But Inza stood her ground as bravely as Merriwell himself.
Then, before more could be said, the big cannon boomed forth its volume of deafening sound, making the very walls shake.

Danny tumbled backward, then picked himself up and felt over his person very carefully.
"Am I all here ?" he anxiously queried.
All watched the direction in which the huge shot had been fired, but it fell miles away.

Merriwell and a few others, provided with strong glasses, saw it drop into the sea.

The captain was talking again.
"The instruments record an initial velocity of one thousand feet per second, with a pressure of twenty-four thousand pounds." "I've been under greater pressure than that," Danny chirped.
"When you were shot ?" Bink asked.

"All guns, big and little, are under pressure when they are shot." "I'll put your throat under pressure when we get away from here!" Bink threatened.
"This is a twelve-inch rifle, loaded with one hundred and thirty pounds of powder and a projectile of the same weight as the first." The party had moved to a new point, and Captain Heath was again talking.
Other guns were fired, after the discharge of this one; the last shot being sent from a twelve-inch rifle with a charge of four hundred and seventy-five pounds of Dupont brown prismatic powder and a projectile weighing one thousand pounds.
The roar, the jar, and the vibration were like that of a miniature earthquake.