The War of the Wenuses--Charles Graves and E.V. Lucas.
Is it satire? Is it parody. I can't rightly say; however, when you start like this:
No one would have believed in the first years of the twentieth century
that men and modistes on this planet were being watched by intelligences
greater than woman's and yet as ambitious as her own. With infinite
complacency maids and matrons went to and fro over London, serene in the
assurance of their empire over man. It is possible that the mysticetus
does the same. Not one of them gave a thought to Wenus as a source of
danger, or thought of it only to dismiss the idea of active rivalry upon
it as impossible or improbable. Yet across the gulf of space astral
women, with eyes that are to the eyes of English women as diamonds are
to boot-buttons, astral women, with hearts vast and warm and
sympathetic, were regarding Butterick's with envy, Peter Robinson's with
jealousy, and Whiteley's with insatiable yearning, and slowly and surely
maturing their plans for a grand inter-stellar campaign.
and go on to do this:
Then came the night of the first star. It was seen early in the morning
rushing over Winchester; leaving a gentle frou-frou behind it. Trelawny,
of the Wells' Observatory, the greatest authority on Meteoric
Crinolines, watched it anxiously. Winymann, the publisher, who sprang to
fame by the publication of _The War of the Worlds_, saw it from his
office window, and at once telegraphed to me: "Materials for new book in
the air." That was the first hint I received of the wonderful wisit.
It is, at least, amusing. Meteoric crinolines--who'd'a thunk it?
