16 Sir Frederick Abel [Jan. 31, 



charge. But altlioiigli the attainment of high velocities with com- 

 paratively small charges of the material, unaccompanied by any indi- 

 cations of injury to the gun, was frequent, it became evident that the 

 fulfilment of the conditions essential to safety to the arm were 

 exceedingly difficult to attain with certainty ; they aj)peared indeed to 

 be altogether beyond absolute control, even in so small a gun as the 

 twelve-pounder. Military authorities not being, in those days, alive 

 to the advantages which might accrue from the employment of an 

 entirely smokeless explosive in artillery, the lecturer received no 

 encouragement to persevere with experiments in this direction, and 

 the same was the case with respect to the possible use of a smokeless 

 explosive in military small arms, with which, however, far more pro- 

 mising results had at that time been obtained at Woolwich. 



Abel's system of preparing gun-cotton was no sooner elaborated 

 than its application to the production of smokeless cartridges for 

 sporting purposes was achieved with considerable success by Messrs. 

 Prentice of Stowmarket. The first gun-cotton cartridge, which found 

 considerable favour with sportsmen, consisted of a roll of felt-like 

 paper composed of gun-cotton and ordinary cotton, and produced from 

 a mixture of the pulped materials. Afterwards a cylindrical pellet of 

 slightly compressed gun-cotton pulp was used, the rapidity of exj)losion 

 of which was retarded, while it was at the same time protected from 

 absorption of moisture, by impregnation with a small proportion of 

 india-rubber. Neither of these cartridges afi'orded promise of suffi- 

 cient uniformity of action to fulfil military requirements, but after a 

 series of experiments which the lecturer made with compressed gun- 

 cotton arranged in various ways, very promising results were attained, 

 especially with the Martini-Henry rifle and a charge of pellet-form, 

 the rapidity of explosion of which was regulated by simple means. 



A sporting powder which was nearly smokeless had, in the mean- 

 time, been produced by Colonel Schultze, of the Prussian Artillery, 

 from wood cut up into very small cube-like fragments, converted into 

 a mild form of nitro-cellulose after a jn-eliminary purifying treatment, 

 and impregnated with a small portion of an oxidising agent. Sub- 

 sequently the manufacture of the Schultze powder was considerably 

 modified ; it was converted into the granular form and rendered con- 

 siderably more uniform in character and less hygroscopic, and it then 

 bore considerable resemblance to the E.G. powder, a granulated nitro- 

 cotton powder, produced, in the first instance, at Stowmarket, and 

 consisting of a less highly nitrated cotton than gun-cotton (trinitro- 

 cellulose), incorporated in the pulped condition with a somewhat 

 considerable proportion of the nitrates of potassium and barium, and 

 converted into grains through the agency of a solvent and a binding 

 material. Both of these powders produced some smoke when fired, 

 though the amount was small in comparison with that from black 

 powder. They did not compete with the latter in regard to accuracy 

 of shooting, when used in arms of precision, but they are interesting 

 as being the forerunners of a variety of so-called smokeless powders, 



