They were described as "vast spiderlike machines, nearly a hundred
feet high, capable of the speed of an express train, and able to shoot
out a beam of intense heat."  Masked batteries, chiefly of field guns,
had been planted in the country about Horsell Common, and especially
between the Woking district and London.  Five of the machines had been
seen moving towards the Thames, and one, by a happy chance, had been
destroyed.  In the other cases the shells had missed, and the
batteries had been at once annihilated by the Heat-Rays.  Heavy
losses of soldiers were mentioned, but the tone of the dispatch was
optimistic.