THE MAILS Jules Vernes Last Scientific Dream.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 8043, 2 February 1906, Page 4

THE MAILS

Jules Vernes Last Scientific Dream.

m FEIDAY, FEBKUABY 1 WL For Australian Stales at 0.15 a.ui.: E due Sydney February 7tli. W',. For Ceylou, India, Cliiua, Straits p Settlements, aud Mcditerrancau Ports, fc; also United Kingdom aud Continent of f Europe, via Suez (for correspondence || specially uddrcssed only), at 0.15 a.m., f£~ due London March 10th. L For Soutli Africa, per Moravian from ¥• " Melbourne, at 0.15 a.m. Due Durban |.. about March 10th. S* For Auckland aud Xorlli per Karat, wa, at 7 p.m. 5 SATURDAY, FEBBUABY 3. =. For Australian States at 7 p.m. Due Sf Syduey February Ulli.

?, For Auckland and > T orth per Taka;l \ puna, at 7 p.m. \' The next best despatch for Continent \ K of Europe and United Kingdom will he $ via San Francisco, do in;; at New Ply- | mouth on Thursday, February Slh, at g;' 7 p.m. Due London March loth. * Mails for Fiji, per Hauroto, close at '*_ Auckland en February 7fb. t" F. D. llnldsH-orlh. t Chief Postmaster.

[Fbosi the San Francisco Kumixeb.J Jules Verne was a novelist and to some extent a prophet. His final prophecy is embodied in a series of notes, a kind ot skeleton novel. This was found among his effects after death and has found its way to the press tor publication. "BOSTON-LIVERPOOL PNEUMATIC TUBES COMPANY." This was the sign that I read with incredulity as I stood before the pretentious marble entrance to what appeared to be a subterranean hall. I knew it was subterranean because an elevator within the entrance rose periodically to the level on which I stood—the street level—and then decended with the load of passengers, to rise thus far again and no further. Colonel Pierce, of Boston, U.S.A., was my companion. He took me by the arm aud said, pointing to two enormous cylinders one on either side of the elevator shaft:

" This is the elevator to the station." The American inventor conducted me into the cage, and down we plunged with a rapidity that nearly deprived me of breath. The Colonel smiled.

" Time is precious now-a-days," he said. Yet for ten minutes he plunged steadily downward into the bowels of the earth. At last we stopped and emerged into a spacious and brilliantly lighted waiting room. In the opposite wall of masonry, level with the floor, were the shining metal heads or covers of what appeared to be twin tubes. These covers were ponderous, like the breech of a huge coast-gun, only fully ten feet in diameter. No machinery was in sight. Colonel Pierce seemed to divine my thought, for he said: "The pneumatic supply and exhaust pipes are concealed in the masonry. All the machinery is far above us." " And you are telling me," I said, " that these are the American end of the two tubes which connect this continent with the western coaßt of England ?" " Yes. We used five million square feet of steel for the cylinders; total weight thirteen millions of tons. As carriers for this enormous mass of steel two thousand vessels travelled thirty three times between Europe and the United States. These tubas consist of innumerable sections of piping, each section ten feet long—you can figure out the exact number required "—the Colonel paused, then added, " that is, you could if you knew the radii of the curves which could not be avoided." " The sections had to be united under the ocean, I observed. How"— " The process is my secret, sir," the Colonel interrupted hastily. " Suffice it to say that they are screwed together and the whole encased in a triple net work of steel, while an outermost shell consists of a mantle of gutta-psrcha three feet thick." I was thoughtful—possibly I may have looked doubtful, for the Colonel added with emphasis: "Every porportion, every strain, sir, was a known quality before a stroke of the actual work wasdone. Engineering has come to be an exact science—no guesswork, nothing left to chance."

I appeased him with a gesture of assent and his brow cleared. " And the motive power, Colonel ? "

" Pneumatic—the same principle used in the post office pneumatic tubes." "Ah, yes, they have little to support beyond their own weight, yet even that " Naturaliy we gave the lioor of the ocean the preference, as in the ease ot all ocean cables," broke in Colonel Pierce. "Hut part of the way the tubes rest on stilts or trestles, as though laid above ground. Some of these amount to enormous steel towers rising from incredible depths. The ocean bed, you know, is a mountainous region. There are many extinct craters, flanked by almost bottomless abysses, high plateaux and low-lying plains. The structure has, of course, to accomodate nil these inequalities." Just now there was a preceptible tremor of the masonry. I looked at the Colonel inquiringly. He smiled and said: " That is the re-action in the east-bound tube. A car has at this moment reached Liverpool. In one and a half minutes our car will be ready to receive us." The Colonel was consulting his watch. Almost as he spoke the tube cover on the left swung slowly open. The Colonel conducted me within. The ponderous breech seemed to close autometically. I at once realised that Colonel Pierce had admitted me by a door not used by the general public. Within, resting on the floor of the tube, whose side was temporarily open into the real public waiting room, were several cars, elegant, cigar-shnped saloons, of the finest Bessemer steel, each in a gutta-percha casing corresponding exactly to the bore of the tube, Quite a numberof passengers were entertaining these. It was evident that when all the passengers were in their places the temporary displaced side of the tube would be drawn down and locked. The Colonel conducted me within the last car, and I thought no more about this branch of the subject. The interior was brilliantly lighted and provided with luxuriously upholstered sofasandchairs. The sliding door which the Colonel had opened by putting his finger on a button slid back at the same performance, leaving no trace of its existence.

" Let me call your attention to the ventilating device," said Colonel Pierce. "By means of that apparatus in the front of the car fresh air is pumped in a way so subtle as to defy explanation. In the rear the foul air is eipelled in much the same way. The chambers are regulated according to the velocity of travel. The Colonel was growing enthusiastic. "Can you imagine a more glorious undertaking ? " he asked. It is grander than digging the Suez and Panama Canals, with the St. Gothard, Mt. Cenis and Simplon tunnels thrown in. But what I especially pride myself on is that I am th e only railroad man in the world who does'nt shake up bis passengers. There is hardly any vibration. This is the ideal mode of travel for invalids." " And the fare? " I asked. " Fare? About the same as steerage on a cattle ship. Quite appropriately I can claim that it is as cheap as air to travel on my road." " And as to velocity, are you satisfied with what you have accomplished in that regard, Colonel? " "Fairly. We make a trifle over 1729 miles an hour." Probably I looked as I felt—dazed. The Colonel continued: " How do we do it? By a system of bellows, you know, is a utensil or ma'chine which, by alternate expansion and contraction, draws in air through a valve and expels it through a tube. " To matters short, my bellows are capable of creating and maintaining a current of air powerful enough to move a train for the distance of about 3500 statute miles—Boston to Liverpool by our route—with nearly the velocity of a cannon ball." I did some figuring on my cuff. " You offer, then, Colonel, to carry me to Liverpool in two hours ? " "Precisely and more than that, I guarantee to make you observe the approach of your customary dinner hour twice in one day.* I shall bring you back from Liverpool to Boston in considerably less than no time.

Jesting? Not a bit of it. Consider the difference in time between the two cities. Liverpool is four hours and forty minutes ahtud of Boston. When it is 9 a.m. in Boston it is 1.40 in Liverpool. Therefore, taking our 9 o'clock train we will seem to have made bad time, for, thouuh we make the trip in two hours, the Liverpool clocks, will say 3.-10 p.m. on our arrival We have been running away from the sun, you see—or, rather, we and the sun have been running away from each other. Now note what happens It we take; the noon train from Liverpool. We are running a race with the sun, and are so much faster than he is that although we are two hours on the road we reach Boston, passing him on the way at 9,'iO a.m., apparently two hours and forty minutes Itss than no time! We have to wait two hours and fony minutes for the sun to catch up with us, alter giving him an even start! If you lunched a bit earlier in Liverpool before starting you arrive in Boston in time for your breakfast on the same day ! It you govern yourself according to the respective clocks of the two cities, you are due for two breakfasts and two lunches that day ! " At first this seemed amazing. It was certainly confusing till I had figured it out for myself. The process increased my appetite for more mechahical details ot this wonderful translantic system. I said : " Assuming that your calculations are correct, that ycu really shoot your passengers through these tubes with the velocity of bullets, when Hearing your goal—Boston or Liverpool—how do you decrease that killing pace? Where are the brakes strong enough to stop such a whirlwind ? A cannon ball, when it arrives at the end of its journey, smashes everything into smithereens, and it seems to me that you must necessarily smash your cars and the passengers in them." The Colonel smiled, looked at his watch, and said:

"In exactly one hour and three minutes you will be reassured on that point." " What! " I almost shrieked, jumping to my feet, "do you -mean to say that wo've started '!"

" In two and one-half minutes," answered Colonel Pierce, still looking impcrturbably at his watch, " we will be exactly half way to Liverpool. " To reassure you about our arrival," ho added with a smile, " I will explain that our submarine tubeway is lilted with perfect electrical means of communication, of course —automatic annunciators and all that sort of thing. When Liverpool receives advices that the Boston 9 o'clock special has left it directs a counter air current to prevent just such catastrophe as you appear to dread. At the proper moment this brings the train to a full stop'. It is the most perfect air cushions ever invented." I lay back in my sofa and gasped. To think that I could start on a journey at a pace of pretty nearly 2,000 miles an hour without knowing it! All the noise and bustleof train departure eliminated I I tried to realize that I was at this moment perhaps two miles below the surface of the ocean. It was useless—my imagination was not equal to it. After awhile I thought I detected a sort ol dull, swishing sound. That was all. It died away as soon as it came. Colonel Pierce rose from his seat and stretched himself. " Come," he said ; " Liverpool." Colonel Pierce touched the button, the panel slid back, and we emerged into a station exactly similar to the one we had stood in two hours before. " 11a, ha," I laughed; " Colonel, you had almost hoaxed me into believing that we had left Boston." The Colonel frowned and conducted me to the elevator—the same elevator I chuckled t) myself. But when we reached the open D.T I hud to rub my eyes and pinch myself. I had visited Liverpool and T could not mistake my surroundings. Moreover, across the way there was a clock dial. The hands pointed to 3.10 o'clock. The Colonel looked at me and smiled. " A Boston train leaves in twenty minutes," he said. "You can still get back in time for luncheon. If you stay here you've missed one meal out of your life." "Colonel Pierce," said 1, " I apologize."