Then the Soldier with the Green Whiskers led them through the inner gate and they at once found themselves in the main street of the magnificent Emerald City.
Sparkling green gems ornamented the fronts of the beautiful houses and the towers and turrets were all faced with emeralds.
The encircling camp of
green warriors lay about five hundred yards from the city's walls.
I knew that the word I brought would prove a splendid passport to Kaol, and I must admit that my caution was due more to my ardent desire to make my way into the city than to avoid a brush with the
green men.
"So he is," said the
green man, "and he rules the Emerald City wisely and well.
Their prodigious bounds and the shrill, screeching purr of their uncanny mouths were well calculated to confuse and terrorize their prey, so that as two of them leaped simultaneously from either side, the mighty sweep of those awful tails met with no resistance and two more
green Martians went down to an ignoble death.
The
Green Man quickly rose and hurried to the door by the side of the fireplace; but it was opened by the landlord who appeared, and said to the keeper:
As Sola and I entered the plaza a sight met my eyes which filled my whole being with a great surge of mingled hope, fear, exultation, and depression, and yet most dominant was a subtle sense of relief and happiness; for just as we neared the throng of Martians I caught a glimpse of the prisoner from the battle craft who was being roughly dragged into a nearby building by a couple of
green Martian females.
His own, so cold and dark and dreary, his empty gardens where no flowers could bloom, no
green trees dwell, or gay birds sing, all desolate and dim;--and while he gazed, his own Spirits, casting off their dark mantles, knelt before him and besought him not to send them forth to blight the things the gentle Fairies loved so much.
This enclosure, all
green and gold and glittering with precious gems, was indeed a wonderful sight to greet our travelers, who first observed it from the top of a little hill; but beyond the wall was the vast city it surrounded, and hundreds of jeweled spires, domes and minarets, flaunting flags and banners, reared their crests far above the towers of the gateways.
Green it might be called, if it were any earthly color--a queer, dull, bronzy
green, with streaks here and there of the original red to heighten the ghastly effect.
There weekly arrive in this town scores of
green Vermonters and New Hampshire men, all athirst for gain and glory in the fishery.