318 REPORT ON NITRIFICATION. 



termined on, and some adequate system of operations should be at 

 least sketched out, even if not brought into present practice. To do 

 this will not be the work of a day, nor, perhaps, of a year; it will 

 require thought and labor, as well as enterprise, and it should not be 

 left to a time of hurry and emergency. 



I respectfully submit the above paper, hoping that it may be of 

 some assistance towards the desired object. In it I have sought rather 

 to give a statement of the different questions to be considered than 

 to enter into lengthy discussions of them. If a fuller detail should 

 be desired on any particular branch of the subject, I shall be happy 

 to do whatever lies in my power towards furnishing it, but I am 

 strongly inclined to think that reliable conclusions on those points 

 that I have left untouched or unsettled can hardly be attained by any 

 other means than those of original investigation. 



Note by the Author. — A great obstacle to the cheap artificial pro- 

 duction of nitrate of potash is the high price of the potash which 

 must be used in its manufacture. 



The nitrates of soda, of lime, and of magnesia, which can be more 

 cheaply obtained than ordinary nitre, have not heretofore been used 

 in the manufacture of gunpowder, for the reason that they have a 

 strong tendency to absorb water, and to render damp the powder 

 into whose composition they enter. 



Of late years, however, water-proof cartridges of various kinds 

 have been brought into use, and it would be perfectly feasible to 

 employ in these gunpowder made from the more deliquescent nitrates. 



Solid blocks of gunpowder with a water-proof coating of collodion 

 are said to have been tried with good results in both cannon and 

 small arms; and if this, or any equivalent contrivance, should be in- 

 troduced into our military service, it would, by facilitating the use of 

 the cheaper nitrates, open a way through which we might render 

 ourselves less dependent upon foreign countries for a very essential 

 material of war. 



One of the various things which it may be recommended to the 

 government to do is, to have made and tried gunpowder, manufactured 

 from the nitrate of soda, and put up in water-proof cartridges, or in 

 collodion-covered blocks. 



