The Portland daily press., 1898-06-30

likely to be of great value during opera
tions in Cuba. His idea is that Il squad
of sappers shall take number Of 'jovite'
cartridges and rush forward with them,
making holes IN the ground with their
bayonets and planting cartridges in them.
single man can fire whole line of
these cartridges and run back in time to
get out of danger. OF course a series of
explosions ensues, and the result is the
excavation Of a deep ditch which serves
admirably as q line of ridepits. In this
manner rif1epits can be excayated at a
moments notice, instead of requiring the
exposure of considerable number of
men during period of digging We
have tried this process on Analostan Is
land with remarkable success.
What is called sap in warfare is an
irregular ditch-made irregular SO that
the workers in it may not be swept down
by an entlading fire. Within the last
few days the War Department has pur-
chased large number of armed shields,
forward toward the enemy. From what
you know of the way in which high ex-
plosives like dynamite acts i'll excavating
| the earth beneath the place where it ex-
plodes, you will realize how a very suit
able trench might be dug in this manner
ofhand. But, for the reasons l have
mentioned, 'jovite' is very superior
be no nervousness in the use of it,. I'm
less something better yet shall be dis
covered, it will certainly take the place of
dynamite for Use in the pneumatic gun
of the Vesuyious.
"There is every reason, indeed, for be-
lieving that 'jovite' will be used instead
of guncotton for loading torpedoes, SO
that those engines of destruction may be
enpl Eyed without danger to those who
manipulate them. The load proper OF q
fish torpedo is of wet guncotton for
detonetor. 1 think that the value OF q
perfectly safe high explosive in warfare
can hardly be over-estimated You I'M
derstand, suppose the difference between
q low explosive like gunpowder and
high explosive like nitro gelntine, which
is ton times as powerful as gunpoWder.
Each grain of gunpowder holds all the
clements necessary to explosion, but in
high explosive all these elements are con-
tanned in each molecule.
You can easily sse, thou, why the
power of the high explosive is SO much
greater. In gunpowder the fire is COM
N unicatod mechanically from grain to
grain, but in .'jovite,' for example. the
whole mass is suddenly resolved into gas
o lie of tire great teachers of the science
of chemistry has said that, ii a drop OF
Water were magnified to the size of the
eal tn, the molecules in it would be found
to lie not bigger than cricket balls and
not smaller than peas.
My belief is that before long we shall
devise explosives very much more power
full than the strongest now known.
Sometime ago I proposed to the navy
department to undertake some expert
ments with view to utilizing the energy
stored up in liquid hydrogen and oxygen.
1t would simply be necessary to mix the
oxygen and hydrogen in liquid condi-
ton, and to set fire to the mixture by
means of a detonator CT igniter. The
resulting explosion would be tremendous.
A familiar performance of the laboratory
is the mixture OF q small quantity of n.y.
drogen and oxygen gases in the proper
tions in which they exist in water, caus-
ing tn .ln to combine thereupon by flash
ing spark through the receptacle con-
tainlng them. The result is the creation
of a single drop of water, accompanied by
a violent explosion.
formed, it would give you some small no.
ton of the energy latent in these gases.
For the instruction Of students in chem
istry, am accustomed to perform it by
filing an ordinary soap bubble with the
oxygen and hydrogen. Simple ignition
| then causes the Hubble to explode with
| force that nearly blows the windows out.
l am rather inclined to think that great
er results coulG bs obtained by mixing
| acetylene with oxygen. At all events,
the pursuit Of this line of research is like
| ly with in the next few years to produce
a new series of high explosives which
| will have power vastly beyond anything
now known.
"For the benefit of my class of sc.en-
lists on Analostan Island, 1 made RATS
of 'jovite' and blew them up. We cut
timbers into pieces by laying cartridges
upon them and covering the cartridges
with turf. This is what is called de
molition experiment. and we practise
various other such methods for destroy
ing bridges railroads and aqueducts
Some of the practice thus gained is likely
to be of use in Cuba before long ,,