Armstrong Guns 143 



pierced through 6 feet of solid oak at a distance of 400 yards, 

 and gone 200 yards on the other side. 



At the next meeting, the io7th, on Dec. i6th, he resumed 

 the subject of these Armstrong guns. They are breech- 

 loaders, the rifled barrel being of steel, which is bound round 

 with a spiral band of welded wrought iron, the weight being 

 somewhat greater than that of a brass gun of similar calibre. 

 He also described the shell, which is built up of segments, 

 united by lead and enclosed in an envelope of the same, to 

 secure its fitting closely to the rifling of the barrel. Guns 

 of three sizes have been made one, a six-pounder, throwing 

 a twelve-pound shot ; another a nine-pounder, throwing 

 an eighteen-pound shot, and the third a sixteen or eighteen- 

 pounder, throwing a thirty-two-pound shot. The first sent 

 a twelve-pound shot, which at 600 yards penetrated eighteen 

 inches into a brick wall, and then exploded, doing it great 

 injury. One hundred rounds, 98 of which passed through 

 a target 9-foot square, were fired from the same gun in as 

 many minutes, and after that it showed no signs of injury. 

 The eighteen-pounder threw a thirty-two-pound shot 9600 

 yards, with a deflection of 20 feet. Sir R. Murchison re- 

 marked that bringing into the Navy these guns, on the 

 breech-loading principle, would mean that only eight men 

 instead of thirteen would be required for working each of 

 them. 



1859. Mr. Horner called attention, at the io8th meeting 

 (Jan. 27th), to the remarkable contrast between the recent 

 winter temperatures in England and the United States. In 

 the one the weather had been very mild ; in the other, at 

 6 a.m., the thermometer had been down to 32 F. at Keene, 

 New Hampton, to 38 at White River Junction, and to 

 40 at St. Johnsbury. In Halifax it registered o at 

 8 a.m. ; in New York, 16| at 3 a.m., and in East Boston, 

 -18. 



In a conversation which followed, arising from an announce- 

 ment of the success of a subscription, initiated at a previous 

 meeting, in aid of an artist whose drawings of microscopic 

 objects had been very useful to workers in science, the 



