The Nashville daily union. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1862-1866, 1865-11-11
A New Explosive Materal----The
ChemisfrY Of the Universe.

Ths accident at the Wyoming Hotel on
SUNDAY viii probably prove 70 be the start
ding announcement Of the advent OF new
explosive material We have heard so
mucb during the war of tofpedoes ard other
internal machines, that the community
came naturally 20 he conclusion, on the
first secount, that the mysterious box 60
long neg ected in the hotel contained only
one more OF the des'ructivs devices Of cur
enemies. But the statement Of Leers that
the box contained specimens Of chemical
oils, brought here with a view 70 make
money, and with no evil purpose, Is in all
| likelihood true. Lee brought the box
| from Hamburg, which place he left in June.
| Some few months before that chemist Of
1 Hamburg, M Alfred Nobel, announced the
discovery Of new blasting OIL, which be
claimed would suPersede gunpowder fof az
ordinary explosive purposes. hobel's com
) pound produces, On explosion, I've times
the volume OF gas produced by an equal
weight Of gunpowder, and, as its inventor
! claims, has thirteen times the power IA As
a chemical compound Of thirty seven parts
Of nitric acid with one Of glyeerine. MS
| nitro-glyeerine is q yellowish, oily fluid IN
| appearance. Ii is not soluble il water nor
| ex plnsiye by FIRE. Il detoaates under GER
( lain eiTcum stances. The sccident IL Green
| wieh street answers in all respects 70 81 ex-
} plosion of this material, especially IN aus
terrific power. 1t IS evident that the explo-
sive msieriL was q fluid there wss some
evolution Of gas Just before the expioSloh'
| giving out an odor that was mistaken for
j that Of hvdroehlorie scid, and when the box
was let faIl on the street, there was q SUN
cient bloE no doubt to explode decorating
compound. Before the. box was carried out,
| flames issued from ii, and Nobels nitro
| glycerine will burn without exploding.
! Nobel's compound, though without the
| immense force of chloride OF nitrogen, has
| been found to possess great power in mining
i operations. Had General Grant at the time
the mine was run under the rebel works at
/ Petersburg placed in IT weight OF this ma
| terial equal To the weight OF gunpowder
| placed there the explosion would have sim
ulated an earthquake. he would haFe
| shaken down every fort that stood between
the two armies and every house in Peters
burg, and would haze made himself felt
| throughout the territory then held by the
| enemy. II IS difficult to say Whist might
| have become OF the two armies. TINS
chemical discovery is one more Of the Sc
crets Of nature secured by science; and It IS
! still safe 10 say that we are only on the
threshold Of discovery IN this direction:
GunpoWder, nitre-glyeerine and chloride OF
nitrogen stand perhaps as only A Z IN
4
which the great operations Of nature have
been wrought. BY their aid we may dimly
/ guess at the powers whose explosion piled
/ up such ranges Of granite as the Rocky
| Mountains, the Andes end the Alps; at the
lesser powers that have torn open the noun
tains through which great rivers, as the
| Hudson, h0w to The sea; that have 'dusted
down the domes" of cities like Lisbon, and
thai require such vast vent holes and safety
| valves as Yesuyius and Elna. BY consider
ing the Garth as one grand chemical lab
! orstOry, with forces OF unknown and un-
/ imagined power operating within it accord
| ing 10 fixed laws, we can gain a better con-
! ception than in any other way Of the opera
| tioas of nature that have most astonished
the world, that they have been most re-
| garded as impenetrable mysteries, aud that
! have been most used by superstition to dark
| en- the human mind.
From purely chemical standpoint, also,
we can gain our only possible comprehen
sion OF the oldest Of traditions-the greatest
| puzzle Of philosophers Of every age-the
story of chaos, when the earth was with
out form aud void" Chemistry shows us
how, by the laws Of nature, the same body
/ may exist IN a solid, fluid or a gaseous
form how from a solid it may be rari6ed to
gas, and how again it may from an expan-
sion that sounds almost fabulous be con-
densed and restored to its solid form. The
application Of this law Of condensation on a
grand scale TO matter expanded through
! space in a gaseous form might result in the
formation of planets-ths chemical contact
OF ne various gases ia the evolution Of heat
and heat in motion. SO out OF proportion
are the gaseous and solid forms Of a given
body that our own earth might perhaps be
60 rarifed as 10 fiji the whole of the space in
our system. Science, while thus looking
upon the visible universe as the result of
fixed lave, yet sees that the power which
made and fixed those laws is still ineom-
| prehensible; though it teaches US TO regard
that power with infinitely higher thought
than Is possible to any blind faith. We can
best understand the history Of the Universe
and Of the Earth by regarding the succession
OF events asso many grand chemical changes,
BY looking at them in the light Of a GER
tanned laws Of science and hence tue axiom
Of the faith Of modern philosophy, 'gMan.
the servant and Interpreter Of Nature, I'm
derstsnds and performs 50 much as he hR
gathered by observation or experience, MOI
does his knowledge or his power extend
further-Neag York Herald.
The Treasury Department will call in al
-