The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-10-20

vast supplies, asked Bob if we had any other
arsenal.
This is truly the only one, . said he, ''for the
Portsmouth Arsenal Is but an insignificant affair,
and, would you believe vt? though the country
is now SO busily engaged certifying all the dock
lards, this most Important place is left all but
deienseless;i there is nothing whatever to PIE.
vent the enemy coming up the river Thames
with their small steel-plate1 steamers and hrne
WoolWich, and then we should be ina pretty
mess. There would not be time to move one
fltieth of the stores now accumulated here, and
all the valuable machinery and workshops would
iall prey to the flames. There are certainly
forti6catons at Sheerness, but the ships need
not go near them; the Thames is wide enough
TO let small steamers pass on the other side, and
the batteries at Gravesend and Tilblmy are not
Woolwich.n
We found in one of these stores very curious
gun ID the shape OF fish; IL had formerly be-
longed to the late King of Delhi was captured
when the place fell during the Indian mutlny,
and afterwards placed in the Arsenal by the late
Lord Canning. II certainly seemed more orna.
mental than useful
Close by were wooden mules with little guns
strapped upon their backs, angry looking var
mints they are light and handy little things
though, and capable of much mischief
Other mules were provided with ambulances
for carrying the sick and wounded consisting of
a kind OF pannier on each side.0f the ANIMAL or
else mere stretchers, which doubled up and
formed sort OF armchair. Bob told me these
were not so much used IN the Crimea as wagons
with trays, upon which the poor fellows we're
laid, and pulled in and out like drawers; they
were more comfortable for the worst cases than
those on the backs OF animals, which, from the
perpetual joltlng, shake the sufferer most pain.
fully.
Other dummy mules were carving miniature
forges, other boxes of horse shoes; in fact every
thing that would be required Tor mountain
warfare.
On leaving these immense stores, we wended
our way once more along the river wall, and on
reaching the end, my guide remarked that we
were approaching the cemetery, in which were
deposited the remains of those who had been
destroyed by accident.
Wondering why the poor fellows had not been
decently inferred in the churchyard, | inquired
whether the ground was consecrated? He
laughed most heartily, ooh, dear, no! it's the
guns I'm talking about" Sure enough, they
were all LAID out In regular rows, their broken
limbs reverently placed together; and it was
curious to notice how they had nearly all burst
in the same way. One piece of the gun flies for.
ward another backwards, and the sides sepa-
rate lateTallY. Some OF these accidents had
been fatal to the ,gunners empoyed but, as the
Armstrong gun does not burst, but only opens
out at the Jennings, it is hoped these calamities
will cease. Many of these old guns, however,
had been burst on purpose for experiment.
Close upon the cemetery l saw six huge
breech-loading guns; the great round breech
was made to slide back, and then, the charge
being inserted, ii was closed up again. "These
are Yankee swindles," said Bob, 'lor in the time
oil the Crimean war, cute Yankee came over
with a small model of breech-loadng gun
which was to do wonders; our Government.
anxious to get hold OF any thing that would floor
Sebastopol, bought the patent, and ordered six
guns from the inventor. They were to throw a
shot ten inches in diameter, and the Yankee was
TO have so much per pound weight for them;
but the specification was not carefully enough
worded; our people expected them TO weigh
about three tons, so you may fancy their aston
ishment when these monsters arrived at Wool
wich, weighing some seventeen tons each. OF
course they could not be moved, much less
used, and there they are just as they left the
snip i wonder our people did not try to resell
them to the Yankees when their little war broke
out.n
We continued our route and arrived at the
gun-6eld. Thirty thousand smooth-bores were
lying IN long rows upon rail way iron; consider
ing how many of them must no " be useless, 1t
is no wonder that many of the bases of the
lamp-posts in Woolwich are nothing but old
guns.
Workmen were putting new touch-holes into
some, and examining the inside of others. to see
whether they were fit tor use In a corner
rested some ancient relics of the deep old iron
guns which had been fshed up some time back
from the briny. They belonged, when new, to
the Mary Rose, lost in the days of the eighth
Harry. They seemed mere pigmies to the giants
by which they were surrounded; and the
thought struck me that even these very mon
sters, at some future day, might be mere play
things as compared TO later inventions.
My attention was now directed to range of
workshops, in which such clatter of banging
and humping was going on, accompanied
by clouds OF smoke and steam, tnat
did not like to venture in. These were
the headquarters of the great Armstrong
whose name, not long ago known scarcely be-
yond Newcastle, has now become o household
word 10 many nations. Bob surprised me by
saying that SO great was the secret of this inven-
ton when 1t was first brought out that even
the gallant artillery general who then COM
manded at Woolwich was not allowed to wit
ness the process OF manufacture. He and his
staff we're one day actually seen waiting outside
this very workshop, while some foreign princes
who happened TO be provided with a special
order from our Government were admitted, and
had everything explained to them. But the
whole thing is well known to everybody now.
1t Is supposed that other nations do not manu-
iacture them either because they think they
have better gun of their own, or that tney
have not the machinery or mechanics 10 make
them.
Outside the factory, men were busy unloading
wagons filled with bars of tough looking IRON
about twelve feet long and'tWo inches broad:
inside, these bars were joined together by weld
ing, then placed in an oven till red hot, and
afterwards drawn out and wound like n rome
round an iron drum, thus forming a coil of
metal. little further, we saw this coil in its
second stage; It had been again heated in fur
mace, and the Nasmyth hammer was now forcing
the non into one mass, till 1t became a cylinder
Of unbroken metal; two of these cylinders were
then hammered together, and so on It'll the
rough gun was complete.
/ must not, however, omit to mention one of
the centre coils, to which were attached the
arms or trunnions which support the gun upon
its carriage. The hammering of this mass was
conducted in another foundry; and when we ar.
rived it had already been well beaten, and was
Just about to issue once more from lis furnace for
anotherI Welding. long iron bar as n handle.
was fastened to it /; and on opening the
furnace door, there it lay so white with
heat we could scarcely look at il. Twenty
men now seized the bar, crane was