There must be a law
that winds must blow under ordinary conditions, and clouds form at
appointed heights and times. It would be very remarkable if Earth were
an exception to natural laws that other worlds obey.
So the strangeness of the morning to those who watched from the ship was
more like the strangeness of an alien land on Earth than that of a
wholly alien planet.
The lower dawnmist thinned. Gazing down, Cochrane saw dark masses
moving slowly past the ship's three metal landing-fins. They were the
beasts of the night, moving deliberately from their bed-ground to the
vast plains inland. There were bunches of hundreds, and bunches of
scores. There were occasional knots of dozens only.
From overhead and through the mist Cochrane could not see individual
animals too clearly, but they were heavy beasts and clumsy ones. They
moved sluggishly. Their numbers dwindled. He saw groups of no more than
four or five. He saw single animals trudging patiently away.
He saw no more at all.
Then the sunlight touched the inland hills. The last of the morning mist
dissolved, and there were the dead bodies of two beasts near the base of
the ship.
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