capture some of them alive."

The signal was given as he had ordered. The flagship then alone dropped
slowly toward the place on the asteroid where the prostrate Martians
were.

As we got near them a terrible scene unfolded itself to our eyes. There
had evidentially been not more than a half dozen of the monsters in the
beginning. Two of these were stretched headless upon the ground. Three
others had suffered horrible injuries where the invisible vibratory
beams from the disintegrators had grazed them, and they could not long
survive. One only remained apparently uninjured.

[Illustration: _As we got near them a terrible scene unfolded itself.
Two of the Martians were stretched headless upon the ground. Three
others had suffered horrible injuries, and only one remained apparently
unhurt._]

It is impossible for me to describe the appearance of this creature in
terms that would be readily understood. Was he like a man? Yes and no.
He possessed many human characteristics, but they were exaggerated and
monstrous in scale and in detail. His head was of enormous size, and his
huge projecting eyes gleamed with a strange fire of intelligence. His
face was like a caricature, but not one to make the beholder laugh.
Drawing himself up, he towered to a height of at least fifteen feet.

But let the reader not suppose from this inadequate description that the
Martians stirred in the beholder precisely the sensation that would be
caused by the sight of a gorilla, or other repulsive inhabitant of our
terrestrial jungles, suddenly confronting him in its native wilds.

With all his horrible characteristics, and all his suggestions of beast
and monster, nevertheless the Martian produced the impression of being a
person and not a mere animal.

I have already referred to the enormous size of his head, and to the
fact that his countenance bore considerable resemblance to that of a
man. There was something in his face that sent a shiver through the soul
of the beholder. One could feel in looking upon it that here was
intellect, intelligence developed to the highest degree, but in the
direction of evil instead of good.

The sensations of one who had stood face to face with Satan, when he was
driven from the battlements of heaven by the swords of his fellow
archangels, and had beheld him transformed from Lucifer, the Son of the
Morning, into the Prince of Night and Hell, might not have been unlike
those which we now experienced as we