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I recall particularly the illustration of one of the first
pamphlets to give a consecutive account of the war. The
artist had evidently made a hasty study of one of the
fighting-machines, and there his knowledge ended. He presented
them as tilted, stiff tripods, without either flexibility
or subtlety, and with an altogether misleading monotony of
effect. The pamphlet containing these renderings had a considerable vogue, and I mention them here simply to warn
the reader against the impression they may have created.
They were no more like the Martians I saw in action than
a Dutch doll is like a human being. To my mind, the pamphlet
would have been much better without them.
At first, I say, the handling-machine did not impress me
as a machine, but as a crablike creature with a glittering
integument, the controlling Martian whose delicate tentacles
actuated its movements seeming to be simply the equivalent
of the crab's cerebral portion. But then I perceived the resemblance
of its grey-brown, shiny, leathery integument to
that of the other sprawling bodies beyond, and the true
nature of this dexterous workman dawned upon me. With
that realisation my interest shifted to those other creatures,
the real Martians. Already I had had a transient impression of
these, and the first nausea no longer obscured my observation.
Moreover, I was concealed and motionless, and under
no urgency of action.
They were, I now saw, the most unearthly creatures it
is possible to conceive. 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--I scarcely know how to speak of it--was the single
tight tympanic surface, since known to be anatomically an ear,
though it must have been almost useless in our dense air.
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, by that
distinguished anatomist, Professor Howes, the HANDS. Even
as I saw these Martians for the first time they seemed to
be endeavouring to raise themselves on these hands, but of
course, with the increased weight of terrestrial conditions,
this was impossible. There is reason to suppose that on Mars
they may have progressed upon them with some facility.
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