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The whole thing was a surprise to Ted and Jack. They had expected to be kept in the yard a long time, quartered on the training ship. To get into active service so soon was more than they anticipated. Marched across the navy yard they soon came in sight of the Dewey -a long cigar-shaped castle of steel, sitting low in the water, riding easy at the end of a tow line near the drydock.
He held up before us a cigar-shaped affair of steel, about eight inches long, with a tiny propeller and rudder of a size to correspond. Above was a series of wires, four or five inches in length, which, he explained, were the aerials by which the torpedo was controlled. "The principle of the thing," he went on proudly, "is that I use wireless waves to actuate relays on the torpedo.
But torture, slow, long and drawn-out, is not in the bargain which in this year of grace every civilized man and half the savages of the world seem to have had to make with the god Mars. As I sit in this steel, cigar-shaped mass of machinery, the question rings incessantly in my ears: "To what object is all this war directed, when analysed from the point of view of the individual?"
This was three feet long and six inches broad in its midships diameter. It was made in two longitudinal sections of polished aluminium, which shone like burnished silver. It would have been cigar-shaped but for the fact that the forward end was drawn out into a long sharp ram, the point of which was on a level with the floor of the hull amidships as it lay upon the table.
On the upper part of the long cigar-shaped iron tug is a platform in the middle of which is the "lid" by which an entrance is effected. In the fore part of the platform projects a periscope, or lookout, formed by port-holes or lenses through which an electric searchlight can throw its gleam for some distance under water in front of and on each side of the tug.
"It certainly is a great machine," remarked the lad as he looked up at the cigar-shaped bulk towering over his head. "Dad has outdone himself this trip." "It looks all right," commented Mr. Sharp. "Whether it will work is another question." "Yes, we can't tell until it's in the water," con ceded Tom. "But I hope it does. Dad has spent much time and money on it."
Two other hying machines were heard of about this date, one by Professor Giampietre, of Pavia, cigar-shaped, driven by screws, and rigged with masts and sails. The other, which had been constructed and tested in strict privacy, was the invention of a French engineer, M. Ader, and was imagined to imitate the essential structure of a bird. Two steam motors of 20-horse power supplied the power.
In 1800, however, he was successful in gaining the moral and financial support of Napoleon Bonaparte, then First Consul of the French Republic. Fulton immediately proceeded to build the Nautilus and completed the boat in May, 1801. It was cigar-shaped, about seven feet in diameter and over twenty-one feet in length. The hull was of copper strengthened by iron ribs.
Two immense tubes, lying side by side, each ten feet in diameter, made of a substance more durable than steel, form the road bed of this lightning system of travel. The cigar-shaped cars have hard rubber-wheels and fit over raised bars all around on the inside of the immense Tube.
The youth, looking anxiously at him, turned his gaze now and then toward a gauge, somewhat like those on steam boilers, which gauge was attached to an aluminum, cigar-shaped affair, about five feet long. Presently there was a hissing sound in the small frame building where the two were conducting an experiment which meant much to them. The hissing grew louder. "Be ready to jump," advised Mr.
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