H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds 1906 — Survivors in Martian-Ravaged Wasteland

Drawn for the 1906 French edition of H.G. Wells' 'La Guerre des Mondes' (The War of the Worlds), this gritty pen-and-ink scene captures two haggard survivors picking through the smoldering wreckage left in the wake of the Martian invasion. Armed with makeshift weapons and tools, the men survey a devastated landscape of debris and ash. The dynamic cross-hatching conveys desperation and exhaustion — humanity reduced to scavengers amid the ruins of civilization.