Oh, the dear uncle! He must have lived a very secluded or very absorbed life, for he was pathetically ignorant of all that concerns motor-cars. His was the sort of ignorance savants have with regard to sciences in which they are not specialists. My physiologist was not strong on the subject of mechanics. He hardly suspected the principle of this docile, supple, silent and speedy engine of locomotion which roused his enthusiasm.
At the edge of the forest:
“Let us stop here, please,” said he. “You must explain this machine to me. This is where I usually end my walks. I am an old eccentric. You shall go on by yourself afterwards, if you like.”
I began my demonstration, and I perceived that the hooter, only slightly damaged, could be repaired in a turn of the hand. Two screws and a piece of wire restored its deafening power. Lerne, at the sound of it, beamed with ingenuous delight. I went on with my lecture, and as I talked, my uncle listened to me with increasing attention.
In truth the thing deserved attentive interest. During the preceding three years, if motor engines had but little changed in the essentials of their structure and in that of their principal organs, fittings on the other hand had progressed, and the materials employed were employed more judiciously. Thus, in the construction of my car, whose only woodwork was the racing-seats, no wood had been employed. My 80 horse-power affair formed a little luxurious and neatly furnished workshop all of cast iron and steel, of copper and aluminum. The great invention of the day had been applied to it—I mean that it did not rest on four pneumatic tires, but on spring-wheels which were wonderfully elastic. Nowadays that seems quite a matter of course; but a year ago my iron fellies caused much surprise.
But the most remarkable thing about my 234 XY, when you come to think of it, was, I think, that improvement which engineers obtained so slowly that one did not see it growing day by day—I mean its automatism.
The first horseless machine was encumbered with levers, pedals, handles and wheels necessary for its guidance, and with taps and grease-valves to turn, which were indispensable for the functioning of the engine. Now, each generation of motor-cars has dispensed with these more and more completely. One by one, almost all those handles have disappeared which require the incessant intervention of man. In our days, by means of its organs which have become automatic, the mechanism controls the mechanism. A chauffeur is no more than a pilot; once going, his machine keeps up its own energy; once awake, it will only fall asleep again at the word of command. In short, as Lerne bade me note, the modern motor-car enjoys properties that a spinal cord might confer; it enjoys instinct and reflex actions. Spontaneous movements take place in it along with the voluntary movements caused by the intelligence of the driver, who becomes as it were the brain of the vehicle. It is from this intelligence that the orders for definite actions go, transmitted by the metallic nerves to the steel muscles.
“Moreover,” said my uncle, “the resemblance between this machine and the body of a vertebrate animal is striking.”
Here Lerne was entering his own domain. I lent an attentive ear, and he went on:
“We have here the nervous and muscular systems represented by the striker-rods, the driving-gear and the cranks. And the châssis, Nicolas, what is it but the skeleton into which the tenants insert themselves like tendons? Blood, the vital element, circulates in those copper arteries in the form of petrol. The carburetor breathes; it’s a lung; instead of combining air with blood, it mixes it with the vapor of the petrol, that’s all! This hood resembles a thorax in which life beats rhythmically—our joints move in the synovia as those swivel-joints in oil. Under the shelter of the resisting skin of the case is the tank, a stomach that grows hungry and is replenished. Here, phosphorescent like those of cats, but as yet void of sight, are eyes, its lamps; its voice is the hooter; and—but I need not go into further details. In a word, Nicolas, the only thing wanting to your car is brain, which you sometimes supply; having that it would become a great deaf beast, blind, insensitive and sterile, without the sense of taste or of smell.”