Three days after the earthquake in Louisiana there was another geological catastrophe announced, this time in China. The coast of the province of Kiangsu, north of Nanking, about half way between the mouth of the Yangtse and the old bed of the Hwangho, was ripped apart in a powerful, thunderous earthquake; the sea gushed into this fissure and joined up with the great lakes of Pan Yoon and Hungtsu between the cities of Hwaingan and Fugyang. Apparently as a result of the earthquake, the Yangtse left its course below Nanking and flowed down towards Lake Tai and on to Hang-Cho. Loss of human life cannot, so far, even be estimated. Hundred of thousands of refugees are fleeing into the provinces to the north and south. Japanese warships have been given orders to sail to the affected area.

Although the earthquake in Kiangsu was far more extensive than the disaster in Louisiana it attracted little attention in the world press because everyone was used to catastrophes happening in China and the loss of some million lives did not seem very important; and besides, it was scientifically clear that it was only a tectonic earthquake to do with the deep sea trench near the Riukiu and Philippine archipelagoes. But three days later, seismographs in Europe registered new tremors centred somewhere near the Cape Verde Islands. More detailed reports stated that the coast of Senegambia, south of St. Louis, had been hit by a serious earthquake. A deep fissure appeared between Lampul and Mboro, allowing the sea to gush in through the Merinagh and as far as Wadi Dimar. Eyewitnesses said that a column of fire and steam had erupted from the ground with a terrible noise, hurling sand and stones for miles around; and then there was the sound of the sea as it rushed into the gulf that had been opened up. There was no significant loss of life.

This third earthquake stirred up something akin to panic. Were all the Earths volcanoes becoming active? the papers asked. The Earths crust is starting to break up, the popular press declared. Specialists gave their opinion that the Senegambian gulley may have been no more than the result of a granite eruption by Mount Pico on the Cape Verde island of Fogo; this volcano had erupted as recently as 1847 but since then had been considered extinct. In this case, the west African earthquake had nothing to do with seismic events in Louisiana and Kiangsu which were clearly tectonic in origin. But nobody seemed to care whether the Earth was breaking up for tectonic reasons or volcanic. The fact was that all the churches were filled to capacity that day and in some areas they had to stay open all night.

At one in the morning on the 20th. November, radio hams over most of Europe suffered serious interference to their reception, as if a new and exceptionally strong broadcaster was operating. They located the interference at two hundred and three metres; it sounded something like the noise of machinery or rushing water; then the continuous, unchanging noise was suddenly interrupted by a horrible, rasping noise (everyone described it in the same way: a hollow, nasal, almost synthetic sounding voice, made all the more so by the electronic apparatus); and this frog-like voice called excitedly, “Hello, hello, hello! Chief Salamander speaking. Hello, chief Salamander speaking. Stop all broadcasting, you men! Stop your broadcasting! Hello, Chief Salamander speaking!” And then another, strangely hollow voice asked: “Ready?” “Ready.” There was a click as if the broadcast were being transferred to another speaker; and then another, unnaturally staccato voice called: “Attention! Attention! Attention!” “Hello!” “Now!”

A voice was heard in the quiet of the night; it was rasping and tired-sounding but still had the air of authority. “Hello you people! This is Louisiana. This is Kiangsu. This is Senegambia. We regret the loss of human life. We have no wish to cause you unnecessary harm. We wish only that you evacuate those areas of coast which we will notify you of in advance. If you do as we say you will avoid anything regrettable. In future we will give you at least fourteen days notice of the places where we wish to extend our sea. Incidents so far have been no more than technical experiments. Your explosives have proved their worth. Thank you for them.

“Hello you people! Remain calm. We wish you no harm. We merely need more water, more coastline, more shallows in which to live. There are too many of us. Your coastlines are already too limited for our needs. For this reason we need to demolish your continents. We will convert them into bays and islands. In this way, the length of coastline can be increased five-fold. We will construct new shallows. We cannot live in deep ocean. We will need your continents as materials to fill in the deep waters. We wish you no harm, but there are too many of us. You will be free to migrate inland. You will not be prevented from fleeing to the hills. The hills will be the l............