Pylon

“ An umbrella of atomo-planes in all the sleek glory of deadly interceptors, spread below them in battle formation; behind them the immense plastic pylons that supported the next tier, and the crenelated superstructure of Level II, combined with distance to dwarf them into toy-like dimensions. The semi-transparent roof of Level II was dangerously near, Guerlan saw, and the forest of pylons dead ahead that marked the center of their level was another fatal hazard. ”

“ The centre-fed T antenna was supported between two pylons of 85 metres (279 feet) . In 1944 when the German army was pulling out of Athens they tried to blow the the pylons up but one of them remained standing at a crazy angle, because one of the explosive charges had been placed incorrectly. ”

“ Then, working his vessel in a manner that won the praise of every sailor there, Pillar hauled the boat to a berth at the stern, and eventually got her to leeward.
Once alongside, Pillar gave the word, and the sailors began to jump aboard the smack. It took half an hour to get that bunch of men off, so difficult was the work as a result of the gale; over thirty feet the waves mounted sometimes, and many a man wellnigh tumbled into the sea, from which his chance of rescue would have been small. ”

“ First the twine was drawn up to and over the beam by the thread, then the rope was drawn up by the twine, and last of all the rope ladder by the rope. There it hung like a thin, slender black line against the silent gray walls.
“And now,” said the Baron, “who will go first and win fifty marks for his own, and climb the rope ladder to the tower yonder?” Those around hesitated. “Is there none brave enough to venture?” said the Baron, after a pause of silence. ”

“ The slitting and rolling mill, together with the nail factory of Stackpole & Whiting, is moved by a steam engine of seventy-horse power. These we visited with much satisfaction. On entering the south-west door, the eye catches the majestic swing of the beam; and at the same instant, nine nailing-machines, all in rapid motion, burst on the view. Bewildered by the varying velocity of so many new objects, we stand astonished at this sublime effort of human ingenuity. ”

“ Guns belch out in the distance, a green light begins to quiver over the whole horizon. Rockets incessantly tear their way, screaming, through the air, amongst them some similar to those we ourselves used to send up over the river Oka. Balls of fire burst in twain, and huge discs emitting a hundred different deadly lights flare above us.
Soon the rockets disappear, and from behind the frost creep three gigantic luminous figures; at first they stretch up into the sky, then, quivering convulsively, they fall down upon us, upon the trenches upon our right and left. ”

“ The chevron, resembling the letter V turned topsy-turvy, is a combination of a bend dexter and a bend sinister, and is rather more than the lower half of the saltire. The French word chevron, still in use, means rafters (Fig. 21) . The pile, derived from the Latin for pillar, is a triangular wedge, and when [pg 19] charged singly on a field may issue from any point of the latter, except from the base (Fig. 22) . If more than one pile occurs, we generally find the number is three, although the Earl of Clare bears "two piles issuing from the chief." ”

“ The column expanded into the shaft, or into the huge pilaster rising unbanded from tier to tier; shaft and pilaster were associated in ordered groups, and the ideas of singleness and limited elevation once attached to them, swept away for ever; the stilted and variously centered arch existed already: the pure ogive followed—where first exhibited we stay not to inquire;—finally, and chief of all, the great mechanical discovery of the resistance of lateral pressure by the weight of the superimposed flanking pinnacle. ”

“ For an instant all sight of them is lost in an ascending column of white water, till as this slowly sinks you again catch sight of the “Prince” quiet amid the din, and then there comes another crash and another column of spray shot high into the air—but this time we are not alarmed; the trucks we discover are only discharging their stone. By a simple mechanical contrivance the waggon drops its whole load bodily into the sea, and it was to this falling mass of rubble, some eight or ten tons in all, that the commotion was due. ”

“ When the pillar stands only on four legs we chip away one leg at a time from a square to an hour-glass shape, and then either the whole of the pillar crashes down from the roof or else a quarter or a half. If the coal lies against the sandstones it carries away clear, but in some places it brings down stone and rubbish with it. ”

“ The foundation will be built on piling, as experiments made by F. J. Llewellyn—Engineering News, May 11 1899—show that the safe load for the soil at New Orleans is only about 700 lbs. per. sq. ft. Nine piles will be used in supporting each column. The depth of pile necessary to safely support the load will be found by driving a few trial piles and using what is known as the Engineering News formula (Baker’s Masonry Construction page 245) P′ = 2Wh ÷ d + 1, in which P′ = the safe load in tons; and d is the 19penetration in inches under the last blow. W is the weight of the hammer in tons ”

“ The cylinder was already opened in the centre of the pit, and on the farther edge of the pit, amid the smashed and gravel-heaped shrubbery, one of the great fighting-machines, deserted by its occupant, stood stiff and tall against the evening sky. At first I scarcely noticed the pit and the cylinder, although it has been convenient to describe them first, on account of the extraordinary glittering mechanism I saw, busy in the excavation, and on account of the strange creatures that were crawling slowly and painfully across the heaped mould near it. ”

“ The inscriptions begin about four feet six inches above the base and read upwards. The interiors of the hollow posts are filled with well-seasoned cedar posts, sawed to fit, and securely spiked through spike holes cast in the pillars for that purpose. The average weight of each pillar when completed is eighty-five pounds. The pillars are all set four feet in the ground, with their inscription faces to the north and south, and the earth is well settled and stamped about them. ”

“ This pillar is two feet in diameter at the top, and four feet at bottom, and is erected on the granite base of six feet square—the pillar consists of five pieces in the form of a frustrum of a cone. Two other revolving domes of the same size are placed over the circular rooms at the southern corners of the Observatory, which are square turrets of solid masonry. The roof or terrace is conveniently approached by two stair-cases outside the building, and winding round the turrets. The verandahs are divided into small rooms as sleeping apartments, computing offices, library, &c. ”

“ By the old system, the pile was driven by a comparatively small mass of iron descending with great velocity from a considerable height—the velocity being in excess and the mass deficient, and calculated, like the momentum of a cannon-ball, rather for destructive than impulsive action. In the case of the steam pile-driver, on the contrary, the whole weight of a heavy mass is delivered rapidly upon a driving-block of several tons weight placed directly over the head of the pile, the weight never ceasing, and the blows being repeated at the rate of a blow a second, until the pile is driven home. ”

“ The sky had closed darkly around the becalmed ships, in sodden clouds which were suddenly obscured by mist and rain while the wind sighed in fitful gusts. It steadied into the southward and swiftly increased in force until the sea was whipped into foam and scud.
Staunch and well-found, the Plymouth Adventure went reeling off across the spray-swept leagues of water, showing only her reefed topsails and courses. The two pirate sloops vanished beyond the curtain of mist. ”

“ Figure 16.—The “Pioneer” as first exhibited in the Arts and Industries building of the Smithsonian Institution prior to restoration of the sandbox. (Smithsonian photo 48069D.)
[BOILER continued]
The steam dome (fig. 18) is located directly over the firebox, inside the cab. It is lagged and jacketed in an identical manner to the boiler. The shell of the dome is of 5/16-inch wrought iron, the top cap is a cast-iron plate which also serves as a manhole cover offering access to the boiler’s interior for inspection and repair. ”

“ The Pillars are of various forms—round or octagonal in small and plain churches, and these not unfrequently alternate; in richer work they are usually clustered; but the pillar most characteristic of the style is the one with detached shafts, which are generally of Purbeck marble, frequently very long and slender, and only connected with the central shaft by the capital and base, with or without one or two bands at intervals. ”

“ A liner leaves Plymouth in one style; a cruiser snakes out from Devonport in quite another, which was explained to me on the "igh an' lofty bridge' as we skated round buoy after buoy, courteously pulled out a little not to interfere with a yacht race, and ran through the brown-sailed Plymouth fishing fleet. It was divine weather—still, cloudless, and blue—and the bridge was of opinion that he who had a farm should sell it and forthwith go to sea.
OUR NOBLE SELVES
The Cornwall coast slid past us in great grey-blue shadows, laid out beyond the little strip of sail-dotted blue ”

“ The determination of the vertical, or "plumb," is far less simple or certain than may at first sight appear, since any pendulum device is affected by acceleration just as much as by gravity, and the reading of a damped pendulum or a spirit-level gives the apparent plumb, which may be literally anywhere.
In the case of a machine "looping the loop," for example, the apparent plumb is, in fact, at one instant diametrically opposite to the true plumb, and during the whole evolution it "boxes the compass" in a vertical plane. ”

“ In architecture it has strictly the second sense. The column erected in honour of Diocletian at Alexandria is known as Pompey’s pillar, and the so-called columns of Trajan and Antoninus are in reality pillars, performing no structural function beyond that of carrying a statue. In India the only example is the iron pillar at Delhi, which is an extraordinary specimen of the iron worker’s art considering the remote date at which it was made. ”

“ It was the dull and heavy boom of a single cannon, sounding from a great way off, and which I instantly knew had been fired aboard of the pirate craft.69 I went straight upon the deck, where I found the weather still as dead a calm as it had been the two days before, with not so much as a breath of air stirring or a cat's-paw upon the water. The ground-swell rose and fell as smoothly as though the sea ran with oil instead of water, and the sky above had an appearance as of a solid sheet of steel-blue, with not so much as one single cloud upon the whole face of it. ”

“ He told him of a woman, young and very beautiful. The captain's knees began to tremble; he sat helplessly on the step of the carriage, and fumbled in his pocket for a cigarette. Pan Ponyatsky warned him that he must not strike a light. In the distance could be heard the roar of cannon, like an approaching midnight storm. Kremnev had never felt such a throbbing joy as he felt now, sitting on the carriage step. Pan Ponyatsky repeated that she was a beauty, and waiting—that the captain must not delay; and led him through the dark corridor of the train.
The carriage smelt of men and leather ”

“ The men on the wharf began laughing. Just then the boatswain came down from the settlement again, and out along the landing. The threatened turbulence quieted as he approached, and the crowd moved sullenly aside to let him pass. He did not bring any pilot with him, and he jumped down into the stern of the boat, saying, briefly, "Push off." The crowd of loungers stood looking after them as they rowed away, and when the boat was some distance from the landing they burst out into a volley of derisive yells. "The villains!" said the boatswain, "they are all in league together. ”

“ He was not then above forty Leagues from that Kingdom, when being informed that the Enemy’s Fleet was not so much damaged as reported, and the Wind coming to be Southerly, he judged it best (as his Instructions were to guard the English Coasts,) to return to Plymouth; lest the same Wind should bring the Enemies out, and carry them by him, unseen, towards England. He arrived at Plymouth the 12th of July, and with great Expedition supplied his Fleet with whatever Necessaries were wanting. ”

“ The deck of The Pelican was icy with blood. Every shock of smashing billows jumbled dead and dying en masse. The night grew black as pitch. The little railing that still clung to the shattered decks of The Pelican was now washed away, and the waves carried off dead and wounded. Tables were hurled from the cabin. The rudder was broken, and the water was already to the bridge of the foundering ship, when the hull began to split, and The Pelican buried her prow in the sands, six miles from the fort. ”

“ The fact that a pile refuses to enter further, does not show that it has reached a bed strong enough to bear the required load; for though it may bear upon a solid bottom, or resist penetration by side friction, when the load has been for some time upon the pile, it may be found too weak to stand. Piles have in some cases refused to enter the ground from the blow of a 1,500 lbs. ram, falling twenty feet, when first driven, and have afterwards gone down three feet from a ram of 1,000 lbs. ”