James Bond's Infernal Machine

[Henry]

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infernal_machine , 
Infernal machine may refer to:
Any explosive device (French: machine infernale) designed with harmful or
destructive intent, such as: 
Naval mine 
Plot of the Rue Saint-Nicaise against Napoleon Bonaparte 
<snip>
Machine of Lum the Mad, a.k.a. Infernal Machine - a major artifact in
Dungeons & Dragons, possessed by Lum the Mad 
<snip>
A 1934 play "The Infernal Machine" by Jean Cocteau 
The De Lorean time machine, from Back to the Future was referred to as an
infernal machine by Doc Brown.

More Infernal Machine Refs:

>From Iron: An Illustrated Weekly Journal for Iron and Steel Manufacturers,
1837 
http://tinyurl.com/2sn9bz 
Filtering Machines and Infernal Mac/lines.-A Frenchman, of the name of
Alleume, has lately got into a pretty scrape by the ignorance of the Belgian
police upon scientific matters. It appears that he invented a machine for
filtering and clarifying water, which he took with him from Paris to
Brussels for the purpose of procuring a patent. The police, however,
mistaking his filtering, for an infernal machine, he was arrested and thrown
into prison, as a conspirator either against the French or Belgian kinff.
After a confinement of two months, he was acquitted, but interdicted from
France, and ordered on board a vessel for England, where he arrived without
money or friends. The Lord Mayor, to whom his case was made known, a few
days ago, recommended him to represent his case to King Leopold, now in
England.

>From Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson's 1903 "The
Dynamiter"
http://www.fullbooks.com/The-Dynamiter3.html 
Somerset retired to bed but not to sleep. What, he asked himself,
had been the contents of the black portmanteau? Stolen goods? the
carcase of one murdered? or--and at the thought he sat upright in
bed--an infernal machine? He took a solemn vow that he would set
these doubts at rest; and with the next morning, installed himself
beside the dining-room window, vigilant with eye; and ear, to await
and profit by the earliest opportunity.
(The above quote makes me think of "Barton Fink" [hm])

and 
http://www.fullbooks.com/The-Dynamiter4.html 
'Is it,' he asked hoarsely, 'an infernal machine?'

Her lips formed the word 'Yes,' which her voice refused to utter.

A-and Neal Stephenson (coincidence?) features a series of computing machines
and infernal machines (explosive) in his Baroque Cycle trilogy.

HENRY MUSIKAR
Information, Media, and Technology Consultant

http://www.urdomain.us/scuffling.htm