If they make an opening in the disk they can arrive at the centre of it. But then the rod of matter which they put in will prevent the disk from revolving.
[Illustration: Diagram VIII.—The nearest approach to a wheel.]
The nearest approach to a wheel with a fixed centre which they can attain is shown in Diagram VIII., a portion of a circular disk which oscillates about the smooth end of a rod built into the substance of the cut-away disk.
Their carts are shown in the accompanying figure. They are simply rods placed on rollers: as the rod is pulled along, the rollers turn, and the rod slides along—just as a boat does on the rollers whereby sailors help themselves in hauling it up the beach. As soon as these rollers roll from under the rod, as it goes on in its forward motion, they have to be secured, and then lifted over the cart and put down in front. Thus there are to each cart a set of little disks or rollers, and, as the cart goes on, these rollers have to be lifted over the cart from the back to the front.
There is no means by which this can be made a continuous action. Each roller has to be waited for, lifted separately, and carried over separately. And to put it down in front, the rope by which the cart is dragged along has to be unfastened and fastened up again.
Looking at the Diagram IX. it will be seen that there is a hollow in the body of the cart. On the part A B the driver sits. In the hollow from B to C is put the load. The load cannot then slip out over the ends of the cart. There is nothing in the cart to prevent it from falling out sideways.
But the contents, as the whole body of the cart, are kept to the smooth surface of the bubble, and are thus supported by it on the side remote from the reader’s eye, and also are kept from rising away from this surface by the force of attraction exerted by the film.
Thus the surface of the bubble and its attractive force supply the other two sides of the cart.
But of these two sides, the beings are ignorant, and it seems to them perfectly natural that loads of any kind, even of fluids, should be kept securely in a cart with two ends.
[Illustration: Diagram X.—How a rope is fixed to a cart.]
The method by which the rope is fastened to the cart is this: C is the body of the cart; R is the rope ending in a wooden step B; A is an oblong piece of wood. When the rope has to be taken out, A is lifted out by its handle, B is slipped back and taken out of the recess in C, and then the rope is free from the cart. And in a similar way it is secured again.
