“My guide noting my dismay and alarm, laughingly explained the reason of the confusion.  ‘For years and years,’ he said, ’it has been hoped by the Martians to send some message to the Earth.  We understand wireless telegraphy, we can bridge almost infinite distances with the monstrous waves of magnetic disturbances, it is possible for us to generate.  We have bombarded the earth with magnetic waves, but no response, no single indication has been returned to us that our messages were received.  Our knowledge of the earth language is complete, even our knowledge of the telegraphic codes is partially so.  But we have hopelessly repeated, are even now repeating these efforts.

“’You, my friend, are the first man from Earth who tells us that wireless telegraphy is understood upon Earth, that receivers have been invented; but above all it amazes and transports us to know that you have perfected means, before leaving the Earth, to have such messages as you may deliver from Mars properly received.  There is, though,’ he exclaimed, as he turned to the eager, shining faces about me, ’still a grave doubt whether our good friend can assure us of the ability of the Earthlings to send us back any communication.  They may be unable to force through this enormous distance waves of sufficient magnitude to reach us.’

“There was a loud murmur of disappointment, mingled with exclamations of dissent and reproach.  Once more I was plied with questions, and then, my son, there came to me, singularly clouded in forgetfulness until that instant, the memory of that fruitless message which we received about a year before my death on Earth.

“I arose, and amid a hush of expectation excited by this motion, accompanied as it were with a gesture inviting silence, spoke aloud in English: 

“’My friends, I recall a night in August, 1890, in the Earth’s chronology, when my son and myself, then hoping against hope that the carefully adjusted receiver we had, would ever be called upon to herald a message from another world, were suddenly surprised to see and hear the register of our instrument move and sound.  It was indeed animated by some extra terrestrial power.  Could that power have come from your Mars; were we the first to receive one of your messages that you have so long been raining on the Earth?’

“I looked around in enthusiasm, and with a conscious sense of companionship, pride and affection.  I do not think I was altogether understood, except by a few, but the contagion of my own pleasure seized the multitude, and a great melodious shout arose, while cries of ’Hi mitla’ echoed in the Hall, and then, carried away with an emotional impulse, these excited Martians broke into a song, a swinging chant, that brought to the doors of the room new accessions of spectators whose instantaneous sympathy was expressed by the added volume of sound they contributed, until beneath the vibrant power of the great chorus the building seemed itself to tremble.