Venusian n. 1

All the feats of gastronomy on the earth could not have created one-thousandth part of the interest which was engendered by the partaking of my first feast in this foreign planet. I suspected from the circumstances the frames of the Venusians were so constituted that sustenance was superfluous; but I afterwards found I was partly wrong. I learned nutrition formed such a subordinate function of their economy that they had only a very small refection once in the month.

‘The good of it?’ rejoined the Venusian; ‘it is beautiful, and gives us pleasure.’

[I]f this life is the only one, why were human beings placed on this planet that earth-men call Venus? That we find them on the two orbs proves that the Almighty placed them there, and it logically follows that He had some end in view (to use such inadequate phraseology because we have none better) when He created them Tellurians and Venusians. But what that end is—who can tell us that?

Dalaker smiled coldly. ‘Basically, I am a Venusian.’ Blake started to say something, then he laughed shortly. ‘Oh, cut it out, Dalaker! A Venusian! Anybody knows Venus is a hellish hot planet and—’ ‘El Dorado, too, is in quite a warm spot,’ Salaker observed, unmoved. ‘But—but— You mean all these people are Venusians?’

It was on Luhar that his attention centered. Bitter memory and hatred had come to savage life within him as soon as he saw the Venusian. The man was handsome. A cashiered officer of the crack Venusian Guards, very slim, very elegant, his pale hair cropped short and curling, his dark tunic fitting him like a second skin.

Popagator merely smiled—well, no. He didn’t smile. He couldn’t; he had no lips to smile with, being only a Venusian and a scrawny, shrunken one at that. But he indicated polite amusement.

She had…enjoyed a music appreciation course that had included…the curious rhythmic progressions of the Venusians, Capellan visual chromatics, the sonic concerti of the Altairians and Reticulan croons.

The Venusian’s hearty voice boomed.

The belief that the Venusians are coming to save us from ourselves is simply an expression of people’s deep-rooted worries.

Scorpio marveled once again at how much the Venusian could eat, and how quickly he could digest it.