1868. | ats Claims as a New Industrial Agent. 157 
at Aspinwall. The nitro-glycerine taken by that vessel from 
Liverpool was placed in the very bottom of the hold, owing to its 
being shipped as a liquid. There is not room here to discuss all 
the pros and cons of that catastrophe ; but one or two facts may 
be mentioned, as they have great scientific and practical interest, 
and some of them, although brought out at the Liverpool trial last 
summer and made public, have been misinterpreted. It is known 
that, besides the seventy-two 28lb. cases of nitro-glycerine, there 
were some 20,000 percussion caps and other combustible substances 
on board. It is also known that there were three explosions, the 
first being very loud and occurring about twenty minutes before 
the second, which was not nearly so loud, and the third and last 
occurring after the vessel had taken fire and had been for some 
time out at sea, where she had been towed by another steamer, and 
where she continued to burn, and eventually went down. ‘The 
nitro-glycerine confined in the hold of a large iron steamer in such 
a warm climate would necessarily be in a somewhat sensitive state. 
The spontaneous combustion theory set up at the Liverpool trial, 
and supported by Professors Abel and Roscoe, is not necessary to 
account for the results. The first explosion was certainly due 
to nitro-glycerine, a case of which was being hoisted up by a 
steam-crane, and with such rapidity that when near the deck it 
struck against a beam and immediately exploded, when it was 
observed that two iron plates were blown off the top of the vessel 
on the port side and near the stern. There seems to be no room 
for doubting that the last explosion was also caused by nitro- 
elycerine, when the loudness of that explosion—it was louder than 
the second—is borne in mind, as also the intense heat of the burn- 
ing ship, the position occupied by the remaining seventy-one cases 
of the liquid, the “striking down” character of an explosion of 
nitro-glycerine, and the fact that the said explosion caused the 
ship to go down. That it did not seem so loud as the first 
explosion is accounted for by the circumstance that the ship was 
not then lying at the wharf, but was some distance out at sea, and 
by the fact, also, that the nitro-glycerine was at the very bottom of 
the hold, at least ten or fifteen feet below the surface of the water. 
Had we space at command it would be profitable to discuss the 
facts and suppositions connected with the Newcastle explosion, as 
that occurrence is invested with a great amount of interest. The 
evidence at the coroner’s inquest—as at the Liverpool trial—brought 
forth the usual theory of spontaneous decomposition, supported by 
the stock arguments. As we happen to know something of the 
history of the Newcastle nitro-glycerine, we may oppose a few facts 
to the fiction which the Newcastle Coroner was compelled to listen to. 
To do so may possibly disabuse the minds of some persons of the 
prejudices acquired by the untoward event of December last. The 
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