Martian

“ Did the Martian reach the pump room? Did the vitalizing air reach the people of that distant planet in time to save them? Was my Dejah Thoris alive, or did her beautiful body lie cold in death beside the tiny golden incubator in the sunken garden of the inner courtyard of the palace of Tardos Mors, the jeddak of Helium? ”

“ A Martian stretched out on an operating table, with sharp instruments of human science glittering in a cone of radiance above his strapped-down body. Pain, torment beyond endurance. Martian pride humbled, and dragged through the dust.
A dissecting laboratory. Would Earth display pity or stay its hand if it needed knowledge to forge weapons to combat an intelligent race bent on space conquest—a race so different from Man in some respects that it would be easy to think of its captive members as caged beasts or hideous and dangerous monsters? ”

“ The rusty ochre emptiness spreading out toward the horizon in all directions, spotted occasionally with pale green and frosty white, the sky gray with but a shade of blue in it, distant gusts of Martian wind swirling ochre clouds across the desert, the spaceship poised on its ungainly bottom, a great silver bowling ball with rocket tubes for finger holes, and the Martians from Earth who had been here on this alien world for seven-hundred-eighty days or twice seven-eighty or three times, and who fought in frenzied eagerness, like savages, to reach the descending gangplank first. ”

“ When any object is too delicate and minute to be examined by the sense of touch and sight, the Martian shuts his eyes and puts it against the pit of his stomach, and knows all about it, even its inside. ”

“ Faintly, fearfully, came the answer.
"We hear, O Sarka!"
"Shift the blue column away from the Earth! Do not interfere as we return to our orbit about the sun! Obey, or I combine the total knowledge of Mars, the Earth, and the Moon in an attack against you and your Martian ally! Inform your ally that their people will not return, that the Earth has need of them—but that two Gens of Earth will be received by Martians in perfect amity, and these Gens allowed biding places on Mars! ”

“ Every soul aboard stood at the bulwarks or on the seats of the steamer and stared at that distant shape, higher than the trees or church towers inland, and advancing with a leisurely parody of a human stride.
It was the first Martian my brother had seen, and he stood, more amazed than terrified, watching this Titan advancing deliberately towards the shipping, wading farther and farther into the water as the coast fell away. ”

“ The Earthlings outlawed him, sent him here to Mars to live out his days."
"Mars is a dying world," repeated the boy. "A dying world. How many Martians are there, sir?"
The old man chuckled. "I guess maybe you are the last pure Martian alive, boy. But there are millions of others."
"Where do they live? I have never seen them."
"You are young. You have much to see, much to learn."
"Where do they live?"
"Out there, beyond the mountains, beyond the dead sea bottoms, over the horizon and to the north, in the caves, far back in the subterrane." ”

“ Overhead stars of unearthly brilliancy were coming out in the frosty sky, while on either hand the banks were high and the shadows under them black as ink. In those shadows now and then I noticed with a horrible indifference other rafts were travelling, and presently, as the stream narrowed, they came out and joined us, dead Martians, budding boys and girls; older voyagers with their age quickening upon them in the Martian manner, just as some fruit only ripens after it falls ”

“ Very strange, then, at first must the statement seem, that we are as sure of the existence of water in all these forms on Mars as if we had sent some messenger to the planet who had brought back for study by our chemists a block of Martian ice, a vessel full of Martian water, and a flask of Martian air saturated with aqueous vapour. Indeed, I do not know of any discovery effected by man which more strikingly displays the power of human ingenuity in mastering difficulties which, at a first view, seem altogether insuperable. ”

“ On, upward, we moved, impelled by an impulse quite indefinable but sufficient to condense about us by its contagion the Martian populace, quick, responsive, inquisitive, intelligent and excitable as children. We were approaching the Patenta by an ever widening avenue, our rustling approach announced by a chant of vociferous and yet melodious notes. ”

“ For it was manifest the Martians were about us. No sooner had the curate overtaken me than we saw either the fighting-machine we had seen before or another, far away across the meadows in the direction of Kew Lodge. Four or five little black figures hurried before it across the green-grey of the field, and in a moment it was evident this Martian pursued them. ”

“ Be that as it may, for many years yet there will certainly be no relaxation of the eager scrutiny of the Martian disk, and those fiery darts of the sky, the shooting stars, will bring with them as they fall an unavoidable apprehension to all the sons of men. ”

“ So accustomed was I to hear the Martian speak of the most miraculous occurrences in an ordinary conversational tone, that the idea of there still remaining something on Mars to be discovered appeared a still greater wonder.
"We have made a most important discovery," pursued Almos. "I say 'we,' as without the response of your instrument the action of a super-radium current on sound-waves would not have been discovered." ”

“ In spite of the quandary in which I found myself upon coming face to face with an inhabitant of Mars, I outwardly remained perfectly calm, nor did it require any effort to appear so. The brain, in such an emergency, followed instinctively its natural habit. It was as if another man had spoken from within me, one who was perfectly acquainted with the visitor and with Martian affairs. ”

“ It will be Martians, the first of our Martian masses who have waited for ages for that moment and who will begin then our conquest of the earth!
"Yes, Earth-beings, our great plan comes to its end now at last! At last! Age on age, prisoned on this dying, arid world, we have desired the earth that by right of power shall be ours, have sought for ages to communicate with its beings. You finally heard us, you hearkened to us, you built the matter-transmitting and receiving station on earth that was the one thing needed for our plan. ”

“ Imagine the impression of humanity a Martian observer would get who, after a difficult process of preparation and with considerable fatigue to the eyes, was able to peer at London from the steeple of St Martin’s Church for stretches, at longest, of four minutes at a time. Mr Cave was unable to ascertain if the winged Martians were the same as the Martians who hopped about the causeways and terraces, and if the latter could put on wings at will. ”

“ The Martian ship was a smoking, half-telescoped mass of wreckage and how a living Martian could have survived deep in the hull, in the midst of what must have been a raging inferno, was not an easy enigma for the scientists to unravel or the newspaper-reading public to grasp. ”

“ Four or five of their fighting-machines suddenly starting off—Heat-Rays right and left, and not a Martian in 'em. Not a Martian in 'em, but men—men who have learned the way how. It may be in my time, even—those men. Fancy having one of them lovely things, with its Heat-Ray wide and free! Fancy having it in control! What would it matter if you smashed to smithereens at the end of the run, after a bust like that? I reckon the Martians'll open their beautiful eyes! Can't you see them, man? Can't you see them hurrying, hurrying—puffing and blowing and hooting to their other mechanical affairs? ”

“ While we count 37 years on Earth, the Martian only counts 20, and a man of 79 years on Earth is only 40 Martian years old. This is an advantage of 88 per cent. Its condition of habitability, its climate and meteorology, its days and its nights, are analogous to ours. ”

“ Believing that Mars is rightly balanced as to temperature, the Earth being so much nearer the Sun, would be too hot for life to exist. The Martian conceives himself to be supremely complete "even to the point that artists wishing to represent God in our sanctuaries have figured Him in the image of a Martian man." ”

“ And great novelists have written about the Martians and their wonderful civilization, and—"
"And they all know as much about that little planet as you do yourself," interrupted the Demon, impatiently. "The trouble with you Earth people is that you delight in guessing about what you can not know. Now I happen to know all about Mars, because I can traverse all space and have had ample leisure to investigate the different planets. Mars is not peopled at all, nor is any other of the planets you recognize in the heavens. ”

“ In some, the Martian life and habit has almost obliterated their earthly notions and designs. It is singular that of the scientific workers of the earth the astronomers, physicists, and chemists alone reach Mars. The biologists, zoologists, botanists, geographers, and geologists rarely are booked at the Registeries as coming from the Earth. Their lives may be prolonged elsewhere, they seldom reach us. ”

“ Thus not more than perhaps ten or twelve out of the original hundred sent by the sun would, under the most favourable circumstances, and from the very centre of the earth's disc, reach the eye of a Martian or lunar observer. The light by which he views our world is, there is little doubt, light reflected from the various strata of our atmosphere, cloud or mist-laden or serene, as the case may be, with an occasional snow-mountain figuring as a permanent white spot. ”

“ Nor of the movement of mankind now that the earth was hotter, northward and southward towards the poles of the earth. It concerns itself only with the coming and the passing of the Star.
The Martian astronomers—for there are astronomers on Mars, although they are very different beings from men—were naturally profoundly interested by these things. ”

“ It is to be hoped that the Martians, if any, are more competent navigators than the terrestrial saucerians who propose this theory. No sensible Martian would plan a journey scheduled to land him on earth during the few weeks when the two planets are closest. ”

“ What wonder then that, with all these past ages of development and the incentive which the present physical condition of the planet supplies them, the Martians of the present day are in all respects, whether physically, morally, or intellectually, far in advance of the inhabitants of our much younger, and therefore less developed, world! ”

“ The Martians immediately replied to this renewed attack, and again the cloud covered globe bristled with lightning, which flashed so fiercely out of the blackness below that the stoutest hearts among us quailed, although we were situated well beyond the danger.
But this sublime spectacle rapidly vanished from our eyes when, having attained a proper elevation, we began our course toward the opposite hemisphere of the planet. ”

“ With main points in view the reader can now readily comprehend the real Martian character, although it may be a disappointment to some who have imagined the inhabitants of Mars as physically different from themselves; or perhaps, as semi-spiritual entities, who have possibly been transplanted from other worlds to undergo a sort of probationary life amid a Paradise of beautiful surroundings and things. ”

“ Through countless thousands of generations the Martians had become acclimated to a planet having little air, less water, and characterized by abrupt transitions from searing heat to bitter cold: from blinding light to almost impenetrable darkness. Eight feet tall and correspondingly massive, they could barely stand against the gravitational force of the Earth, almost three times as great as that of Mars, but the two Martian scientists struggled to their feet as the Terrestrials entered. ”

“ Everything showed that the Martians, though they had to work (as men have) , still strove to make life pleasant. *⁠*⁠*⁠* It is impossible for me to describe all the strange sights I beheld on Mars, while I traversed again, with my Martian friend, the oceans of this strange world. Earthly words are only fit for earthly things, and so are imperfect and, therefore, deceptive, when applied do the things of another world. ”

“ As to details of explanation, any we may adopt will undoubtedly be found, on closer acquaintance, to vary from the actual Martian state of things; for any Martian life must differ markedly from our own. ”

“ In fact, on Mars the Creator had His one great opportunity of [52] making a flying man, and I do not think He has overlooked it. With a rather small, tightly-knit frame, and the upper limbs developed into wings as long as the body, flying against the weak Martian gravitation would be perfectly easy, and a vast advantage over walking. ”

“ His ignorance was shared by every man, woman and child on Earth. Not even the sharp, wise eyes of the astronomers had detected the rocket flares on Mars when the Martian ships had taken off from the red planet on their three-stage journey across space. ”

“ But the shell of a Martian is one of the most impermeable armors ever developed by organic evolution, and when quiescent he can go upwards for an hour without breathing. This is because he is built for an extremely rarified atmosphere—his physiology is typical of a depleted-planet economy. ”

“ In one Martian day, therefore, one of the moons of Mars makes more than three complete revolutions round that planet, so that, to an inhabitant of Mars, there would be more than three months in a day. ”