230 Ckj/iical Balls. 



institution have so long, so sedulously, and so huidably been eU"? 

 deavouring to effect, will be attended with the completest success. 

 It is unnecessary to enter into a detail of the advantages to society, 

 commerce, and the arts, which have uniformly been derived in 

 other places from establishments of this kind ; they are too fa- 

 miliar to every well-informed mind to need any comment or ob- 

 servation. Justice, however, requires it should be known, that 

 the patrons of this institution have formed their plans upon the 

 broadest basis of enlightened liberality. Besides the cultivation 

 and diffusion of the nobler sciences, and the prosecution of what- 

 ever is likely to be of real benefit qr utility to the community and 

 the rising generation, they intend to make this institution a focus, 

 in which to collect and concentrate, not onlv the scattered ravs 

 of the genius and ability of Bristol, but also of all true lovers of 

 scientific pursuits ; to confine their patronage to no particular 

 branch or branches of the sciences, but to extend and afford the 

 utmost encouragement for the development of talent in every de- 

 partment of useful knowledge and literature. 



XXXV. Inlelligence aiid Miscellaneous Articles, 



CONICAL BALLS. 



To Mr. Tilloch. 



A Woolwich, March 7, IS20. 



T p. 147 and 148 of your last Number, are some use- 

 ful remarks on conical balls, to which may be added the follow- 

 ing correct observations, viz. That about the year 1780, Dr. 

 Pollock, then Professor of Fortification at the Roval Military Aca- 

 demy at this place, invented and proposed to the Board of Ord- 

 nance a new kind of cannon shot called pear-shot, being very 

 thick at one end and small at the other, like some kinds of pears, 

 and which might as well have been called conical shot, as they 

 were very nearly in the shape of a cone. These shot, he asserted, 

 would always proceed in their flight with the heavy end foremost, 

 By order of the Boar<l of Ordnance, experiments with these shots 

 were performed at Landguard Fort for several weeks ; when the 

 only result was, tiiat they ranged further than the globular or 

 round shot, with the same gun, and equal charges of powder ; 

 which was owing to the circumstance of the former being heavier 

 than the latter, and so better overcoming the resistance of the 

 air: a property not then knoun, or not well understood. It did 

 not then appear whether they flew with the heavy end foremost: 

 but soon after they were finther tried in Woolwich Warren, by 

 discharging them against large screens of thin deal boards placed 

 at several diiitaiicca behind each other; when it was found that 



thq 



