OCR Text |
Show Tin: . -ttyW.EA&MMBAUGHMJl War Machines Seneca, who was born about the year 54 B. C. and who evidently was a pacifest, gave birth to a sentiment regarding war which many today believe, when he said' "We arrest those guilty of manslaughter man-slaughter and execute murderers when they take life, but the public pub-lic slaughter of whole nations by soldiers under uniformed generals makes these men national heroes." Since the first men lived, those who followed them have engaged in improving and devising engines of war to confute, confound and destroy their enemies. From the days of the club, to bombs and deadly gasses, the perfecting of machines and methods to destroy humanity has steadily progressed. Even animals have been called upon to aid man in his attempts at conquest. When that famous sea buccaneer, Morgan, attacked Panama, Pa-nama, then under the domain of Spain, with the purpose of capturing captur-ing the place and looting it of its great horde of golden treasure, the Hidalgo commander attempted to route him by releasing several thousand enraged wild bulls, which he chased toward the Invading In-vading host. Morgan stampeded the steers against the Spanish troops, who retreated and finally surrendered. He then sacked the treasury and the churches and obtained the greatest financial prize of his career car-eer due chiefly to the stampeded cattle for his piratical crew were outnumbered twenty to one by the garrison they attacked. During the World War, the German Ger-man troops In East Africa, about 10.000 men, held off the Allies' armies, whose combined strength was approximately 300,000, by the aid of bees and hornets who were stirred into action by electric buzzers buzz-ers inserted in their nests, the current cur-rent being turned on when troops and pack trains with supplies approached ap-proached through the dense jungle trails. Virgil and Pliny also speak of the soldiers of their day employing employ-ing bees to help them attack be-leagured be-leagured garrisons. One of the earliest patents ever granted took advantage of the bees' natural hatred for Intruders. In 1326, A. D., Edward II of England Eng-land issued letters patent to one of his couriers for a device mounted mount-ed on a movable base provided with small wheels and having an upright thereon, containing arms "like unto ye windmille arms, ye said arms being provided with mean for ye holdying of bee-hives at ye ends." When this engine of war was moved toward a wall or a fortress, the windmill arms were rotated by a belt driven by a hand wheel, and the angry bees ejected- from their homes, swarmed over obstructions ob-structions and city walls and attacked at-tacked the defenders. This strange device is credited with having routed many soldiers, capturing cities, and bringing numerous victories vic-tories to the Englishmen. |