“They are still semiaquatic and amphibious, and they have both lungs and gills. They do not bring forth their young alive, but the female lays eggs in the water, the wealthy families having little tanks kept at a proper temperature. The females of the poor and rougher classes simply go to the nearest pond and deposit their eggs and leave them to their fate. Nine times out of ten, however, the warmth of the water is sufficient to hatch out the tiny stars which swim around in the water without any care or bother to their parents. They then use only their gills for breathing, but in a few weeks their lungs are developed enough to permit them to crawl out on land and remain awhile. They do this daily and finally are able to remain out continuously. Some of the lowest classes, the savages as the are called, never lose their gills, but continue to be amphibious all their lives. They spend their days on shore and mingle with the rest, but at night retire to the water in which they sleep and eat, feeding upon a tender and nutritious grass that grows in the water and in marshy places. This grass also constitutes a considerable part of the food of the better classes, but they generally cook it. In winter time these savages burrow in the mud at the bottom of the ponds and marshes and canals and go into a sort of torpid condition and remain there till spring. The more advanced classes cannot do this, they remain out of the water continuously after they are fairly weaned from it, and lose the use of their gills so that they cannot breathe under water at all. So there is almost as much difference between different varieties of these strange people so far as civilization is concerned as between men and some of their domestic animals.”
“Professor,” said I, “a moment ago you mentioned the canals. Our astronomers have seen these and puzzled themselves greatly in regard to them, now you can tell me all about them I am sure.”
“Yes, I intended to tell you about them, I understand their history well. That’s where we sunk our money, or at least a great part of it.”
“What, in the canals?”
“Yes—that is, in their construction.”
“Do you mean that the Lunarians went and dug those canals on Mars?”
“I will explain. As I said awhile ago when our folks first visited Mars the people were in a very barbarous state, but still seemed to have some idea of bettering their condition. They were much impressed by the superiority of the Lunarians and were anxious to get their advice as to the best way of improving their own situation. The inhabitants then all lived along the shores of the seas while the interior of the continents were uninhabited and for the most part unexplored. The Lunarians by the help of their wings and their repulsio-gravitation cars were in a position to make the exploration and in a short time gained a general knowledge of the topography of the planet. They found high land over both the poles, but all the middle parts are low. There were numerous ponds and lakes of fresh water, with marshy outlets to the seas, which are very salty. There were no rivers except a few small ones in the high lands. As the Martians were amphibious and had always been accustomed to salt water, the Lunarians doubted whether they could live in the interior where the water was fresh. But they saw that it would be necessary to scatter the people away from the sea shore, divert their thoughts from war by finding peaceful occupations for them, and to create artificial wants for them since their very few natural wants were all bountifully supplied with little or no effort on their part. The climate of Mars is much like that of the temperate parts of the earth, but its polar regions are never so cold nor its equatorial regions so hot.
“In summer time these people had no use for clothes, for it was warm enough without them. In winter they had always gone into winter quarters under water remaining in a torpid inactive condition till spring. When they found the Lunarians never did so, they were anxious to imitate them. But they could not stand the cold without clothes and houses artificially heated. So some rude clothing was made of grass, and some huts built under instructions from the Lunarians and the king and some of the better classes undertook to keep alive, as they called it, all winter. They were quick to perceive that they could thus add much time to their lives, for the winters of Mars last some 300 days out of the 687 that constitute his year. At first it was hard to work into the new way, but after one or two generations had been kept from hibernating from childhood, it came to be a second nature to their descendants, and now all the better classes have outgrown it, only the savages, who are merely beasts of burden continue to go into the torpid state and not all of these. This change of nature in these people, made it essential to have houses and clothes and also to secure food to be kept through the winter thus creating the wants that would compel the people to employ their muscles and brains, and so insure their cultivation and development. The chief food of the people consisted of the grass I have mentioned which grows only in water and at that time only in salt water. It grows in thick pulpy stems and is very rich in sugar oil and gelatine. This vegetable product was obtainable only along the sea shore in shallow water and in salt-water marshes formed by the sea. The new way of life demanded at least one half more food than the old for each person, and it also led to a rapid increase in the population. These causes made it essential to devise some way of increasing the production of food, the most obvious way being the increase of the area of shallow salt water. This the king undertook to do, but made small progress, for neither he nor his council knew anything about engineering, or the management of such works.
“The Lunarians who had been observing matters and things, and studying the situation very closely and shrewdly, now came forward with a proposition for a very comprehensive scheme of public works—or rather several schemes in one.”