The War of the Worlds Part 1

The War of the Worlds.

by H. G. Wells.

Introduction.

In 1895 Herbert George Wells learned to ride a bicycle. Hardly an unusual occurrence, for the twenty-nine-year-old Wells it represented a major accomplishment and a tremendous liberation. Wells had always been physically weak-his lungs hemorrhaged on more than one occasion-and he further punished his const.i.tution by cramming for examinations in order to extricate himself from abject poverty and boring jobs with no future. The bicycle, by 1895 so popular in England that manufacturers could not keep pace with demand, revealed to Wells and countless thousands of others that using a body-even a not especially strong body-to propel a machine could free them from dependence on collective modes of transportation. People could now travel at their own speed, wherever and whenever they chose.

The bicycle is also symbolic of Wells's solitary individuality-even later when he designed a tandem bicycle so he and his wife could ride together, he made sure he would do the steering. By becoming a writer, Wells liberated himself from family and employers, but like a bicyclist, his success depended entirely on his own efforts and willpower. If he crashed, he would have no one to blame but himself. In this sense, Wells is the ultimate expression of nineteenth-century individualism: the solitary Romantic at odds with things as they are, the visionary able to see things to which others are blind, the self-made man who owes nothing to anyone yet concerns himself with the future of all mankind.

Conscious that the industrial revolution had utterly transformed Europe, Wells became obsessed with the idea that society too could be made into a smoothly functioning, efficient, and productive machine. Aware, as relatively few were, of socialism, Wells was convinced that a new and better social order could be devised, though he did not believe in the "workers' paradise" utopia promised by Karl Marx (1818-1883). In fact, the nightmare future of The Time Machine (1895) is Wells's version of that Marxist utopia, a world where the former workers (the Morlocks) eat the former capitalist cla.s.s (the Eloi). Wells distrusted utopias precisely because he believed they deprive humanity of goals and render it complacent and, ultimately, stupid. His solution was unremitting work, production, and compet.i.tion.

Wells realized he was living in an age of transition and concluded that industrialization would invalidate traditional forms of government-from monarchy to democracy-but he was only too aware that technological advances would occur much more rapidly than would social evolution, that an undisciplined, anarchic humanity equipped with modern machines would be like a child playing with a loaded pistol. All of his writing has, then, a double focus: On the one hand, it points out the shortcomings of the current age, while on the other, it seeks to orient the present in the direction the author deems proper. So Wells is something very different from a prophet, who tells what the future will will be: He is a social planner who offers a model of what it should be. be: He is a social planner who offers a model of what it should be.

The differences between England in the late-nineteenth century-especially its last five years, when Wells produced The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), (1896), The Wheels of Chance The Wheels of Chance (1896), (1896), The Invisible Man The Invisible Man (1897), (1897), The War of the Worlds The War of the Worlds (1898), (1898), When the Sleeper Wakes When the Sleeper Wakes (1899), and (1899), and Love and Mr. Lewisham Love and Mr. Lewisham (1900), along with myriad short stories and journalistic essays-and England after World War I are radical. From today's perspective, England in 1895 is an only partially modern country: There was gas for lighting, at least in munic.i.p.al areas, and a rail network that connected the entire country. This meant that while Wells could get to London from Woking by train, he would still have to rely on horse-drawn carriages for local travel. This was true even in London and applied as well to the transportation of goods and objects, so the nineteenth century actually ended at the railroad station, and an earlier age began just outside it. (1900), along with myriad short stories and journalistic essays-and England after World War I are radical. From today's perspective, England in 1895 is an only partially modern country: There was gas for lighting, at least in munic.i.p.al areas, and a rail network that connected the entire country. This meant that while Wells could get to London from Woking by train, he would still have to rely on horse-drawn carriages for local travel. This was true even in London and applied as well to the transportation of goods and objects, so the nineteenth century actually ended at the railroad station, and an earlier age began just outside it.

This simple fact marks just one of the significant differences between life in the late 1800s and what it would become over the course of the next half-century. If, like Wells's Time Traveller, we could visit London in 1895, we would be shocked at its utter filthiness and dismayed by streets fouled with the manure of countless horses, making walking fetid and hazardous. We would quickly discover that the water supply, especially in densely populated areas, was dangerous, since modern sewage systems required extensive and expensive construction no government was prepared to finance. The poor, the vast majority of the population, lived thoroughly unhealthy and, usually, short lives. They had no sanitary facilities, drew water from public pumps, and bathed very infrequently. Consequently, lice, fleas, and other parasites were commonplace, as were the diseases they transmitted. This, coupled with air made opaque by coal smoke (the famous London fog), made urban life uncomfortable and poisonous. With the gradual development of pure water delivery systems, sewage systems, standards of hygiene, and public health inspections, the quality of life improved for everyone, but chamber pots, which we are likely to regard as ancient, quaint artifacts, remained in common use, especially in the country, until well into the twentieth century. Here is Wells, in his 1907 suite of socialist essays New Worlds for Old, New Worlds for Old, commenting on the 1905 Report of the Education Committee of the London County Council: commenting on the 1905 Report of the Education Committee of the London County Council: Taking want of personal cleanliness as the next indication of neglect at home [he'd already commented on the inadequate clothing worn by poor children], 11 per cent of the boys are reported as "very dirty and verminous." ... Eleven per cent verminous; think what it means! Think what the homes must be like from which these poor little wretches come! Better perhaps than the country cottage where the cesspool drains into the water-supply and the henhouse vermin invades the home, but surely intolerable beside our comforts.1 These public health problems, along with alcoholism, a problem as serious then as drug abuse is today, infuriated Wells because he thought social management and technology could eliminate them. But it would be a mistake to think Wells felt sorry for the poor because he had lived in poverty as a boy and felt he could better their lot. Actually, he felt contempt for the poor and, by 1895, has left his poverty behind forever: He earns almost 800 pounds per year from his writing, enough to put him solidly in the middle cla.s.s. But he does have expenses: He is freshly divorced from his first wife, Isabel, and paying her 100 pounds per year in alimony. He is also supporting his parents-another 60 pounds. To make ends meet, to have a larger living s.p.a.ce, and to exempt himself from a too-busy social life that distracted him from his almost superhuman writing schedule, he moves to the county of Surrey-just southwest of London County and bordered on the north by the river Thames-and resides in the town of Woking on the London and South-Western railway line. It is in Woking that he produces his bicycling novel The Wheels of Chance, as well The Wheels of Chance, as well as as The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, and any number of short pieces, fiction and nonfiction. Wells describes his move to Woking in his 1934 and any number of short pieces, fiction and nonfiction. Wells describes his move to Woking in his 1934 Experiment in Autobiography: Experiment in Autobiography: Our withdrawal to Woking was a fairly cheerful adventure. Woking was the site of the first crematorium but few of our friends made more than five or six jokes about that. We borrowed a hundred pounds by a mortgage on Mrs. Robbins' [his mother-in-law] house in Putney and with that hundred pounds, believe it or not, we furnished a small resolute semi-detached villa with a minute greenhouse in the Maybury Road facing the railway line, where all night long the goods trains shunted and b.u.mped and clattered-without serious effect upon our healthy slumbers....In all directions stretched open and undeveloped heath land, so that we could walk and presently learn to ride bicycles and restore our broken contact with the open air. There I planned and wrote the War of the Worlds, War of the Worlds, the the Wheels of Chance and the Invisible Man. Wheels of Chance and the Invisible Man. I learnt to ride my bicycle upon sandy tracks with none but G.o.d to help me; he chastened me considerably in the process, and after a fall one day I wrote down a description of the state of my legs which became the opening chapter of the I learnt to ride my bicycle upon sandy tracks with none but G.o.d to help me; he chastened me considerably in the process, and after a fall one day I wrote down a description of the state of my legs which became the opening chapter of the Wheels of Chance. Wheels of Chance.2 The poverty of his early years-like the protagonist of The Wheels of Chance, The Wheels of Chance, he was apprenticed to a draper in 1880, worked a seventy-hour week, lived in a dormitory, and ate unhealthy food-coupled with his scientific training at the Normal School of Science, where he was a scholars.h.i.+p student, made him acutely aware of the shortcomings of sanitary conditions in England, so that when he oversaw the construction of his first house, Spade House, in 1900, he made certain it would be as modern a structure as possible, especially with regard to plumbing. he was apprenticed to a draper in 1880, worked a seventy-hour week, lived in a dormitory, and ate unhealthy food-coupled with his scientific training at the Normal School of Science, where he was a scholars.h.i.+p student, made him acutely aware of the shortcomings of sanitary conditions in England, so that when he oversaw the construction of his first house, Spade House, in 1900, he made certain it would be as modern a structure as possible, especially with regard to plumbing.

Knowing exactly where Wells lived in 1895 is essential for an understanding of The War of the Worlds The War of the Worlds because he minutely explored the area around Woking by bicycle and made it the setting for his romance, as he says in a letter in which he comments on the first, magazine version of the novel: because he minutely explored the area around Woking by bicycle and made it the setting for his romance, as he says in a letter in which he comments on the first, magazine version of the novel: I'm doing the dearest little serial for Pearson's new magazine in which I completely wreck and sack Woking-killing my neighbors in painful and eccentric ways-then proceed via Kingston and Richmond to London, which I sack, selecting South Kensington for feats of peculiar atrocity.3 Once again, as he had in The Invisible Man, The Invisible Man, Wells would create a situation in which the world right outside the door is invaded by a totally fantastic agency. This is his literary masterstroke in Wells would create a situation in which the world right outside the door is invaded by a totally fantastic agency. This is his literary masterstroke in The War of the Worlds, The War of the Worlds, making ba.n.a.l reality into something terrifying, a technique that contrasts vividly with his modus operandi in, for example, making ba.n.a.l reality into something terrifying, a technique that contrasts vividly with his modus operandi in, for example, The Time Machine or When the Sleeper Wakes, The Time Machine or When the Sleeper Wakes, where a character from Wells's present is magically transported to the future. In those works, Wells's social message is more overt, while in novels like where a character from Wells's present is magically transported to the future. In those works, Wells's social message is more overt, while in novels like The Invisible Man or The War of the Worlds The Invisible Man or The War of the Worlds the reader is caught up in the combination of the everyday and the bizarre. Small wonder Orson Welles ( 1915-1985) caused panic and ma.s.s hysteria in October 1938, when he transposed the reader is caught up in the combination of the everyday and the bizarre. Small wonder Orson Welles ( 1915-1985) caused panic and ma.s.s hysteria in October 1938, when he transposed The War of the Worlds The War of the Worlds to New Jersey for a Halloween radio program. to New Jersey for a Halloween radio program.

What Wells constantly suggests is that reality in 1895 England is a paradox. For example, the nation where the industrial revolution was born lacked a uniform electrical grid. This meant that only parts of London had electricity and that outside of London people had to use gas and oil lamps for lighting. The reasons why electrification in England lagged so far behind Germany and the United States are complex but probably relate to public distrust of utility monopolies. During the nineteenth century, concessions to railroad companies, then gas companies, then water companies meant that owners of land saw huge chunks of their property ceded to private companies. Finally, they resisted, and the result, beginning in 1882 with the Electrical Lighting Act, was a series of retrograde measures that hamstrung national electrification.

This situation, in which local interests-private property and personal animosities-thwart something that is an obvious advantage to the entire community, is the kind of dilemma Wells understood to be absurd. If electrical power is good for all, then, Wells would argue, it should be brought in as soon as possible. The welfare of all must take precedence over the welfare of the few, though soon enough Wells began to see that some members of society were more important than others, that a technocratic elite not only had the right but the obligation to run society.

His most important statements about the future appear in Antic.i.p.ations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Antic.i.p.ations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Progress upon Human Life and Thought Human Life and Thought (1902). This is Wells writing what we might call "futurology," probable changes in human life and society that flow logically, at least from the author's point of view, from the current situation. Wells's hopes for the future-these articles are, after all, speculations and not prophecies-reside on a single principle: that future society, which Wells calls the "New Republic," will be governed by a confederation of technocrats scientifically trained to deal with a world where economic globalization is a fact of life. (1902). This is Wells writing what we might call "futurology," probable changes in human life and society that flow logically, at least from the author's point of view, from the current situation. Wells's hopes for the future-these articles are, after all, speculations and not prophecies-reside on a single principle: that future society, which Wells calls the "New Republic," will be governed by a confederation of technocrats scientifically trained to deal with a world where economic globalization is a fact of life.

These New Republicans will not be benevolent but pragmatic. For example, they will regard war not as a conflict between armies but one between peoples. This is the "total war" Adolph Hitler ( 1889-1945) put into practice, an idea that includes not only military campaigns but the actual right to exist of "inferior people," whole races Wells views as excluded from the technological domination of nature. As he himself says: And how will the New Republic treat the inferior races? How will it deal with the black? how will it deal with the yellow man? how will it tackle that alleged termite in the civilized woodwork, the Jew? Certainly not as races at all. It will aim to establish, and it will at last, though probably only after a second century has pa.s.sed, establish a world-state with a common language and a common rule. It will, I have said, make the multiplication of those who fall behind a certain standard of social efficiency unpleasant and difficult.... The Jew will probably lose much of his particularism, intermarry with Gentiles, and cease to be a physically distinct element in human affairs in a century or so. But much of his moral tradition will, I hope, never die.... And for the rest, those swarms of black, and brown, and dirty-white, and yellow people, who do not come into the new needs of efficiency? Well, the world is a world, not a charitable inst.i.tution, and I take it they will have to go.4 This astonis.h.i.+ng pa.s.sage, in which the phrase "have to go" sanctions genocide, reminds us that the difference between one kind of totalitarianism and another is more a matter of nuance than ideology. That is, Wells deals in words, not acts, but the twentieth century would see Hitler and Josef Stalin (1879-1953) put ideas into practice that resemble Wells's notions with harrowing results. Wells's racism, unlike that of Hitler, does not derive from any discernable biological theory of racial superiority-though his sweeping statement about "swarms of black, and brown, and dirty-white, and yellow people" strongly suggests it-but from the idea that only an educated elite has the right to govern, while the obligation of the ma.s.ses is to serve. Those who do not qualify for a place in the New Republic will have to be exterminated, not out of cruelty but out of a twisted kind of altruism: If they are truly unfit, they only waste resources and pollute the society of the new elite.

This new society will a.s.sert itself through violence. Wells notes that the New Republic will flourish in times of peace, but that it develops "only very painfully and slowly, amidst these growing and yet disintegrating ma.s.ses." Its development will accelerate because war is inevitable and, along with it, "the absolute determination evident in the scheme of things to smash such a body [society as it is], under the hammer of war, that must finally bring about rapidly and under pressure the same result as that to which the peaceful evolution slowly tends."5 While this advocacy of violence is shocking, it is nevertheless the hallmark of the twentieth century's most prominent forms of totalitarianism, fascism and Marxism-Leninism. While each puts into practice at least some of Wells's ideas, they are different because they correspond to specific national and cultural contexts and histories. Wells's ultimate hope is to move mankind (at least what he would call the best of it) beyond the nation state into a single corporate nation with one language and a single purpose. While this advocacy of violence is shocking, it is nevertheless the hallmark of the twentieth century's most prominent forms of totalitarianism, fascism and Marxism-Leninism. While each puts into practice at least some of Wells's ideas, they are different because they correspond to specific national and cultural contexts and histories. Wells's ultimate hope is to move mankind (at least what he would call the best of it) beyond the nation state into a single corporate nation with one language and a single purpose.

Wells is the product of a peculiar moment in Western history. Between 1814, the final defeat of Napoleon, and 1914, the outbreak of World War I, there is a century of relative peace for Europeans. There are international conflicts (the Crimean War of 1853-1856, the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871, and the Boer War of 1899-1902) as well as myriad internal and civil clashes (uprisings all over Europe in 1848 and the American Civil War of 1861-1865, for example), but none of these compares to World War I in terms of casualties, destruction, and collective demoralization. It may well be, giving him the benefit of the doubt, that Wells had no clear grasp of the full meaning of what he was advocating in the name of social rationalization, but the fact is that his proposals-genocide, the subordination of individual rights to the needs of the state, and the concept of total war-are all too familiar to those born during the twentieth century. It is certainly the case that Wells's hideously radical thought makes most of us cringe, but we must also remember that everything he wrote was echoed, repeated, and, unfortunately, practiced by others.

Antic.i.p.ations was not one of Wells's popular books, but its retrospective importance with regard to The War of the Worlds The War of the Worlds is immense. Wells could not create his New Republic anywhere in the real world, so he caused it to take place in the realm of the imagination. is immense. Wells could not create his New Republic anywhere in the real world, so he caused it to take place in the realm of the imagination. The War of the Worlds The War of the Worlds is nothing more or less than the attempt of an alien New Republic to take control of the world as it is. Whenever novelists or filmmakers imagine alien races, they conceive them as racially h.o.m.ogeneous and all speaking the same language. Wells's Martians all look exactly alike, speak the same language, and act like the moving parts of a vast machine. is nothing more or less than the attempt of an alien New Republic to take control of the world as it is. Whenever novelists or filmmakers imagine alien races, they conceive them as racially h.o.m.ogeneous and all speaking the same language. Wells's Martians all look exactly alike, speak the same language, and act like the moving parts of a vast machine.

The Martians were born from an article Wells published in November 1893 in the Pall Mall Budget, Pall Mall Budget, "The Man of the Year Million." This semi-satirical piece applies the concept of evolution postulated by Charles Darwin ( 1809-1882) and popularized by the one professor at the Normal School of Science Wells idolized, Thomas Huxley (1825-1895). While evolution is the subject of the essay, the style derives from Thomas Carlyle ( 1795-1881), one of Wells's favorite writers and author of "The Man of the Year Million." This semi-satirical piece applies the concept of evolution postulated by Charles Darwin ( 1809-1882) and popularized by the one professor at the Normal School of Science Wells idolized, Thomas Huxley (1825-1895). While evolution is the subject of the essay, the style derives from Thomas Carlyle ( 1795-1881), one of Wells's favorite writers and author of Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr of Herr Teufelsdrockh Teufelsdrockh ( 1833-1834), and Carl ( 1833-1834), and Carlyle was himself influenced by yet another of Wells's favorites, Laurence Sterne ( 1713-1768), author of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1759-1767). In the case of Carlyle, the name "Teufelsdrockh" means "devil's dung" in German, while his t.i.tle, (1759-1767). In the case of Carlyle, the name "Teufelsdrockh" means "devil's dung" in German, while his t.i.tle, Sartor Resartus, Sartor Resartus, means "The Tailor Re-tailored." In turn, Wells claims to be presenting the ideas of Professor Holzkopf (Professor Wooden Head) who teaches at the University of Wessnictwo ("I don't know where"). means "The Tailor Re-tailored." In turn, Wells claims to be presenting the ideas of Professor Holzkopf (Professor Wooden Head) who teaches at the University of Wessnictwo ("I don't know where").

The man of the future, says Professor Holzkopf, will have a larger brain than he does now, and his body will atrophy, except for his hands, which will grow stronger and more dexterous. Human evolution will bring a simplification of the body, so the ears, nose, brow ridges, and feet will disappear. Digestion, often an arduous process, will also be replaced: Humans will simply immerse themselves in nutritious fluids and absorb nourishment. To move, they will use their hands to hop over a world devoid of harmful bacteria, devoid of plants and animals, a world inhabited only by humans. The comic magazine Punch Punch published a mocking poem on Wells's article, and his readers understood that his facetious tone concealed genuine speculation about human evolution, a theme calculated to arouse the fury of Darwin's many enemies. published a mocking poem on Wells's article, and his readers understood that his facetious tone concealed genuine speculation about human evolution, a theme calculated to arouse the fury of Darwin's many enemies.

Wells's "man of the year million" is remarkably similar to the Martians in The War of the Worlds: The War of the Worlds: They were huge round bodies-or, rather, heads-about four feet in diameter, each body having in front of it a face. This face had no nostrils-indeed the Martians do not seem to have had any sense of smell, but it had a pair of very large dark-coloured eyes, and just beneath this a kind of fleshy beak. In the back of this head or body ... was the single tight tympanic surface, since known to be anatomically an ear.... In a group round the mouth were sixteen slender, almost whiplike tentacles, arranged in two bunches of eight each. These bunches have since been named rather aptly... the hands hands (pp.141-142). (pp.141-142).

The Martians derive nourishment from human blood, which they inject directly into their bodies. They require no sleep, never tire, work twenty-four hours a day, wear no clothes, reproduce by budding instead of s.e.xual intercourse, and communicate telepathically. In short, they are the hyper-efficient descendants of the founders of Wells's New Republic.

Wells imposes on them an absolutely desperate situation: Mars is rapidly cooling and will no longer be able to support life. The Martians must either die or migrate to another planet. They attempt to colonize Earth. Wells solves their transportation problem by resorting to a device conceived by Jules Verne (1828-1905), author of From the Earth to the Moon of From the Earth to the Moon (1865), the supercannon that fires a projectile-s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p. Somehow, the Martians survive the recoil of launching and then emerge unscathed from the crash of the projectile into Earth. Another amazing feat is the precision of the Martians' aim: Even though three-quarters of Earth's surface is water, they manage to place all their projectiles in and around Woking. Just these gross improbabilities should suffice to show that Wells, unlike Verne, is writing not science fiction but social allegory. (1865), the supercannon that fires a projectile-s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p. Somehow, the Martians survive the recoil of launching and then emerge unscathed from the crash of the projectile into Earth. Another amazing feat is the precision of the Martians' aim: Even though three-quarters of Earth's surface is water, they manage to place all their projectiles in and around Woking. Just these gross improbabilities should suffice to show that Wells, unlike Verne, is writing not science fiction but social allegory.

In allegory, the literal level-what actually happens in the text's action-is the first tier in the work's meaning. Dante ( 1265-1321 ) in The Divine Comedy The Divine Comedy is aided by Virgil, who leads him to Beatrice. Dante is real (the literal level), but he is also a kind of Everyman, helped by reason (Virgil) and then grace (Beatrice) to attain salvation. Wells doesn't need such a complicated apparatus. In fact, the literal level dominates most of the novel, and the Martians are the only element that demands multiple readings. is aided by Virgil, who leads him to Beatrice. Dante is real (the literal level), but he is also a kind of Everyman, helped by reason (Virgil) and then grace (Beatrice) to attain salvation. Wells doesn't need such a complicated apparatus. In fact, the literal level dominates most of the novel, and the Martians are the only element that demands multiple readings.

Within Wells's personal interpretation of evolution, the Martians are what humans will be thousands of centuries into the future. They are also an implacable outside force that galvanizes the anarchic body of mankind into a collective response. They are, then, any crisis that threatens humanity and that will stimulate the formation of a totally organized collective state designed to protect the future of all people. Their s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps, their weapons (they use a heat-ray, poison gas, and fighting machines), are nothing more than imaginative projections, Wells's way of providing his intervening agency with the means to destroy the old order of society.

The Martians also reflect Wells himself. Just as the bicycle liberated Wells from the limitations of a weak body, the machines used by the Martians, who are weighed down because the pull of gravity is stronger on Earth than it is on Mars, enable them to move swiftly and attack without warning. The machine is an extension of a body, a kind of prosthetic device that supplies an ability the body lacks. The Martian sitting on top of a huge, three-legged fighting machine striding across Surrey toward London resembles nothing so much as Wells piloting his bicycle around the countryside. And the Martians, like Wells, tend to work alone. That is, while they are involved in a collective activity-the invasion and conquest of England, which is, by extension, the world-they work alone in their fighting machines or their aluminum manufacturing devices. Except for their time in the s.p.a.ce capsule, they are rarely together.

Wells's first problem was to decide how to tell such a tale. He could use an external, omniscient narrator, but that would cut down on the immediacy of the action and make it seem much more like history. A single first-person narrator would be possible, but that person would have to travel long distances at almost superhuman speed in order to see everything involved in the Martian invasion. Wells opts for a device Robert Louis Stevenson ( 1850-1894) uses in Treasure Island (1883), having a first-person narrative become two first-person narratives by introducing a second character who tells us about what happened elsewhere. This is, admittedly, an awkward device because the two characters-brothers in The War of the Worlds The War of the Worlds-are not in communication with each other. Their separate stories become a single story because the primary narrator takes control of his brother's tale, treating him in the same way an omniscient narrator would treat a character.

The primary narrator, then, is both witness and author, a modification of the narrator of The Time Machine, The Time Machine, who transcribes the story of the Time Traveller. The personality of this narrator is a vexing matter, and it is here Wells departs from traditional novelistic practice. Wells clearly had many options in this situation: He could make his nondescript, suburban science writer into a hero by having him either subdue the Martians or lay the foundations for an - organized defense. That solution does not suit Wells's hidden intention, which is to warn those people capable of understanding that their world is rotten and will fall at the first blow from an outside force. who transcribes the story of the Time Traveller. The personality of this narrator is a vexing matter, and it is here Wells departs from traditional novelistic practice. Wells clearly had many options in this situation: He could make his nondescript, suburban science writer into a hero by having him either subdue the Martians or lay the foundations for an - organized defense. That solution does not suit Wells's hidden intention, which is to warn those people capable of understanding that their world is rotten and will fall at the first blow from an outside force.

Wells does what in both human and novelistic terms makes the most sense: He makes his narrator a man of science, but a conventional thinker and not a man in the line of the Time Traveller. He is not a leader, not a warrior, but a man imbued with curiosity. He wants to understand the Martians, wants to observe their machines, and wants to survive to tell the tale. His psychological depth is slight: He loves his wife, detests the mad clergyman who almost manages to deliver him to the Martians, feels guilt about being responsible for the man's death, and has a nervous breakdown after learning that the Martians all die because of Earth's bacteria. The second central figure, the narrator's brother, is no more developed than the narrator. He is a "medical student, working for an imminent examination" (p. 83), but that is all we know of him. When, in the final chapter of book one, Wells feels he no longer needs the brother, he simply has him board a s.h.i.+p, witness a navy vessel ram two Martian fighting machines, and sail to Europe. We then return to the adventures of our primary narrator.

This sacrifice of character depth to action explains the success of The War of the Worlds. If Wells had transformed his narrator into a preachy precursor of his New Republicans, the reader would probably begin to cheer for the Martians. Instead, he uses both brothers as innocent points of view, reporters telling us what they saw. That they have emotions is merely incidental to their role as informants.

Wells relegates his ideas to the minor characters, carefully linking them to human imperfections so that the novel does not degenerate into sermon or essay. Probably the most interesting example of this is the artilleryman. In book one, chapter 11, the narrator, hiding inside his Woking house, sees a man trying to escape the Martians. He invites the man in and learns he is a soldier, "a driver in the artillery" (p. 62) whose unit has been wiped out by the Martians. The two separate in chapter 12, and we think we've seen the last of the artilleryman-until suddenly in book two, chapter 7, he reappears, and now it is he who extends hospitality to the narrator.

The artilleryman tells the narrator the Martians have developed a flying machine, information that sends the narrator into a depression. The artilleryman scoffs at his sadness and tells him he intends to survive. He has a plan for moving a community of survivors underground, into the drains below London. But who will be in that community? First, "able-bodied, clean-minded men" (p. 177), then: Able-bodied, clean-minded women we want also-mothers and teachers. No lackadaisical ladies-no blasted rolling eyes. We can't have any weak or silly. Life is real again, and the useless and c.u.mbersome and mischievous have to die. They ought to die. They ought to be willing to die. It's a sort of disloyalty, after all, to live and taint the race (p. 177).

This new underground race will be trained in science-"not novels and poetry swipes, but ideas, science books" (p. 177)-in order to be able to combat the Martians and, ultimately, to a.s.similate their knowledge. The narrator is at first astounded at the rationality of the artilleryman's program, but soon he notices flaws, not in the plan but in the artilleryman himself. He is a drunkard. Does this invalidate his ideas? Not in the slightest, but it does suggest that he is not the right person to put them into practice. With the benefit of hindsight we might suppose the right person would be Wells himself, since what the artilleryman says coincides so closely with what Wells espouses in Antic.i.p.ations. Antic.i.p.ations.

Three other figures stand out in the novel: the curate, Miss Elphinstone, and a "bearded, eagle-faced man." The curate appears in book one, chapter 13, and stays with the narrator-whose adventures are interrupted by the chapters dedicated to the narrator's brother-until book two, chapter 4. The curate represents everything wrong with the traditional order of society. He is a clergyman, automatically a target for Wells's anticlericalism, but worse than that, he is incapable of accepting that the "rules" as he understands them no longer apply, that the Martian invasion has turned yesterday's reality into a dream.

Wells's depiction of the curate is virtually a parody of the self-satisfied, complacent social conformist: His face was a fair weakness, his chin retreated, and his hair lay in crisp, almost flaxen curls on his low forehead; his eyes were rather large, pale blue, and blankly staring (p. 80).

In the context of Wells's writing the curate is a late-nineteenth-century version of the Eloi the Time Traveller finds in the distant future. They too are blond, doll-like, and self-satisfied. Their fate is to be eaten by the Morlocks. The curate is more complex. First, he tries to fit the Martian invasion into his intellectual-that is, theological-training: "Why are these things permitted? What sins have we done? The morning service was over, I was walking through the roads to clear my brain for the afternoon, and then-fire, earthquake, death! As if it were Sodom and Gomorrah! All our work undone, all the work-What are these Martians?" (p. 80).

The narrator can only respond with a question of his own: "What are we?" To understand new phenomena by automatically relating them to a code handed down from the past is, Wells a.s.serts, impossible. The Martians are not a divine judgment but an invading force that must be understood and fought.

In the chapter that recounts his death, the curate has become a madman, alternating between fits of gluttony, in which he consumes as much food as he can, and religious hysteria, in which he blames himself for what has happened: "It is just. On me and mine be the punishment laid. We have sinned, we have fallen short. There was poverty, sorrow; the poor were trodden in the dust, and I held my peace. I preached acceptable folly-my G.o.d, what folly!-when I should have stood up, though I died for it, and called upon them to repent-repent! ... Oppressors of the poor and needy ... !" (p. 156).

Even in this madness we detect a thread of criticism that leads straight to Wells: The Church should be at the service of the poor, but it merely serves the status quo. Like all other inst.i.tutions of the pre-Martian world, it will have to be replaced. When the curate's shrieking threatens to reveal their position to the Martians, the narrator has no choice but to silence him. He knocks him out, but before he can do anything to save him, a Martian sends in a metallic tentacle that drags the curate to his doom. His blood will be food for the Martian.

Miss Elphinstone and the "bearded, eagle-faced man" are very different but absolutely important elements in Wells's vision. Both appear in the chapters in which the princ.i.p.al actor is the narrator's medical student brother. As he makes his escape from London, the brother becomes an accidental hero. Three men are attacking two women riding in a small carriage pulled by a pony. Wells's initial description of the scene is critical: One of the ladies, a short woman dressed in white, was simply screaming; the other, a dark, slender figure, slashed at the man who gripped her arm with a whip she held in her disengaged hand (p. 106).

The woman screaming (Mrs. Elphinstone) is a female version of the curate, unable to react rationally to the situation, incapable of saving herself. The other woman (Miss Elphinstone, sister to Mrs. Elphinstone's husband) not only tries to save herself but actually comes to the aid of the brother when he finds himself facing two a.s.sailants: He would have had little chance against them had not the slender lady very pluckily pulled up and returned to his help. It seems she had had a revolver.... She fired at six yards' distance, narrowly missing my brother (p. 107).

Miss Elphinstone embodies the artilleryman's idea of the "able-bodied, clean-minded" woman who will be a partner to the man of the new society. By working together, the brother and Miss Elphinstone save not only themselves-they board a s.h.i.+p bound for Ostend that takes them not only out of England but out of the novel as well-but also the incompetent Mrs. Elphinstone. Wells's vision of the new woman is that of a self-reliant, independent individual, able to think and act on her own, no longer the "inferior vessel" of past ages.

The "bearded, eagle-faced man" is a problematic image for modern readers. As the brother and the two Elphinstone women make their way toward the sea, they run into a throng of refugees: Then my brother's attention was distracted by a bearded, eagle-faced man lugging a small handbag, which split even as my brother's eyes rested on it and disgorged a ma.s.s of sovereigns that seemed to break up into separate coins as it struck the ground. They rolled hither and thither among the struggling feet of men and horses. The man stopped and looked stupidly at the heap, and the shaft of a cab struck his shoulder and sent him reeling (p. 114).

This man is Wells's caricature Jew, running for his life but unable to see that money is not going to be his salvation. When his bag bursts and his gold coins spill onto the highway, he risks his life trying to save his money. The brother tries to save the man, whose back is broken when he is run over by a carriage. But even as the brother tries to pull the fatally injured man out of traffic: "My brother looked up, and the man with the gold twisted his head round and bit the wrist that held his collar" (p. 115). His love of gold far outweighs his instinct to survive. This is Wells's version of the anti-Semitism common in England at the time, that Jews were money-grubbing monsters who cared for nothing but gold. It is an unfortunate side of an author so liberal and clear-thinking in so many other areas, but one we must see if we are to have a clear image of the man and his writing.

The War of the Worlds is remarkable for its economy. All of the action takes place in a two-week period, with a three-day coda when the narrator has a nervous breakdown (book two, chapter 9) after the Martians fall victim to bacterial infection. The narrator recovers, makes his way home to Woking, and there finds his wife. It would seem the circle closes, that life returns to normalcy, that the Martian threat will fade from memory, and that complacency will reign again. But this is not so. In his epilogue (book two, chapter 10), the narrator shows that human history has been irrevocably changed: At any rate, whether we expect another invasion or not, our views of the human future must be greatly modified by these events. We have learned now that we cannot regard this planet as being fenced in and a secure abiding place for Man; we can never antic.i.p.ate the unseen good or evil that may come upon us suddenly out of s.p.a.ce. It may be that in the larger design of the universe this invasion from Mars is not without its ultimate benefit for men; it has robbed us of that serene confidence in the future which is the most fruitful source of decadence, the gifts to human science it has brought are enormous, and it has done much to promote the conception of the commonweal of mankind (p. 201).

The Martian invasion may, Wells a.s.serts, spur us into being prepared for any eventuality, stimulate our scientific research, and make us realize the dire need for world government-as happened later when the threat of nuclear holocaust hovered over the world after World War II. The death of thousands may be a small price if the result is the salvation of the human race.

Whether we read The War of the Worlds as The War of the Worlds as a sociopolitical allegory (Wells's obvious intention) or as a tale of high adventure (action often speaks louder than ideas), we have here a novel we can enjoy at many levels at many times in our lives. In 1946 the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges ( 1899-1986) wrote on the occasion of Wells's death about the impact Wells's early works had on him, saying: a sociopolitical allegory (Wells's obvious intention) or as a tale of high adventure (action often speaks louder than ideas), we have here a novel we can enjoy at many levels at many times in our lives. In 1946 the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges ( 1899-1986) wrote on the occasion of Wells's death about the impact Wells's early works had on him, saying: They are the first books I ever read; perhaps they will be the last ... I think they are destined to become part ... of the collective memory of humanity and that they will multiply in that setting beyond the limits of the glory of the man who wrote them, beyond the death of the language in which they were written.6 Alfred Mac Adam, a professor at Barnard College-Columbia University, teaches Latin American and comparative literature. He is a translator of Latin American fiction and writes extensively on art. Between 1984 and 2002, Mac Adam was the editor of Review: Latin American Literature and Arts, Review: Latin American Literature and Arts, a publication of the Americas Society. a publication of the Americas Society.

Notes to the Introduction

1 H. G. Wells, "The Good Will in Man," in H. G. Wells, "The Good Will in Man," in New Worlds for Old, New Worlds for Old, New York: Macmillan, 1908, p. 13. New York: Macmillan, 1908, p. 13.

2 H. G. Wells, H. G. Wells, Experiment in Autobiography: Discoveries and Conclusions of a Very Ordinary Brain Experiment in Autobiography: Discoveries and Conclusions of a Very Ordinary Brain (Since 1866), vol. 2, London: Victor Gollancz, 1934, p. 543. (Since 1866), vol. 2, London: Victor Gollancz, 1934, p. 543.

3 Quoted in H. G. Quoted in H. G. Wells: A Biography, Wells: A Biography, by Norman and Jeanne Mackenzie, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1973, p. 113. by Norman and Jeanne Mackenzie, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1973, p. 113.

4 H. G. Wells, "The Faith of the New Republic," in H. G. Wells, "The Faith of the New Republic," in Antic.i.p.ations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought, Antic.i.p.ations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought, London: Chapman and Hall, 1902, pp. 315, 317. London: Chapman and Hall, 1902, pp. 315, 317.

5 Antic.i.p.ations, Antic.i.p.ations, p. 211. p. 211.

6 Jorge Luis Borges, "El primer Wells," in Jorge Luis Borges, "El primer Wells," in Jorge Jorge Luis Luis Borges, Ficcionario: Una Antologia de Borges, Ficcionario: Una Antologia de Sus Textos, edited by Emir Rodriguez Monegal, Mexico: Fondo de Cultura Economica, 1981, p. 223 [my translation]. Sus Textos, edited by Emir Rodriguez Monegal, Mexico: Fondo de Cultura Economica, 1981, p. 223 [my translation].

But who shall dwell in these worlds if they be inhabited? ... Are we or they Lords of the World? ... And how are all things made for man?

-KEPLER (quoted in The Anatomy of Melancholy)

BOOK ONE.

THE COMING OF THE MARTIANS.

Chapter 1.

The Eve of the War.

No ONE WOULD HAVE believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own:1 that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their a.s.surance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoria that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their a.s.surance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoriaa under the microscope do the same. No one gave a thought to the older worlds of s.p.a.ce under the microscope do the same. No one gave a thought to the older worlds of s.p.a.ce2 as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable. It is curious to recall some of the mental habits of those departed days. At most, terrestrial men fancied there might be other men upon Mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise. Yet across the gulf of s.p.a.ce, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. And early in the twentieth century came the great disillusionment. as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable. It is curious to recall some of the mental habits of those departed days. At most, terrestrial men fancied there might be other men upon Mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise. Yet across the gulf of s.p.a.ce, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. And early in the twentieth century came the great disillusionment.

The planet Mars,3 I scarcely need remind the reader, revolves about the sun at a mean distance of 140,000,000 miles, and the light and heat it receives from the sun is barely half of that received by this world. It must be, if the nebular hypothesis has any truth, I scarcely need remind the reader, revolves about the sun at a mean distance of 140,000,000 miles, and the light and heat it receives from the sun is barely half of that received by this world. It must be, if the nebular hypothesis has any truth,4 older than our world; and long before this earth ceased to be molten, life upon its surface must have begun its course. The fact that it is scarcely one seventh of the volume of the earth must have accelerated its cooling to the temperature at which life could begin. It has air and water and all that is necessary for the support of animated existence. older than our world; and long before this earth ceased to be molten, life upon its surface must have begun its course. The fact that it is scarcely one seventh of the volume of the earth must have accelerated its cooling to the temperature at which life could begin. It has air and water and all that is necessary for the support of animated existence.

Yet so vain is man, and so blinded by his vanity, that no writer,b up to the very end of the nineteenth century, expressed any idea that intelligent life might have developed there far, or indeed at all, beyond its earthly level. Nor was it generally understood that since Mars is older than our earth, with scarcely a quarter of the superficial area and remoter from the sun, it necessarily follows that it is not only more distant from life's beginning but nearer its end. up to the very end of the nineteenth century, expressed any idea that intelligent life might have developed there far, or indeed at all, beyond its earthly level. Nor was it generally understood that since Mars is older than our earth, with scarcely a quarter of the superficial area and remoter from the sun, it necessarily follows that it is not only more distant from life's beginning but nearer its end.

The secularc cooling that must someday overtake our planet has already gone far indeed with our neighbour. Its physical condition is still largely a mystery, but we know now that even in its equatorial region the midday temperature barely 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 slow seasons change huge snowcaps gather and melt about either pole and periodically inundate its temperate zones. That last stage of exhaustion, which to us is still incredibly remote, has become a present-day problem for the inhabitants of Mars. The immediate pressure of necessity has brightened their intellects, enlarged their powers, and hardened their hearts. cooling that must someday overtake our planet has already gone far indeed with our neighbour. Its physical condition is still largely a mystery, but we know now that even in its equatorial region the midday temperature barely 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 slow seasons change huge snowcaps gather and melt about either pole and periodically inundate its temperate zones. That last stage of exhaustion, which to us is still incredibly remote, has become a present-day problem for the inhabitants of Mars. The immediate pressure of necessity has brightened their intellects, enlarged their powers, and hardened their hearts.5 And looking across s.p.a.ce with instruments, and intelligences such as we have scarcely dreamed of, they see, at its nearest distance only 35,000,000 of miles sunward of them, a morning star of hope, our own warmer planet, green with vegetation and grey with water, with a cloudy atmosphere eloquent of fertility, with glimpses through its drifting cloud wisps of broad stretches of populous country and narrow, navy-crowded seas. And looking across s.p.a.ce with instruments, and intelligences such as we have scarcely dreamed of, they see, at its nearest distance only 35,000,000 of miles sunward of them, a morning star of hope, our own warmer planet, green with vegetation and grey with water, with a cloudy atmosphere eloquent of fertility, with glimpses through its drifting cloud wisps of broad stretches of populous country and narrow, navy-crowded seas.6 And we men, the creatures who inhabit this earth, must be to them at least as alien and lowly as are the monkeys and lemursd to us. The intellectual side of man already admits that life is an incessant struggle for existence, to us. The intellectual side of man already admits that life is an incessant struggle for existence,7 and it would seem that this too is the belief of the minds upon Mars. Their world is far gone in its cooling and this world is still crowded with life, but crowded only with what they regard as inferior animals. To carry warfare sunward is, indeed, their only escape from the destruction that, generation after generation, creeps upon them. and it would seem that this too is the belief of the minds upon Mars. Their world is far gone in its cooling and this world is still crowded with life, but crowded only with what they regard as inferior animals. To carry warfare sunward is, indeed, their only escape from the destruction that, generation after generation, creeps upon them.

And before we judge of them too harshly we must 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 inferior races. The Tasmanians,e in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the s.p.a.ce of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit? in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the s.p.a.ce of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit?

The Martians seem to have calculated their descent with amazing subtlety-their mathematical learning is evidently far in excess of ours-and to have carried out their preparations with a well-nigh perfect unanimity. Had our instruments permitted it, we might have seen the gathering trouble far back in the nineteenth century. Men like Schiaparelli watched the red planet-it is odd, by-the-bye, that for countless centuries Mars has been the star of warf-but failed to interpret the fluctuating appearances of the markings they mapped so well. All that time the Martians must have been getting ready.

During the oppositiong of 1894 a great light was seen on the illuminated part of the disk, first at the Lick Observatory, of 1894 a great light was seen on the illuminated part of the disk, first at the Lick Observatory,h then by Perrotin of Nice, and then by other observers. then by Perrotin of Nice, and then by other observers.8 English readers heard of it first in the issue English readers heard of it first in the issue of Nature of Nature dated August 2. I am inclined to think that this blaze may have been the casting of the huge gun, in the vast pit sunk into their planet, from which their shots were fired at us. Peculiar markings, as yet unexplained, were seen near the site of that outbreak during the next two oppositions. dated August 2. I am inclined to think that this blaze may have been the casting of the huge gun, in the vast pit sunk into their planet, from which their shots were fired at us. Peculiar markings, as yet unexplained, were seen 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 of Java set the wires of the astronomical exchange palpitating with the amazing intelligence of a huge outbreak of incandescent gas upon the planet. It had occurred towards midnight of the twelfth; and the spectroscope,i to which he had at once resorted, indicated a ma.s.s of flaming gas, chiefly hydrogen, moving with an enormous velocity towards this earth. This jet of fire had become invisible about a quarter past twelve. He compared it to a colossal puff of flame suddenly and violently squirted out of the planet, "as flaming gases rushed out of a gun." to which he had at once resorted, indicated a ma.s.s of flaming gas, chiefly hydrogen, moving with an enormous velocity towards this earth. This jet of fire had become invisible about a quarter past twelve. He compared it to a colossal puff of flame suddenly and violently squirted out of the planet, "as flaming gases rushed out of a gun."

A singularly appropriate phrase it proved. Yet the next day there was nothing of this in the papers except a little note in the Daily Telegraph, Daily Telegraph, and the world went in ignorance of one of the gravest dangers that ever threatened the human race. I might not have heard of the eruption at all had I not met Ogilvy, the well-known astronomer, at Ottershaw. He was immensely excited at the news, and in the excess of his feelings invited me up to take a turn with him that night in a scrutiny of the red planet. and the world went in ignorance of one of the gravest dangers that ever threatened the human race. I might not have heard of the eruption at all had I not met Ogilvy, the well-known astronomer, at Ottershaw. He was immensely excited at the news, and in the excess of his feelings invited me up to take a turn with him that night in a scrutiny of the red planet.

In spite of all that has happened since, I still remember that vigil very distinctly: the black and silent observatory, the shadowed 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 streaked across it. Ogilvy moved about, invisible but audible. Looking through the telescope, one saw a circle of deep blue and the little round planet swimming in the field. It seemed such a little thing, so bright and small and still, faintly marked with transverse stripes, and slightly flattened from the perfect round. But so little it was, so silvery warm-a pin's-head of light! It was as if it quivered, but really this was the telescope vibrating with the activity of the clockwork that kept the planet in view.

As I watched, the planet seemed to grow larger and smaller and to advance and recede, but that was simply that my eye was tired. Forty millions of miles it was from us-more than forty millions of miles of void. Few people realise the immensity of vacancy in which the dust of the material universe swims.

Near it in the field, I remember, were three faint points of light, three telescopic stars infinitely remote, and all around it was the unfathomable darkness of empty s.p.a.ce. You know how that blackness looks on a frosty starlight night. In a telescope it seems far profounder. And invisible to me because it was so remote and small, flying swiftly and steadily towards me across that incredible distance, drawing nearer every minute by so many thousands of miles, came the Thing they were sending us, the Thing that was to bring so much struggle and calamity and death to the earth. I never dreamed of it then as I watched; no one 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 the chronometer struck midnight; and at that I told Ogilvy and he took my place. The night was warm and I was thirsty, and I went, stretching my legs clumsily and feeling my way in the darkness, to the little table where the siphon stood, while Ogilvy exclaimed at the streamer of gas that came out towards us.

That night another invisible missile started on its way to the earth from Mars, just a second or so under twenty-four hours after the first one. I remember how I sat on the table there in the blackness, with patches of green and crimson swimming before my eyes. I wished I had a light to smoke by, little suspecting the meaning of the minute gleam I had seen and all that it would presently bring me. Ogilvy watched till one, and then gave it up; and we lit the lantern and walked over to his house. Down below in the darkness were Ottershaw and Chertseyj and all their hundreds of people, sleeping in peace. and all their hundreds of people, sleeping in peace.

He was full of speculation that night about the condition of Mars, and scoffed at the vulgar idea of its having inhabitants who were signalling us. His idea was that meteorites might be falling in a heavy shower upon the planet, or that a huge volcanic explosion was in progress. He pointed out to me how unlikely it was that 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 that night and the night after about midnight, and again the night after; and so for ten nights, a flame each night. Why the shots ceased after the tenth no one on earth has attempted to explain. It may be the gases of the firing caused the Martians inconvenience. Dense clouds of smoke or dust, visible through a powerful telescope on earth as little grey, fluctuating patches, spread through the clearness of the planet's atmosphere and obscured its more familiar features.

Even the daily papers woke up to the disturbances at last, and popular notes appeared here, there, and everywhere concerning the volcanoes upon Mars. The seriocomic periodical Punch, I remember, made a happy use of it in the political cartoon. And, all unsuspected, those missiles the Martians had fired at us drew earthward, rus.h.i.+ng now at a pace of many miles a second through the empty gulf of s.p.a.ce, hour by hour and day by day, nearer and nearer. It seems to me now almost incredibly wonderful that, with that swift fate hanging over us, men could go about their petty concerns as they did. I remember how jubilant Markham was at securing a new photograph of the planet for the ill.u.s.trated paper he edited in those days. People in these latter times scarcely realise the abundance and enterprise of our nineteenth-century papers. For my own part, I was much occupied in learning to ride the bicycle, and busy upon a series of papers discussing the probable developments of moral ideas as civilisation progressed.

One night (the first missile then could scarcely have been 10,000,000 miles away) I went for a walk with my wife. It was starlight, and I explained the Signs of the Zodiac to her, and pointed o