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"There is but one kind of missile which produces such a terrible wound the percussion rifle-shell, perfected years ago by an army officer in India, and since then introduced into every part of the globe. Into the point of a cylindro-conical slug is inserted a thin copper cartridge, loaded with powder, and primed with fulminate of mercury.
How can you treat me as such? me, who have demanded a cylindro-conical projectile, in order to prevent turning round and round on my way like a squirrel?" "But, unhappy man, the dreadful recoil will smash you to pieces at your starting."
How can you call me that when I have asked for a cylindro-conical bullet from my friend Barbicane so as not to turn round on the road like a squirrel?" "But, unfortunate man! the fearful shock will smash you to pieces when you start."
The only difficulty lay in the smooth sides of the cylindro-conical bullet, which made it difficult to grapple. With that end in view the engineer Murchison, summoned to San Francisco, caused enormous grappling-irons to be fitted upon an automatical system which would not let the projectile go again if they succeeded in seizing it with their powerful pincers.
The projectile outside was nine feet wide and twelve feet high. In order not to pass the weight assigned the sides had been made a little less thick and the bottom thicker, as it would have to support all the violence of the gases developed by the deflagration of the pyroxyle. Bombs and cylindro-conical howitzers are always made with thicker bottoms.
The Staphilinus Cæsareus acts with still greater shrewdness; not only is his pit more perfect, but he takes care to remove all traces of preceding repasts which might render the place obviously one of carnage. He chooses a stone, beneath which he hollows a cylindro-conical hole with extremely smooth walls.
'In the construction of these enormous balloons, M. Pétin proposes to substitute, in place of the silken bag hitherto used to contain the gas, a rigid envelope of a cylindro-conical form, composed of a series of metallic tubes, laid one above the other, and supplied with gas obtainable to any amount and almost instantaneously from the decomposition of water by a powerful electric battery; and with these resources at command, M. Pétin conceives that balloons might be constructed on a scale even larger than that just given!
By last accounts, however, it would seem that the armor-plate would in the end have to give way to the shot; nevertheless, there were competent judges who had their doubts on the point. At the last experiment the cylindro-conical projectiles of Barbicane stuck like so many pins in the Nicholl plates.
Substitute for your spherical shell a cylindro-conical projectile. I shall go inside. Shall arrive by steamer Atlanta. If this astounding news, instead of flying through the electric wires, had simply arrived by post in the ordinary sealed envelope, Barbicane would not have hesitated a moment.
It seemed, however, that in the end armour-plate would have to give way to projectiles. Nevertheless, competent men had their doubts. At the latest experiments the cylindro-conical shots of Barbicane had no more effect than pins upon Nicholl's armour-plate. That day the forger of Philadelphia believed himself victorious, and henceforth had nothing but disdain for his rival.
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