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1He remained standing at the edge of the pit that the Thing had made for itself, staring at its strange appearance,
2astonished chiefly at its unusual shape and colour, and dimly perceiving even then some evidence of design in its
3arrival. The early morning was wonderfully still, and the sun, just clearing the pine trees towards Weybridge, was
4already warm. He did not remember hearing any birds that morning, there was certainly no breeze stirring, and the only
5sounds were the faint movements from within the cindery cylinder. He was all alone on the common. Then suddenly he
6noticed with a start that some of the grey clinker, the ashy incrustation that covered the meteorite, was falling off
7the circular edge of the end. It was dropping off in flakes and raining down upon the sand. A large piece suddenly came
8off and fell with a sharp noise that brought his heart into his mouth. For a minute he scarcely realised what this
9meant, and, although the heat was excessive, he clambered down into the pit close to the bulk to see the Thing more
10clearly. He fancied even then that the cooling of the body might account for this, but what disturbed that idea was the
11fact that the ash was falling only from the end of the cylinder. And then he perceived that, very slowly, the circular
12top of the cylinder was rotating on its body. It was such a gradual movement that he discovered it only through noticing
13that a black mark that had been near him five minutes ago was now at the other side of the circumference. Even then he
14scarcely understood what this indicated, until he heard a muffled grating sound and saw the black mark jerk forward an
15inch or so. Then the thing came upon him in a flash. The cylinder was artificial--hollow--with an end that screwed out!
16Something within the cylinder was unscrewing the top! "Good heavens!" said Ogilvy. "There's a man in it--men in it! Half
17roasted to death! Trying to escape!" At once, with a quick mental leap, he linked the Thing with the flash upon Mars.
18The thought of the confined creature was so dreadful to him that he forgot the heat and went forward to the cylinder to
19help turn. But luckily the dull radiation arrested him before he could burn his hands on the still-glowing metal. At
20that he stood irresolute for a moment, then turned, scrambled out of the pit, and set off running wildly into Woking.
21The time then must have been somewhere about six o'clock. He met a waggoner and tried to make him understand, but the
22tale he told and his appearance were so wild--his hat had fallen off in the pit--that the man simply drove on. He was
23equally unsuccessful with the potman who was just unlocking the doors of the public-house by Horsell Bridge. The fellow
24thought he was a lunatic at large and made an unsuccessful attempt to shut him into the taproom. That sobered him a
25little; and when he saw Henderson, the London journalist, in his garden, he called over the palings and made himself
26understood. "Henderson," he called, "you saw that shooting star last night?" "Well?" said Henderson. "It's out on
27Horsell Common now." "Good Lord!" said Henderson. "Fallen meteorite! That's good." "But it's something more than a
28meteorite. It's a cylinder--an artificial cylinder, man! And there's something inside." Henderson stood up with his
29spade 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
30minute or so taking it in. Then he dropped his spade, snatched up his jacket, and came out into the road. The two men
31hurried back at once to the common, and found the cylinder still lying in the same position. But now the sounds inside
32had ceased, and a thin circle of bright metal showed between the top and the body of the cylinder. Air was either
33entering or escaping at the rim with a thin, sizzling sound. They listened, rapped on the scaly burnt metal with a
34stick, and, meeting with no response, they both concluded the man or men inside must be insensible or dead. Of course
35the two were quite unable to do anything. They shouted consolation and promises, and went off back to the town again to
36get help. One can imagine them, covered with sand, excited and disordered, running up the little street in the bright
37sunlight just as the shop folks were taking down their shutters and people were opening their bedroom windows. Henderson
38went into the railway station at once, in order to telegraph the news to London. The newspaper articles had prepared
39men's minds for the reception of the idea. By eight o'clock a number of boys and unemployed men had already started for
40the common to see the "dead men from Mars." That was the form the story took. I heard of it first from my newspaper boy
41about a quarter to nine when I went out to get my Daily Chronicle. I was naturally startled, and lost no time in going
42out and across the Ottershaw bridge to the sand-pits. III. ON HORSELL COMMON. I found a little crowd of perhaps twenty
43people surrounding the huge hole in which the cylinder lay. I have already described the appearance of that colossal
44bulk, embedded in the ground. The turf and gravel about it seemed charred as if by a sudden explosion. No doubt its
45impact had caused a flash of fire. Henderson and Ogilvy were not there. I think they perceived that nothing was to be
46done for the present, and had gone away to breakfast at Henderson's house. There were four or five boys sitting on the
47edge of the Pit, with their feet dangling, and amusing themselves--until I stopped them--by throwing stones at the giant
48mass. After I had spoken to them about it, they began playing at "touch" in and out of the group of bystanders. Among
49these were a couple of cyclists, a jobbing gardener I employed sometimes, a girl carrying a baby, Gregg the butcher and
50his little boy, and two or three loafers and golf caddies who were accustomed to hang about the railway station. There
51was very little talking. Few of the common people in England had anything but the vaguest astronomical ideas in those
52days. Most of them were staring quietly at the big table like end of the cylinder, which was still as Ogilvy and
53Henderson had left it. I fancy the popular expectation of a heap of charred corpses was disappointed at this inanimate
54bulk. Some went away while I was there, and other people came. I clambered into the pit and fancied I heard a faint
55movement under my feet. The top had certainly ceased to rotate. It was only when I got thus close to it that the
56strangeness of this object was at all evident to me. At the first glance it was really no more exciting than an
57overturned carriage or a tree blown across the road. Not so much so, indeed. It looked like a rusty gas float. It
58required a certain amount of scientific education to perceive that the grey scale of the Thing was no common oxide, that
59the yellowish-white metal that gleamed in the crack between the lid and the cylinder had an unfamiliar hue.
60"Extra-terrestrial" had no meaning for most of the onlookers. At that time it was quite clear in my own mind that the
61Thing had come from the planet Mars, but I judged it improbable that it contained any living creature. I thought the
62unscrewing might be automatic. In spite of Ogilvy, I still believed that there were men in Mars. My mind ran fancifully
63on the possibilities of its containing manuscript, on the difficulties in translation that might arise, whether we
64should find coins and models in it, and so forth. Yet it was a little too large for assurance on this idea. I felt an
65impatience to see it opened. About eleven, as nothing seemed happening, I walked back, full of such thought, to my home
66in Maybury. But I found it difficult to get to work upon my abstract investigations. In the afternoon the appearance of
67the common had altered very much. The early editions of the evening papers had startled London with enormous headlines:
68"A MESSAGE RECEIVED FROM MARS." "REMARKABLE STORY FROM WOKING," and so forth. In addition, Ogilvy's wire to the
69Astronomical Exchange had roused every observatory in the three kingdoms.
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