[ I07 ] 



giving him a more liberal price for his powder, or (what would 

 be of greater national advantage) that the board of ordnance 

 fhould take the management of this manufadure (as far as is 

 requifite for the fupply of the army and navy) into their own 

 hands : Whilft it is furniflhed by contradt, and the procefs of 

 manufacturing fubjeded to no controul on the part of govern- 

 ment, its quality can never be depended on. Towards the clofe 

 of lafl war the manufii£lurer was paid thirty fliillings, cxclufivC; 

 of eighty pounds of falt-petre, per barrel of powder, containing 

 one hundred net pounds; which, confidering the enormous 

 price of nitre at that period, made the full coft to the nation 

 about five pounds. Extravagant as this may appear, when w? 

 combine the high wages of workmen, the danger of explofion in 

 the mills, the riik of rejection in the proof, and, above all, the 

 irregular dilatory mode of payment in ufe with the ordnance 

 board, candour muft oblige us to allow that the merchant's profit 

 was moderate indeed. I have been informed by feveral of thofe 

 gentlemen, that they certainly could encreafe the ftrength and 

 durability of their powder by milling it fome hours longer, but 

 that the price given would not indemnify them for the additional 

 labour. It is furely unpardonable to negledt, and an ill-judged 

 oeconomy to be parfimonious in an article whofe quality may 

 determine the event of a conteft, decifive of our exiftence as an 

 independent people! If to this ferious confideration wc add the; 

 expence of re-manufaduring powder, which, defedive in its ori- 

 ginal conftrutlion for want of fufficient working, is returned and 

 condemned foon after being iffued (to the entire lofs of the 

 charcoal and fulphur) with the fums paid for ftore-houfes, work- 



P 2 men, 



