New Orleans daily crescent., 1854-12-25

From the Montreal Gazette.
The Lancaster Gun-How it Differs from the Or
dinary Gun-Its Merits and Defects
Among our extracts from English papers in a
recent issue, our readers may have observed o
paragraph upon the subject Of this new arm,
and as a public writer has shown so much igno-
rance while protesting to instruct others, it has
occurred to us that brief description Of this
powerful instrument of death and the principle
of its construction would be acceptable to many.
The writer in question commences by saying
g The object of boring the Lancaster gun into
an elipsis is to prevent the ball taking rotary
notion and thereupon he raises the question
whether the ellitpical ball, in passing through
an elliptieal bore, being prevented from taking
rotary motion, has not dangerous tendency
to burst the gun. So far from his premises
being correct, the very reverse is the true state
of the case The elliptical bore is intended to
give the ball a rotary motion, for in this mo-
ton Of the ball upon its own axis consists the
superiority of this gun over the ordinary can
non It is well known fact that it is impossi-
BILE to cast balls or bullets in such way that
one side will not be heavier than the other, and
it is also well. known that this circumstance
defects the projectile from its right line.
With small arms the difficulty is overcome by
the groove in the rifle barrel, which, being
spiral, acts upon the soft substance Of the leaden
ing the muzzle Of the rifle, which continues until
the ball is stopped. By this means the heavy
side is alternately turned in all directions, 50
that any tendency in one direction is immedi-
ately counterbalanced by revolution of the
bullet, which changes the position of the heavy
side, and the result is that the ball hies in
direct line. Now, however well this plan may
answer for small arms and leaden balls, the.
groove is impracticable for cannon and cast-iron
IN n
some means Of making rifed cannon.
The Lancaster gun processes to have accom-
plished this by means Of an elliptical bore, out
Of which is to be thrown an elliptical proiectile
either shot or she'll Without plates we may
not be able to make all our readers understand
our explanations, but we hope most of them will
do so. The gun is large, because it is at q long
range that its great precision of aim tells best
over the common gun, and its appearance is
that Of an ordinary large cannon, except that
the month, instead Of being circular, is elong-
ated like an egg, having one axis longer than
another. Wewin suppose that the mouth is the
largest up and down--that is, that the longer
axis vertical, that the fattened ball fitting it
would stand on its edge but the bore winds
gradually from the mouth to the breech Of the
gun, SO that when the ball is driven home to the
proper position when the gun is loaded, it will
have turned i around, and will lie horizontally;
that lsa at Taghb tnetlonger axis OF the
mouth of the gun, and on It's side When the
gun is fired, the ball must make one revolution
for every four lengths of the gun, and thereby
any imperfection in its shape
which would otherwise defect it. Several OF
these guns have burst. This is perhaps attrib-
utable to the fact that they are used at very
long ranges, and we're probably overloaded,
although it is quite possible, and the fact proba
BILE, that forcing the ball to take rotary mo-
ton would increase the resistance offered 50
much as to increase the risk of bursting. Ex-
perience Will soon test the question. We may
remark that the same principle has been applied
to small arms, and q decided advantage is
claimed for the Lancaster over the common rifle,