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from earth to moon

from earth to moon

儒勒·凡尔纳

  • science fiction

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  • 1970-01-01Published
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Chapter 1 Chapter 1 The Cannon Club

from earth to moon 儒勒·凡尔纳 4381Words 2018-03-23
During the Civil War, a powerful new club was established in the city of Baltimore in central Maryland, USA.We know how flourishing military talent was at that time among these shipbuilders, merchants, and machine builders.Many ordinary businessmen, without the training of West Point Military Academy, stepped out of their counters and transformed themselves into lieutenants, field officers, and even generals. After a while, they were on par with the old continent in terms of "combat technology" Those of my colleagues are comparable, and at the same time, like them, they have won several battles with a lot of shells, money and lives.

But the Americans particularly excelled the Europeans in ballistics, not so much because of the sophistication of their guns, but because of their astonishingly large size and consequently their range, which was unprecedented at the time. Unheard of.The English, the French, the Prussians have nothing left to learn in ground fire, dipping or direct fire, side fire, longitudinal fire or reflexes; but their cannon, howitzers, mortars.Compared with those terrible weapons of the United States, the cannon is like a pocket pistol. In fact, there is nothing strange about this.The Americans, the first mechanical scientists in the world, were born engineers just as the Italians were born musicians and the Germans were born philosophers.So it's no surprise to see them apply their daring inventiveness to ballistics.Those gigantic cannons, though not as useful as the sewing machine, were just as amazing, and more admirable.We know of this incredible weapon the masterpieces of Pilot, Douglin, Rodman and others.The Europeans' "Arms Strong", "Bali Sai", and Bao Lie's "Troy"① had no choice but to bow their heads in front of their overseas opponents.

Thus, while the northerners and the southerners were desperately fighting, the inventors of the cannon took the lead; and the newspapers of the Confederacy congratulated their invention so enthusiastically that not even the petty trader and the naive "fool" did not rack his brains day and night , calculating tedious ballistics. If an American comes up with an idea, he goes to another American to cooperate.If there are enough three, a chairman and two secretaries will be elected.When there are four, one person is designated as the archivist, and their office begins to work.When there are five, a general meeting is held and a club is formed.That was the case in Baltimore.The first person to invent a new type of cannon collaborates with the first person to cast the cannon and the first person to bore the barrel. This is the heart of the Cannon Club.Just one month after the club was established, it has absorbed 1,833 official members and 30,050 and 75 correspondent members.

Anyone who is willing to join this organization must meet an indispensable condition, that is, he has invented or at least improved a kind of cannon. Without cannon, any weapon can replace it. The man with the revolver, the swivel carbine, or the saber-gun was not valued.No matter what the circumstances, the inventor of the cannon was always superior. "The esteem they receive," said one day, one of the most learned orators of the Cannon Club, "is proportionate to the size of their guns, and proportional to the square of the range achieved by their balls!" If it goes on, it will move Newton's universal gravitation to the moral realm.

It is not difficult to imagine what the inventive genius of the United States could produce in this direction after the establishment of the Cannon Club.The size of the weapon was astonishingly large, and the shells flew out of the defined boundary, blasting innocent pedestrians in two.All these inventions left the cold weapons of Europe far behind.We look at the following figures, we can have a fair concept. In the past, when "fortune" was good, a thirty-eight-pound shell could knock down thirty-six horses and sixty-eight men from the side at a distance of three hundred feet.This is the infancy of gunsmithing.Since then, shells have flourished.The half-ton shell fired by the Rodman gun could easily knock down 150 horses and 300 men at a distance of seven miles.It even became a problem for the Cannon Club to conduct a formal experiment.Unfortunately, even though the horse agreed to do the experiment, the human couldn't be found.

In any case, the lethality of their cannons was terrible. Every time they fired, the soldiers fell like wheat ears under the sickle.In 1587 the famous shot of Coutra took out two hundred and fifty men of combat ability; in 1758 another shot of Soldover killed forty infantry: In 1742 the Austrian gun at Kesselsdorf knocked down seventy enemies per shot: but what are they compared with Rodman's shells?What counted for that terrific bombardment of Nana or Austerlitz, which decided the battle?We saw so much during the Civil War!At the Battle of Gettysburg, a conical shell fired from a corkscrew hit 173 Confederate soldiers; 2115 South Army troops were sent to the Paradise of Paradise.Mention should here be made of a formidable mortar invented by Maston, a distinguished member and permanent secretary of the Gun Club, which was so powerful that it killed three hundred and thirty-seven men in a single shot during its trials.Really, it was solved with a bang.

What more can we add to a figure so convincing?there is none left.Then, we will readily admit the statistics made by the statistician Peter Keith, and stop arguing.He took the numbers of the Cannon Club, subtracted those who had been struck down by their shells, and found that they each killed "on average" some two thousand three hundred and seventy-five points. Judging from such figures, it is obvious that the only job of this scientific group is to destroy human beings under the goal of philanthropy and to improve the weapons they use as tools of civilization. This is a group of fierce spirits, but they are still excellent sons of the people of the world.

It should be added here that these Americans who have stood the test not only studied the research formula, but also paid their own lives.Among them were officers of all ranks, from second lieutenants to generals, and soldiers of all ages, some of whom had begun their lives in the war and others who remained on the gun carriages until old age.Many died on the battlefield, their names entered the honor roll of the Cannon Club, and most of those who survived bore the indisputable marks of bravery: crutches, wooden legs, artificial arms, iron hooks in place of hands, rubber gums , silver skull, platinum nose, everything is available, and Pitcairn has also made such statistics: In the Cannon Club, on average, every four people have less than one complete arm, and six people have two legs.

But those intrepid cannon inventors didn't care about that.Whenever a battle is over and the reports show casualties ten times the shells expended, they take pride, and indeed, they have a right to do so. But one day, it was a gloomy, dreary day, the survivors of the war signed peace, the explosions slowly died down, the mortars fell silent, and the howitzers and cannons in their jackets were brought back to the arsenal, The cannonballs piled up in the factory, the bloody memories faded slowly, the cotton grew luxuriantly in the heavily manure fields, the mourning clothes disappeared with the mourning, and the Cannon Club had nothing to do.

A few zealous workers are still busy calculating ballistics; they are still dreaming of inventing huge mortar shells and incomparable grenades.But divorced from practice, what is the point of such empty theory?So the halls of the club grew cold, the waiters slept in the ante-room, the newspapers were moldy on the tables, and from the dark corners came the melancholy voices of the former members of the so rowdy Cannon Club. We, now, are all silenced by a miserable peace, and sunk into dreamland of utopian gunsmithing! "It's so miserable!" said brave Tom Hunter one evening by the fire in the smoking-room, his wooden legs about to burn to charcoal, "nothing! no hope! What a boring life! Where are the days when you were woken every morning by the merry sound of the cannon?"

"That day will never come again," answered the refreshed Bielsby, trying to stretch his missing arm. "It was fun back then! Whoever invents a howitzer, as soon as the cannon is finished, puts it to the enemy's field test; and then, with Silman's encouragement, or with McClelland, he returns to the barracks!But now the generals were back at their counters, and instead of shells they were transporting bales of cotton which did no one any harm.well!God of guns, Barb, the future of American gunsmithing is really unimaginable! " "Yes, Bellsby," cried Colonel Bloomsbury, "it is discouraging! When we threw off our quiet habits, practiced our arms, and left Baltimore to do a great job in the field, but Just two or three years later, I have to throw away the fruits of hard work, put my hands in my pockets, and live this miserable life of idleness." That being said, the brave colonel was incapable of such idle gestures, though he had no shortage of pockets. . "There is no hope of any war at all!" said the famous Maston at this moment, scratching his Guttabo skull with an iron hook. "There is not a cloud in the sky, and this is a time of great promise in gunsmithing: to tell you the truth, this morning I finished a drawing of a mortar, with plans, cross-sections, and longitudinal sections drawn. Well, it's destined to change the laws of warfare!" Really? "Really," replied the other. "However, what is the use of doing so much work and overcoming so many difficulties? Isn't this a waste of energy? The people of the new world seem to have agreed to live in peace, even our high-spirited The "Tribune" also predicts that the future disasters of mankind can only be caused by a terrible increase in population!" "But, Maston," said Colonel Bloomsbury, "Europe is still fighting for the principle of self-determination!" "so what?" "Well! Maybe try your luck over there, if they'll accept our help..." "Do you think so?" exclaimed Bielsby. "Study ballistics for foreigners!" "It's better than no research," the colonel retorted. "Undoubtedly," said Maston, "it would be better, but we shouldn't think in that direction." "Why?" asked the Colonel. "Because the old world notion of promotion runs counter to our American habits. It is almost inconceivable to them that a man who did not serve as a second lieutenant should become a general. Cannons don't make good gunners! So it's simple..." "What absurdity!" replied Tom Hunter, whittling away the arm of a chair with a hunting knife. "In that case, we'll have to grow tobacco or make whale oil!" "What!" cried Maston in a loud voice, and shall we never use our old age to improve our guns!No more chance to test the range of our shells!No longer will our artillery fire light up the atmosphere1 No more international disputes will allow us to declare war with an Atlantic power!Wouldn't the French sink one of our steamships, and the British, in violation of international law, hang three or four of our countrymen! " "No, Maston," replied Colonel Bloomsbury, "we shall not be so blessed! No! It will never happen again, and, if it did, we cannot take advantage of it! America The excitability of man is getting weaker and weaker, and we have to pass the mantle to the women!" "Yeah, we just had to swallow it!" said Bielsby. "It was forced!" said Tom Hunter angrily. "It's all true," said Maston again vehemently, "there are a thousand reasons to fight now, and they don't fight! They don't give up their arms and legs, and that's only for those who don't know how to use them." People are good! Look! You don't have to go far to find a reason for war. Didn't North America belong to the British before?" "No doubt," replied Tom Hunter, stomping the fire with his stick. "Very well!" continued Maston, "why shouldn't it be England's turn to belong to the Americans?" "That's only fair," replied Colonel Bloomsbury. "Go and tell the President of the United States," cried Maston, "and see how he treats you!" "He's not going to take us well," muttered Bielsby, four of which he had salvaged from the war, through gritted teeth. "I swear," cried Maston, "he will never count on my vote again at the next general election!" "You don't need to count on us either!" The belligerent disabled soldiers replied in unison. "Now," Maston went on, "in short, if I don't get a chance to try my new mortar on a real field, I'll quit the Cannon Club and go off to the prairies of Kansas to die! " "We'll go with you," echoed those who spoke with the bold Maston. The situation has come to a point where emotions have grown and the club has been threatened with disbanding in the near future.Just at this juncture, an unforeseen event averted this lamentable disaster. On the second day of this conversation, every member of the club received a notice with the following words: The chairman of the Cannon Club has the honor to inform his members that he will make a very interesting report at the meeting on the fifth of this month.Therefore, he begged them to accept the invitation, and then to drop all business and come to the meeting. president of the cannon club Imbe Barbicane Baltimore, October 3 ①These are famous cannons in Europe.
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