows. as it passed it set up an exultantdeafening howl that drowned the thunder-- "aloo!
aloo!"--and in another minute it was withits companion, half a mile away, stooping over something in the field. i have no doubt this thing in the field wasthe third of the ten cylinders they had fired at us from mars. for some minutes i lay there in the rainand darkness watching, by the intermittent light, these monstrous beings of metalmoving about in the distance over the hedge tops. a thin hail was now beginning, and as itcame and went their figures grew misty and then flashed into clearness again.now and then came a gap in the lightning,
and the night swallowed them up. i was soaked with hail above and puddlewater below. it was some time before my blankastonishment would let me struggle up the bank to a drier position, or think at allof my imminent peril. not far from me was a little one-roomedsquatter's hut of wood, surrounded by a patch of potato garden. i struggled to my feet at last, and,crouching and making use of every chance of cover, i made a run for this. i hammered at the door, but i could notmake the people hear (if there were any
people inside), and after a time idesisted, and, availing myself of a ditch for the greater part of the way, succeeded in crawling, unobserved by these monstrousmachines, into the pine woods towards maybury.under cover of this i pushed on, wet and shivering now, towards my own house. i walked among the trees trying to find thefootpath. it was very dark indeed in the wood, forthe lightning was now becoming infrequent, and the hail, which was pouring down in atorrent, fell in columns through the gaps in the heavy foliage.
if i had fully realised the meaning of allthe things i had seen i should have immediately worked my way round throughbyfleet to street cobham, and so gone back to rejoin my wife at leatherhead. but that night the strangeness of thingsabout me, and my physical wretchedness, prevented me, for i was bruised, weary, wetto the skin, deafened and blinded by the storm. i had a vague idea of going on to my ownhouse, and that was as much motive as i had. i staggered through the trees, fell into aditch and bruised my knees against a plank,
and finally splashed out into the lane thatran down from the college arms. i say splashed, for the storm water wassweeping the sand down the hill in a muddy torrent.there in the darkness a man blundered into me and sent me reeling back. he gave a cry of terror, sprang sideways,and rushed on before i could gather my wits sufficiently to speak to him. so heavy was the stress of the storm justat this place that i had the hardest task to win my way up the hill.i went close up to the fence on the left and worked my way along its palings.
near the top i stumbled upon somethingsoft, and, by a flash of lightning, saw between my feet a heap of black broadclothand a pair of boots. before i could distinguish clearly how theman lay, the flicker of light had passed. i stood over him waiting for the nextflash. when it came, i saw that he was a sturdyman, cheaply but not shabbily dressed; his head was bent under his body, and he laycrumpled up close to the fence, as though he had been flung violently against it. overcoming the repugnance natural to onewho had never before touched a dead body, i stooped and turned him over to feel for hisheart.
he was quite dead. apparently his neck had been broken.the lightning flashed for a third time, and his face leaped upon me.i sprang to my feet. it was the landlord of the spotted dog,whose conveyance i had taken. i stepped over him gingerly and pushed onup the hill. i made my way by the police station and thecollege arms towards my own house. nothing was burning on the hillside, thoughfrom the common there still came a red glare and a rolling tumult of ruddy smokebeating up against the drenching hail. so far as i could see by the flashes, thehouses about me were mostly uninjured.
by the college arms a dark heap lay in theroad. down the road towards maybury bridge therewere voices and the sound of feet, but i had not the courage to shout or to go tothem. i let myself in with my latchkey, closed,locked and bolted the door, staggered to the foot of the staircase, and sat down. my imagination was full of those stridingmetallic monsters, and of the dead body smashed against the fence. i crouched at the foot of the staircasewith my back to the wall, shivering violently.
book one the coming of the martianschapter eleven at the window i have already said that my storms ofemotion have a trick of exhausting after a time i discovered that i was coldand wet, and with little pools of water about me on the stair carpet. i got up almost mechanically, went into thedining room and drank some whiskey, and then i was moved to change my clothes.after i had done that i went upstairs to my study, but why i did so i do not know. the window of my study looks over the treesand the railway towards horsell common. in the hurry of our departure this windowhad been left open.
the passage was dark, and, by contrast withthe picture the window frame enclosed, the side of the room seemed impenetrably dark.i stopped short in the doorway. the thunderstorm had passed. the towers of the oriental college and thepine trees about it had gone, and very far away, lit by a vivid red glare, the commonabout the sand pits was visible. across the light huge black shapes,grotesque and strange, moved busily to and fro. it seemed indeed as if the whole country inthat direction was on fire--a broad hillside set with minute tongues of flame,swaying and writhing with the gusts of the
dying storm, and throwing a red reflectionupon the cloud-scud above. every now and then a haze of smoke fromsome nearer conflagration drove across the window and hid the martian shapes. i could not see what they were doing, northe clear form of them, nor recognise the black objects they were busied upon. neither could i see the nearer fire, thoughthe reflections of it danced on the wall and ceiling of the study.a sharp, resinous tang of burning was in the air. i closed the door noiselessly and crepttowards the window.
as i did so, the view opened out until, onthe one hand, it reached to the houses about woking station, and on the other tothe charred and blackened pine woods of byfleet. there was a light down below the hill, onthe railway, near the arch, and several of the houses along the maybury road and thestreets near the station were glowing ruins. the light upon the railway puzzled me atfirst; there were a black heap and a vivid glare, and to the right of that a row ofyellow oblongs. then i perceived this was a wrecked train,the fore part smashed and on fire, the
hinder carriages still upon the rails. between these three main centres of light--the houses, the train, and the burning county towards chobham--stretched irregularpatches of dark country, broken here and there by intervals of dimly glowing andsmoking ground. it was the strangest spectacle, that blackexpanse set with fire. it reminded me, more than anything else, ofthe potteries at night. at first i could distinguish no people atall, though i peered intently for them. later i saw against the light of wokingstation a number of black figures hurrying one after the other across the line.
and this was the little world in which ihad been living securely for years, this fiery chaos! what had happened in the last seven hours istill did not know; nor did i know, though i was beginning to guess, the relationbetween these mechanical colossi and the sluggish lumps i had seen disgorged fromthe cylinder. with a queer feeling of impersonal interesti turned my desk chair to the window, sat down, and stared at the blackened country,and particularly at the three gigantic black things that were going to and fro inthe glare about the sand pits. they seemed amazingly busy.i began to ask myself what they could be.
were they intelligent mechanisms? such a thing i felt was impossible.or did a martian sit within each, ruling, directing, using, much as a man's brainsits and rules in his body? i began to compare the things to humanmachines, to ask myself for the first time in my life how an ironclad or a steamengine would seem to an intelligent lower animal. the storm had left the sky clear, and overthe smoke of the burning land the little fading pinpoint of mars was dropping intothe west, when a soldier came into my garden.
i heard a slight scraping at the fence, androusing myself from the lethargy that had fallen upon me, i looked down and saw himdimly, clambering over the palings. at the sight of another human being mytorpor passed, and i leaned out of the window eagerly."hist!" said i, in a whisper. he stopped astride of the fence in doubt. then he came over and across the lawn tothe corner of the house. he bent down and stepped softly."who's there?" he said, also whispering, standing under the window and peering up. "where are you going?"i asked.
"god knows.""are you trying to hide?" "that's it." "come into the house," i said.i went down, unfastened the door, and let him in, and locked the door again.i could not see his face. he was hatless, and his coat wasunbuttoned. "my god!" he said, as i drew him in."what has happened?" i asked. "what hasn't?"in the obscurity i could see he made a gesture of despair."they wiped us out--simply wiped us out,"
he repeated again and again. he followed me, almost mechanically, intothe dining room. "take some whiskey," i said, pouring out astiff dose. he drank it. then abruptly he sat down before the table,put his head on his arms, and began to sob and weep like a little boy, in a perfectpassion of emotion, while i, with a curious forgetfulness of my own recent despair,stood beside him, wondering. it was a long time before he could steadyhis nerves to answer my questions, and then he answered perplexingly and brokenly.
he was a driver in the artillery, and hadonly come into action about seven. at that time firing was going on across thecommon, and it was said the first party of martians were crawling slowly towards theirsecond cylinder under cover of a metal shield. later this shield staggered up on tripodlegs and became the first of the fighting- machines i had seen. the gun he drove had been unlimbered nearhorsell, in order to command the sand pits, and its arrival it was that hadprecipitated the action. as the limber gunners went to the rear, hishorse trod in a rabbit hole and came down,
throwing him into a depression of theground. at the same moment the gun exploded behindhim, the ammunition blew up, there was fire all about him, and he found himself lyingunder a heap of charred dead men and dead horses. "i lay still," he said, "scared out of mywits, with the fore quarter of a horse atop of me.we'd been wiped out. and the smell--good god! like burnt meat!i was hurt across the back by the fall of the horse, and there i had to lie until ifelt better.
just like parade it had been a minutebefore--then stumble, bang, swish!" "wiped out!" he said. he had hid under the dead horse for a longtime, peeping out furtively across the the cardigan men had tried a rush, inskirmishing order, at the pit, simply to be swept out of existence. then the monster had risen to its feet andhad begun to walk leisurely to and fro across the common among the few fugitives,with its headlike hood turning about exactly like the head of a cowled humanbeing. a kind of arm carried a complicatedmetallic case, about which green flashes
scintillated, and out of the funnel of thisthere smoked the heat-ray. in a few minutes there was, so far as thesoldier could see, not a living thing left upon the common, and every bush and treeupon it that was not already a blackened skeleton was burning. the hussars had been on the road beyond thecurvature of the ground, and he saw nothing of them.he heard the martians rattle for a time and then become still. the giant saved woking station and itscluster of houses until the last; then in a moment the heat-ray was brought to bear,and the town became a heap of fiery ruins.
then the thing shut off the heat-ray, andturning its back upon the artilleryman, began to waddle away towards thesmouldering pine woods that sheltered the second cylinder. as it did so a second glittering titanbuilt itself up out of the pit. the second monster followed the first, andat that the artilleryman began to crawl very cautiously across the hot heather ashtowards horsell. he managed to get alive into the ditch bythe side of the road, and so escaped to woking.there his story became ejaculatory. the place was impassable.
it seems there were a few people alivethere, frantic for the most part and many burned and scalded. he was turned aside by the fire, and hidamong some almost scorching heaps of broken wall as one of the martian giants returned. he saw this one pursue a man, catch him upin one of its steely tentacles, and knock his head against the trunk of a pine tree. at last, after nightfall, the artillerymanmade a rush for it and got over the railway embankment. since then he had been skulking alongtowards maybury, in the hope of getting out
of danger londonward. people were hiding in trenches and cellars,and many of the survivors had made off towards woking village and send. he had been consumed with thirst until hefound one of the water mains near the railway arch smashed, and the waterbubbling out like a spring upon the road. that was the story i got from him, bit bybit. he grew calmer telling me and trying tomake me see the things he had seen. he had eaten no food since midday, he toldme early in his narrative, and i found some mutton and bread in the pantry and broughtit into the room.
we lit no lamp for fear of attracting themartians, and ever and again our hands would touch upon bread or meat. as he talked, things about us came darklyout of the darkness, and the trampled bushes and broken rose trees outside thewindow grew distinct. it would seem that a number of men oranimals had rushed across the lawn. i began to see his face, blackened andhaggard, as no doubt mine was also. when we had finished eating we went softlyupstairs to my study, and i looked again out of the open window.in one night the valley had become a valley of ashes.
the fires had dwindled now. where flames had been there were nowstreamers of smoke; but the countless ruins of shattered and gutted houses and blastedand blackened trees that the night had hidden stood out now gaunt and terrible inthe pitiless light of dawn. yet here and there some object had had theluck to escape--a white railway signal here, the end of a greenhouse there, whiteand fresh amid the wreckage. never before in the history of warfare haddestruction been so indiscriminate and so universal. and shining with the growing light of theeast, three of the metallic giants stood
about the pit, their cowls rotating asthough they were surveying the desolation they had made. it seemed to me that the pit had beenenlarged, and ever and again puffs of vivid green vapour streamed up and out of ittowards the brightening dawn--streamed up, whirled, broke, and vanished. beyond were the pillars of fire aboutchobham. they became pillars of bloodshot smoke atthe first touch of day. book one the coming of the martianschapter twelve what i saw of the destruction of weybridgeand shepperton
as the dawn grew brighter we withdrew fromthe window from which we had watched the martians, and went very quietly downstairs.the artilleryman agreed with me that the house was no place to stay in. he proposed, he said, to make his waylondonward, and thence rejoin his battery-- no. 12, of the horse artillery. my plan was to return at once toleatherhead; and so greatly had the strength of the martians impressed me thati had determined to take my wife to newhaven, and go with her out of thecountry forthwith. for i already perceived clearly that thecountry about london must inevitably be the
scene of a disastrous struggle before suchcreatures as these could be destroyed. between us and leatherhead, however, laythe third cylinder, with its guarding giants.had i been alone, i think i should have taken my chance and struck across country. but the artilleryman dissuaded me: "it's nokindness to the right sort of wife," he said, "to make her a widow"; and in the endi agreed to go with him, under cover of the woods, northward as far as street cobhambefore i parted with him. thence i would make a big detour by epsomto reach leatherhead. i should have started at once, but mycompanion had been in active service and he
knew better than that. he made me ransack the house for a flask,which he filled with whiskey; and we lined every available pocket with packets ofbiscuits and slices of meat. then we crept out of the house, and ran asquickly as we could down the ill-made road by which i had come overnight.the houses seemed deserted. in the road lay a group of three charredbodies close together, struck dead by the heat-ray; and here and there were thingsthat people had dropped--a clock, a slipper, a silver spoon, and the like poorvaluables. at the corner turning up towards the postoffice a little cart, filled with boxes and
furniture, and horseless, heeled over on abroken wheel. a cash box had been hastily smashed openand thrown under the debris. except the lodge at the orphanage, whichwas still on fire, none of the houses had suffered very greatly here. the heat-ray had shaved the chimney topsand passed. yet, save ourselves, there did not seem tobe a living soul on maybury hill. the majority of the inhabitants hadescaped, i suppose, by way of the old woking road--the road i had taken when idrove to leatherhead--or they had hidden. we went down the lane, by the body of theman in black, sodden now from the overnight
hail, and broke into the woods at the footof the hill. we pushed through these towards the railwaywithout meeting a soul. the woods across the line were but thescarred and blackened ruins of woods; for the most part the trees had fallen, but acertain proportion still stood, dismal grey stems, with dark brown foliage instead ofgreen. on our side the fire had done no more thanscorch the nearer trees; it had failed to secure its footing. in one place the woodmen had been at workon saturday; trees, felled and freshly trimmed, lay in a clearing, with heaps ofsawdust by the sawing-machine and its
engine. hard by was a temporary hut, deserted.there was not a breath of wind this morning, and everything was strangelystill. even the birds were hushed, and as wehurried along i and the artilleryman talked in whispers and looked now and again overour shoulders. once or twice we stopped to listen. after a time we drew near the road, and aswe did so we heard the clatter of hoofs and saw through the tree stems three cavalrysoldiers riding slowly towards woking. we hailed them, and they halted while wehurried towards them.
it was a lieutenant and a couple ofprivates of the 8th hussars, with a stand like a theodolite, which the artillerymantold me was a heliograph. "you are the first men i've seen comingthis way this morning," said the lieutenant."what's brewing?" his voice and face were eager. the men behind him stared curiously.the artilleryman jumped down the bank into the road and saluted."gun destroyed last night, sir. have been hiding. trying to rejoin battery, sir.you'll come in sight of the martians, i
expect, about half a mile along this road.""what the dickens are they like?" asked the lieutenant. "giants in armour, sir.hundred feet high. three legs and a body like 'luminium, witha mighty great head in a hood, sir." "get out!" said the lieutenant. "what confounded nonsense!""you'll see, sir. they carry a kind of box, sir, that shootsfire and strikes you dead." "what d'ye mean--a gun?" "no, sir," and the artilleryman began avivid account of the heat-ray.
halfway through, the lieutenant interruptedhim and looked up at me. i was still standing on the bank by theside of the road. "it's perfectly true," i said."well," said the lieutenant, "i suppose it's my business to see it too. look here"--to the artilleryman--"we'redetailed here clearing people out of their houses. you'd better go along and report yourselfto brigadier-general marvin, and tell him all you know.he's at weybridge. know the way?"
"i do," i said; and he turned his horsesouthward again. "half a mile, you say?" said he."at most," i answered, and pointed over the treetops southward. he thanked me and rode on, and we saw themno more. farther along we came upon a group of threewomen and two children in the road, busy clearing out a labourer's cottage. they had got hold of a little hand truck,and were piling it up with unclean-looking bundles and shabby furniture.they were all too assiduously engaged to talk to us as we passed.
by byfleet station we emerged from the pinetrees, and found the country calm and peaceful under the morning sunlight. we were far beyond the range of the heat-ray there, and had it not been for the silent desertion of some of the houses, thestirring movement of packing in others, and the knot of soldiers standing on the bridge over the railway and staring down the linetowards woking, the day would have seemed very like any other sunday. several farm waggons and carts were movingcreakily along the road to addlestone, and suddenly through the gate of a field wesaw, across a stretch of flat meadow, six
twelve-pounders standing neatly at equaldistances pointing towards woking. the gunners stood by the guns waiting, andthe ammunition waggons were at a business- like distance. the men stood almost as if underinspection. "that's good!" said i."they will get one fair shot, at any rate." the artilleryman hesitated at the gate. "i shall go on," he said.farther on towards weybridge, just over the bridge, there were a number of men in whitefatigue jackets throwing up a long rampart, and more guns behind.
"it's bows and arrows against thelightning, anyhow," said the artilleryman. "they 'aven't seen that fire-beam yet." the officers who were not actively engagedstood and stared over the treetops southwestward, and the men digging wouldstop every now and again to stare in the same direction. byfleet was in a tumult; people packing,and a score of hussars, some of them dismounted, some on horseback, were huntingthem about. three or four black government waggons,with crosses in white circles, and an old omnibus, among other vehicles, were beingloaded in the village street.
there were scores of people, most of themsufficiently sabbatical to have assumed their best clothes. the soldiers were having the greatestdifficulty in making them realise the gravity of their position. we saw one shrivelled old fellow with ahuge box and a score or more of flower pots containing orchids, angrily expostulatingwith the corporal who would leave them i stopped and gripped his arm."do you know what's over there?" i said, pointing at the pine tops that hidthe martians. "eh?" said he, turning.
"i was explainin' these is vallyble.""death!" i shouted."death is coming! death!" and leaving him to digest that ifhe could, i hurried on after the artillery- man.at the corner i looked back. the soldier had left him, and he was stillstanding by his box, with the pots of orchids on the lid of it, and staringvaguely over the trees. no one in weybridge could tell us where theheadquarters were established; the whole place was in such confusion as i had neverseen in any town before. carts, carriages everywhere, the mostastonishing miscellany of conveyances and
horseflesh. the respectable inhabitants of the place,men in golf and boating costumes, wives prettily dressed, were packing, river-sideloafers energetically helping, children excited, and, for the most part, highly delighted at this astonishing variation oftheir sunday experiences. in the midst of it all the worthy vicar wasvery pluckily holding an early celebration, and his bell was jangling out above theexcitement. i and the artilleryman, seated on the stepof the drinking fountain, made a very passable meal upon what we had brought withus.
patrols of soldiers--here no longerhussars, but grenadiers in white--were warning people to move now or to takerefuge in their cellars as soon as the firing began. we saw as we crossed the railway bridgethat a growing crowd of people had assembled in and about the railway station,and the swarming platform was piled with boxes and packages. the ordinary traffic had been stopped, ibelieve, in order to allow of the passage of troops and guns to chertsey, and i haveheard since that a savage struggle occurred for places in the special trains that wereput on at a later hour.
we remained at weybridge until midday, andat that hour we found ourselves at the place near shepperton lock where the weyand thames join. part of the time we spent helping two oldwomen to pack a little cart. the wey has a treble mouth, and at thispoint boats are to be hired, and there was a ferry across the river. on the shepperton side was an inn with alawn, and beyond that the tower of shepperton church--it has been replaced bya spire--rose above the trees. here we found an excited and noisy crowd offugitives. as yet the flight had not grown to a panic,but there were already far more people than
all the boats going to and fro could enableto cross. people came panting along under heavyburdens; one husband and wife were even carrying a small outhouse door betweenthem, with some of their household goods piled thereon. one man told us he meant to try to get awayfrom shepperton station. there was a lot of shouting, and one manwas even jesting. the idea people seemed to have here wasthat the martians were simply formidable human beings, who might attack and sack thetown, to be certainly destroyed in the end. every now and then people would glancenervously across the wey, at the meadows
towards chertsey, but everything over therewas still. across the thames, except just where theboats landed, everything was quiet, in vivid contrast with the surrey side.the people who landed there from the boats went tramping off down the lane. the big ferryboat had just made a journey.three or four soldiers stood on the lawn of the inn, staring and jesting at thefugitives, without offering to help. the inn was closed, as it was now withinprohibited hours. "what's that?" cried a boatman, and "shutup, you fool!" said a man near me to a yelping dog.
then the sound came again, this time fromthe direction of chertsey, a muffled thud-- the sound of a gun.the fighting was beginning. almost immediately unseen batteries acrossthe river to our right, unseen because of the trees, took up the chorus, firingheavily one after the other. a woman screamed. everyone stood arrested by the sudden stirof battle, near us and yet invisible to us. nothing was to be seen save flat meadows,cows feeding unconcernedly for the most part, and silvery pollard willowsmotionless in the warm sunlight. "the sojers'll stop 'em," said a womanbeside me, doubtfully.
a haziness rose over the treetops. then suddenly we saw a rush of smoke faraway up the river, a puff of smoke that jerked up into the air and hung; andforthwith the ground heaved under foot and a heavy explosion shook the air, smashing two or three windows in the houses near,and leaving us astonished. "here they are!" shouted a man in a bluejersey. "yonder! d'yer see them?yonder!" quickly, one after the other, one, two,three, four of the armoured martians
appeared, far away over the little trees,across the flat meadows that stretched towards chertsey, and striding hurriedlytowards the river. little cowled figures they seemed at first,going with a rolling motion and as fast as flying birds. then, advancing obliquely towards us, camea fifth. their armoured bodies glittered in the sunas they swept swiftly forward upon the guns, growing rapidly larger as they drewnearer. one on the extreme left, the remotest thatis, flourished a huge case high in the air, and the ghostly, terrible heat-ray i hadalready seen on friday night smote towards
chertsey, and struck the town. at sight of these strange, swift, andterrible creatures the crowd near the water's edge seemed to me to be for amoment horror-struck. there was no screaming or shouting, but asilence. then a hoarse murmur and a movement offeet--a splashing from the water. a man, too frightened to drop theportmanteau he carried on his shoulder, swung round and sent me staggering with ablow from the corner of his burden. a woman thrust at me with her hand andrushed past me. i turned with the rush of the people, but iwas not too terrified for thought.
the terrible heat-ray was in my mind. to get under water!that was it! "get under water!"i shouted, unheeded. i faced about again, and rushed towards theapproaching martian, rushed right down the gravelly beach and headlong into the water.others did the same. a boatload of people putting back cameleaping out as i rushed past. the stones under my feet were muddy andslippery, and the river was so low that i ran perhaps twenty feet scarcely waist-deep. then, as the martian towered overheadscarcely a couple of hundred yards away, i
flung myself forward under the surface. the splashes of the people in the boatsleaping into the river sounded like thunderclaps in my ears.people were landing hastily on both sides of the river. but the martian machine took no more noticefor the moment of the people running this way and that than a man would of theconfusion of ants in a nest against which his foot has kicked. when, half suffocated, i raised my headabove water, the martian's hood pointed at the batteries that were still firing acrossthe river, and as it advanced it swung
loose what must have been the generator ofthe heat-ray. in another moment it was on the bank, andin a stride wading halfway across. the knees of its foremost legs bent at thefarther bank, and in another moment it had raised itself to its full height again,close to the village of shepperton. forthwith the six guns which, unknown toanyone on the right bank, had been hidden behind the outskirts of that village, firedsimultaneously. the sudden near concussion, the last closeupon the first, made my heart jump. the monster was already raising the casegenerating the heat-ray as the first shell burst six yards above the hood.
i gave a cry of astonishment.i saw and thought nothing of the other four martian monsters; my attention was rivetedupon the nearer incident. simultaneously two other shells burst inthe air near the body as the hood twisted round in time to receive, but not in timeto dodge, the fourth shell. the shell burst clean in the face of thething. the hood bulged, flashed, was whirled offin a dozen tattered fragments of red flesh and glittering metal. "hit!" shouted i, with something between ascream and a cheer. i heard answering shouts from the people inthe water about me.
i could have leaped out of the water withthat momentary exultation. the decapitated colossus reeled like adrunken giant; but it did not fall over. it recovered its balance by a miracle, and,no longer heeding its steps and with the camera that fired the heat-ray now rigidlyupheld, it reeled swiftly upon shepperton. the living intelligence, the martian withinthe hood, was slain and splashed to the four winds of heaven, and the thing was nowbut a mere intricate device of metal whirling to destruction. it drove along in a straight line,incapable of guidance. it struck the tower of shepperton church,smashing it down as the impact of a
battering ram might have done, swervedaside, blundered on and collapsed with tremendous force into the river out of mysight. a violent explosion shook the air, and aspout of water, steam, mud, and shattered metal shot far up into the sky. as the camera of the heat-ray hit thewater, the latter had immediately flashed into steam. in another moment a huge wave, like a muddytidal bore but almost scaldingly hot, came sweeping round the bend upstream. i saw people struggling shorewards, andheard their screaming and shouting faintly
above the seething and roar of themartian's collapse. for a moment i heeded nothing of the heat,forgot the patent need of self- preservation. i splashed through the tumultuous water,pushing aside a man in black to do so, until i could see round the bend.half a dozen deserted boats pitched aimlessly upon the confusion of the waves. the fallen martian came into sightdownstream, lying across the river, and for the most part submerged. thick clouds of steam were pouring off thewreckage, and through the tumultuously
whirling wisps i could see, intermittentlyand vaguely, the gigantic limbs churning the water and flinging a splash and sprayof mud and froth into the air. the tentacles swayed and struck like livingarms, and, save for the helpless purposelessness of these movements, it wasas if some wounded thing were struggling for its life amid the waves. enormous quantities of a ruddy-brown fluidwere spurting up in noisy jets out of the machine. my attention was diverted from this deathflurry by a furious yelling, like that of the thing called a siren in ourmanufacturing towns.
a man, knee-deep near the towing path,shouted inaudibly to me and pointed. looking back, i saw the other martiansadvancing with gigantic strides down the riverbank from the direction of chertsey. the shepperton guns spoke this timeunavailingly. at that i ducked at once under water, and,holding my breath until movement was an agony, blundered painfully ahead under thesurface as long as i could. the water was in a tumult about me, andrapidly growing hotter. when for a moment i raised my head to takebreath and throw the hair and water from my eyes, the steam was rising in a whirlingwhite fog that at first hid the martians
altogether. the noise was deafening.then i saw them dimly, colossal figures of grey, magnified by the mist. they had passed by me, and two werestooping over the frothing, tumultuous ruins of their comrade. the third and fourth stood beside him inthe water, one perhaps two hundred yards from me, the other towards laleham. the generators of the heat-rays waved high,and the hissing beams smote down this way and that.
the air was full of sound, a deafening andconfusing conflict of noises--the clangorous din of the martians, the crashof falling houses, the thud of trees, fences, sheds flashing into flame, and thecrackling and roaring of fire. dense black smoke was leaping up to minglewith the steam from the river, and as the heat-ray went to and fro over weybridge itsimpact was marked by flashes of incandescent white, that gave place at onceto a smoky dance of lurid flames. the nearer houses still stood intact,awaiting their fate, shadowy, faint and pallid in the steam, with the fire behindthem going to and fro. for a moment perhaps i stood there, breast-high in the almost boiling water,
dumbfounded at my position, hopeless ofescape. through the reek i could see the people whohad been with me in the river scrambling out of the water through the reeds, likelittle frogs hurrying through grass from the advance of a man, or running to and froin utter dismay on the towing path. then suddenly the white flashes of theheat-ray came leaping towards me. the houses caved in as they dissolved atits touch, and darted out flames; the trees changed to fire with a roar. the ray flickered up and down the towingpath, licking off the people who ran this way and that, and came down to the water'sedge not fifty yards from where i stood.
it swept across the river to shepperton,and the water in its track rose in a boiling weal crested with steam.i turned shoreward. in another moment the huge wave, well-nighat the boiling-point had rushed upon me. i screamed aloud, and scalded, halfblinded, agonised, i staggered through the leaping, hissing water towards the shore. had my foot stumbled, it would have beenthe end. i fell helplessly, in full sight of themartians, upon the broad, bare gravelly spit that runs down to mark the angle ofthe wey and thames. i expected nothing but death.
i have a dim memory of the foot of amartian coming down within a score of yards of my head, driving straight into the loosegravel, whirling it this way and that and lifting again; of a long suspense, and then of the four carrying the debris of theircomrade between them, now clear and then presently faint through a veil of smoke,receding interminably, as it seemed to me, across a vast space of river and meadow. and then, very slowly, i realised that by amiracle i had escaped.
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