Another trouble now occurred. Several electrolysis stations on Venus
were wrecked, apparently by submarine eruption. Also, a number of
ether-ships, engaged in surveying the ocean, mysteriously exploded. The
explanation was found when one of these vessels, though damaged, was
able to return to the earth. The commander reported that, when the
sounding line was drawn up, a large spherical object was seen to be
attached to it. Closer inspection showed that this object was fastened
to the sounding apparatus by a hook, and was indeed unmistakably
artificial, a structure of small metal plates riveted together. While
preparations were being made to bring the object within the ship, it
happened to bump against the hull, and then it exploded.
Evidently there must be intelligent life somewhere in the ocean of
Venus. Evidently the marine Venerians resented the steady depletion of
their aqueous world, and were determined to stop it. The terrestrials
had assumed that water in which no free oxygen was dissolved could not
support life. But observation soon revealed that in this world-wide
ocean there were many living species, some sessile, others
free-swimming, some microscopic, others as large as whales. The basis of
life in these creatures lay not in photosynthesis and chemical
combination, but in the controlled disintegration of radio-active atoms.
Venus was particularly rich in these atoms, and still contained certain
elements which had long ago ceased to exist on the earth. The oceanic
fauna subsisted in the destruction of minute quantities of radio-active
atoms throughout its tissues.
Several of the Venerian species had attained considerable mastery over
their physical environment, and were able to destroy one another very
competently with various mechanical contrivances. Many types were indeed
definitely intelligent and versatile within certain limits. And of these
intelligent types, one had come to dominate all the others by virtue of
its superior intelligence, and had constructed a genuine civilization on
the basis of radio-active power. These most developed of all the
Venerian creatures were beings of about the size and shape of a
swordfish. They had three manipulative organs, normally sheathed within
the long ‘sword’, but capable of extension beyond its point, as three
branched muscular tentacles. They swam with a curious screw-like motion
of their bodies and triple tails. Three fins enabled them to steer. They
had also organs of phosphorescence, vision, touch, and something
analogous to hearing. They appeared to reproduce asexually, laying eggs
in the ooze of the ocean bed. They had no need of nutrition in the
ordinary sense; but in infancy they seemed to gather enough radio-active
matter to keep them alive for many years. Each individual, when his
stock was running out and he began to be feeble, was either destroyed by
his juniors or buried in a radio-active mine, to rise from this living
death in a few months completely rejuvenated.
At the bottom of the Venerian ocean these creatures thronged in cities
of proliferated coral-like buildings, equipped with many complex
articles, which must have constituted the necessities and luxuries of
their civilization. So much was ascertained by the Terrestrials in the
course of their submarine exploration. But the mental life of the
Venerians remained hidden. It was clear, indeed, that like all living
things, they were concerned with self-maintenance and the exercise of
their capacities; but of the nature of these capacities little was
discoverable. Clearly they used some kind of symbolic language, based on
mechanical vibrations set up in the water by the snapping claws of their
tentacles. But their more complex activities were quite unintelligible.
All that could be recorded with certainty was that they were much
addicted to warfare, even to warfare between groups of one species; and
that even in the stress of military disaster they maintained a feverish
production of material articles of all sorts, which they proceeded to
destroy and neglect.
One activity was observed which was peculiarly mysterious. At certain
seasons three individuals, suddenly developing unusual luminosity, would
approach one another with rhythmic swayings and tremors, and would then
rise on their tails and press their bodies together. Sometimes at this
stage an excited crowd would collect, whirling around the three like
driven snow. The chief performers would now furiously tear one another
to pieces with their crab-like pincers, till nothing was left but
tangled shreds of flesh, the great swords, and the still twitching
claws. The Terrestrials, observing these matters with difficulty, at
first suspected some kind of sexual intercourse; but no reproduction was
ever traced to this source. Possibly the behaviour had once served a
biological end, and had now become a useless ritual. Possibly it was a
kind of voluntary religious sacrifice. More probably it was of a quite
different nature, unintelligible to the human mind.
As man’s activities on Venus became more extensive, the Venerians became
more energetic in seeking to destroy him. They could not come out of the
ocean to grapple with him, for they were deep-sea organisms. Deprived of
oceanic pressure, they would have burst. But they contrived to hurl high
explosives into the centres of the islands, or to undermine them from
tunnels. The work of electrolysis was thus very seriously hampered. And
as all efforts to parley with the Venerians failed completely, it was
impossible to effect a compromise. The Fifth Men were thus faced with a
grave moral problem. What right had man to interfere in a world already
possessed by beings who were obviously intelligent, even though their
mental life was incomprehensible to man? Long ago man himself had
suffered at the hands of Martian invaders, who doubtless regarded
themselves as more noble than the human race. And now man was committing
a similar crime. On the other hand, either the migration to Venus must
go forward, or humanity must be destroyed; for it seemed quite certain
by now that the moon would fall, and at no very distant date. And though
man’s understanding of the Venerians was so incomplete, what he did know
of them strongly suggested that they were definitely inferior to himself
in mental range. This judgement might, of course, be mistaken; the
Venerians might after all be so superior to man that man could not get
an inkling of their superiority. But this argument would apply equally
to jelly-fish and micro-organisms. Judgement had to be passed according
to the evidence available. So far as man could judge at all in the
matter, he was definitely the higher type.
There was another fact to be taken into account. The life of the
Venerian organism depended on the existence of radio-active atoms. Since
those atoms are subject to disintegration, they must become rarer. Venus
was far better supplied than the earth in this respect, but there must
inevitably come a time when there would be no more radio-active matter
in Venus. Now submarine research showed that the Venerian fauna had once
been much more extensive, and that the increasing difficulty of
procuring radio-active matter was already the great limiting factor of
civilization. Thus the Venerians were doomed, and man would merely
hasten their destruction.
It was hoped, of course, that in colonizing Venus mankind would be able
to accommodate itself without seriously interfering with the native
population. But this proved impossible for two reasons. In the first
place, the natives seemed determined to destroy the invader even if they
should destroy themselves in the process. Titanic explosions were
engineered, which caused the invaders serious damage, but also strewed
the ocean surface with thousands of dead Venerians. Secondly, it was
found that, as electrolysis poured more and more free oxygen into the
atmosphere, the ocean absorbed some of the potent element back into
itself by solution; and this dissolved oxygen had a disastrous effect
upon the oceanic organisms. Their tissues began to oxidize. They were
burnt up, internally and externally, by a slow fire. Man dared not stop
the process of electrolysis until the atmosphere had become as rich in
oxygen as his native air. Long before this state was reached, it was
already clear that the Venerians were beginning to feel the effects of
the poison, and that in a few thousand years, at most, they would be
exterminated. It was therefore determined to put them out of their
misery as quickly as possible. Men could by now walk abroad on the
islands of Venus, and indeed the first settlements were already being
founded. They were thus able to build a fleet of powerful submarine
vessels to scour the ocean and destroy the whole native fauna.
This vast slaughter influenced the mind of the fifth human species in
two opposite directions, now flinging it into despair, now rousing it to
grave elation. For on the one hand the horror of the slaughter produced
a haunting guiltiness in all men’s minds, an unreasoning disgust with
humanity for having been driven to murder in order to save itself. And
this guiltiness combined with the purely intellectual loss of
self-confidence which had been produced by the failure of science to
account for the moon’s approach. It reawakened, also, that other quite
irrational sense of guilt which had been bred of sympathy with the
everlasting distress of the past. Together, these three influences
tended toward racial neurosis.
On the other hand a very different mood sometimes sprang from the same
three sources. After all, the failure of science was a challenge to be
gladly accepted; it opened up a wealth of possibilities hitherto
unimagined. Even the unalterable distress of the past constituted a
challenge; for in some strange manner the present and future, it was
said, must transfigure the past. As for the murder of Venerian life, it
was, indeed, terrible, but right. It had been committed without hate;
indeed, rather in love. For as the navy proceeded with its relentless
work, it had gathered much insight into the life of the natives, and had
learned to admire, even in a sense to love, while it killed. This mood,
of inexorable yet not ruthless will, intensified the spiritual
sensibility of the species, refined, so to speak, its spiritual hearing,
and revealed to it tones and themes in the universal music which were
hitherto obscure.
Which of these two moods, despair or courage, would triumph? All
depended on the skill of the species to maintain a high degree of
vitality in untoward circumstances.
Man now busied himself in preparing his new home. Many kinds of plant
life, derived from the terrestrial stock, but bred for the Venerian
environment, now began to swarm on the islands and in the sea. For so
restricted was the land surface, that great areas of ocean had to be
given over to specially designed marine plants, which now formed immense
floating continents of vegetable matter. On the least torrid islands
appeared habitable pylons, forming an architectural forest, with
vegetation on every acre of free ground. Even so, it would be impossible
for Venus ever to support the huge population of the earth. Steps had
therefore been taken to ensure that the birth-rate should fall far short
of the death-rate; so that, when the time should come, the race might
emigrate without leaving any living members behind. No more than a
hundred million, it was reckoned, could live tolerably on Venus. The
population had therefore to be reduced to a hundredth of its former
size. And since, in the terrestrial community, with its vast social and
cultural activity, every individual had fulfilled some definite function
in society, it was obvious that the new community must be not merely
small but mentally impoverished. Hitherto, each individual had been
enriched by intercourse with a far more intricate and diverse social
environment that would be possible on Venus.
Such was the prospect when at length it was judged advisable to leave
the earth to its fate. The moon was now so huge that it periodically
turned day into night, and night into a ghastly day. Prodigious tides
and distressful weather conditions had already spoilt the amenities of
the earth, and done great damage to the fabric of civilization. And so
at length humanity reluctantly took flight. Some centuries passed before
the migration was completed, before Venus had received, not only the
whole remaining human population, but also representatives of many other
species of organisms, and all the most precious treasure of man’s
culture.