Page:Robert William Cole - The Struggle for Empire; A Story of the Year 2236 (1900).djvu/150

138 bursting as they fell. These occurrences impressed the minds of those who saw them with greater terror, as the contending fleets were quite invisible, and no one would have known what was going on but for the occasional fall of the battered wrecks.

At night the scene was more brilliant but more awful. Frightful detonations disturbed the season of darkness. The awakened inhabitants rushed out into the open air, fearing to be buried under the ruins of their houses. They saw a fiery object falling to the ground in the distance accompanied by a long trail of flame. Sometimes the flaming meteorite would emit terrific explosions all the time that it was falling, and after it had touched the ground, as shell after shell exploded, and the air around it would be filled with clouds of smoke and steam. At other times there would be long flashes of green and purple light and distant detonations as wandering projectiles struck the air