Labels: text | screenshot | machine OCR: A group of scientists approaches the Martian ARTISTS DREAM OF MARS craft with a white flag of peace. But, H.G. WELLS . the Martians lash out. "Suddenly there was a flash of light, CINEMA & MUSIC and a quantity of luminous greenish smoke came out of the pit ... Forthwith flashes of actual flame, a bright glare leaping from one to another, sprang from the scattered group of men. It was as if some invisible jet impinged upon them and flashed into white flame. It was if each man were suddenly and momentously turned to fire. Then, by the light of their own destruction, I saw them staggering and falling, and their supporters turning to run." The following night another cylinder hit the Earth. The welcoming committee is this time wary and armed. A company of soldiers is brought in and cordons off the area. The second cylinder is shelled, in hope of destroying it before it can be opened. The narrator flees to safety and encounters a soldier who has escaped the unequal combat with the Martians. ""What has happened' I asked ... In the obscurity I could see he made a gesture of despair. They wiped us out-simply wiped us out,' he repeated again and again." The soldier describes the battle: "In a few minutes there was, so far as the soldier could see, not a living thing left upon the common, and every bush and tree upon it that was not already a blackened skeleton was burning." MARS BET
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