THE COSMIC COMPUTER

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"Couldn't they all have been fitted with Dillingham hyperdrive engines
and used in the evacuation?"

"Possible. But the average interplanetary ship isn't very big; five
hundred to seven-fifty feet in diameter. One of those things couldn't
carry more than a couple of hundred[Pg 102] people, after you put in all
the supplies and the hydroponic tanks and carniculture vats and so on
for a four- to six-month voyage. I can't see the economy of altering
anything that small for interstellar work. Why, the smallest of these
tramp freighters that come in here will run about fifteen hundred feet."

They didn't just disintegrate when peace broke out, that was for sure.
And there certainly weren't any of them left on Poictesme. He puzzled
over it briefly, then shoved it aside. He had more important things to
think about.

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