i6 
LAND & WATER 
April 27, 1916 
A Book on Zeppelins 
Reviewed by F. W. Lanchester 
MK. R. P. Hcarne's Zcppdins and Super -Zeppelins 
(John Lane. 2s. bd. net.) may be said to be a book 
with a purpose. Its purpose is to advocate 
the big airship, to advocate, in fact, that this 
countr\- should embark on a programme of the building of 
big airships. The book, being of a popular character, the big 
airship is termed a super-Zeppelin, which from the context 
apj)ears to mean something that for size and power is greater 
than the Zeppelin, and presumably, if the Zeppelin gets 
bigger, faster, and more powerful, the super-Zeppelin is to get 
bigger, faster, and more powerful also. 
'liiere is no particular reason given why great Britain 
should have a jwtential monopoly in super-Zeppelins, or why 
our technical skill should enable us to fulfil Mr. Hearne's 
reejuirements. For example, he says " A super-Zeppelin may 
be defined as a rigid airship which is better, faster, and more 
reliable than the Zeppelin. The vital essential is speed. 
Our rujjer-ships must be from ten to thirty miles an hour 
faster than the best (icrman ship. At the same time it is 
desirable that our ships should be smaller, lighter, and stronger 
than the Zeppelins." This all sounds very fine, but it does 
not get us any forwarder. The Germans may just as easily 
postulate a supcr-sqiiared-ZeppeUn, which is to be from ten 
to thirty miles an hour faster than our best super -ship, and 
all the rest of the specification. This kind of talk is like unto 
slaying the enemy with printers' ink. No one is any the 
l>etter or worse ; we slay each other on paper, and, like the 
characters is Bombastes Furioso, we are ready to die again to- 
morrow. 
But I believe in the plea that it is time to initiate a pro- 
granune of big airships. There is no doubt the Navy wants 
airships, and what the Navy wants it must have. We must 
not 'leceivc ourselves however. An airship fleet is required 
—not an odd ship or two— the programme is one which will 
run into millions sterling. We don't mind spending millions 
nowadays on anything" which is necessary from a national 
standpoint. Since the War all Parties are agreed, and the 
parish-pump Radical, the great majority of the Labour 
Party, the Irish Party and the Unionist Party are all in the 
same boat pulling more or less in the same direction. We 
are going to have big airships, Mr. Hearne advocates a pro- 
gramme of big airships. In this respect it may be said that his 
book preaches the right doctrine. 
Interlarded with Politics 
When this has been said it is very difficult to find anything 
further to praise in the volume, cither as to views expressed 
in the matter or in the arrangement. Thus the whole book, 
from introduction to the last chapter is interlarded with the 
politics of the subject ; gibes at the want of foresight of the 
Government, of the stupidity of experts, and even at the 
stupidity of the constructors of German Zeppelins. Moreover 
it is full of assumptions which are by no means proven, in- 
accuracies in description, and general mis-statements of the 
position which cannot be condoned. Mr. Hearne conjures up 
people he calls " anti-airship experts," and describes them 
in many places as foolish and prejudiced people who would 
not listen to common sense. His accusations and statements 
are inconsistent amongst themselves, and are not in accord- 
ance with facts. Beyond this I think that even the advocates 
of the large airship will say, when they read this book — " Save 
me from my friend," for again and again we find the matter 
being urged as wanted for " future Wars," or to the " next 
War. ' It is fervently to be hoped that we are not going to 
wait till then. 
Also, instead of confining himself to the possibilities which 
are well within sight, Mr. Hearne talks glibly of great sea- 
going aircraft capable of travelling at 100 miles per hour. 
Doubtless this will come in time, but such speeds are not 
quite vet within sight. 
As illustrating the above criticisms it is clearly stated in 
more than one place in the book that an air fleet such as 
proposed, would constitute a definite assurance that "never 
again will enemy airships bombard London." How the super- 
Zeppelin fleet is to effect this guarantee is not made clear. 
There is unconscious humour in much of the writing with 
which Mr. Hearne presents us. For example, when he paints 
the Zeppelin as being of small use, because it is crude and 
badly designed, and because it has been stupidly employed, 
one cannot suppress a smiie. Or again, referring to Count 
Zeppelin, he says : " In strictly adhering to that design in the 
Ui;lit of later "knowledge Z''i)pclin has shown stupid con- 
servatism," atid there arc many other passages to the same 
effect. When we turn the page to see what Mr. Hearne's 
ideas on the subject arc, we find (page 44) that he advocates 
a central tube along the entire length of the airship. In other 
words a stiffening member along the neutral axis (neutral 
whether in bending or torsion). This one suggestion is a 
quite sufficient commentary on Mr. Hearne's qualifications 
to criticise the Zeppelin as it exists. He repeats this sug- 
gestion in another form later in the book. 
From a literary standpoint this work cannot be con- 
sidered altogether an acquisition to one's library. The sloppv 
colloquialism of prefacing adjectives without adequate reason 
by the word " simple " (simply marvellous " page 54) is always 
irritating, but the gem of the collection, if one may so express 
it, is to be found in the following passage — " The stock argu- 
ment against the Zeppelin is that it is a fair-weather' instru- 
ment, and no use in War. But the succession of raids on 
England in 1915 prove the Zeppelin to be a most wonderful 
vessel." As a piece of inconscquentiality, this reminds one 
of the admonition to the prisoner in the dock bv the village 
J. P., " You have hard working and industrious parents, you 
have been blessed with good health, you have been given a 
good education, instead of which you go about stealing ducks." 
Some Novels of the Day 
Readers of Mr. Phillips Oppenheim's stories— and their 
name is legion — will find in The Vanished Messenger (Methuen 
and Co., 6s.) a mystery of the international politics order, 
with an entirely new kind of villain, an extremely up-to-date 
hero, and a very attractive heroine. Mr. John P. Dunstcr. 
the messenger, brought over from America disijatches on 
which the peace of Europe depended ; the villain. Miles 
t'entolin, intercepted the dispatches, and the hero — well, 
the whole story is told in Mr. Oppenheim's best manner, 
and though it seems rather strange to read of the preserva- 
tion of peace now that war has actually come about, the 
plot is so well worked out that one is lured to belief in it. 
We commend the book to all iii search of thrills and an 
adequate seasoning of sentiment and romance. 
Josiah Chapel, the hero of Chapel, by Miles Lewis (Heinc- 
mann, 6s.) began life as a failure, and stuck to that profession 
up to the time of his wife's death, after which he began to take 
a grip on things. Mr. Lewis, evidently a Welshman himself, 
has worked out his Welsh hero's ultimate success in a series 
of strongly drawn sketches ; though the book is one con- 
tinuous story, it is made up of detached and separate studies 
of Josiah, his son Griff, Bess Hughes — whom Griff married— 
and certain other figures in the plot. The method suits the 
type of work, forceful stuff, extremely material in outlook, 
with a note of reality and very little sentiment about it. In 
the best sense of the phrase, this is a very clever book, intro- 
ducing an entirely new and attractive type of Welshman. 
The Stranger's Wedding by W. L. George (T. Fisher 
Unwin, 6s.) concerns a certain Huncote, fresh down from 
Oxford, who went in for settlement work in north London, 
where he met, fell in love with, and married a washer- 
woman's daughter— rather a superior washerwoman's 
daughter, possessed of aspirates and beauty, but still of 
an entirely different class from Huncote. The story is that 
of their meeting, marriage, and attempts to fit in their lives 
to each other. Huncote was moderately tactful, and Sue, 
his wife, tried her best to live up to her new status. 
There, in essence, is the storv, but not the book. l-'or 
the author has brought to his work such artistry as Wells, 
brings to his studies of the lower middle class, and has brought 
too, a species of ei)igrammatic wit. a I.atinity of brilliance, 
that one misses in Wells. There is, perhaps, a trace too much 
millinery in the book, a shade too much intimacy with things 
innately feminine, but both Huncote and Sue are' masterpieces 
of creation, characters that will live long in the minds of those 
who learn them from these pages. 
Mr. George proves himself a master of delicate shades of 
emotion, and m this, undoubtcdlv the best work he has done 
so far, he gives us a book that should rank very high among 
the novels of the year. For the book is not only brilliantly 
clever, in the best sense of that plirase, but is also a work of 
. unusual depth and power. 
