CHAPTER IV 



AMMUNITION : POWDER, CAPS AND CARTRIDGE-CASES, 

 WADDING, SHOT 



G UN-construction as now practised is a totally 

 different craft from the gun-making of sixty or 

 seventy years ago, the time that fine old sportsman, 

 Colonel Peter Hawker, was writing about guns, and the 

 equally famous Joe Manton was building them. Between 

 the flint-lock and percussion-cap guns of that period and 

 the single-triggered, double hammerless, automatically- 

 cocking and cartridge-ejecting breechloader of to-day 

 there exists dissimilarity as great as betwixt the old 

 Rocket and the modern compound locomotive. As with 

 the arm, so with the ammunition. Fifty years ago the 

 gun-maker had alone the thoroughly-tried black powder 

 to deal with ; now, at the commencement of this twentieth 

 century, he is surrounded by a crowd of propellant 

 explosives, each one of the group being a law unto 

 itself, differing from the rest in nature and appearance 

 as well as in method of use. Still, in all probability, 

 the evolution of the modern nitro-compound is far from 

 complete ; startling changes must yet be looked for. 



Numerous questions are now involved in the loading 

 of cartridges with the various powders ; complexities 

 in the matters of ignition, suitability of cartridge-case 



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