The War of the Worlds

ntry was empty; every scrap of food had gone. Apparently, the Martian had taken it all on the previous day. At tha

f despondent wretchedness. My mind ran on eating. I thought I had become deaf, for the noises of movement I had been accustomed to h

ng rain-water pump that stood by the sink, and got a couple of glassfuls of blackened and tainted rain water. I was

onclusive way, I thought much of the

ed I dreamt of horrible phantasms, of the death of the curate, or of sumptuous dinners; but, asleep or awake, I felt a keen pain that urged me to d

that the fronds of the red weed had grown right across the hole in the wa

tening, identified it as the snuffing and scratching of a dog. Going into the kitchen, I saw a dog's nose peer

e able, perhaps, to kill and eat him; and in any case, it would be advisa

!" very softly; but he suddenly w

as still. I heard a sound like the flutter of a bir

e or twice I heard a faint pitter-patter like the feet of the dog going hither and thither on the sand far belo

and fought over the skeletons of the dead the Martians

ound of greyish-blue powder in one corner, certain bars of aluminium in another, the black bi

e, to the north, and neither Martians nor sign of Martians were to be seen. The pit dropped sheerly from my feet, but a little

esolution, and with a heart that throbbed violently, I scramb

To the northward, too,

dy trees. Now I stood on a mound of smashed brickwork, clay, and gravel, over which spread a multitude of red cactus-shaped plants, knee-high, without a so

d shattered doors. The red weed grew tumultuously in their roofless rooms. Below me was the great pit, with the crows struggling for its refuse.

he sky a glowing blue. A gentle breeze kept the red weed that covered every