All 4 Uses of

inferior
in
The War of the Worlds

At most terrestrial men fancied there might be other men upon Mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise.†
Chpt 1.1

inferior = (adjective) of low quality, or of lower quality or rank than something else OR (more rarely as a noun) a person of lower rank or status

Their world is far gone in its cooling and this world is still crowded with life, but crowded only with what they regard as inferior animals.†
Chpt 1.1 *

And before we judge of them too harshly we must remember what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought, not only upon animals, such as the vanished bison and the dodo, but upon its inferior races.†
Chpt 1.1

Strangest in this, that so soon as dawn had come, I, who had talked with God, crept out of the house like a rat leaving its hiding place—a creature scarcely larger, an inferior animal, a thing that for any passing whim of our masters might be hunted and killed.†
Chpt 2.7

Definitions:

(1) (inferior)
of low quality, or of lower quality or rank than something else -- sometimes used as a noun to refer to a person of lower rank or status
(2) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
meaning too rare to warrant focus:

Less commonly, specialized senses include:
- anatomy and botany -- a lower position on a body or plant (or pointed downward)
- typography -- a character that drops beneath a printing line (such as with subscript)
- astronomy -- having an orbit relative to the sun that is lower than earth's (making Mercury and Venus inferior planets)