[2] The story is told from the perspective of a scientist called Bassett, who is on an expedition in the jungle of Guadalcanal to collect butterflies.

[3] The story's theme was suggested to London by his friend George Sterling, to whom he wrote in 1916: Do you remember another wonderful story you told me a number of years ago—of the meteoric message from Mars or some other world in space, that fell amongst isolated savages, that was recognized for what it was by the lost explorer, who died or was killed before he could gain access to the treasure in the heart of the apparent meteor?

[6] The story makes an enigmatic reference to helmeted figures, perhaps the Red One's alien crew.

As I’d never even heard of it, I hastened to do so, and was deeply impressed by his thirty-year-earlier tale of the "Star-Born," an enormous sphere lying for ages in the jungles of Guadalcanal.

I wonder if this is the first treatment of a theme which has suddenly become topical, now that the focus of the SETI debate has changed from “Where’s Everyone?” to the even more puzzling "Where Are Their Artifacts?