OCR Text |
Show DREAMS OF THE WAR INVENTORS Many Absurd Things Presented Pre-sented to British Board for Its Consideration. LONDON, July 31 (Correspondence of the Associated Press.) If the dreams of numerous British amateur inventors who have been besieging tho ministry of munitions could be realized, tho war would have been over long sinco ftnd little would be left of the German army. Recent proposals include the following: Freeze tho clouds and mount artillery artil-lery thereon. Train cormorants to fly to Essen to pick the mortar from Krupp's walls so that they will crumble. Trail from balloons monster magv nets that would snatch rifles from the hands of the German soldiers. Perch men on shells to steer them. A suggestion often submitted is to attach a searchlight to an anti-aircraft gun, project the light on a Gotha and shoot along tho beam. Unfortunately, Unfortu-nately, shells will not follow a path of light Other schemes for dealing with hostile hos-tile aircraft are to suspend heavy guns from captive galloons; to arm defense airplanes with scythes; to provide heat rays for setting Zeppelins on fire, and to cover the moon with a big black balloon. To prevent polished rails shining at night and acting as a guide to enemy aicraft, the last coach of the last train is to drop blacking on them. A shell containing gravel is to lay a pathway over mud, and another, containing con-taining an irritant powder or a sticky substance, is to hamper machine guns. The "relay shell' is a favorite proposal, pro-posal, the plan being for a shell at the height of its flight to expel a smaller inner shell- As a shell does not point directly along its trajectory, it would be impossible to secure accuracy of aim for the second shell. Among the more miscellaneous projects pro-jects are: To petrify German soldiers by squirting cement over them. To throw snakes by pneumatic propulsion pro-pulsion into tho enemy trenches. To penetrate and attack Germany itself it-self via a "tube" built "all tho way" from England. It is said that about one suggestion in ten that reach the ministry of munitions muni-tions is novel and possible. The air ministry announces that its air inventions committee, formed about nine mouths ago, has examined more than 5000 inventions and suggestions. sugges-tions. - |