Year: 1878

Abcu.tl r y-twoycars ago Schonbein
a German chemist, la | occasion to i'm
merse cotton II mixture of concen-
trated nitric and sulphuric acids. To
his surprise he noticed that the cotton
did not dissolve. Taking it and washing
off the acid he placed it in drying oven
to dry. On returning the next morn
ing no cotton was to be seen. As the
students in his laboratory affirmed that
they had not meddled with it, he Won
dered much as to what had become of it.


He tried the experiment again, and this
time had the good fortune to witness
the disappearance of the cotton. He
had discovered gun cotton. This is a
very curious substance, although it does
not differ in appearance from ordinary
cotton. 1t is, however, trifle heavier


Strange to say, the manner in which
fire is applied 10 this, causes it to burn
very differently. Touch it with a live
coal or lighted cigar, and it burns away
very slowly, much like the mixtures
used to produce the colored fires of
Fourth of July nights; apply flame to
it, and 1t explodes like gunpOwder, but
if you fire it by means of Illuminating
cap it eXplodes with terrific violence.
and rapidity six or seven times great
er. But there is another substance
which explodes even more terribly
still. 1t is nitro-glycerine. This is
produced somewhat similarly to gun
cotton, with the exception that glycer-
inc is used instead of cotton, these sub
stances being very much alike in chem
zeal composition. Nitro-glycerine is a
dense, oily, liquid, which has a very
safe and harmless appearance, but in
reality it is something terrible. A
small quantity placed upon huge boul-
der and fired, will blow it into thous-
and pieces, whereas, with gunpowder
the result would have been merely
flash, and great puff of wind and
smoke. You wonder perhaps, how it
is that nitro-glycerine merely placed
upon stone and exploded, can possibly
break it, as you think that the air will
give way so much sooner than the stone,
Let us consider two or three things
which will make it easier TO understand


You know very well that il is hard work
to run with kite a yard square in your
hand with the face of the kite against
the wind. Now suppose yOujump upon
a locomotive, running forty miles an
hour. You would find it utterly impos-
sible to hold the kite as you did before.
and even if you could, paper kite
would not stand the pressure. In I'M
agination increase your velocity to that
of a cannon ball, or twelve miles
minute. Your kite, though made of
the strongest cloth, would then give
way like so much wet paper. The truth
is, the air is very unyielding substance
indeed to bodies moving with high
velocity. Now the rapidly with which
the gas formed by the combustion of
nitro-glycerine expands is a hundred
times that of a cannon ball, and the
atmosphere offers more resistance to a
body moving at that rate than the stone
beneath it. NitrO-glycerine in some Of
its forms is the agent almost universally
in blasting. Without it many
of the great railway tunnels and other
feats of engineering would have been
The compounds of nitro
plycerine are many Miyed with tripoli |
or rottenstone it becomes dynamite, or
''die-in-a-minute," as some wag has !
termed it; this adulterated |
with nitrate of soda or potash is known
as giant powder. When nitro-glycerine
is mixed with gunpowder, in a very !
finely divided state, it is called rend- |
rock powder; with saw-dust, qualin. !
These are, however, all adnlterations. |
and weaken the power of the explosive.