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"The world is really so surreal these days that it's necessary for us to blunt it somehow in order to stay sane. The artist functions to short-circuit the buffering mechanism, so that people can occasionally perceive the weirdness of things as they are."
- William Gibson
 |
| Buggaroo | ||
| Martian creature for transportation. |
I couldn't resist the description and the illustration.
| Sidney stood for a minute scrutinizing the four buggaroo I had obtained. Two were already loaded with supplies, and an attendant was strapping on the sun-shaded seats of the others we were to ride. A bugaroo isn't much for looks, but it's a native of Martian deserts and can stand more heat and dryness than any other living thing.
 (Buggaroo from 'The Secret of the Canali' by Clifton B. Kruse) About eight feet long, and half as high, their grub-shaped bodies completely covered with chitinous plates, they creep over the hot sands on their dozen stumpy legs with the grace and speed of a caterpillar. |
| Technovelgy from The Secret of the Canali,
by Clifton B. Kruse. Published by Astounding Science Fiction in 1938 Additional resources -
|
As I recall, the steed of choice in Robert Heinlein's Glory Road was a six-legged horse named Ars Longa.
Many-legged robots and vehicles are an ongoing joy to science fiction readers. Compare to the robass from The Quest for Saint Aquin (1951) by Anthony Boucher, the centipede-machine from Monsters of Mars (1931) by Edmond Hamilton, the centipede from Killing Titan (2015) by Greg Bear and the walking fort from The Killing Machine (1964) by Jack Vance.
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