How we cite our quotes: (Volume.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
Or did a Martian sit within each, ruling, directing, using, much as a man's brain sits and rules in his body? I began to compare the things to human machines, to ask myself for the first time in my life how an ironclad or a steam engine would seem to an intelligent lower animal. (1.11.8)
At firs the narrator was struck by how unfamiliar the Martian technology was, but here the narrator is getting the idea that it isn't so different from our own.
Quote #5
"It's bows and arrows against the lightning, anyhow," said the artilleryman. "They 'aven't seen that fire-beam yet." (1.12.31)
Man, the artilleryman is making humans sound like cavemen here. That's how far behind human technology appears when compared to the Martians' weapons.
Quote #6
"What is that flicker in the sky?" [the curate] asked abruptly.
I told him it was the heliograph signalling – that it was the sign of human help and effort in the sky. (1.13.44-45)
We included this quote because there's a curiously religious sound to the narrator's answer about "help and effort in the sky." Is there something religious about technology here? Or is the narrator hinting that we can't look to God to help us, but have to help ourselves? Or is it merely a chance to take something military (the heliograph) and place it in a strange context (southern England)? (That is, just because you're used to some piece of technology, doesn't mean you expect to find it everywhere. We're used to trains, but we don't expect them at the bottom of the ocean, though that would be awesome.)