A NEW GUNPOWDER.

Southland Times, Issue 636, 25 February 1867, Page 3

A NEW GUNPOWDER.

Every day some new discovery is being made in the instruments and appliances of war, and the last invention promises certainly not to be one of the least important. A Swiss inventor has discovered an explosive compound which we believe j has been offered for. experiment to on? War Office authorities. It consists of a powder, the ingredients of which are as yet unknown, as they are the secret of the inventor. This powder is intended to be used only as a bursting charge for shells or for explosive rifle bullets; in fact, it can be used as a charge for every ] species of projectile, and its force is so great that a bullet charged with it and fired from the ordinary Enfield rifle suffiices to blow up the caisson of an artillery waggon. What its effect would be when forming the charge of the hollow projectiles of the heavier species of ordnance is as yet unknown, as it has not hitherto been experimented upon on a large scale, but judging from that produced by the very small quantity of the powder contained in a hollow missile fired from the ordinary rifle, it must prove a terrible engine of" destruction. Although possessing such formidable explosive powers, the composition is, in its ordinary condition, one of the safest known, as it only explodes whjen the hollow projectile charged with it strikes some object when fired from a rifle or a piece of ordnance ; even the shell does not burst till it has penetrated the substance against which it strike's.- A bullet charged with this substance can be flung about and struck without any explosion resuming from the roughest treatment; upon being thrown into a fire the bullet will be fused, and no explosion ensues. Upon the powder being placed upon a sheet ; of paper and a Jight applied to it, it burns slowly and without noise, nearly in the same manner as would a similar

quantity of common sulphur. The mode of using it is extremely simple, as it is simply poured into the shell till it is well filled with it, and the orifice throughwhich it was introduced is then stopped' up in the manner that seems most convenient — in the case of a rifle bullet, for instance, with a piece of wax. No fuse is required to determine the ignition of the shell. One of its most important qualities, however, is, that by adding to or diminishing one of the ingredients, the explosion of the shell, after striking, may be retarded or accelerated, so that in' firing, we shall say, at a an iron-plated ship of war, it may be so arranged as to explode either between decks, after having penetrated the side, or in the side of the vessel itself, and the breach made by such a formidable mine would, most probably, utterly destroy or sink the vessel. . It is to be hoped that such an extraordinary discovery will be duly inquired into, and there is little doubt that if it is, from experiments that have already taken place abroad, this new power of destruction will be an important addition to our land, and above all to our marine artillery.