The St. Mary banner. (Franklin, Parish of St. Mary, La.) 1889-1931, 1909-11-13


| in the development of the science is
primarily supremacy in warfare, and
because Germany is the most warlike
Power in the world to-day, the ex-
cited concern of England about the
progress Of the Zeppelin type Of fly
ing machine is well justified.
A valuable study of the achieve
ments looking to the command of
the air. so to say, by Germany
comes appropriately with the centen-
airy OF that poet who predicted a bat
tie between AIRY navies graphing in
the central blue" We are so near the
realization of the prophecy that it is
almost certainty the next war be-
tween Old World Powers will have as
its features, if not a fight between
battleships in the clouds, at least a
demand on the modern army to vindi-
cate its right to existence in the face
of a new and terrible engine, which
can prey on its ranks with little dan
ger to its own efficiency.
The facts marshaled in McClure's
Magazine by Carl Dienstbach and r.
r. MacMechan make the conjecture
anything but wild. A fight by the
latest Zeppelin ship, which would
have taken it from German soil to
London and back, is one of these
facts. Another is that from the deck
of Zeppelin airship a rapid-fring
gun, throwing sixty shells a minute,
was fired successfully Other facts
are that Germany has finished an air
ship plant on Lake Constance costing
81 800, 900; Zeppelin 1. has been sta
toned at the military fortress Of
Metz, Zeppelin H. at the fortress of
Cologne and the next aerial battleship
will leave its station at Mainz.
Further signs that Germany means
business is that by year from now
plans already laid will provide the
Germans with fleet of from ten to
twenty of these vessels of war The
Aerial Navy League of Germany
blazes with enthusiasm over the Yep
pelin project, the Government is
financing it also, and there is moth
ing but time between that nation and
the possession of a big battle fleet
with which it hopes to put armies to
rout and change the whole COM
plexion of warfare more radically
than anything since the first use Of
gunpowder. -->-
A new machine of war has arrived.
1t will he ship as large as and
eventually much larger than present
ocean battleships. 1t will fight from
a height Of mile above the earth,
and will manoeuvre, during battle,
at rate of sixty or sixty-five miles
an hour. The winds at this eleva-
ton average twenty-five miles an
hour, and on brisk days often reach
thirty. The aerial battleships will
move to windward and sweep down
these winds when passing over the
enemy. In this way they can direct
an absolutely certain fire upon the
earth, while they are themselves prac-
tically out of danger.
Ordinary rife fire will not reach !
them. Big guns have not yet been
perfected which can be fired at the |
distance to which an airship will !
have to drop to work its machine
rifle fire. Yet when this problem of !
training the gun is solved there re-
mains the matter Of the range. The
target, it is true, may be a ship any,
where fran 446 feet long and a. feet
beam Dimensions of Zeppelin II.) to
one Of greater size than the Maure-
tania. This would be easy to hit,
one would suppose. But getting the
range on a rapidly moving object like
this gives the artillerists something
new to work on.
Against an enemy on'land the range
Is found with trial shots, marked on
the ground. There is nothing to go
BY when balloons are the targets. Ex-
oeriments are said to have shown that
t takes from five to twenty minutes
Tor artillery to hit low-hanging bal
oons at battle ranges. On the other
hand, the marksmen high in the air
AN pick of their men with relative
Ease. Our writer's tell us what may
'e expected of the new ships in whose
money will not be stint
ID. as 1t was with the first two Yep
,elins:
Count Zeppelin announced some
ime ago that he could easily build
n airship with a displacement of
10000 cubic meters-just twice that
4 Zeppelin II. and two and half |
lines that of ZepD, lin I. 1t has also
'een announced that the ships now G
at Germany's aerial ship {
ards in Fredrichshafen are consid-
md it is more than probable that the +