Andersen is not usually identified as a writer of Science Fiction - not yet recognized as a genre in his time - but in fact some of his work could be categorized as such. For example, in Andersen's ""The Wicked Prince"" (1840) [http://hca.gilead.org.il/wicked_p.html], the story's world-conqueror of boundless ambition and cruelty orders "a magnificent ship to be constructed, with which he could sail through the air." The Prince, sitting at the center of this flying ship, "had only to touch a spring in order to make thousands of bullets fly out in all directions from the ship's gun barrels, while the guns were at once loaded again" - a rapid-fire weapon predating the invention of the Machine Gun. Later, the Prince develops an improved model, able to also fire "Steel Thunderbolts," and orders many thousands of them built to make a massive air flotilla manned by his troops - a prediction of the Air Forces that would become a reality in the coming century.