UFOs ATTACK EARTH

The world has revolved around the sun many, many times since Wilkins joined up with the crew of that great mothership in the sky. We offer this work to those who may not have had the opportunity to read his offerings, and who wish to evoke his spirit now, and to those who wish to recall his writing in the fondest of ways. God only knows that the Universe will never be the same!

Excerpt:

The old Brito-Roman town of Uriconium (or Wroxeter, near Shrewsbury, England) is the locale of another old woman's lucky dream. It happened in the 1870s, and she was dame Betty Fox, wife to a wheelwright. Bet spent a lot of her time grubbing about in old Roman ruins, and daydreaming about finding Roman gold. She had no luck, and the peering grannums in her village had a lot of fun about old Betty's "maggots." But the more they laughed, the more did she.

One night, the luck turned: she dreamt she saw a crock of gold buried, under an alder-bush, on a bank on one side of the lane leading from Wroexeter to the old Horse Shoe Inn. The lane cut very deeply through high ground on which the ancient Roman town had once stood. Round there, the best Roman houses had been located, and the banks, just here, are very high and descend much below the level of the ancient Roman floors.

Bet woke her husband and told him; but he snorted and cursed her for waking him out of his own dreams of bliss in the bowery, and bade her turn round and go to sleep again. She did, and the same dream rose again before her. Up Bet rose, and without waking her snoring husband, doffed shift and pulled on long black cotton stockings and skirt and apron, and, lifting some tools from her husband's wicker frail, walked out of the cottage into the lane, but not so pussyfooted as she might have been. It was around 3 A.M., and the predawn light was yellowing the wan eastern sky.

Yet, early as it was, that did not prevent another poke-nosing old girl from raising her own window sash and presenting a vision of frowsy nightcap, and a dirty shift that barely concealed some rather monstrous charms. Her eyes goggling, the old girl opened her mouth and bawled an inquiry from cackling lips that cause neighboring dogs to howl in protest.