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The Food of the Gods and How it Came to Earth Book 3 Chapter 3 - Young Caddles in London · The H. G. Wells Library

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Speaker 1: Book three, Chapter three of the Food of the Gods
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Speaker 1: and How It Came to Earth. This is the LibriVox recording.
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Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
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Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording
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Speaker 1: by Alexey Tolander Davis, California. The Food of the Gods
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Speaker 1: and How It Came to Earth by H. G. Wells,
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Speaker 1: Book three, Chapter three. Young Cattles in London one, all
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Speaker 1: unaware of the trends of events, unaware of the laws
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Speaker 1: that were closing in upon all the brethren, unaware indeed
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Speaker 1: that there lived a brother for him on the earth.
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Speaker 1: Young Cattles chose this time to come out of his
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Speaker 1: chalk pit and see the world. His brooding came at
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Speaker 1: last to that there was no answer to all his questions.
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Speaker 1: In cheesing eyebright, the new vicar was less luminous even
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Speaker 1: than the old, and the riddle of his pointless labor
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Speaker 1: grew at last to the dimensions of exasperation. Why should
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Speaker 1: I work in this pit day after day? He asked?
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Speaker 1: Why should I walk within bounds and be refused all
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Speaker 1: the wonders of the world beyond there? What have I done?
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Speaker 1: If he condemned to this. And one day he stood up,
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Speaker 1: straightened his back, and said, in a loud voice, No,
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Speaker 1: I won't, he said, and then, with great vigor, cursed
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Speaker 1: the pit. Then, having few words, he sought to express
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Speaker 1: his thought. And as he took a track half filled
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Speaker 1: with chalk, lifted it and flung it smashed against another.
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Speaker 1: Then he grasped a whole row of empty trucks and
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Speaker 1: spun them down a bank. He set a huge bolt
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Speaker 1: of chalk bursting among them, and then ripped up a
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Speaker 1: dozen yards of rail with a mighty plunge of his foot.
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Speaker 1: So he commenced the conscientious wrecking of the pit. Worked
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Speaker 1: all my days, he says, at this it was an
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Speaker 1: astonishing five minutes for the little geologist. He had, in
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Speaker 1: his preoccupation overlooked this poor little creature, having dodged two
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Speaker 1: boulders by a hair breath, got out by the westward corner,
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Speaker 1: and fled athwart the hill with flapping rocks at and
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Speaker 1: twinkling knickerbockered legs, leaving a trail of cretaceous echinoderns behind him.
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Speaker 1: While young Kettles, satisfied with the destruction he had achieved,
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Speaker 1: came striding out to fulfill his purpose in the world,
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Speaker 1: work in that old pit until I die and rotten stink? Aye?
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Speaker 1: What worm did they think was living in my giant body?
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Speaker 1: Did chalk for? God knows what foolish purpose? Ay? Not
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Speaker 1: I the trend of road and railway, perhaps, or of
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Speaker 1: mere chance? It was turned his face to London, and
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Speaker 1: thither he came, striding over the downs and athwart the meadows,
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Speaker 1: through the hot afternoon, to the infinite amazement of the world.
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Speaker 1: It signified nothing to him that torn posters in red
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Speaker 1: and white, bearing various names, flat from every wall and barn.
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Speaker 1: He knew nothing of the electoral revolution that had flung
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Speaker 1: Catahan jacked the Giant Killer into power. It signified nothing
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Speaker 1: to him that every police station along his route had
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Speaker 1: what was known as Caterham's oouquets upon its notice board
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Speaker 1: that afternoon, proclaiming that no giant, no person whatever over
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Speaker 1: eight feet in height, should go more than five miles
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Speaker 1: from his place of location without a special permission. It
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Speaker 1: signified nothing to him that on his wake belated police officers,
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Speaker 1: not a little relieved to find themselves belated, shook warning
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Speaker 1: handbills at his retreating back. He was going to see
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Speaker 1: what the world had to show him, pouring Craigage's blockhead,
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Speaker 1: and he did not mean that occasional spirited persons shouting
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Speaker 1: high at him should stay his course. He came on
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Speaker 1: down by Rochester and Greenwich towards an ever thickening aggregation
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Speaker 1: of houses, walking rather slowly, now stiring about him and
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Speaker 1: swinging his huge chopper. People in London had heard something
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Speaker 1: of him before, how that he was idiotic, but gentle
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Speaker 1: and wonderfully managed by Lady Wondershoot's agent and the vicar.
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Speaker 1: How in his dull way, he revered these authorities, and
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Speaker 1: was grateful to them for their care of him, and
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Speaker 1: so forth. So that when they learned from the newspaper
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Speaker 1: placards that afternoon that he also was on strike, the
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Speaker 1: thing appeared to many of them as a deliberate, concerted act.
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Speaker 1: They mean to try our strengths, said the men in
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Speaker 1: the trades going home from business. Lucky we at Cadahan.
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Speaker 1: It's in answer to his proclamation. The men in the
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Speaker 1: clubs were better informed. They clustered round the tape or
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Speaker 1: talked in groups in their smoking rooms. He has no weapons,
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Speaker 1: he would have gone to seven oaks. If he'd been
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Speaker 1: put up to it. Catahan will handle him, the shopmen
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Speaker 1: told their customers. The waiters and restaurants snatched a moment
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Speaker 1: for an evening paper between the courses. The cabmen read
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Speaker 1: it immediately after the bedding news. The placards of the
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Speaker 1: chief governed evening paper were conspicuous with grasping the nettle.
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Speaker 1: Others relied for effect on giant Redwood continues to meet
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Speaker 1: the Princess. The Echoes struck a light of its own
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Speaker 1: with rumored revolt of giants in north of England. The
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Speaker 1: Sunderland giants start for Scotland. The Westminster Gazette sounded his
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Speaker 1: usual warning note giants beware, said the Westminster Gazette, and
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Speaker 1: tried to make a point out of it that might
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Speaker 1: perhaps serve towards uniting the Liberal Party at that time
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Speaker 1: greatly tore in between seven intensely egotistical leaders. The later
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Speaker 1: newspaper dropped into a uniformity the giant in the new
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Speaker 1: camp road. They proclaimed. What I want to know, said
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Speaker 1: the pale young man in the tea shop, is why
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Speaker 1: we aren't getting any news of the young consers. You'd
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Speaker 1: think they'd be in it. Most of all, they tell
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Speaker 1: me that there's another of them young giants got loose,
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Speaker 1: said the bar, wiping out a glass. I've always said
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Speaker 1: they were dangerous things to have about right away from
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Speaker 1: the beginning. It ought to be put to a stop. Anyhow,
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Speaker 1: I hope he won't come a long ere. I'd like
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Speaker 1: to have a look at him, said the young man
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Speaker 1: at the bar recklessly, and added, I see the princess.
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Speaker 1: Do you think they'll heart him, said the barmaid. May
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Speaker 1: I do, said the young man at the bar, finishing
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Speaker 1: his glass. Amidst a hum of ten million such sayings,
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Speaker 1: Young Cattles came to London two. I think of Young
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Speaker 1: Cattles always as he was seen in the New Kent Road.
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Speaker 1: The sun set warm upon his perplexed and staring face.
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Speaker 1: The road was thick with its very traffic omnibuses, trans vans, carts, trolleys, cyclists, motives,
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Speaker 1: and a marveling crowd loafers, women, nursemaids, shopping women, children,
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Speaker 1: venturesome hovel dee hoys gathered behind his gingerly moving feet.
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Speaker 1: The warnings were untidy everywhere, with this tattered election paper,
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Speaker 1: a bubblement of voices urged about him, once seized, the
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Speaker 1: customers and shopmen crowded in the doorways of the shops,
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Speaker 1: the faces that came and went the windows, the little
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Speaker 1: street boys running and shouting, the policemen taking it all
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Speaker 1: quite stiffly and calmly, the workmen knocking off upon scaffoldings.
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Speaker 1: The seething miscellany of the little folks. They shouted to him,
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Speaker 1: vague encouragement, vague insults, the imbecile catchwares of the day.
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Speaker 1: And he stared down at them, at such a multitude
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Speaker 1: of living creatures as he had never before imagined in
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Speaker 1: the world. Now that he had fairly entered London, he
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Speaker 1: had had to slacken his pace more and more. The
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Speaker 1: little folks crowded so mightily upon him. The crowd grew
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Speaker 1: denser at every step, and at last, at a corner
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Speaker 1: where two great ways converged, he came to a stop,
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Speaker 1: and the multitude flowed about him and closed him in.
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Speaker 1: There he stood, with his feet a little apart, his
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Speaker 1: back to a big corner gin palace, the tower twice
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Speaker 1: in its height and ended in a sky sign, staring
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Speaker 1: down at the pygmies and wondering, trying I doubt not
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Speaker 1: to collate it all with the other things of his life,
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Speaker 1: with the valley, among the down lands, the nocturnal lovers,
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Speaker 1: the singing in the church, the chalky hammer daily, and
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Speaker 1: with insign and death and the sky. Trying to see
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Speaker 1: it all together coherent, insignificant. His brows were net. He
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Speaker 1: put up its huge pole to scratch his coarse hair
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Speaker 1: and groaned aloud. I don't see it, he said. His
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Speaker 1: accent was unfamiliar. A great babblement went across the open space, abovenment,
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Speaker 1: amidst which the gongs of the trams, plowing their obstinate
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Speaker 1: way through the mass, rose like red poppies amidst corn.
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Speaker 1: What did he say that he didn't see? Said? Where's
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Speaker 1: the sea? Said? Where is the seat? He wants a seat?
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Speaker 1: Can't the breasted fools sit on an ouse or something?
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Speaker 1: What are you for, ye swarming little people? What are
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Speaker 1: ye all doing? What are ye all for? What are
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Speaker 1: ye doing up here? Ye swarming little people? While I'm
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Speaker 1: a cuttin chalk for ye down in the chalk pits.
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Speaker 1: There his queer voice, the voice that had been so
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Speaker 1: bad for school discipline, at cheasing eyebright smote the multitude
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Speaker 1: of silence while it sounded and splashed them all to tumult.
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Speaker 1: At the end, somewhit was audible, screaming speech speech. What's
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Speaker 1: he saying was the burthen of the public mind, And
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Speaker 1: an opinion was abroad that he was drunk. Hi Hi Hi,
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Speaker 1: bawled the omnibus drivers threading a dangerous way. A drunken
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Speaker 1: American sailor wanted about, tearfully, inquiring what's he want anyhow?
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Speaker 1: Alitery faced, ragged dealer upon a little pony drawn cart,
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Speaker 1: swored up over the tumult by virtue of his voice.
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Speaker 1: Garnam you brasted giant, he growled, garnam, you've brasted great
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Speaker 1: dangerous thing. Cat. You see you're frightened. The horses go
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Speaker 1: with you. Hasn't anyone had the sense to tell you
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Speaker 1: the law? And now over all this uproar. Young Cattles stared, perplexed, expectant,
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Speaker 1: saying no more. Down a side road came a little
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Speaker 1: string of solemn policemen and threaded itself ingeniously into the traffic.
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Speaker 1: Stand back, said the little voices keep moving please. Young
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Speaker 1: Cattles became aware of a little dark blue figure thumping
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Speaker 1: at his shin. He looked down and perceived two white
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Speaker 1: hands gesticulating what he said bending forward. Can't stand about here,
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Speaker 1: shouted the inspector. No, you can't stand about here, he repeated.
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Speaker 1: But where am I to go? Back to your village
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Speaker 1: place of location? Anyhow? Now you've got to move. You're
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Speaker 1: obstructing the traffic. What traffic along the road? But where
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Speaker 1: is it going? Where does it come from? What does
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Speaker 1: it mean? They're all round me? What do they want?
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Speaker 1: What are they doing? I want to understand. I'm tired
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Speaker 1: of cutting chalk and beIN alone. What are they doin
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Speaker 1: for me while I'm a cutting chalk? I may just
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Speaker 1: as well understand here now as anywhere. Sorry, but we
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Speaker 1: aren't here to explain things of that sort. I must
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Speaker 1: arst you to move on, don't you know? I mast
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Speaker 1: arce you to move on if you please, I'd strongly
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Speaker 1: advise you to get off home. We've had no especial
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Speaker 1: instructions yet, but it's against the law. Clear away there,
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Speaker 1: clear away. The payment to his left became invitingly bare,
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Speaker 1: and young Cattles went slowly on his way. But now
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Speaker 1: his tongue was loosened. I don't understand, he muttered, I
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Speaker 1: don't understand, he would appeal brokenly to the changing crowd
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Speaker 1: that ever trailed beside him and behind. I didn't know
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Speaker 1: there were such places at this What are all your
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Speaker 1: people doing with your seals? What's it jail for? What's
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Speaker 1: it all for? And where do I come in? He
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Speaker 1: had already begotten a new catchword. Young men of wit
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Speaker 1: and spirit addressed each other in this manner, hullo arie o'cok,
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Speaker 1: what's it all for? Eh? What's it all blooming well? For?
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Speaker 1: To which there sprang up a competing variety of repartees,
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Speaker 1: for the most part impolite. The most popular and best
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Speaker 1: adapted for general use, appears to have been shut it
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Speaker 1: or at a voice of scornful detachment, gammy I. There
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Speaker 1: were others almost equally popular. Three What was he seeking?
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Speaker 1: He wanted something the pygmy would not give, some end
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Speaker 1: which the pygmy world prevented his attaining, prevented even his
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Speaker 1: seeing clearly, which he was never to see clearly. It
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Speaker 1: was the whole gigantic social side of this lonely dumb monster,
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Speaker 1: crying out for his race, the things akin to him,
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Speaker 1: for something he might love and something he might serve
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Speaker 1: for a purpose. He might comprehend. Under command, he might
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Speaker 1: could obey. And you know, all this was dumb rage,
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Speaker 1: dumbly within him, could not, even had he met a
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Speaker 1: fellow giant, have found outlet and expression in speech. All
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Speaker 1: the life he knew was the dull round of the village.
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Speaker 1: All the speech he knew was the talk of the
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Speaker 1: cottage that failed and collapsed at the bare outline of
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Speaker 1: his least gigantic need. He knew nothing of money, this
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Speaker 1: monstrous simpleton, nothing of trade, nothing of the conflicts pretenses
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Speaker 1: upon which the social fabric of the little folks was built.
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Speaker 1: He needed, he needed whatever he needed. He never found
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Speaker 1: his need. All through the day and the summer night,
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Speaker 1: he wandered, growing hungry but as yet untired, making the
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Speaker 1: very traffic of the different streets, the inexplicable businesses of
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Speaker 1: all these infinitesimal beings in the aggregate. It had no
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Speaker 1: other color than confusion for him. He is said to
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Speaker 1: have plucked a lady from a carriage in Kensington, a
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Speaker 1: lady in evening dress of the smartest sort, to have
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Speaker 1: scrutinized her closely train in shoulder blades, and to have
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Speaker 1: replaced her a little carelessly, with the profoundest sigh for
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Speaker 1: that I cannot vouch. For an hour or so he
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Speaker 1: watched people fighting for places in the omnibuses at the
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Speaker 1: end of Piccadilly. He was seen looming of a Kensington
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Speaker 1: oval for some moments in the afternoon. When he saw
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Speaker 1: these dense thousands were engaged with the mystery of cricket,
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Speaker 1: and quite regardless of him, he went his way with
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Speaker 1: a growl. He came back to Piccadilly Circus between eleven
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Speaker 1: and twelve at nights and found a new sort of multitude.
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Speaker 1: Clearly they were very intent, full of things they, for
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Speaker 1: inconceivable reasons, might do, and of us as they might
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Speaker 1: not do. They stared at him, and jeered at him,
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Speaker 1: and went their way. The cabmen vultriite followed one another
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Speaker 1: continually along the edge of the swarming pavement. People emerged
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Speaker 1: from the restaurants or entered them, grave intent, dignified, or
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Speaker 1: gently and agreeably excited, or keen and vigilant beyond the
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Speaker 1: cheating of the sharpest weight of bourne. The great giants,
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Speaker 1: standing at his corner peered them all. What is it
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Speaker 1: all for? He murmured in a mournful, vast undertone. What
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Speaker 1: is it all for? They are all so earnest, What
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Speaker 1: is it? I do not understand? And none of them
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Speaker 1: seemed to see as he could do, the drink, sudden
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Speaker 1: wretchedness of the painted women at the corner, the ragged
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Speaker 1: misery that sneaked along the gutters, the infinite futility of
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Speaker 1: all this employment, the infinite futility. None of them seemed
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Speaker 1: to feel the shadow of that giant's need, that shadow
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Speaker 1: of the future that lay athwart their path. Across the road,
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Speaker 1: high up, mysterious letters flamed and went that might could
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Speaker 1: he have read them, have measured for him the dimensions
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Speaker 1: of human interest, have told him of the fundamental needs
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Speaker 1: and features of life, as the little folks conceived. First
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Speaker 1: would come a flaming tea, Then you would follow tu,
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Speaker 1: then P t U, P, until at last there stood
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Speaker 1: complete across the sky, this cheerful message to all who
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Speaker 1: felt the burthen of Lea's earnestness, Tupper's tonic wine for
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Speaker 1: vigor snap, and it had vanished into night, to be
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Speaker 1: followed in the same slowed to development by a second
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Speaker 1: universal solitude, beauty soap. Not to remark more your cleansing chemicals,
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Speaker 1: but something, as they say, ideal, and then completing the
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Speaker 1: tripod of the little life tanker's yellow pills. And after
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Speaker 1: that there was nothing for it but Tupper again in
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Speaker 1: naming crimson letters. Snap Snap across the void t U
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Speaker 1: p p. Early in the small hours, it was seeing
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Speaker 1: that young Cattles came to the shadowy quiet of Region's Park,
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Speaker 1: stepped over the railings and lay down on a grass.
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Speaker 1: He sloped near where the people skate in winter time,
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Speaker 1: and there he slept an hour or so. At about
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Speaker 1: six o'clock in the morning, he was talking to a
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Speaker 1: draggled woman he had found sleeping in a ditch near
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Speaker 1: Hampstead Heath, asking her very earnestly what she thought she
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Speaker 1: was four four. The wandering of Cattles about London came
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Speaker 1: to a head on the second day in the morning.
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Speaker 1: For then his hunger overcame him. He hesitated where the
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Speaker 1: hot smelling loaves were being tossed into a cart, and
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Speaker 1: then very quietly knelt down and commenced robbery. He entered
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Speaker 1: the cart while the baker's man fled for the police.
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Speaker 1: And then his great hand came into the shop and
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Speaker 1: cleared counter and cases. Then, with an armful, still eating,
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Speaker 1: he went his way, looking for another shop to go
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Speaker 1: on with his meal. It happened to be one of
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Speaker 1: those seasons when work is scarce and food deer, and
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Speaker 1: the crowd in that quarter was sympathetic, even with a
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Speaker 1: giant who took the food they all desired. They plauded
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Speaker 1: the second phase of his meal and laughed at his
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Speaker 1: stupid grimace the policeman. I was hungry, he said, with
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Speaker 1: his mouth full. Bravo, cried the crowd. Bravo. Then, when
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Speaker 1: he was beginning his third baker's shop, he was stopped
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Speaker 1: by half a dozen policemen, hammering with truncheons on his shins.
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Speaker 1: Look here, my fine giant, you come along on me,
15:09
Speaker 1: said the officer in charge. You in it aloud, away
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Speaker 1: from home like this, You come off home with me.
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Speaker 1: They did their best to arrest him. There was a trolley,
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Speaker 1: i'm told, chasing up and down streets at that time,
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Speaker 1: bearing rolls of chain and ship's cable to play the
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Speaker 1: part of handcuffs in that great arrest. There was no
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Speaker 1: intention then of killing him. He is no party to
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Speaker 1: the plot. Catahan had said, I will not have insant
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Speaker 1: blood upon my hands, and added until everything else has
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Speaker 1: been tried. At first Cattles did not understand the import
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Speaker 1: of these attentions. When he did, he told the policemen
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Speaker 1: not to be fools, and set off in great strides
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Speaker 1: that left them all behind. The Baga's shops had been
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Speaker 1: in the Harrow Road, and he went through Canal London
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Speaker 1: to Saint John's Wood and sat down in a private
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Speaker 1: garden there to pick his teeth and be speedily assailed
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Speaker 1: by another posse of constables. You leave me alone, he growled,
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Speaker 1: and slatched through the gardens, spoiling several lawns and kicking
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Speaker 1: down a f or so, while the adjic little policeman
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Speaker 1: followed him up, some through the gardens, some along the
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Speaker 1: road in front of the houses. Heither or one or
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Speaker 1: two with guns, but they made no use of them.
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Speaker 1: When he came out into the Edgeware Road, there was
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Speaker 1: a new note and a new movement in the crowd,
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Speaker 1: and a mounted policeman rode over his foot and got
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Speaker 1: upset for his panes. You leave me alone, said Cattles,
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Speaker 1: facing the breathless crowd. I ain't done anything to you.
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Speaker 1: At the time, he was unarmed for he had left
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Speaker 1: his chalk chopper in Regent's Park, but now, poor wretch,
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Speaker 1: he seems to have felt the need of some weapon.
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Speaker 1: He turned back towards the Goods Yard of the Great
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Speaker 1: Western Railway, wrenched up the standard of a tall arc
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Speaker 1: night and for formidable mace for him, and flung it
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Speaker 1: over his shoulder, And, finding the police still turning up
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Speaker 1: to pester him, he went back along the Edgeware Road
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Speaker 1: towards Creaklewood and struck off sullenly to the north. He
16:47
Speaker 1: wanted as far as Waltham, and then turned back westward,
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Speaker 1: and then again towards London, and came by the cemeteries
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Speaker 1: and over the crest of Highgate about mid day, into
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Speaker 1: view of the greatness of the city. Again, he turned
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Speaker 1: his side and sat down in a garden with his
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Speaker 1: back to a house that overlooked all London. He was
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Speaker 1: breathless and his face was lowering. And now the people
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Speaker 1: no longer crowded upon him as they had done when
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Speaker 1: first he came to London, but lurked in the adjacent
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Speaker 1: garden and peeped from cautious securities. They knew by now
17:14
Speaker 1: the thing was grimmer than they had thought, Why can't
17:16
Speaker 1: they leave me alone? Growled young Kettles. I must eat?
17:20
Speaker 1: Why can't they leave me alone? He sat with a
17:22
Speaker 1: darkening face, gnawing at his knuckles and looking down over London.
17:26
Speaker 1: All the fatigue, wory, perplexity, and impotent wrath of his
17:29
Speaker 1: wanderings was coming to a head in him. They mean nothing,
17:32
Speaker 1: he whispered, They mean nothing, and they won't let me alone,
17:36
Speaker 1: and they will get in my way and again, over
17:38
Speaker 1: and owered himself, meaning nothing, Ah, the little people. He
17:42
Speaker 1: bit harder at his knuckle, and his scowl deepened. Cutting
17:45
Speaker 1: chalk for me, whispered, all the world is theirs. I
17:48
Speaker 1: don't come in nowhere. Presently, with a spasm of sick anger,
17:52
Speaker 1: he saw the now familiar form of a policeman astride
17:54
Speaker 1: the garden wall. Leave me alone, grunted the giant. Leave
17:57
Speaker 1: me alone. I go to do my duties, said the
18:00
Speaker 1: little policeman, with a face that was white and resolute.
18:03
Speaker 1: You leave me alone. I got to live as well
18:05
Speaker 1: as you. I got to think. I got to eat.
18:07
Speaker 1: You leave me alone. It's the law, said the little policeman,
18:10
Speaker 1: coming no further. We never made the law, nor me,
18:13
Speaker 1: said Young Kettles. You little people, made all that before
18:16
Speaker 1: I was born. You and your law. What I must
18:18
Speaker 1: and what I mustn't. No food for me to eat
18:21
Speaker 1: unless I work a slave, No rest, no shelter, nothin.
18:24
Speaker 1: And you tell me I ain't got no business with that,
18:26
Speaker 1: said the policeman. I am not one to argue. All
18:29
Speaker 1: I got to do is carry out the law. And
18:31
Speaker 1: he brought his second leg over the wall and seemed
18:33
Speaker 1: disposed to get down. Other policeman appeared behind him. I
18:37
Speaker 1: got no quarrel with you mine, said young Kettles, with
18:39
Speaker 1: his grip tied upon his huge mace of iron, his
18:42
Speaker 1: face pale, and a lank, explanatory great finger to the policeman.
18:46
Speaker 1: I got no quarrel with you, but you leave me alone.
18:49
Speaker 1: The policeman tried to be calm and commonplace, with a
18:51
Speaker 1: monster's tragedy clear before his eyes. Give me the proclamation,
18:55
Speaker 1: he said to some unseen follower, and a little white
18:58
Speaker 1: paper was handed to him. Leave me, and said Cattles, scowling,
19:01
Speaker 1: tense and drawn together. This means, said the policeman, before
19:04
Speaker 1: he read, go home, go on to your chalkpit. If not,
19:08
Speaker 1: you'll be hurt. Kettles gave an inarticulate growl. Then, when
19:12
Speaker 1: the proclamation had been read, the officer made a sign
19:14
Speaker 1: forming with rifles, came into view and took up positions
19:17
Speaker 1: of affected ease along the wall. They wore the uniform
19:20
Speaker 1: of the rat Police. At the side of the guns,
19:22
Speaker 1: Young Cattles blazed into anger. You remembered the sting of
19:26
Speaker 1: the red stone farmer's shotguns. You're going to shoot off
19:29
Speaker 1: those of me, he said, pointing that it seemed to
19:31
Speaker 1: the officer he must be afraid if you don't march
19:33
Speaker 1: back to your pit. Then in an instance, the officer
19:36
Speaker 1: had slung himself back over the wall, and sixty feet
19:38
Speaker 1: above him the great electric standard whirled down to his death.
19:42
Speaker 1: Bang bang, Bang went the heavy guns and smashed the
19:44
Speaker 1: shattered wall. The soil and sub soil of the garden flew.
19:48
Speaker 1: Something flew with it that left red drops on one
19:50
Speaker 1: of the shooter's hands. The rifleman dodged this way and that,
19:54
Speaker 1: and turned valiantly to fire again, But young Kettles, already
19:57
Speaker 1: shot twice through. The body had spun about to find
19:59
Speaker 1: who was had hid him so heavily in the back.
20:02
Speaker 1: Bang Bang. He had a vision of houses and greenhouses
20:05
Speaker 1: and gardens, the people dodging at windows, the hole swaying
20:08
Speaker 1: fearfully and mysteriously, seemed to have made three stumbling strides,
20:13
Speaker 1: to have raised and dropped his huge mace, and to
20:15
Speaker 1: have clutched his chest. He was stung and wrenched by pain.
20:19
Speaker 1: What was this warm and wet on his hand? One
20:22
Speaker 1: man peering from the bedroom window saw his face, saw
20:25
Speaker 1: him staring with a grimace of weeping dismay at the
20:28
Speaker 1: blood upon his hand. And then his knees bent under him,
20:31
Speaker 1: and he came crashing to the earth, the first of
20:33
Speaker 1: the giant nettles to fall to Cadahan's resolute clutch. The
20:37
Speaker 1: very last that he reckoned would come into his hand.
20:41
Speaker 1: End of Book three, Chapter three of The Foot of
20:45
Speaker 1: the Gods and How It Came to Earth. Recording by
20:50
Speaker 1: alexey To Lander, Davis, California, www dot elextlander dot com.