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The War of the Worlds
Chapter 3. ON HORSELL COMMON
I found a small crowd of maybe twenty people around the huge hole where the cylinder lay.
I have already described how that enormous thing looked, stuck in the ground.
The grass and gravel around it seemed burned, as if by a sudden explosion.
No doubt its impact had caused a flash of fire, Henderson and Ogilvy weren't there.
I think they saw that nothing could be done for now, and had gone to breakfast at Henderson's house.
There were four or five boys sitting on the edge of the Pit with their feet hanging down, amusing themselves.
I stopped them by throwing stones at the giant mass.
After I spoke to them about it, they began playing at "touch" in and out of the group of people standing around.
Among these were a couple of cyclists.
There was also a jobbing gardener I sometimes employed.
A girl carried a baby, Gregg the butcher and his little boy were there.
Two or three loafers and golf caddies also hung around the railway station.
There was very little talking, Few ordinary people in England had anything but the vaguest ideas about astronomy in those days.
Most of them were staring quietly at the big table-like end of the cylinder, which was still as Ogilvy and Henderson had left it.
I suppose the popular expectation of a pile of burned bodies was disappointed by this lifeless bulk.
Some went away while I was there, and other people came.
I climbed into the pit and thought I heard a faint movement under my feet, the top had certainly stopped rotating.
It was only when I got this close to it that the strangeness of this object became clear to me.
At first glance, it was really no more exciting than an overturned carriage or a tree blown across the road.
Not even that much, actually, it looked like a rusty gas float.
A certain amount of scientific education was needed.
It showed that the grey scale on the Thing wasn't common rust.
The yellowish-white metal in the crack between the lid and the cylinder had an unfamiliar color.
"Extra-terrestrial" had no meaning for most of the watchers.
At that time, it was quite clear in my own mind that the Thing had come from the planet Mars.
But I thought it unlikely that it contained any living creature.
I thought the unscrewing might be automatic.
Despite Ogilvy, I still believed that there were men on Mars.
My mind ran wildly on possibilities such as it containing a manuscript and the difficulties of translation.
I pictured finding coins, models, and other strange objects inside it.
Yet it was a little too large for me to be sure about this idea.
I felt impatient to see it opened.
About eleven, as nothing seemed to happen, I walked back, full of such thoughts, to my home in Maybury.
But I found it hard to get to work on my abstract investigations.
In the afternoon, the appearance of the common had changed a lot.
The early editions of the evening papers had startled London with huge headlines,
"A MESSAGE RECEIVED FROM MARS."
"REMARKABLE STORY FROM WOKING,"
and so on, In addition, Ogilvy's telegram to the Astronomical Exchange had woken up every observatory in the three kingdoms.
There were half a dozen carriages from Woking station in the road by the sand-pits, a basket-chaise from Chobham, and a grand carriage.
Besides that, there was quite a pile of bicycles.
A large number of people must have walked from Woking and Chertsey, despite the heat of the day.
So there was altogether quite a big crowd, with one or two brightly dressed ladies among the others.
It was hot, not a cloud in the sky nor a breath of wind, the only shadow was from the scattered pine trees.
The burning heather was out, but the flat ground towards Ottershaw lay blackened to the horizon, sending up vertical streams of smoke.
An enterprising sweet-seller in the Chobham Road had sent his son with a barrow-load of green apples and ginger beer.
Going to the edge of the pit, I found it occupied by a group of about half a dozen men.
Henderson, Ogilvy, and a tall, fair-haired man that I later learned was Stent, the Astronomer Royal, with several workmen using spades and pickaxes.
Stent was giving directions in a clear, high-pitched voice.
He stood on the cylinder, now cooler, his face was red and streaming with sweat, and something had annoyed him.
A large part of the cylinder had been uncovered, though its lower end was still stuck in the ground.
Ogilvy saw me among the staring crowd on the edge of the pit.
He called to me to come down.
Then he asked if I'd mind going to see Lord Hilton, the lord of the manor.
The growing crowd, he said, was becoming a serious problem for their digging, especially the boys.
They wanted a light railing put up, and help to keep the people back.
He said a faint stirring was sometimes heard in the case, but workmen could not unscrew the top, it gave them no grip.
The case seemed to be enormously thick, and it was possible that the faint sounds we heard represented a noisy confusion inside.
I was very glad to do as he asked, and so become one of the special watchers inside the planned enclosure.
I failed to find Lord Hilton at his house.
I was told he was expected from London by the six o'clock train from Waterloo.
It was then about a quarter past five.
I went home, had some tea, and walked up to the station to meet him.