DETONATING SYSTEM. 65 



" A detonater that does not light at the side, how- 

 ever, is, he thinks, quite" (I should now, by further 

 experience, rather say " almost") " equal in power to 

 the flint ; but one that does, he should be induced, at 

 a rough calculation, to consider one fifth inferior ; 

 consequently he prefers the guns with breechings 

 made expressly for caps, to those fired with tubes, or 

 any other primers, at a side touch-hole ; and if this 

 plan was adopted, perhaps the flint might be alto- 

 gether dispensed with even in duck-guns ; besides, 

 this invention is more simple, more water-proof, and 

 admits of the gravitating stops. A detonating gun, 

 to be sufficiently independent of the muriatic acid 

 which is produced by the ^composition, or detonation 

 of the fulminating powder, should have no springs, 

 or wovcable bodies outside the loch-plate, that are 

 dependent on cleanliness ; and, in short, a detonating 

 gun can never be so near perfection as when it has no 

 springs whatever, except the main spring and scear 

 spring, which, on the principle last mentioned, being 

 well protected inside of the lock-plate, and free from 

 the smoke that is apt to be driven, even there, by all 

 side communications, no part of the machinery is 

 here dependent in its action on being kept clean from 

 the foulness arid rust which is always occasioned by 

 the oxygen gas. 



" The superiority of the foregoing plan may, per- 

 haps, in a great measure, be accounted for thus : 

 every gun that fires at the side, positively must have 

 some of its advantage iti shooting sacrificed to a 



