MECHANICS AND USEFUL ARTS. 115 



•will be the more apparent when we state that, a few weeks since. 

 Major Palliser's projectiles were tried against the " Bellerophon" 

 target, Avhich has six inches of iron, with twenty-two inches of 

 teak, and an inch iron inner skin. The results, however, were 

 precisely similar to those with the "Warrior" target, the shells 

 passing through quite as easily. The results, therefore, constitute 

 a victory for guns over armor-ijlates, and this long-pending ques- 

 tion may be considered for the present as definitively settled. For 

 the present we say, because, although the " Warrior's " strong sides 

 afford but little more jirotection against Major Pailiser's shells than 

 would those of a wooden ship, it is possible that we may in time 

 find some means of neutralizing the damaging effects of these pro- 

 jectiles. It always has been so; throughout the history of the 

 question, victory has always alternated between the guns and the 

 plates. But, unquestionalily, Major Palliser has gained such a 

 victory as will not easily be reversed, and has inaugurated such 

 a condition of things as will require a long time and a considerable 

 amount of scientific and engineering skill to render obsolete. — 

 Mechanics' Magazine. 



CHILLED SHOT AND THE SHOEBUEYNESS EXPERIMENTS. 



As the facts come to hand, it is apparent that the success of the 

 shots made by the nine-inch gun at Shoeburyness, on the 20th of 

 September, was due mainly to the character of the projectile, and 

 not to the gun nor the charge of powder. The Palliser shot and 

 shell are made of chilled iron, which has been pretty satisfactorily 

 proved to be superior in penetrating qualities to either wrought- 

 iron, ordinary cast-iron, or steel. Both steel and chilled shots were 

 used in these experiments, but while the hardened-steel shots 

 failed to penetrate through the target, and either broke in pieces, 

 or were compressed and bulged out of shape, every one of the 

 chilled-iron shots did effective service, never in one instance 

 changing in form. 



The target used was about forty feet long by eight feet high, 

 built of single thickness of rolled wrought-iron, eight inches 

 through, bolted by the Palliser screws to a backing of eighteen 

 inches of teak timber and an inner plate of three-quarters of an 

 inch iron. The whole was sustained by heavy timber backs. The 

 face of the target was not in one plane, but half of its length was 

 inclined at an angle of thirty degrees to the other half, the line of 

 fire being the same in both cases ; so that a shot against the in- 

 clined face would make, with the target, an angle of sixty degi-ees. 

 The gun was a nine-inch muzzle-loading rifle, Avith increasing 

 twist of thread, throwing shot of two hundred and fifty pounds 

 with charges of forty-three pounds of powder. The distance fired 

 was two hundred yards. 



The steel shot were cylinders having either pointed heads struck 

 on a circle the diameter of the shot, flat heads, or the Belgian or 

 ogee head. All of them were hardened in prussiate of potash and 

 oil, or water. Some of them were solid, others shells with the 

 head screwed into the body, or the base secured in the same man- 



