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01 - The God's of Mars - Edgar Rice Burroughs · Daily Sci-Fi Books

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The Gods of Mars, written by Edgar Rice Burroughs Forward. Twelve years had
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passed since I had laid the body of my great uncle, Captain John Carter
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of Virginia away from the sight of men, in that strange mausoleum in the
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old Cemetery at Richmond. Often I had pondered on the odd instructions he had
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left me governing the construction of his mighty tomb, and especially those parts which
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directed that he be laid in an open casket, and the ponderous mechanism which
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controlled the bolts of the vault's huge door be accessible only from the inside.
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Twelve years had passed since I read the remarkable manuscript of this remarkable man,
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This man who remembered no childhood, and who could not even offer a vague
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guess as to his age, who was always young, and yet who had
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dandled my grandfather's great grandfather upon his knee, This man who had spent ten
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years upon the planet Mars, who had fought for the green men of Barsoom
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and fought against them, who had fought for and against the Red men,
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and who had won the ever beautiful dejah Thoris, Princess of Helium for his
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wife, and for nearly ten years had been a prince of the House of
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Tardos Mors Jeddak of Helium. Twelve years had passed since his body had been
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found upon the bluff before his cottage overlooking the Hudson, and oftentimes during these
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long years, I had wondered if John Carter were really dead, or if
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he again roamed the dead sea bottoms of that dying planet, if he had
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returned to Barsoom to find that he had opened the frowning portals of the Mighty
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Atmosphere plant in time to save the countless millions who were dying of asphyxiation.
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On that far gone day that had seen him hurled ruthlessly through the forty eight
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million miles of space back to Earth. Once more, I had wondered if
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he had found his black haired princess and the slender son he had dreamed was
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with her in the royal gardens of Tardos Mors, awaiting his return, or
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had he found that he had been too late and thus gone back to living
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death upon a dead world. Or was he really dead after all, never
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to return either to his mother Earth or his beloved Mars. Thus, I
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was lost in a useless speculation one sultry August evening when old Ben, my
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body servant, handed me a telegram, tearing it open, I read,
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meet me tomorrow, Hotel Riley, Richmond, John Carter. Early the next
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morning, I took the first train for Richmond, and within two hours was
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being ushered into the room occupied by John Carter. As I entered, he
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rose to greet me his old time cordial smile of welcome lightning his handsome face.
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Apparently he had not aged a minute, but was still the straight,
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clean, limbed fighting man of thirty. His keen gray eyes were undimmed,
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and the only lines upon his face were the lines of an iron character and
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determination that always had been there. Sent first, I remembered him nearly thirty
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five years before, Well, nephew, He greeted me. Do you feel
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as though you were seeing a ghost or suffering from the effects of too many
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of your uncle Ben julops julips I reckon, I replied, for I certainly
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feel mighty good, but maybe it's just the sight of you again that affects
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me. You have been back to Mars. Tell me and dejah Thoris you
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found her well in awaiting you. Yes, I have been to Barsoom again,
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Anne, but it's a long story, too long to tell in the
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limited time I have before I must return. I have learned the secret,
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Nephew, and I may traverse the trackless void at my will, coming and
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going between the countless planets as I list. But my heart is always in
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Barsoom. And while it is there, in the keeping of my martian Princess,
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I doubt that I shall ever again leave the dying world that is my
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life. I have come now because my affection for you prompted me to see
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you once more before you pass over forever into that other life that I shall
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never know, and which, though I have died thrice and shall die again
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to night, as you know death, I am as unable to fathom as
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you are. Even the wise and mysterious thurns of Barsoom, that ancient cult
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which for countless ages has been credited with holding the secret of life and death
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in their impregnable fastness upon the hither slopes of the mountains of Aughts, are
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as as ignorant as we are. I have proved it, though I near
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lost my life in the doing of it. But you shall read it all
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in the notes I have been making during the last three months that I have
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been back upon earth. He padded a swelling portfolio that lay on the table
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at his elbow. I know that you are interested, and that you believe.
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And I know that the world too is interested, though they will not
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believe for many years, yes, for many ages, since they cannot understand
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Earth. Men have not yet progressed to a point where they can comprehend the
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things that I have written in those notes. Give the them what you wish
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of it, what you think will not harm them. But do not feel
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aggrieved if they laugh at you. That night, I walked down to the
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cemetery with him. At the door of his vault, he turned and pressed
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my hand. Good Bye, nephew, he said, I may never see
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you again, for I doubt that I can ever bring myself to leave my
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wife and boy while they live, and the span of life upon Barsoom is
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often more than a thousand years. He entered the vault. The great door
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swung slowly to the ponderous bolts grated into place. The lock clicked. I
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have never seen Captain John Carter of Virginia since. But here is the story
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of his return to Mars on that other occasion, as I have gleaned it
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from that great mass of notes which he left for me upon the table of
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his room in the hotel at Richmond. There is much which I have left
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out, much which I have not dared to tell. But you will find
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the story of his second search for dejah Thoris, Princess of Helium, even
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more remarkable than was his first manuscript, which I gave to an unbelieving world
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a short time since, and through which we followed the fighting Virginian across dead
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sea bottoms under the moons of Mars. Edgar Rice Burroughs, Chapter one,
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The Planet Men. As I stood upon the bluff before my cottage on that
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clear cold night in the early part of March eighteen eighty six, the noble
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Hudson flowing like the gray and silent spectacle of Dead River below me, I
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felt again the strange, compelling influence of the mighty God of War, my
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beloved Mars, which for ten long and lonesome years I have implored with outstretched
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arms to carry me back to my lost love. Not since that other March
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night in eighteen sixty six, when I had stood without that Arizona Cave,
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in which my still lifeless body lay wrapped in the similitude of earthly death,
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had I felt the irresistible attraction of the God of my profession. With arms
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out the stretched toward the red eye of the great Star, I stood praying
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for return of that strange power which twice had drawn me through the immensity of
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space, praying as I had prayed on a thousand nights before, during the
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long ten years that I had waited in hope. Suddenly a qualm of nausea
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swept over me. My senses swam, my knees gave beneath me, and
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I pitched headlong to the ground upon the very verge of the dizzy bluff.
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Instantly my brain cleared, and there swept back across the threshold of my memory
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the vivid picture of the horrors of that ghostly Arizona Cave. Again, as
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on that far gone night, my muscles refused to respond to my will,
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and again, as though even here upon the banks of the placid Husson,
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I could hear the awful moans and rustling of the fearsome thing which had lurked
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and threatened me from the dark recesses of the cave. I made the same
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mighty and superhuman effort to break the bonds of the strange anastagia which held me,
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and again came the sharp click as of the sudden parting of a taut
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wire, and I stood naked and free beside the staring, lifeless thing that
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had so recently pulsed with the warm red life blood of John Carter. With
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scarcely a parting glance, I turned my eyes again toward Mars, lifted my
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hands towards this lurid rays, and waited. Nor did I have long to
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wait for scarce had I turned air, I shot, with the rapidity of
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thought into the awful void before me. There was the same instant of unthinkable
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cold and utter darkness that I experienced twenty years before. And then I opened
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my eyes in another world, beneath the burning rays of a hot sun which
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beat through a tiny opening in the dome of a mighty forest in which I
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lay. The scene that met my eyes was so unmartian that my heart sprang
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to my throat as the sudden fear swept through me that I had been aimlessly
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tossed upon some strange planet by a cruel fate. Why not? What guide
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had I through the trackless waste of interplanetary space, What assurance that I might
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not as well be hurtled to some far distant star of another solar system as
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to Mars. I lay upon a close cropped swath of red grass like vegetation,
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and about me stretched a grove of strange and beautiful trees, covered with
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huge and gorgeous blossoms, and filled with brilliant, voiceless birds. I called
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them birds, since they were winged, But mortal eye ne'er rested on such
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odd, unearthly shapes. The vegetation was similar to that which covers the lawns
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of the red Martians of the Great Waterways, but the trees and birds were
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unlike anything that I had ever seen upon Mars. And then through the further
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trees, I could see that most Unmartian of all sights, an open sea,
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its blue water shimmering beneath the brazen sun. As I rose to investigate
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further, I experienced the same ridiculous catastrophe that had met my first attempt to
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walk under my Martian conditions, the lesser attraction of this smaller planet and the
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reduced air pressure of its greatly rarefied atmosphere afforded so little resistance to my earthly
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muscles that the ordinary exertion of the mere act of rising sent me several feet
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into the air and precipitated me upon my face in the soft and brilliant grass
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of this strange world. This experience, however, gave me some slightly increased
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assurance that, after all, I might indeed be in some to me unknown
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corner of Mars. And this was very possible, since during my ten years
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residence upon the planet I had explored but a comparatively tiny area of its vast
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expanse. I rose again, laughing at my forgetfulness, and soon had mastered
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once more the art of attuning my earthly sinews to these changed conditions. As
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I walked slowly down the imperceptible slope toward the sea, I could not help
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but note the park like appearance of the sword of trees. The grass was
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as close cropped and carpet like as some old English lawn, and the trees
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them shelves showed evidence of careful pruning to a uniform height of about fifteen feet
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from the ground, so that as one turned his glance in any direction.
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The forest had the appearance at a little distance of a vast, high,
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sealed chamber. All these evidence of careful and systematic cultivation convinced me that I
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had been fortunate enough to make my entry into Mars on this second occasion,
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through the domain of a civilized people, and that when I should find them,
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I would be accorded the courtesy and protection that my rank as a prince
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of the House of Tortoise Moors entitled me to. The trees of the forest
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attracted my deep admiration as I proceeded toward the sea. Their great stems,
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some of them fully a hundred feet in diameter, attested to the prodigious height
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which I could only guess at, since at no point could I penetrate their
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dense foliage above me to more than sixty or eighty feet. As far aloft
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as I could see, the stems and branches and twigs were as smooth and
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as highly polished as the newest of American made pianos. The wood of some
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of the trees was as black as ebony, while their nearest neighbors might perhaps
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gleam in the subdued light of the forest as clear and white as the finest
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china. Or again they were a source scarlet yellow or deep as purple.
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And in the same way was the foliage as gay and variegated as the stems,
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while the blooms that clustered thick upon them may not be described in any
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earthly tongue, and indeed might challenge the language of the gods. As I
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neared the confines of the forest, I beheld before me, and between the
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grove and the open sea, a broad expanse of meadow land. And as
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I was about to emerge from the shadows of the trees, a sight met
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my eyes that banished all romantic and poetic reflection upon the beauties of the strange
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landscape. To my left, the sea extended as far as the eye could
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reach. Before me, only a vague dim line indicated its further shore,
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while at my right a mighty river, broad and placid and majestic, flowed
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between scarlet banks to empty into the quiet sea. Before me, At a
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little distance up the river rose mighty perpendicular bluffs, from the very base of
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which the river seemed to rise. But it was not these inspiring and magnificent
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evidence of nature's grandeur that took my immediate attention from the beauties of the forest.
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It was the sight of a score of figures moving slowly about the meadow
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near the bank of the Mighty River. Odd grotesque shapes. They were unlike
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anything that I had ever seen upon Mars, and yet at a distance most
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manlike in appearance. The large specimens seemed to be about ten or fifteen feet
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in height when they stood erect, and to be proportioned as to torso and
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lower extremities precisely as is earthly man. Their arms, however, were very
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short, and from where I stood, seemed as though fashioned much after the
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manner of an elephant's trunk, in that they moved insinuous in snakelike undulation,
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as though entirely without bony structure, or if there were bones, it seemed
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that they must be virtual in nature. As I watched them from behind the
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stem of a huge tree, one of the creatures moved slowly in my direction,
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engaged in the occupation that seemed to be the principal business of each of
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them, and which consisted in running their oddly shaped hands over the surface of
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the sword. For what purpose I could not determine, As he approached quite
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close to me, I obtained an excellent view of him, and though I
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was later to become better acquainted with his kind, I may say that single
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cursory examination of this awful travesy on nature would have proved quite sufficient to my
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desires. Had I been a free agent. The fastest flier of the Helimic
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navy could not quickly enough have carried me far from this hideous creature. Its
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hairless body was a strange and ghoulish blue, except for a broad band of
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white which encircled its protruding single eye, and an eye that was all dead
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white, pupil iris and ball Its nose was a ragged inflamed circular hole in
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the center of its blank face, a hole that resembled more closely nothing that
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I could think of, other than a fresh bullet wound which has not yet
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commenced to bleed below the repulsive orifice. The face was quite blank to the
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chin, for the thing had no mouth that I could discover. The head,
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with the exception of the face, was covered by a tangled mass of
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jet black hair, some eight or ten inches in length. Each hair was
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about the bigness of a large angleworm, and as the thing moved, the
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muscles of its skulp, its awful head covering seemed to rith and wiggle and
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crawl about the fearsome face, as though indeed each separate hair was endowed with
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independent life. The body and the legs were asymmetrically human as nature could have
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fashioned them, and the feet, too were human in shape, but of
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monstrous proportions. From heel to toe. They were fully three feet long,
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and very flat and very broad. As it came quite close to me,
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I discovered that its strange movements running its odd hands over the surface of the
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turf, were the result of its peculiar method of feeding, which consists in
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cropping off the tender vegetation with its razor like talons and sucking it up from
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its two mouths, which lie one in the palm of each hand, through
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its arm like throats. In addition to the features which I had already described,
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the beast was equipped with a massive tail about six feet in length,
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quite round where it joined the body, but tapered in capering to a flat,
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thin blade toward the end, which trailed at right angles to the ground.
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By far the most remarkable feature of this most remarkable creature. However,
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were the two tiny replicas of it, each about six inches in length,
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which dangled one on either side from its armpits. They were suspended by a
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small stem which seemed to grow from the exact tops of their heads to where
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it connected them with the body of the adult. Whether they were the young
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or merely proportions of a composite creature, I did not know. As I
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had been scrutinizing this weird monstrosity, the balance of the herd had fed quite
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close to me, and I now saw that while many had the smaller specimens
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dangling from them, not all were thus equipped. And I further noted that
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the little ones varied in size from what appeared to be but tiny, unopened
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buds an inch in diameter, through various stages of development, to the full
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fledged and perfectly formed creature of ten to twelve inches in length. Feeding with
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the herd were many of the little fellows, not much larger than those which
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remained attached to their parents, and from the young of that size the herd
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grated up to the immense adults. Fearsome looking as they were, I did
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not know whether to fear them or not, for they did not seem to
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be particularly well equipped for fighting, and I was on the point of stepping
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from my hiding place and revealing myself to them, to note the effect upon
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them of the sight of a man, when my rash resolve was fortunately for
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me nipped in the bud by a strange shrieking wail which seemed to come from
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the direction of the bluffs at my right. Naked and unarmed as I was,
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my end would have been both speedily and horrible at the hands of these
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cruel creatures, had I had time to put my resolve into execution. But
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at the moment of the shriek, each member of the herd turned in the
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direction from which the sound seemed to come, and at the same instant,
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every particular snakelike hair upon their heads rose stiffly perpendicular, as if each had
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been a sentient organism looking or listening for the source or meaning of the whale.
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And indeed the latter proved to be the truth, for this strange growth
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upon the craniums of the plant men of Barsoom represents the thousand ears of these
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hideous creatures, the last remnant of the strange race which sprang from the original
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tree of life. Instantly, every eye turned toward one member of the herd,
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a large fellow who evidently was the leader. A strange purring sound issued
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from the mouth in the palm of one of his hands, and at the
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same time he started rapidly toward the bluff, followed by the entire herd.
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Their speed and method of locomotion were both remarkable, springing as they did in
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great leaps of twenty or thirty feet, much after the manner of a kangaroo.
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They were rapidly disappearing when occurred to me to follow them, and so,
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hurling caution to the winds, I sprang across the meadow in their wake,
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with leaps and bounds even more prodigious than their own, For the muscles
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of an athletic earthmen produced remarkable results when pitted against the lesser gravity and air
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pressure of Mars. Their way led directly towards the apparent source of the river
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at the base of the cliffs, and as I neared this point, I
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found the meadow dotted with huge boulders that the ravages of time had evidently dislodged
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from the towering crags above. For this reason, I came quite close to
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the cause of the disturbance before the seam broke. Upon my horrified gaze,
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as I topped a great boulder, I saw the herd of plant men surrounding
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a little group of perhaps five or six green men and women of barsoom that
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I was indeed upon Mars. I now had no doubt, for here were
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members of the wild hordes that people the dead sea bottoms and deserted cities of
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that dying planet. Here were the great males, towering in all their majesty,
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of their imposing height. Here were the gleaming white tusks protruding from their
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massive lower jaws to a point near the center of their foreheads, the laterally
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placed protruding eyes with which they could look forward or backward, or to either
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side without turning their heads. Here the strange antennae like ears rising from the
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tops of their foreheads, and the additional pair of arms extending from midway between
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the shoulders and the hips. Even without the glossy green hide and the metal
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ornaments which denoted the tribes to which they belonged, I would have known them
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on the instant for what they were. For where else in all the universe
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is their like duplicated. There were two men and four females in the party,
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and their ornaments denoted them as members of different hordes, a fact which
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tended to puzzle me infinitely, since the various hordes of green men of Barsoom
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are eternally at deadly war with one another, and never except on that single
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historic instant, when the great Tars Tarkas of thark gathered one hundred and fifty
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thousand green warriors from several hordes to march upon the doomed city of Zodanga to
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rescue dejah Thoris, Princess of Helium, from the clutches of than Kors.
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Had I seen great green martians of different hordes associated in other than mortal combat.
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But now they stood back to back, facing in wide eyed amazement the
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very evidently hostile demonstrations of a common enemy. Both men and women were armed
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with long swords and daggards, but no firearms were in evidence. Else it
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had been short shrift for the gruesome Plantmen of Barsoom. Presently, the leader
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of the plant Men charged the little party, and his method of attack was
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as remarkable as it was effective, and by its very strangeness was the more
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potent, since in the science of the Green Warriors there was no defense for
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the singular manner of attack, the like of which it soon was evident to
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me they were as unfamiliar with as they were with the monstrosities which confronted them.
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The plant men charged to within a dozen feet of the party, and
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then with a bound rose as though to pass directly above their heads. His
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powerful tail was raised high to one side, and as he passed close above
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them, he brought it down in one terrific sweep that crushed a Green warrior's
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skull as though it had been an eggshell. The balance of the frightful herd
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was now circling rapidly and with bewildering speed about the little knot of victims.
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Their prodigious bounds and the shrill, shrieking purr of their uncanny mouths were well
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calculated to confuse and terrorize their prayer, as that as two of them leaped
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simultaneously from each side, the mighty sweep of those awful tales met with no
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resistance stance, and two more Green martians went down to an ignoble death.
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There were now but one warrior and two females left, and it seemed that
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it could be but a matter of seconds ere these also lay dead upon the
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scarlet's sword. But as two more of the plant men charged, the warrior,
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who was now prepared by the experiences of the past few minutes, swung
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his mighty long sword aloft and met the hurtling bulk with a clean cut that
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clove one of the plant men from chin to groan. The other, however,
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dealt a single blow with his cruel tail that laid both of the females
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crushed corpses upon the ground. As the green warriors saw the last of his
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companions go down, and at the same time perceived that the entire herd was
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charging him in a body, he rushed boldly to meet them, swinging his
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long sword in the terrific manner that I had so often seen the men of
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his kind wielded in their ferocious and almost continual warfare among their own race.
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Cutting and hewing to right and left, he laid an open path straight through
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the advancing plant men, and then commenced a mad race for the forest,
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in the shelter of which he evidently hoped that he might find a haven of
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refuge. He had turned for that portion of the force which abutted on the
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cliffs, and thus the mad race was taking the entire party farther and farther
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from the boulder where I lay concealed. As I watched the noble fight which
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the great warrior had put up against such enormous odds, my heart had swelled
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in admiration for him, and, acting as I am, wont to do
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more upon impulse than after mature deliberation, I instantly sprang from my sheltering rock
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and bounded quickly toward the bodies of the dead Green Martians. A well defined
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plan of action already formed. Half a dozen great leaps brought me to the
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spot, and another instant saw me again in my stride, in quick pursuit
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of the hideous monsters that were rapidly gaining on the fleeing warrior. But this
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time I grasped a mighty long sword in my hand, and in my heart
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was the old blood lust of the fighting man, and a red mist swam
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before my eyes, and I felt my lips respond to my heart in the
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old smile that has ever marked me, in the midst of the joy of
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battle, swift as I was. I was none too soon, for the
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green Warrior had been overtaken ere he had made half the distance to the forest,
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and now he stood with his back to a boulder, while the herd
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temporarily balked, hissed, and screeched about him, with their single eyes in
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the center of their heads, and every eye turned upon their prey. They
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did not note my soundless approach, so that I was upon them with my
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great long sword, and four of them lay dead ere they knew that I
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was among them for an instant they recoiled before my terrific onslaught, And in
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the instant the Green Warrior rose to the occasion, and, springing to my
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side, laid to the right and left of him, as I had never
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seen but one other warrior do, with great circling strokes that formed a figure
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eight about him, and that never stopped until none stood living to oppose him,
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his keen blade passing through flesh and bone and metal, as though each
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had been alike thin air. As we bent to the slaughter, far above
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us rose the shrill, weird cry which I had heard once before, and
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which had called the herd to the attack upon their victims again, and again
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it rose, but we were too much engaged with the fierce and powerful creatures
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about us to attempt to search out even with our eyes. The author of
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the horrid notes great tales lashed in frenzied anger about us. Razorlike talons cut
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our limbs and bodies, and a green, sticky syrup, such as oozes
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from crushed caterpillar smeared us from head to foot. For every cut and thrust
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of our long swords brought spurts of this stuff upon us from the severn arteries
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of the plant men, through which it cursed courses in its sluggish vicidity in
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lieu of blood. Once I felt the great weight of one of the monsters
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upon my back, and as keen talons sank into my flesh, I experienced
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the frightful sensation of moist lips sucking the life blood from the wounds to which
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the claws still clung. I was very much engaged with a ferocious fellow who
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was endeavoring to reach my throat from in front, while two more, one
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on either side, were lashing viciously at me with their tails. The green
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warrior was much put to it to hold his own, and I felt that
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the unequal struggle could last but a moment longer, when the huge fellow discovered
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my plight, and tearing himself from those that surrounded him, he raked the
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assailant from my back with a single sweep of his blade, and thus relieved,
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I had little difficulty with the others. Once together we stood almost back
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to back against the great boulder, and thus the creatures were prevented from soaring
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above us to deliver their deadly blows. And as we were easily their match
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while they remained upon the ground, we were making great headway in despatching what
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remained of them, when our attention was again attracted by the shrill wail of
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the color above our heads. This time I glanced up, and far above
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us, upon a little natural balcony on the face of the cliff, stood
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a strange figure of a man, shrieking out his shrill signal, the while
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he waved one hand in the direction of the river's mouth, as though beckoning
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to some one there, and with the other pointed and gesticulated toward us.
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A glance in the direction toward which he was looking was sufficient to apprise me
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of his aims, and at the same time to fill me with the dread
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of dire apprehension, For streaming in from all directions across the meadow, from
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out of the forest, and from the far distance of the flat land across
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the river, I could see converging upon us a hundred different lines of wildly
30:00
leaping creatures, such as we were now engaged with, and with them some
30:06
strange new monsters which ran with great swiftness, now erect, and now upon
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all fours. It will be a great death, I said to my companion.
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Look. As he shot a quick glance in the direction I indicated,
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He smiled, we may at least die fighting, as great warriors should John
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Carter, He replied, we had just finished the last of our immediate antagonists.
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As he spoke, and I turned in surprised wonderment at the sound of
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my name, And there before my astonished eyes I beheld the greatest of the
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green men of Barsoom, their shrewdest statesman, their mightiest general, my great
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and good friend Tars Tarkas Jeddak of Thark. End of Chapter one