The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-08-25
THE EVENING STOR
a Ffgl1t With a Cannon.

mand to clear for action. The carronade |
hurled forward by the pitching, dashed /
into this knot of men, and crushed four
at the .Sst blow; then, flung back and /
shot out anew by the rolling, it cut in /
two a fifth poor fellow, planced off to /
the larboard side, and struck a piece of |
Then rose the cry of distress which |
had been heard. The men rushed tow |
ard the ladder: the gun deck emptied /
in the twinkling of an eye The enorm- |
Gus cannon was left alone. She was |
given up to herself. She was her own |
and mistress of the vessel. She
could do what she willed with both /
This whole crew. accustomed to laugh |
in battle, trembled now. To describe the |
universal terror would be impossible.
1t kept on its work of destruction. 1t |
had already shattered four other pieces, |
and dug two crevices in the side. fort |
unately above the water line. though |
they would leak in case a sQuall should |
come on 1t dashed itself frantically
beams resisted, their curved form Civ
ing them great strength, but they
creaked ominously under the assaults
of this terrible club which seemed en-
dowed with a sort of appalling ubiqui-
ty, striking on every side at once.
The strokes of bullet shaken in
bottle would not be madden or more
rapid. The four wheels passed and re-
passed above the dead men, cut, carved,
slashed them, till the five corpseS were
a score of stumps rolling about the
deck; the heads seem to cry out;
streams of blood twisted in and out of
the plankS with every pitch Of the yes
sci. The ceiling, damaged in several
places, began to cape The whole ship
was filled with the awful tumult.
The old passenger. who had de-
scended to the gun deck, looked, like
a form 0f stone stationed at the foot
of the stairs. He stood motionless.
gazing sternly about upon the devaS-
tation. Indeed, it seemed impossible
to take a single step forward.
made menaced the destruction of the
vessel. A few minutes more and
shipwreck would be inevitable.
Suddenly, into the midst of this sort
of inaccessible circus, where the
escaped cannon leaped and bounded,
there sprang a man with an iron bar
in his hand. 1t was the author of
this catastrophe-the gunner whose
culpable negligence had caused the
ing been the means of bringing about
the misfortune, he desired to repair
it. He had caught up a handsplke
in one first, a tiller rope with slip
ping moose in the other, and jumped
down into the gun deck.
Then a strange combat began,
Titanic strife-the struggle OF the gun
against the gunner; a battle between
matter and intelligence: a duel be-
tween the inanimate and the human.
"Come on!" the man said to 1t. 1t
seemed to listen.
Suddenly it darted upon him. The
gunner avoided the shock.
The struggle began-struggle I'M
heard Of The fragile matching itself
against the invulnerabie- The thing
of flesh attacking the braZen brute.
On the one side blind force, on the
other soul.
soul. strange thing; but you would
have said that the cannon had one elso
"a soul filled with rage and hatred.
The monster had the air of watching
the man. There waS-one might have
fancied so at least-cunning in this
mass. 1t also chose it's moment. 1t
became some gigantic insect of metal,
having, or seeming to have, the will
of a demon. Sometimes this colossal
grasshopper would strike the low cell
ing of the gun deck, then fall back on
its four wheels like a tiger upon its
four claws. and dart anew on the man.
He, supple, agile, adroit, would glide
away like a snake from the reach of
these Hghtning-like movements he
avoided the encounters; but the blows
which he escaped fell upon the vessel
and continued the havoc.
The gunner held his handspike in
rest. The cannon seemed to perceive
| him. and, without taking the trouble
to turn itself, backed upon him with
| the quickness of an axe-stroke- The
gunner, if driven back against the side,
was lost. The crew uttered a stimuli
| taneous cry.
| But the old passenger. until now
| immovable, made a spring more rapid
than all those wild whirls. He seized
bale of the false assignats, and at
sr.I~ % 11nsr q or
| in fiinging it between the wheels of the
carronade This maneuver, decisive
and dangerous, could not have been
executed with more adroftness and
precision by a man trained to all the
exercises set down in Durosefs MAN
| ual of Sea Gunnery.
The bale had the effect of a plug. A
pebble may stop log, tree branch
| turn an avalanche. The carrOnade
stumbled. The gunner, in his turn,
Selling this terrible chance, plunged
his iron bar between the spokes of
the hind wheels. The cannon was
stopped.
bar as a lever, rocked it to and fro.
| The heavy mass turned over with a
clang like a falling bell, and the gun
ner dripping with sweat, rush ed for
ward headlong and passed the slipping
moose of the tiller rope about the
bronze neck of the overthrow mon
Ster.
| 1t was ended- Inc man mao con-
ouered. The ant has subdued the
mastodon; the pygmy had taken the
| thunderbolt prisoner.
The marines and the sailors c1apped
| their hands.
The whole crew hurried down with
cables and chains, and in an instant
| the cannon was securely 1ashed.
The gunner saluted the passenger.
"Sir," he said to him, you have
saved my life"
| The old man had resumed his i'm
| passible attitude, and did not reply.
The count made military salute to
the unknown in peasant garb, and said
| to him:
| general, here is the man.
The gunner held himself erect, his
ewes downcast. standing in soldierly
attitude