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17 - The 'Thunder Child' - The War of the Worlds - H G Wells · Classic Science Fiction Books

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Speaker 1: Chapter seventeen, The thunder Child. Had the Martians aimed only
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Speaker 1: at destruction, they might on Monday have annihilated the entire
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Speaker 1: population of London as it spread itself slowly through the
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Speaker 1: Home Counties, not only along the road through Barnet, but
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Speaker 1: also through Edgeware and Waltham Abbey, and along the roads
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Speaker 1: eastward to south End and Shuberness, and south of the
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Speaker 1: Thames to Deal and broad Stairs, poured the same frantic route.
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Speaker 1: If one could have hung that June morning in a
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Speaker 1: balloon in the blazing blue above London, every northward and
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Speaker 1: eastward road running out of the tangled maze of streets
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Speaker 1: would have seemed stippled black, with the streaming fugitives. Each
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Speaker 1: dot a human agony of terror and physical distress. I
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Speaker 1: have set forth at length in the last chapter my
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Speaker 1: brother's account of the Road through Chipping Barnet, in order
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Speaker 1: that my readers may realize how that swarming of black
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Speaker 1: dots appeared to one of those concerned. Never before in
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Speaker 1: the history of the world had such a mass of
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Speaker 1: human beings moved and suffered together. The legendary hosts of
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Speaker 1: Goths and Huns. The hugest armies Asia has ever seen
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Speaker 1: would have been but a drop in that current. And
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Speaker 1: this was no disciplined march. It was a stampede, a
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Speaker 1: stampede gigantic and terrible, without order and without a goal,
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Speaker 1: six million people, unarmed and unprovisioned, driving headlong. It was
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Speaker 1: the beginning of the route of civilization, of the massacre
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Speaker 1: of mankind. Directly below him, the balloonist would have seen
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Speaker 1: the network of streets far and wide, houses, churches, squares, crescents, gardens,
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Speaker 1: already derelict, spread out like a huge map, and in
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Speaker 1: the southward, blotted over ealing Richmond, Wimbledon, it would have
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Speaker 1: seemed as if some monstrous pen had flung ink upon
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Speaker 1: the chart. Steadily incessantly. Each black splash grew and spread,
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Speaker 1: shooting out ramifications this way and that, now banking itself
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Speaker 1: against rising ground, now pouring swiftly over a crest into
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Speaker 1: a new found valley, exactly as a gout of ink
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Speaker 1: would spread itself upon blotting paper, and beyond, over the
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Speaker 1: blue hills that rise southward of the river. The glittering
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Speaker 1: Martians went to and fro calmly and methodically, spreading their
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Speaker 1: poison cloud over this patch of country, and then over that,
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Speaker 1: laying it again with their steam jets when it had
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Speaker 1: served its purpose, and taking possession of the conquered country.
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Speaker 1: They do not seem to have aimed at extermination so
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Speaker 1: much as at complete demoralizedation and the destruction of any opposition.
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Speaker 1: They exploded any stores of powder they came upon, cut
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Speaker 1: every telegraph, and wrecked the railways. Here and there they
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Speaker 1: were hamstringing mankind. They seemed in no hurry to extend
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Speaker 1: the field of their operations, and did not come beyond
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Speaker 1: the central part of London all that day. It is
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Speaker 1: possible that a very considerable number of people in London
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Speaker 1: stuck to their homes through Monday morning. Certain it is
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Speaker 1: that many died at home, suffocated by the black smoke.
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Speaker 1: Until about mid day, the pool of London was an
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Speaker 1: astonishing scene. Steamboats and shipping of all sorts lay there,
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Speaker 1: tempted by the enormous sums of money offered by fugitives,
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Speaker 1: and it is said that many who swam out to
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Speaker 1: these vessels were thrust off with boat hooks and drowned.
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Speaker 1: About one o'clock in the afternoon, the thinning remnant of
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Speaker 1: a cloud of the black vapor appeared between the arches
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Speaker 1: of Blackfriar's Bridge. At that the pool became a scene
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Speaker 1: of mad confusion, fighting and collision, and for some time
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Speaker 1: a multitude of boats and barges jammed in the northern
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Speaker 1: arch of the tower bridge, and the sailors and lightermen
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Speaker 1: had to fight savagely against the people who swarmed upon
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Speaker 1: them from the river front. People were actually clambering down
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Speaker 1: the piers of the bridge from above, when an hour
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Speaker 1: later a Martian appeared beyond the clock tower and waded
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Speaker 1: down the river. Nothing but wreckage floated above Limehouse. Of
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Speaker 1: the falling of the fifth cylinder, I have presently to
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Speaker 1: tell the sixth Star fell at Wimbledon. My brother, keeping
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Speaker 1: watch beside the women in the chaise in a meadow,
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Speaker 1: saw the green flash of it far beyond the hills.
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Speaker 1: On Tuesday, the little party, still set upon getting across
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Speaker 1: the sea, made its way through the swarming country towards Colchester.
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Speaker 1: The news that the Martians were now in possession of
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Speaker 1: the whole of London was confirmed. They had been seen
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Speaker 1: at Highgate, and even it was said at Neesden, but
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Speaker 1: they did not come into my brother's view until the morrow.
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Speaker 1: That day, the scattered multitudes began to realize the urgent
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Speaker 1: need of provisions. As they grew hungry, the rights of
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Speaker 1: property ceased to be regarded. Farmers were out to defend
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Speaker 1: their cattle sheds, granaries and ripening root crops with arms
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Speaker 1: in their hands. A number of people, now like my brother,
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Speaker 1: had their faces eastward, and there were some desperate souls
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Speaker 1: even going back towards London to get food. These were
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Speaker 1: chiefly people from the northern suburbs whose knowledge of the
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Speaker 1: black smoke came by hearsay. He heard that about half
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Speaker 1: the members of the government had gathered at Birmingham, and
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Speaker 1: that enormous quantities of high explosives were being prepared to
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Speaker 1: be us used in automatic mines across the Midland counties.
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Speaker 1: He was also told that the Midland Railway Company had
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Speaker 1: replaced the desertions of the first day's panic, had resumed
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Speaker 1: traffic and was running northward trains from Saint Auban's to
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Speaker 1: relieve the congestion of the home counties. There was also
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Speaker 1: a placard in shipping Ongar announcing that large stores of
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Speaker 1: flower were available in the northern towns and that within
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Speaker 1: twenty four hours bread would be distributed among the starving
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Speaker 1: people in the neighborhood. But this intelligence did not deter
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Speaker 1: him from the plan of escape he had formed. And
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Speaker 1: the three pressed eastward all day and heard no more
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Speaker 1: of the bread distribution than this promise, nor as a
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Speaker 1: matter of fact, did any one else hear more of it.
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Speaker 1: That night fell the seventh star falling upon Primrose Hill.
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Speaker 1: It fell while Miss Elphinstone was watching, for she took
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Speaker 1: that duty alternately with my brother. She saw it. On Wednesday,
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Speaker 1: the three fugitives, they had passed the night in a
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Speaker 1: field of unripe wheat, reached Chelmsford, and there a body
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Speaker 1: of the inhabitants, calling itself the Committee of Public Supply,
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Speaker 1: seized the pony as provisions, and would give nothing in
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Speaker 1: exchange for it but the promise of a share in it.
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Speaker 1: The next day here there were rumors of martians at Epping,
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Speaker 1: and news of the destruction of walter Mabbey powder mills
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Speaker 1: in a vain attempt to blow up one of the invaders.
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Speaker 1: People were watching for martians here from the church towers.
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Speaker 1: My brother, very luckily for him, as it chanced, preferred
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Speaker 1: to push on at once to the coast, rather than
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Speaker 1: wait for food, although all three of them were very
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Speaker 1: hungry by midday. They passed through Tillingham, which strangely enough,
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Speaker 1: seemed to be quite quiet and deserted, save for a
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Speaker 1: few furtive plunderers hunting for food. Near Tillingham, they suddenly
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Speaker 1: came in sight of the sea and the most amazing
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Speaker 1: crowd of shipping of all sorts that it is possible
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Speaker 1: to imagine. For after the sailors could no longer come
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Speaker 1: up the Thames, they came on to the Essex coast,
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Speaker 1: to Harrich and Walton and Clacton, and afterwards to foul
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Speaker 1: Nurse and Shubury. To bring off the people, they lay
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Speaker 1: in a huge sickle shaped curve that vanished into mist
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Speaker 1: at last towards the Naise. Close in shore was a
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Speaker 1: multitude of fishing smacks, English, Scotch, French, Dutch and Swedish
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Speaker 1: steam launches from the Thames, yachts, electric boats, and beyond
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Speaker 1: were ships of large burden, a multitude of filthy colliers,
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Speaker 1: trim merchantmen, cattle ships, passenger boats, petroleum tanks, ocean tramps,
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Speaker 1: an old white transport, even neat white and gray liners
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Speaker 1: from Southampton and Hamburg, and along the Blue coast. Across
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Speaker 1: the black Water, my brother could make out dimly a
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Speaker 1: dense swarm of boats chaffering with the people on the beach,
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Speaker 1: a swarm which also extended up the black Water almost
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Speaker 1: to Malden. About a couple of miles out lay an
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Speaker 1: iron clad, very low in the water, almost to my
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Speaker 1: brother's perception, like a water logged ship. This was the
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Speaker 1: Ram thunder Child. It was the only warship in sight,
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Speaker 1: but far away to the right, over the smooth surface
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Speaker 1: of the sea. For that day there was a dead
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Speaker 1: calm lay a serpent of black smoke to mark the
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Speaker 1: next iron clads of the Channel fleet, which hovered in
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Speaker 1: an extended line, steam up and ready for action across
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Speaker 1: the Thames Estuary during the course of the Martian conquest,
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Speaker 1: vigilant and yet powerless to prevent it. At the site
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Speaker 1: of the sea, Missus Elphinstone, in spite of the assurances
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Speaker 1: of her sister in law, gave way to panic. She
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Speaker 1: had never been out of England before. She would rather
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Speaker 1: die than trust herself friendless in a foreign country, and
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Speaker 1: so forth she seemed poor woman to imagine that the
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Speaker 1: French and the Martians might prove very similar. She had
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Speaker 1: been growing increasingly hysterical, fearful, and depressed during the two
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Speaker 1: days journeyings. Her great idea was to return to Stanmore.
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Speaker 1: Things had always been well and safe at Stanmore. They
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Speaker 1: would find George at Stanmore. It was with the greatest
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Speaker 1: difficulty that they could get her down the beach, where
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Speaker 1: presently my brother succeeded in attracting the attention of some
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Speaker 1: men on a paddle steamer from the Thames. They sent
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Speaker 1: a boat and drove a bargain for thirty six pounds
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Speaker 1: for the three the steamer was going. These men said
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Speaker 1: to ostend. It was about two o'clock when my brother,
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Speaker 1: having paid their fares at the gangway, found himself safely
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Speaker 1: aboard the steamboat with his charges. There was food aboard,
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Speaker 1: albeit at exorbitant prices, and the three of them contrived
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Speaker 1: to eat a meal on one of the seeds forward.
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Speaker 1: There were already a couple of score of passengers aboard,
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Speaker 1: some of whom had expended their last money in securing
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Speaker 1: a passage. But the captain lay off the black water
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Speaker 1: until five in the afternoon, picking up passengers until the
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Speaker 1: seated decks were even dangerously crowded. He would probably have
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Speaker 1: remained longer, had it not been for the sound of
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Speaker 1: guns that began about that hour in the south. As
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Speaker 1: if in answer, the iron clad Seaward fired a small
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Speaker 1: gun and hoisted a string of flags. A jet of
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Speaker 1: smoke sprang out of her funnels. Some of the passengers
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Speaker 1: were of opinion that this firing came from shuburiness, until
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Speaker 1: it was noticed that it was growing louder. At the
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Speaker 1: same time, far away in the southeast, the masts and
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Speaker 1: upper works of three iron clads rows, one after the other,
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Speaker 1: out of the sea, beneath clouds of black smoke. But
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Speaker 1: my brother's attention speedily reverted to the distant firing in
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Speaker 1: the south. He fancied he saw a column of smoke
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Speaker 1: rising out of the distant gray haze. The little steamer
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Speaker 1: was already flapping her way eastwards of the big crescent
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Speaker 1: of shipping, and the low Essex coast was growing blue
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Speaker 1: and hazy, when a martian appeared, small and faint in
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Speaker 1: the remote distance, advancing along the muddy coast from the
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Speaker 1: direction of foul Nurse. At that the captain on the
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Speaker 1: bridge swore at the top of his voice with fear
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Speaker 1: and anger at his own delay and the paddles seemed
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Speaker 1: infected with his terror. Every soul aboard stood at the
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Speaker 1: bulwarks or on the seats of the steamer and stared
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Speaker 1: at that distant shape, higher than the trees or church
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Speaker 1: towers inland, and advancing with a leisurely parody of a
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Speaker 1: human stride. It was the first martian my brother had seen,
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Speaker 1: and he stood more amazed and terrified watching this titan,
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Speaker 1: advancing deliberately towards the shipping, wading farther and farther into
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Speaker 1: the water as the coast fell away. Then far away,
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Speaker 1: beyond the crouch came another, striding over some stunted trees,
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Speaker 1: and then yet another, still farther off, wading deeply through
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Speaker 1: a shiny mud flat that seemed to hang half way
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Speaker 1: up between sea and sky. They were all stalking seaward,
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Speaker 1: as if to intercept the escape of the multitudinous vessels
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Speaker 1: that were crowded between foul ness and the maize. In
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Speaker 1: spite of the throbbing exertions of the engines of the
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Speaker 1: little paddle boat and the pouring foam that her wheels
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Speaker 1: flung behind her, she receded with terrifying slowness from this
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Speaker 1: ominous advance. Glancing northwestward, my brother saw the large crescent
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Speaker 1: of shipping already writhing with the approaching terror, one ship
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Speaker 1: passing behind another, another coming round from broadside to end
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Speaker 1: on steamships whistling and giving off volumes of steam, sails
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Speaker 1: being let out, launches rushing hither and thither. He was
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Speaker 1: so fascinated by this, and by the creeping danger away
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Speaker 1: to the left, that he had no eyes for anything seaward.
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Speaker 1: And then a swift movement of the steamboat she had
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Speaker 1: suddenly come round to avoid being run down, flung him
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Speaker 1: headlong from the seat upon which he was standing. There
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Speaker 1: was a shouting all about him, a trampling of feet,
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Speaker 1: and a cheer that seemed to be answered faintly. The
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Speaker 1: steamboat lurched and rolled him over upon his hands. He
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Speaker 1: sprang to his feet and saw to starboard, and not
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Speaker 1: a hundred yards from their heeling pitching boat, a vast
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Speaker 1: iron bulk like the blade of a plow, tearing through
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Speaker 1: the water, tossing it on either side in huge waves
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Speaker 1: of foam that leaped towards the steamer, flinging her paddles
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Speaker 1: helplessly in the air, and then sucking her deck down
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Speaker 1: almost to the waterline. A douche of spray blinded my
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Speaker 1: brother for a moment. When his eyes were clear again,
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Speaker 1: he saw the monster had passed and was rushing landward.
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Speaker 1: Big iron upper works rose out of this headlong structure,
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Speaker 1: and from that twin funnels projected and spat a smoking
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Speaker 1: blast shot with fire. It was the torpedo ram thunder Child,
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Speaker 1: steaming headlong, coming to the rescue of the threatened shipping,
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Speaker 1: keeping his footing on the heaving deck by clutching the bulwarks.
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Speaker 1: My brother looked past this charging leviathan at the Martians again,
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Speaker 1: and he saw the three of them, now close together
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Speaker 1: and standing so far out to sea that their tripod
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Speaker 1: supports were almost entirely submerged. Thus sunken, and seen in
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Speaker 1: remote perspective, they appeared far less formidable than the huge
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Speaker 1: iron bulk in whose wake the steamer was pitching So helplessly,
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Speaker 1: it would seem they were regarding this new antagonist with astonishment.
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Speaker 1: To their intelligence, it may be the giant was even
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Speaker 1: such another as themselves. The thunder Child fired no gun,
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Speaker 1: but simply drove full speed towards them. It was probably
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Speaker 1: her not firing that enabled her to get so near
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Speaker 1: the enemy as she did. They did not know what
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Speaker 1: to make of her one shell, and they would have
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Speaker 1: sent her to the bottom forthwith with the heat ray.
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Speaker 1: She was steaming at such a pace that in a
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Speaker 1: minute she seemed half way between the steamboat and the Martians,
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Speaker 1: a diminishing black bulk against the receding horizontal expanse of
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Speaker 1: the Essex coast. Suddenly, the foremost Martian lowered his tube
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Speaker 1: and discharged a canister of the black gas at the
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Speaker 1: iron Clad. It hit her larboards and glanced off in
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Speaker 1: an inky jet that rolled away to seaward, an unfolding
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Speaker 1: torrent of black smoke, from which the iron Clad drove clear.
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Speaker 1: To the watchers from their steamer. Low in the water,
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Speaker 1: and with the sun in their eyes, it seemed as
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Speaker 1: though she were already among the Martians. They saw the
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Speaker 1: gaunt figures separating and rising out of the water as
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Speaker 1: they retreated shoreward, and one of them raised the camera
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Speaker 1: like generator of the heat ray. He held it pointing
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Speaker 1: obliquely downward, and a bank of steam sprang from the
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Speaker 1: water at its touch. It must have driven through the
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Speaker 1: iron of the ship's side like a white hot iron rod.
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Speaker 1: Through paper. A flicker of flame went up through the
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Speaker 1: rising steam, and then the Martian reeled and staggered. In
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Speaker 1: another moment he was cut down, and a great body
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Speaker 1: of water and steam shot high in the air. The
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Speaker 1: guns of the thunder Child sounded through the going off
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Speaker 1: one after the other, and one shot splashed the water
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Speaker 1: high close by. The steamer ricocheted towards the other flying
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Speaker 1: ships to the north and smashed a smack to matchwood,
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Speaker 1: but no one heeded that very much. At the sight
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Speaker 1: of the Martian's collapse, the captain on the bridge yelled inarticulately,
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Speaker 1: and all the crowding passengers on the steamer's stern shouted together,
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Speaker 1: and then they yelled again. Four surging out beyond the
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Speaker 1: white tumult drove something long and black, the flames streaming
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Speaker 1: from its middle parts, its ventilators and funnels spouting fire.
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Speaker 1: She was alive still, the steering gear, it seems, was intact,
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Speaker 1: and her engines working. She headed straight for a second
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Speaker 1: Martian and was within a hundred yards of him when
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Speaker 1: the heat ray came to bear. Then, with a violent thud,
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Speaker 1: a blinding flash, her decks her funnels leaped upward. The
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Speaker 1: Martians staggered with the violence of her explosion, and in
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Speaker 1: another moment, the flaming wreckage, still driving forward with the
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Speaker 1: impetus of its pace, had struck him and crumpled him
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Speaker 1: up like a thing of cardboard. My brother shouted involuntarily.
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Speaker 1: A boiling tumult of steam hid everything again, two yelled
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Speaker 1: the captain. Everyone was shouting. The whole steamer from end
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Speaker 1: to end, rang with frantic cheering that was taken up
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Speaker 1: first by one and then by all in the crowding
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Speaker 1: multitude of ships and boats that was driving out to sea.
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Speaker 1: The steam hung upon the water for many minutes, hiding
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Speaker 1: the Third Martian and the coast altogether. And all this
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Speaker 1: time the boat was paddling steadily out to sea and
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Speaker 1: away from the fight. And when at last the confusion cleared,
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Speaker 1: the drifting bank of black vapor intervened, and nothing of
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Speaker 1: the thunder Child could be made out, nor could the
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Speaker 1: Third Martian be seen. But the iron clads to seaward
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Speaker 1: were now quite close and standing in towards shore past
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Speaker 1: the steamboat. The little vessel continued to beat its way seaward,
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Speaker 1: and the iron clads receded slowly towards the coast, which
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Speaker 1: was hidden still by a marbled bank of vapor, part steam,
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Speaker 1: part black gas, eddying and combining in the strangest way.
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Speaker 1: The fleet of refugees was scattering to the northeast. Several
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Speaker 1: smacks were sailing between the iron clads and the steamboat.
20:42
Speaker 1: After a time, and before they reached the sinking cloud bank,
20:46
Speaker 1: the war ships turned northward and then abruptly went about
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Speaker 1: and passed into the thickening haze of evening Southward, the
20:54
Speaker 1: coast grew faint and at last indistinguishable amid the low
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Speaker 1: banks of clouds that were gathering at the sinking sun.
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Speaker 1: Then suddenly, out of the golden haze of the sunset
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Speaker 1: came the vibration of guns and a form of black
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Speaker 1: shadows moving. Everyone struggled to the rail of the steamer
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Speaker 1: and peered into the blinding furnace of the west, but
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Speaker 1: nothing was to be distinguished clearly. A mass of smoke rose,
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Speaker 1: slanting and barred the face of the sun. The steamboat
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Speaker 1: throbbed on its way through an interminable suspense. The sun
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Speaker 1: sank into gray clouds, the sky flushed and darkened, The
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Speaker 1: evening star trembled into sight. It was deep twilight. When
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Speaker 1: the captain cried out and pointed my brother strained his eyes.
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Speaker 1: Something rushed up into the sky, out of the grayness,
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Speaker 1: rushed slantingly upward and very swiftly into the luminous clearness
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Speaker 1: above the clouds in the western sky. Something flat and
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Speaker 1: broad and very large that swept round in a vast curve,
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Speaker 1: grew smaller, sank slowly, and vanished again into the gray
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Speaker 1: mystery of the night. And as it flew it rained
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Speaker 1: down darkness upon the land. End of Section seventeen, end
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Speaker 1: of Book one.