Latest / Daily Classic Sci Fi Books / 06 - The Heat-ray in the Chobham Road - The War of the Worlds - H G Wells

Transcript

06 - The Heat-ray in the Chobham Road - The War of the Worlds - H G Wells · Daily Classic Sci Fi Books

• 0:00
  Chapter six, The heat ray in the Chobham Road. It is still a
• 0:06
  matter of wonder how the Martians are able to slay men so swiftly and so
• 0:11
  silently. Many think that in some way they are able to generate an intense
• 0:17
  heat in a chamber of practically absolute non conductivity. This intense heat they project
• 0:25
  in a parallel beam against any object they choose, by means of a polished
• 0:29
  parabolic mirror of unknown composition, much as the parabolic mirror of a lighthouse projects
• 0:35
  a beam of light. But no one has absolutely proved these details. However
• 0:42
  it is done. It is certain that a beam of heat is the essence
• 0:46
  of the matter heat, and invisible instead of visible light. Whatever is combustible
• 0:53
  flashes into flame at its touch. Lead runs like water, It softens iron,
• 1:00
  cracks and melts glass, and when it falls upon water, incontinently,
• 1:04
  that explodes into steam. That night, nearly forty people lay under the starlight
• 1:11
  about the pit, charred and distorted beyond recognition, And all night long the
• 1:19
  common from Horsell to Maybury was deserted and brightly ablaze. The news of the
• 1:26
  massacre probably reached Chobham, Woking and Ottershore about the same time. In Woking,
• 1:33
  the shops had closed when the tragedy happened, and a number of people
• 1:37
  shop people and so forth, attracted by the stories they had heard, were
• 1:41
  walking over the Horsell Bridge and along the road between the hedges that runs out
• 1:46
  at last upon the common. You may imagine the young people brushed up after
• 1:51
  the labors of the day, and making this novelty, as they would make
• 1:55
  any novelty. The excuse for walking together and enjoying a trivial flare. You
• 2:00
  may figure to yourself the hum of voices along the road in the gloaming.
• 2:07
  As yet, of course, few people in Woking even knew that the cylinder
• 2:10
  had opened, though poor Henderson had sent a messenger on a bicycle to the
• 2:15
  post office with a special wire to an evening paper. As these folks came
• 2:20
  out by twos and threes upon the open they found little knots of people talking
• 2:24
  excitedly and peering at the spinning mirror over the sand pits, and the newcomers
• 2:30
  were no doubt soon infected by the excitement of the occasion. By half past
• 2:37
  eight, when the deputation was destroyed, there may have been a crowd of
• 2:40
  three hundred people or more at this place. Besides those who had left the
• 2:45
  road to approach the martians nearer, there were three policemen too, one of
• 2:50
  whom was mounted, doing their best under instructions from Stent, to keep the
• 2:54
  people back and deter them from approaching the cylinder. There was some booing from
• 3:00
  those more thoughtless and excitable souls, to whom a crowd is always an occasion
• 3:06
  for noise and horse play. Stent and Ogilvie, anticipating some possibilities of a
• 3:12
  collision, had telegraphed from Horsell to the barracks as soon as the martians emerged
• 3:16
  for the help of a company of soldiers to protect these strange creatures from violence.
• 3:23
  After that they returned to lead that ill fated advance. The description of
• 3:29
  their death as it was seen by the crowd tallies very closely with my own
• 3:34
  impressions, the three puffs of green smoke, the deep humming note, and
• 3:38
  the flashes of flame. But that crowd of people had a far narrower escape
• 3:45
  than mine. Only the fact that a hummock of heathery sand intercepted the lower
• 3:50
  part of the heat ray saved them. Had the elevation of the parabolic mirror
• 3:54
  been a few yards higher. None could have lived to tell the tale.
• 4:00
  They saw the flashes and the men falling, and an invisible hand as it
• 4:04
  were, lit the bushes as it hurried towards them through the twilight. Then,
• 4:11
  with a whistling note that rose above the droning of the pit, the
• 4:15
  beams swung close over their heads, lighting the tops of the beech trees that
• 4:18
  lined the road and splitting the brakes, smashing the windows, firing the window
• 4:25
  frames, and bringing down, in crumbling ruin a portion of the gable of
• 4:29
  the house nearest the corner. In the sudden thud, hiss and glare of
• 4:34
  the igniting trees, the panic stricken crowd seems to have swayed hesitatingly. For
• 4:41
  some moments. Sparks and burning twigs began to fall into the road, and
• 4:46
  single leaves like puffs of flame. Hats and dresses caught fire. Then came
• 4:54
  a crying from the common. There were shrieks and shouts, and suddenly a
• 4:59
  mounted policeman came galloping through the confusion with his hands clasped over his head,
• 5:03
  screaming, they're coming. A woman shrieked, and incontinently every one was turning
• 5:11
  and pushing at those behind. In order to clear their way to Woking again,
• 5:15
  they must have bolted as blindly as a flock of sheep. Where the
• 5:20
  road grows narrow and black between the high banks, the crowd jammed, and
• 5:26
  a desperate struggle occurred. All that crowd did not escape. Three persons,
• 5:31
  at least two women and a little boy were crushed and trampled there and left
• 5:36
  to die amid the terror and the darkness. End of Section six.