, 1885-08-13
2o.oao EeEr N SECOND


New York sun.
A little man with n dark mustRche,
whu stood in the sand out ut Sandy
Hook, diyed one hand into his coat sud
denly and flashed out n metal cartridge
two inches long. 1t was packed with
powder, and had a hole through the
center from end to end.
III you lit that, - he said, at would
liz away harmlessly, Just like a Fourth
of Judy Hover pot. Watch what ii
does when | let it OF in this gun barrel. -
4 common smooth bore, bree h. load
ing gun barrel that the man had bought
in town for - lay in the sand. 1t was
Just = feet long, and had a bore 5-16 of
an inch in diameter. In front Of ii,
resting right against the mu xle OF the
barrel, was "A little square, target. 1t
was made Of nine sheets of boiler iron
screwed together tightly. Each sheet
was o~ne-quurter of an inch in thickness.
The little man fitted the cartridge in the
hreeul, and right ahead of it laid n thin
rod O tempered steel. 1t was nine
inches long. and weighed nine and .
half onces.
here is nine tenths OF an ounce OF
powder in that cartridge, he said as he
got into n boom-proof on the sands
and here she goes.
He yanked a string that wa attached
to the gun hammer. There was an ex
plosion and then n thud. The little
man came out from the shelter Of the
bomb proof and picked up the
little target. He got a hammer and a
wedge and pried it apart. The steel
rod had been forced straight through
seven t~hicknesses of the boiler IRON
then it had been turned upward and
broken of. The broken piece WIS
wedged between the last two LOiler
plates. The topmost inch of it had
penetrated the fiber Of the iron perpen
dicularly. Tho little man gazed at the
ruin of tho target in admiration
That beats the record all hollow"
he cried, e%xultantly. THE best that
anybody has been able to do heretofore
with a cartridge OF that size is to drive
a steel pro octile through an inch OF
boiler iron. II would burst the gun to
put it to such a test with a cartridge OF
ordinary make.
He lodged behind the bomb. proof
again and tried it with an ordinary
coarse grain cartridge. There was a
tig explosion when no yanked the
string, and through the peep-holes OF
the bomb-proof the spectators saw the
gun barrel blown TO flinders. The little
man fished up another OF the new
tangled cartridges from hia pocket and
said
This thing was invented by the man
who invented the multichGrge gun. The
idea consists in tho character OF the
powder used, and in the loring of n
hole through the middle of il after It
has been packed in the cartridge. The
superiority of the cartridge over any
thing that has heretofore been gotten
up in the same line il the immense
power IL imparts TO the pro ectile. and
the great reduction of the strain usually
caused upon the gun by the force Of
the explosion necessary to fire a pro
lectile. These results are secured hy
arranging the powder so that the force
generated at the moment il is ignited
will be comparatively small, and will
increase continually until the whole
charge is consumed. This arrangement
starts the proiectile gently at first, and
then imparts to 1t a gradually increased
motion, and equalizes the strain upon
the walls of the gun.
To accomplish this, the powder, which
Is of very fine grade, is packed in the
shell in n solid mass, and then perfor-
ated with the central hole, so that when
II Is ignlted 10y a primer it will throw a
stream of fire downward through this
perioration. The stream of FIRE ignites
the powder along the internal walls OF
the perforation, and, as this p%erforation
is comparatively small, the volume of
gases generated at first is correspond
ingly small; but as the combustion pro.
ceeds the fire surface continually in
creases until the entire mass of the pow
der is consumed. BY properly proper
tioning the size and shape of the powder
cake relatively to the pro ectile to le
used, and to the length of tho barrel
through viii h it Is to he driven, the
force exerted upon the pro iectile by the
powder may be regulated practically at
will, and 50 as to do the most elective
work in any given case
Can this principle he applied to can.
non as well as small armsf' was asked.
Certainly, tho little man replied.
"All that is necessary is to pierce the
solidly packet powder longitudinally
with n number Of holes instead of one,
and then make CORE ponding holes in
the head Of the shell, and arrange the
head so that the holes can communi-
cate with each other This can be Sc
cured by the Introduction into the DOW
der cake perforations of a number of
tubes pro Getting rearwardly from the
cartridge head, so that they will rest
against the breech-l lock of the cannon.
and leave a space between the lock and
the cartridge head. Tho construction
insures the instantaneous and sim
%ultaneons ignition Of the powder
perforations at their cad. It is
essential that the powder cake be
hard and dense, so that the fire can not
penetrate into it, but will burn only on
its surfaces-that is, as distinguished
from cakes made of granular powder.
which, though solid in form. are gran
ular in structure. and burn in all direc-
tons through their mass. This method
VIII maintain tho maximum pressure
Uniform all the way to the muz lie, and
overcome the inertia of the proiectilc,
instead of applying a ma imum pressure
suddenly before the inertia of the heavy
pro ectile is overcome. and suffering a
reduction of velocity thereby.
I'VE haven't tested the cartridge in n
cannon yet, the little man said, ''but
with small. arms we have propelled n
projectile 90. 0S0 feet per second, and
that beats the record for speed, rs the
perforation of the boiler iron plate beats
the record in overcoming resistance"
Cooking on tho Stage.
New Orleans Times Democrat