The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-05-10

1t. supposing that you do Il fairly ekilfully,
the moro slowly It will sink. To . clam
shell the same proposition applies, - every
small boy viii tell you And why il this
thus2 Simply because the shingle or clam
rents Of air, Is . bird is in fight, and the
swifter they 60 the moro easily they are
SO sustained. This seems very surprising,
hat let M see If il il not readily accounted
for. Did you ever skate over thin icef II
80. you did not stop long in one place. lest
It break beneath you. You knew instinct
lively that the faster .you went and the
more your weight was in this manner dis
tributed, the less thickness Of ice was
needed to support you. II you were able
TO travel fast enough the surface Of still
water would uphold you. Likewise that
other fuid called air, If you could only
achieve sufficient speed.
Now you have the two important prin-
will be based. First, the bird idea must
be applied TO utilize the currents of air for
support in that element. All flying ma
chimes that dispensed with balloons have
employed the bird a. their model in more
or less degree, but they have almost in
variably embodied the mistaken notion
thst bird relied for fight upon tapping.
patent Office show this sufficiently well.
Aeroplanes will represent the birds wings
In the airship of the time to come. Such,
at all events, il the surmise, and the like
lihood seams to be that steam engine of
small Dimensions, though powerful, will
supply the motive force. Secondly, the
motive force required will be least for the
greatest speed, and so proportionately.
Professor Langley's notion seems to be
this, that such Continuance as he con-
ceives, elevated in the air, would have no
trouble to uphold itself in motion, suppos-
ing that its engineer knew how to deliect
its supporting wings. In this point there
hes an important difficulty, inasmuch as
the most Intelligent human being has no
knowledge whatever of the art which the
birds have transmitted to their progeny
for Thousands and thousands of genera
tions, ever since, the scientists say, they
were first evolved from reptiles in an an
cient geological epoch. But the
honorable secretary of the Smith
sonian Institution is of the
opinion that it is possible for human be-
ings, with practice fortified by their su-
perior intelligence, to learn how to use
wings in this way. just as small boys ac-
Gnire the art of walking upon stills. al
though such members are altogether arti-
fetal. When this art has been acquired,
man, hitherto untutored in the science Of
navigating space, will launch himself
abroad and chase the fugacious meteorites
vi blIClcSS IuOtOT~6CtQ6tSQ DInlOU9.
Seriously, however, there does not seem
to be any good reason wherefore such
mechanical principles as these should not
be successfully applied for navigating the
air. At the beginning the problem of
steering and the weight Of the motor pre-
sent themselves as the two most serious
obstacles. Professor Langley has proposed
to get over these preliminary difficulties
by running tho first flying machine on q
wire, such a. Il used for certain sort of
electric cars. In this case, however, the
machine is to fly above, perhaps at
height Of 200 feet, with an attachment to
the wire below that runs along the tops
Of telegraph-like poles. A motor at each
end of the line will do the propelling.
Thus there will be no engine to carry, and
the wire will do the steering.
How did birds learn to fy originally?
To escape from their carnivorous enemies,
they developed wings and acquired the art
of navigating the air through practice.
Now that the true principle of fight has
been discovered, it would seem possible to
apply it to mechanics so as to secure for
man, with sufficient experience, the same
power. The muscles of the human being
are not strong enough for the purpose,
and SO he must construct a chariot of some
sort to carry him, with machine on
board to do the work. Professor Langley's
ideas on this subject are shared by the
fortmost scientific men Of the day who
have interested themselves in aeronautics
"a branch OF research to which a
great deal of attention is being
paid at present. Their almost unanimous
conclusion is that the soaring bird must
be the model for the successful hying con-
trivance of the future. The investigation
of problems respecting aerial volitation is
no longer relegated to cranks; in fact, the
foremost Investigator in this line now
Twin NJ nnSo l.
OF the American Society of Engineers. He
took occasion recently to call attention to
some rather absurd conclusions reached
by certain French theorists who promul-
gated the astonishing statement, as re-
suit of their calculations, that swallow
in flying forty miles an hour must exert
one-tenth of one horsepower, an eagle
crane about forty horsepower. To
suppose that an eagle or . tur-
key buzzard is as strong as ten
horses he deemed tribe ridiculous.
Regarding the rate of propulsion of the
future flying machine, Professor J. Elfreth
Watkins, the distinguished mechanical ex-
pert, declares that 1t simply depends upon
Mt which the fans are revolved. In his
opinion, the old theory that the atmos-
phere was too tenuous medium for pro-
peller to act upon has been proved to be
nonsense. Sufficient resistance is offered
by it to render possible an enormous speed,
so that it would not be too much to sur
mise that properly-constructed air-ship
might accomplish the distance between,
Chicago and New York within an hours
time. Necessarily, however, there would
be a limit to the rapidity Of flight, mas
much as propeller ceases to propel after
certain number of revolutions per Sec
ond has been reached. 1t is open to any
ones observation that q vessels propeller.
operating in the water, often revolves
much faster when the craft is moving
slowly than when it is going fast
Attention was called only the other dav
by General Hazen to the tremendous revo-
luton which the introduction of practical
bic air-ships would work in the methods of
ofsense and defense in war. Fortihcations.
on which 1t is suggested that Uncle Sam
shall expend $40. 900, 900 as soon as posi-
BILE, would be of little use against flying
machines that could drop dynamite and
other explosives from aloft. Likewise
ships. of war, however heavily armored,
would be at the mercy of hostile aerial
navigators. In such case batteries of a
description altogether new would
have to be devised for shooting
vertically, and general de-
Tending position on terra frma
would I've obliged 20 assail the winged foe
with volleys of bombs directed upward. as
one would shoot ducks on the wing.
Should such state of affairs come to pass
u seems likely that the conflicts of the
future between nations will have TO be
fought out in the air between squairons of
lying men-of-war. About that time one
would imagine il would be considered that
the period had arrived, so long looked for
by military thinkers, when there could be
no more lighting because it would be too
vastly destructive