Triplanetary - E. E. Smith (phonics reader TXT) 📗

super-ship, there was written the first Inter-Systemic Treaty. Upon one side were the three Nevians; amphibious, cone-headed, loop-necked, scaly, four-legged things to us monstrosities: upon the other were human beings; air-breathing, round-headed, short-necked, smooth-bodied, two-legged creatures equally monstrous to the fastidious Nevians. Yet each of these representatives of two races so different felt respect for the other race increase within him minute by minute as the conversation went on.

The Nevians had destroyed Pittsburgh, but Adlington’s bomb had blown an important Nevian city completely out of existence. One Nevian vessel had wiped out a Triplanetarian fleet; but Costigan had depopulated one Nevian city, had seriously damaged another, and had beamed down many Nevian ships. Therefore loss of life and material damage could be balanced off. The Solarian System was rich in iron, to which the Nevians were welcome; red Nevia possessed abundant stores of substances which upon Earth were either rare or of vital importance, or both. Therefore commerce was to be encouraged. The Nevians had knowledges and skills unknown to Earthly science, but were entirely ignorant of many things commonplace to us. Therefore interchange of students and of books was highly desirable. And so on.

Thus was signed the Triplanetario-Nevian Treaty of Eternal Peace. Nerado and his two companions were escorted ceremoniously to their vessel, and the Boise took off inertialess for Earth, bearing the good news that the Nevian menace was no more.

Clio, now a hardened spacehound, immune even to the horrible nausea of inertialessness, wriggled lithely in the curve of Costigan’s arm and laughed up at him.

“You can talk all you want to, Conway Murphy Spud Costigan, but I don’t like them the least little bit. They give me goosebumps all over. I suppose that they are really estimable folks; talented, cultured, and everything; but just the same I’ll bet that it will be a long, long time before anybody on Earth will really, truly like them!”

Colophon

Triplanetary
was published in 1948 by
E. E. Smith.

This ebook was produced for
Standard Ebooks
by
Mike Bennett,
and is based on a transcription produced in 2010 by
Greg Weeks, Graeme Mackreth, and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team
for
Project Gutenberg
and on digital scans available at the
Internet Archive.

The cover page is adapted from
Composition No. 61,
a painting completed in 1939 by
Stuart Walker.
The cover and title pages feature the
League Spartan and Sorts Mill Goudy
typefaces created in 2014 and 2009 by
The League of Moveable Type.

The first edition of this ebook was released on
June 9, 2020, 8:59 p.m.
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Uncopyright

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