The Washington times., 1901-11-17


She is as dainty and as pretty as the
pTettiest shotgun that ever was turned
out by a loving old maker of guns. She
sits fourteen feet up in the air, with
poise as light as that of the swallow
that has just perched for a moment OF
her long thiH, Inuzzle. II you We're tolC
to climb up and swing her you would
not hream of using more than one hand
to db it.
She is forty feet long and weighs six
ty-four tons. She throws half a ton OF
solid steel ten miles and never trem-
bles from the shock. She eXplodes 4Sl
pounds of powder in her womb and
never weakens. Her blast will knocl
you head over heels, though you stand
fifty feet outside of her line of fire.
She is the American 12-inch all-steel
rife seacoast defence gun, the queen OF
them all, and, until the American 16-
inch gun shall have been tested, the
ruler Of the shore.
She is an earthquake harnessed. She
is leashed death and ruin. How do we
know what She can do? She never has
been proved in that final battle test
when the warships ring the land around
her with fire and must make her great
voice silent or else themselves 20 down
in the sea with all their armor. bat
teries and men.
But we know what she can do, be-
cause We have sowed the long white
sea beach and the open ocean for ten
miles of shore With tons on tons of
steel projectiIe in order TO know. We
have tried her OUT at the arm.r
ordnance proving grounds, hidden away
on Sandy Hook the wave-washed spit
of land that New Jersey sends reaching
into the Atlantic Ocean, like the long,
white skeleton arm of Davy Jones him
self. That long, white arm for many
years has trembled and echoed daily
to every noise that every gun can make,
from the spitefuI little Nordenfeldt to
the steel mortar that can throw a thing
that presently Will drop from the sky
eight miles distant and plunge through
batleship from deck TO keel with
much more certainty than even a bolt
Of lightning would.
a
tie office in little building. 1t looks
bit like chemists laboratory, a bit
like an architects drafting room, bit
like machinery makers ante room.
That is where the ordnance officers of
the United States convert every shot
that is fired into long tables fun Of
figures.
The gun itself telegraphs a good part
OF the story of each shot into the office
Sit in that quiet place-always as quiet
and silent as most offices connected
with great noisy works like forges and
sawmills and other roaring industries
usually are. and suddenly there will
sound Click Click. Click all around
the room, just as the far away throb-
Ding complaint of a great gun loosed
trembles on the air. Those clicks have
all been separate and distinct. But no
ear ever was fine and quick enough to
catch them as anything except one COM
mingled sound. They have stopped
while the ear still is gathering them
and transmitting their message to the
brain.
Those few sharp sounds that sounded
like one nave recorded the five-mile
flight of a projectile. Click one told
when It left the muzzle. Click two re-
corded its flight thousand feet away.
Click three said that the projectiIe had
Just passed the mile. So they caught
its passage-one mile, two miles, three
miles, five miles away. Small wonder
that the ear could not catch the diff
ferent messages separately. That shot,
If It was a 12-inch 1000 pound projec-
tile from the 12-inch gun, Travelled
1.S52 feet in the first second II was a
quarter Of mile from the muzzle of
the cannon before the finger that pres
sed the firing button had even con
sciously ceased pressing.
No clock ever was made fine enough
TO begin TO denote the minute fragments
OF time that are occupied in the flight
or a shot from a modern high-powered
weapon. The best stop-watch in the
world is many hundred times too slow
TO do it Even If one could be made fine
enough for the purpose, the quickest
man in the world couldn't stop it in
time. Before the sharpest eye had pass
ed the knowledge 10 the nimblest brain
and that in turn had passed the com
mand TO the quickest finger that ever
moved. half-ton of metal would have
hit its goal ten miles away. Ordnance
officers have to deal not with half sec
ouds or eighth seconds, but with the
one one thousandth part of a second
In the Office in Sandy Hook is a queer
instrument of polished steel. Day after
day it records instaHts Of time too small
for the mind even 10 conceive To meas
uFe and record the oue-thcusandth of
q second is play for il. Ii is always set
10 do that But it can measure a mil |
iionih part of a second.
Yet the work of recording the course |
of big Shot is beautifully simple. The |
real work. that demands many years Of |
and study is 10 know what !
to do with the records after you have
them.
So simple and perfect is the method
that It is entirely possible on Sandy
Hook 10 record the speed of a projec-
tile in every foot of its course, if such !
knowledge were necessary, which it is
not
AS one stands by the long line of |
taper cannon one can see large frame |
supports scattered at uniform distances |
down the range. Each OF them is hung |
with wires, and looks q great deal like !
the weighted wires hung over railroad |
tracks Just in front Of overhead OBJ
to tap forgetful trainmen on |
Of oh 1